What does it mean to be a local translator?

Can translators ever really be local?

By our nature, translators straddle worlds – at its core, our job is to help people (individually or as organisations/groups) to communicate across barriers. These barriers are linguistic, of course, but also cultural and geographical. We always have one foot in each world, and even when translating into our language(s) of habitual use*, we are drawing not just on linguistic comprehension but also on a deep understanding of the cultural preferences that went into the source text. Whilst we are usually physically present in only one of the location, our lives are constantly permeated by the other.

So can a translator ever really be local?

*We used to call these ‘native languages’ or ‘mother tongues’, but this newer term reflects the complex realities of the way humans acquire and use language.

Does it matter?

Perhaps it doesn’t matter to some. Indeed, perhaps there are translators who prefer to think of themselves as global, as not bound to any one location or culture – who conceive of their own identity as just as nomadic as their business. Or maybe the areas they work in aren’t compatible with emphasising the ‘local’ in their business model. And that’s fine, I make no criticism of my colleagues in those situations.

But as I spend more and more time within spaces and communities that are committed to sustainable agriculture and industry, to growing food and producing things in a way that does not compromise the future stability of our ecosystems, I find myself trying to be more ‘local’ in all areas of my life. That means buying as much of my food as I can locally, and choosing to support independent businesses whenever I can over large (inter)national chains. It’s one of those things that feels quite challenging and frustrating to begin with but that becomes its own sort of fun, once you get into it. Of course, I’ve probably only made about a 20% difference in my actual habits, but it’s a 20% I’m proud of.

To operate locally, and to be ‘a local’ is, I think, something to be proud of. And I would like it to be a source of pride within my translation business as well. That brings us back to my original question:

Can a translator ever really be local?

Geographically? Probably not. There are, of course, some circumstances where you have multiple layers of language and culture sharing the same physical space, which can give rise to a need for mediation. Similarly, on the official boundaries between countries or regions, there are areas where people from the two different ‘sides’ interweave and have one foot in each culture despite being in the same location. To quote Terry Pratchett, “This sort of thing is something that governments really hate, which is a very good thing.” In these sorts of circumstances (and a few others), having a translator nearby can be very useful. This is not the norm, however – most of the time a translator will be physically distant from at least one of the two cultures they are bridging.

So in a very literal sense, no, translators cannot be truly ‘local’.

Can we expand the definition of ‘local’ a bit then?

The thing is, translators don’t generally operate at the literal level. And if we probe a little, we might find that going local is not just about physical distance. There is a whole attitude and philosophy bound up in the notion of ‘localism’, some parts of which could feasibly be applied to translation.

We should start, I suppose, with the fact that there is an entire branch of the translation industry called ‘localisation’. This term sprung up to emphasise the fact that translation is about far more than just words (‘transcreation’ is another). What ‘localisers’ do is not just take the source words and translate them into another language – they adapt the content (the message, the format, everything really) to make it work in the target market*. This obviously requires a sophisticated, in-depth understanding of that local market.

‘Local’ has quite a broad meaning here – it could mean an entire nation, a region, or even a particular community within a region. And localisation doesn’t necessarily have to mean flattening out every cultural characteristic of the source material. There are different levels and approaches, depending on what you are trying to achieve. If your company is trying to expand into a new international market and your product is fairly ‘universal’ (i.e. not particularly characteristic of or unique to your culture), then it may well be more effective to explain the product in terms your target market already understand. Conversely, if your target market is tourists visiting your town, then there may well be significant value in retaining more of the local ‘spirit’ in the product and the marketing around it. In translation theory, this is sometimes referred to as the degree of ‘foreignisation’ (though this is somewhat removed from the original meaning of the term). The point is that in the hands of a skilled translator, the level to which the source culture is allowed to ‘intrude’ into the target text is something to be carefully calibrated to achieve a particular effect.

And this requires a deep understanding of the people you are talking to, and what they think about and need. If you run a local business, this probably sounds familiar to you. One of the great advantages of being a local business firmly embedded in the community that you serve is that you really understand them and what they are looking for, and have the flexibility to adapt accordingly.

*I use the term ‘market’ here because localisation is primarily a commercial activity, but other, non-commercial messaging (e.g. a health awareness campaign) can also undergo be localised to ensure it is as impactful as possible.

Why do people prioritise buying locally?

At this point, you might be thinking “Fair enough, but big companies have to adapt to their target market as well, and they have much bigger budgets to do it.” And you would be right to think that – theoretically large companies should have swallowed up the entire market by now. And yet, according to the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB), 60% of the UK population was employed in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in 2024, accounting for 52% of the UK’s total turnover. Clearly there is something about local businesses that is incredibly resilient. So why do customers continue to buy locally?

Environmental concerns

Alright, this is not necessarily applicable to every industry, but if we take the example of food production, local produce is often assumed to be less environmentally damaging because of the distance the food has to travel. There is a lot of nuance here in this debate. It has been shown that food transportation produces a significant amount of emissions, but others point out that what we eat (e.g. vegetables vs meat) is more impactful that how far we move it. But in general, it does make an intuitive sense that if you can acquire the same food of the same quality at the same price, but one has come from the other side of the world, you would probably opt for the local one.

