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Hello, everyone
I wondered if you could help me respond to the query below from a student of an
STC member. Sounds like an interesting project, and a challenging
question for us. Thanks; please cc her on correspondence.
Lisa Moses
The Mallard Group
Marketing Communications
Tel: 416-226-9001
www.mallardgroup.com
------------------------------------
Email from Wendy Ford to Lisa Moses:
I am currently taking Professor St. Amant's TCO 635 Internationalization class
at Mercer University, and we are working on designing material for International
Countries. One of the requirements of the assignment is to select a country that
our company has the most contact. The company that I
work for has a Canadian facility in Montreal, Quebec. Interaction with
individuals at this site is on-going, and fairly smooth. The people that I have
come in contact with personally at this facility speak English and do so
fluently. I am aware that their are many individuals from Quebec that do not
speak English fluently, but are familiar with many English words, terms, and
signs. Other than language and a few cultural differences I have not had much
success in obtaining information on designing material for
Canadians.
I have struggled with finding differences in Canadian and US audiences
pertaining to material presentation and design. The information that I was able
to find on the Internet did not give me much more to work with.
The information that I would need from you pertains to differences in creating
documentation for Canadian verses US audiences. To simplify this request some,
what I mean is differences in word structure and meanings, and symbols and
signs.
If you could provide any information to me on the subject, it would be greatly
appreciated. I would like to thank you in advance for your time in reading this
e-mail and any assistance you may be able to provide.
-----------------------------------------
Lisa, You didn't include your student's e-mail, so I am copying to you instead.
My reply to your student is that personally I don't think there ARE any
differences in presentation/design -- just nuances in the language itself, which
by the way would include "differences in word structure and meanings" if not
"symbols and signs." For the differences in word structure and meaning, there
are many web sites containing information about the language differences.
FWIW!
--Suzanne
Hi Lisa and all of Internet vacuum land! ;-)
I live and work in Montreal. You have an interesting project, and I hope that I
can make a few helpful comments and observations.
I think, if you truly want to have a localized documentation product, and you
are not _too_ afraid of cost|management overhead|localization
nightmares, then you should work with professionals "on the ground."
That is, if you truly want a Quebecois French product or a Brazilian Portuguese
product, you better be prepared to invest the time and effort needed to find the
right resources.
What works in Paris (France[!]), does not necessarily cut it in Shawinigan.
Conversely, what works in London (U.K.[!]), does not necessarily mean that the
folks in Albuquerque will get your subtle messages.
Language is used by people to include and exclude. Therefore if you use a
language foreign to the audience (and French from France is quite "foreign"
to a native Quebecois speaker), then you will have a problem.
Now if you are talking Canadian English, well that's a whole other kettle o'
fish.
I think American companies can take good advantage of our professional, highly
educated and motivated technical writing, editing and translation
workforce. (It would be nice to paid in American $$$ too, but that's another
story!) ;-)
As far as differences go, well there are many, and subtle, differences (probably
mainly cultural icon things) that make Canadians and Americans close but
different. And I guess that is the purview of sociolinguists and ethnologists.
Good luck on the project, and I hope that helped.
James Alexander McCarney
As another Montreal, I concur with Suzanne's reply. In my
experience, the main difference in Canadian and American documentation is
linguistic ("labor" vs. "labour", etc.). Guidelines for colours, layouts, and
other presentational details are pretty much the same.
An unofficial but extensive spelling list (which differentiates between
Canadian, American, and British usage) can be found here:
http://www3.bc.sympatico.ca/linguisticsissues/
BritishCanadianAmerican.htm
Good luck!
Ann Howell
A number of people pointed out that the only differences between
English Canadian and U.S. documentation is language.
While I agree that there are not some of the localization issues
that Lisa was thinking of (colours, symbols, etc.), there are a few other
differences.
For example, in Canada we use metric measuments. Officially,
this is probably supposed to be in all cases, but in common use there are a
number of areas where imperial measurements are still the norm.
Also, if you are not writing about generic office/home software
there may be other issues for documentation and/or the software itself. If you
are writing for a regulated industry (e.g., healthcare, legal), there may be
differences in regulation and/or culture that would be reflected in the
documentation or software.
Even for more generic software, there may be fields in the
software where a different term would normally be used in Canada (e.g., Postal
Code instead of Zip Code). In those cases we may understand what you mean by
using the U.S. term, but it will also be obvious to users that this is a U.S.
product.
- Michele
I would respectfully disagree with Suzanne, but only in that
there are differences in expectations between English Canadian audiences and
French Canadian audiences. I absorbed those differences while living and working
in Quebec for 20 years, but now that I've been away for 10 years, these
subtleties escape me. However, there are a couple of Quebec-based writers who
participate on the techwr-l list, and Lisa, you might get some good feedback
from them. (I notice that one of them, Geoff Hart, is on this list,
as well.)
Rahel Bailie
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