Translation Vs Transliteration: What is the Difference?

Aren’t you confused between the two? Well, you are not alone.

We can relate to this kind of confusion because we have received this same question multiple times from the people who look for our translation solutions.

But, today is the day, when we are here with the abundance of information to clarify this common doubt.

First of all, yes there is a huge difference between translation and transliteration even if they appear like the best suitable way to communicate something in a better way.

Walk through this interesting blog to understand the difference between the two.

Differences Between Translation Vs Transliteration

Here are the key differences between the translation and transliteration-

1- Definition

a)- Translation

It is the technique of converting sentences or words into the target language.

When it comes to precisely translate your documents, a human translator picks a word and translates it into a word with the same meaning in a different language.

For example, the Hind translation of the English phrase “These shoes are hers.” is “यह जूते उसके हैं।”

b)- Transliteration

It is a process of clearly writing a sentence or word in the script or even characters that individuals can simply know.

Transliteration includes transforming the script utilized to write words in a single language into the script of another.

For example, a Hindi word ‘দৃষ্টি’’ is pronounced as ‘Dr̥ṣṭi’. So, it’s transliteration into English is ‘Drishti’.

2- Uses

a)- Translation

Translated texts are useful to individuals who are unaware of the source language of the text.

The are various legal documents that need translation when they are required to be presented in many different languages.

Also, it’s crucial for the business deals of multinational companies. Even now e-Learning content makes the best use of translation so that individuals across the world can know it as well as learn from it.

b)- Transliteration

Usually, people choose to transliterate proper nouns such as recipes on restaurant menus, details on their business cards, a few categories of business brochures, etc.

Transliterated texts are likewise useful to individuals who know reading and speaking part of a language but can’t read that specific language.

Even the menu in a few restaurants also has transliterated texts for the individuals who can’t read a specific language, however, understand it when rightly pronounced.

3- Change of Characters

a)- Translation

The characters are totally changed at the time of the process.

For example, at the time of proper Chinese website translation, the complete script with Devnagri or Chinese characters changes to the Roman alphabet.

b)- Transliteration

The characters or letters are taken from a word, and they are transliterated to the equivalent characters in a different language. Such as, α → a, χ → ch, д → d, æ → ae or ն → n.

4- Change of Meaning

a)- Translation

When it comes to the translation, the meaning remains the same as that of the original text.

b)- Transliteration

When it comes to transliteration, the meaning of the transliterated version may or may not has a similar meaning as that of the original version.

5- Purpose

a)- Translation

To be impressive, a niche relevant foreign document translation takes the meaning out of the original text and carefully puts it into the target language so that the message’s intent remains intact.

b)- Transliteration

When there is a word that you want to keep unchanged, uninterpreted, or unexplained, but only placed into the characters of a different language, this is where transliteration is used.

Translation vs Transliteration: Which One is Highly Important?

One really cannot determine the dominance of transliteration and translation over one another.

Both of them play their specific roles in the accurate conversion of the source language to the target language.

On one side, language translation by proficient translation services in Ahmedabad allows organizations to remove the communication barrier as well as expand their business internationally which assists them in getting a foothold in the global market.

On the other side, transliteration helps several professionals to carefully identify a strange language and rightly spell words with proper pronunciation providing them with an edge over different non-native speakers.

Both of them hold equal weightage. A linguist should be well-versed in several transliterations i.e. Greek, Arabic, Cyrillic, Hebrew, etc.

This is important in order to sound like a native speaker and help businesses target their potential prospects easily regardless of the country they belong to.

Whatever be your choice, our translators are there to help you in every way possible. Connect with us today at +91-8527599523 or just request a free quote free quote.