Does this apply to translation? Not really, at least not directly. Mostly translation is conducted digitally these days – I’m sure that a significant proportion of the texts I’ve translated over the last seven years have only ever existed on a screen. And I have yet to see any hard statistics around the environmental impact of doing translation digitally, as opposed to on-paper. There some things translators can do of course, like minimising their use of energy-guzzling technologies like AI, as I do.

But there is a related element here, which has to do with supply chains.

Shorter supply chains

It may seem like a secondary concern to the environmental impact, but I think people are generally becoming more and more mistrustful of opaque global supply chains. Not everyone, of course, and not all of the time – or even the majority of the time. But there is an assumption that the further something has travelled, the more hands it must have passed through, and therefore the longer the supply chain. At each one of these stages, there is a transfer not just of the goods in question, but also of the information around them. And inevitably, not all the details get passed on – some things are lost in translation, if you’ll forgive the pun.

In practical terms, that means that the further away the source of a particular foodstuff, the less traceable it is. That in turn means that it’s harder to work out where any error that may occur originated, and that obscurity undermines consumer confidence. Conversely, buying through a very short supply chain (even buying directly) comes with the certainty that you can always go back to the same person or company you bought from to rectify any issues.

This is definitely applicable within translation – at least, when you’re working with very small agencies or even individual translators like me. Often, the only people who will have any input into how your text is translated is myself and the reviser (if you’ve opted for revision). This is about as short as the supply chain can get. It means that when I provide you with a translation, I can tell you exactly how I went about doing it, including how I tailored my approach to the particular needs of your circumstances.

Supplier flexibility and consistency

This is true of most small businesses, of course. It’s often assumed that large companies are the ones that have the capacity to take on huge, complex tasks. But that scale and ability to handle volume can come with a certain level of process rigidness. This is understandable when working on the sorts of highly standardised documents that large companies tend to handle (e.g. medical safety documentation), but is it the right choice for your organisation or business?

Now, I’m not saying that an individual ‘local’ translator will reinvent the wheel every time you send them a new text to translate. If anything, it’s the opposite – the more you get to know your translator, the more they get to know you, and understand what you need from your translations. Because translation is an almost infinitely customisable process. Do you need to retain more of your own local feel in your marketing materials? I can do that – and over time, I will learn with you how to tailor the level of ‘foreignisation’ to suit your target audience. Conversely, if one day you need a greater deal of technical precision in a translation (e.g. because you’re applying for a grant), I can do that too.

That’s what you get when you work with any local business – customisation, particularly because the person you deal with to commission a job is usually the person actually doing the work. So you don’t have to worry about your expectations being miscommunicated along the way. And by dealing with the same person over and over again, they will come to understand you, and you won’t have to explain your requirements every time – it just becomes ‘the usual’.

Mutual importance

Another common assumption about local businesses is that they care about their local community in a way that big corporations don’t (despite the marketing). Part of that comes from being part of the community, of course, from being embedded in it and affected by its ups and downs. But another element is that local businesses are often dependent on their local community – they cannot exist without it. This creates an incentive to do whatever it takes to keep their local customers happy.

The same applies in my business as well. I don’t have a massive roster of clients. I also don’t have any ambitions to grow that roster beyond what I can reasonably manage myself. This is not to say that I’m not open to new clients – of course I am. But it does mean that I don’t have great growth ambitions. I don’t know where exactly my growth ceiling is yet, but I am sure it exists. And I think this is a position that is shared by many local businesses. The never-ending growth mindset that is a feature of large corporations is not the default for small businesses who prioritise serving their local customers over expansion.

More important is that everyone of my clients – and every one of their translations – matters to me. I think some people might be scared to admit that they are dependent on their clients, but I don’t think dependence is something to be feared. If anything, it’s something to be proud of – a way of making sure you that are always delivering work that meets their expectations, so that they keep coming back. I know that my clients have other options for where to source their translations, so it’s vital that I keep going above and beyond to prove the value that I add to their work.

Pride

And then, of course, there’s the question of pride. I take pride in my work, like any local businesses does, and part of that is taking pride in the people I work for. I hope that my clients know that I am proud to work for them because I believe in the work they are doing. And in turn, I hope that they take pride in working with a translator who is committed to doing their work to the highest possible standard – not just in terms of the quality of the work, but also in terms of the attitude they take to the way they do business. I hope there is a mutual respect there – that even though we work in very different areas, we are both operating from the same set of principles, and the same vision of how the world should be.

So what does it mean to me to be a local translator?

You might be thinking that what I’ve done here is conflate the word ‘local’ with the word ‘small’. And to an extent, you are right – I haven’t been able to find a unanimous definition of what a ‘local business’ is, but I imagine many would say a local business is probably small. But I would argue that that’s not necessarily true. A local business, like a farm, might employ dozens (or hundreds?) of people, but supply primarily to the local area. Conversely, a business can be small without being local – an IT security consultancy may only have a local physical presence but deliver its services all over the world. Is that still a local business?

My business would probably fall into that latter category. I operate from a very local base, but I provide services all over the world (and also work with translators all over the world). So am I really a ‘local’ business, as I would like to think? It comes down to definitions. If we understand ‘local’ in a broader sense than just ‘operating within a limited geographic range’, if we can instead define it as an attitude that prioritises the shortest possible supply chains, that values ongoing long-term relationships of mutual confidence built on flexibility and accountability and that sees the interdependence that comes with those as a source of pride, then yes, I am a local translator.