Document localisation
Image: Edward Kimmel (cc)
Last month the New South Wales police got themselves into a spot of bother in their dealings with the US State Department. They had developed a detailed security plan for President Obama’s forthcoming (now postponed) visit to Australia and had named it ‘Operation Bluegum’.
Like all police operations it was named by a database matching program that randomly links up a selection of adjectives and nouns to produce a bland descriptor for the operation.
Unfortunately for them, ‘bluegum’ is a derogatory term for a ‘work-shy African-American’ in US slang. Ouch.
By all accounts it was an innocent slip, but it precipitated a major hush-up operation on both sides of the Pacific in which most (but obviously not all) of the fallout was contained.
What’s the lesson? Know your audience. Especially if a document is to have international exposure, it pays to carry out ‘document localisation’, in which the document is edited with specific sensitivity to another English-speaking market. This can involve identifying catastrophic missteps such as ‘bluegum’ but more commonly involves removing local idiosyncrasies that may be confusing or ambiguous to an overseas reader. In such instances, an ounce of prevention can be worth a pound of cure.
