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Posted by borneomom (U4770405) on Wednesday, 15th September 2010
I need help, or at least, some of my English students do.
I teach scientists working for an Important German Institute, who spend a good deal of their time writing proposals for European Community funding. They asked me yesterday to help find them more adjectives to make their projects seem more exciting.
Does anyone know if such proposals are read by native speakers? Are extra adjectives ( I have banned 'innovative') really welcome? If so, does anyone have any ideas, along the line of ground-breaking, cutting edge etc?
, in reply to message 1.
Posted by Dame_Celia_ Molestrangler (U14257909) on Wednesday, 15th September 2010
Well, what would they say in German?
Then use a site like LEO or Linguee to see how others have translated it.
Another possibility would be a good English thesaurus. Sometimes I use the online possibilities... I type in the word along with the word synonym (e.g. I type in: dynamic synonym or ground-breaking synonym) and get a page with suggestions. Or I use a good book thesaurus that an English teacher at school was going to chuck out.
Another possibility is using the thesaurus option of the Word programme if you have an English version of it.
, in reply to message 2.
Posted by Dame_Celia_ Molestrangler (U14257909) on Wednesday, 15th September 2010
For example, go into the first option there (I've just checked it out) - some very nice suggestions.
That's part of the problem, in German they are no better! These are people who just hate to have to write anything.
Thank you for your suggestions, they do all cling to LEO etc for dear life, but have been caught out thus using inappropriate collocations and then made to feel silly by colleagues/bosses etc.
, in reply to message 4.
Posted by Dame_Celia_ Molestrangler (U14257909) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
I used to have a student who started learning English at the age of 60. She was about 70 when I met her. Her English was extremely good. However, the only time she tried too hard was when she tried to put three adjectives together. If she had just stuck to two, she'd have been perfect, but the third one didn't always fit in with the context.
What I suggest they do is something I do to check whether certain words go together.
Write the words in Google (e.g. innovative method) but put inverted commas around the phrase you want (e.g. "innovative method"). By putting inverted commas around a set of words, you are looking to see if that precise combination (with the words in that precise order) comes up elsewhere. From the number of hits they get, they can see how popular the term is - if it gets any hits at all.
If they do get any hits but not very many, then check which country the website is in. Even just on the results page (the one that lists the hits) you can see the country code at the end of the website address. If the country code says 'de', then proceed with caution. It might just mean that another German has made the same mistake.
Wow, thank you, that is a brilliant idea. Will happily pass it on.
Have a good day.
, in reply to message 6.
Posted by Dame_Celia_ Molestrangler (U14257909) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
Glad to be of service.
, in reply to message 7.
Posted by Dunlurkin NL (U2675855) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
~~~~~ borneomum ~~~~~
Have you come across the Visual Thesaurus? You can have a few free tries each time. It might make them look at things differently.
Dunlurkin
Good afternoon DL!
I do know that site, but had not thought of suggesting it to them, will do so. Thank you
, in reply to message 9.
Posted by Celtic Tiger (U2229153) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
Writing EU funding proposals is a very specialised thing because they don't seem to be assessed in the way other funding proposals are. I have over the years written many successful funding proposal for non-EU funding but when I have been asked to do an EU one I have always done it in conjucntion with another consultant who specialises in EU proposals. Basically I would write down what the client wanted to do in the project and then my colleague would convert this into the sort of gibberish which seems to guarantee success with EU proposal scorers. This consultant had a very high rate of success in securing the funding.
I have also seen successful EU project proposals written by other people and they too were written in EU gibberish.
So I am not convinved that thinking of the sort of words one would put in a normal project proposal and then transalting them into English will be likley to result in success with the EU.
, in reply to message 10.
Posted by borneomom (U4770405) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
Yes, that is what I'm afraid of. They really don't have a very good acceptance rate and spend so much of their time writing the blinking things.
, in reply to message 11.
Posted by Celtic Tiger (U2229153) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
My recommendation would be for them to find someone who specialises in writing these sort of proposals and get him/her to do it for them. It really is the only way to get money out of the EU.
If you were in the UK I could suggest a couple of people with proven success rates but I am afraid neither of them speak German.
, in reply to message 12.
Posted by Dame_Celia_ Molestrangler (U14257909) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
Do you think, CTA, that you could ask them if they know of anyone in Germany who could do it for them? Often, freelancers meet other freelancers and build up a network of colleagues.
, in reply to message 12.
Posted by Dunlurkin NL (U2675855) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
CTA, would they actually need to speak German? If the engineers can do an initial draft in English, which they seem to be able to do, could your successful colleague work from that? There must be reference material available in English. It sounds as though these engineers would be able to read a text in English, and say whether they were happy with it or ask questions, but are not able to draft it themselves.
Dunlurkin
, in reply to message 14.
Posted by Celtic Tiger (U2229153) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
I'll try and contact my colleagues and see if they would be interested in this work. If they are, I will get back to you and exchange e-mails via Keri.
, in reply to message 15.
Posted by borneomom (U4770405) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
Just got in and saw your posts - thank you all very much. But there is no way this Famous Institute is going to employ anyone else to write these proposals... and we are talking of hundreds and hundreds of them every year!
, in reply to message 14.
Posted by borneomom (U4770405) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
Oh and I have to add, these are not engineers but really extremely superior scientists, and lots of what they do doesn't have reference material... it is so, well, innovative/ground-breaking/cutting edge!
Good night all and thank you for your help.
, in reply to message 17.
Posted by Celtic Tiger (U2229153) on Thursday, 16th September 2010
That's fine. I will not contact my colleagues.
, in reply to message 18.
Posted by Dunlurkin NL (U2675855) on Friday, 17th September 2010
What a shame the Famous Institute seems to be being a little short-sighted here and seemingly cutting off its nose to spite its face. It is a vicious circle: proposals are not good enough so no funding. No funding so no money to (help) write good proposals. Hmmmm.
Dunlurkin
, in reply to message 19.
Posted by Dame_Celia_ Molestrangler (U14257909) on Friday, 17th September 2010
Well.. do you need to 'employ' anyone (i.e. I assume you mean a full-time job or at least one where the tax and social welfare contributions are paid for by the employer) or could you ask them to write these proposals on a freelance basis - at least the most important ones? I would suggest that to them
CTA can then put you in touch with these people - they could then inform you how much it would cost .. if the scientists did some of the work themselves.
Every heard of Ricardo?
Read his theory of comparative advantage.
It might be better for the scientists to pay for someone else to do this work than waste their time - and their employer's money - on trying to do it myself.
For example, say I earn EUR 30 an hour as a freelancer. And I have three hours to work in but I also need to spend one of those hours cleaning my home.
It would make more sense for me to pay someone to clean my home for EUR 7 an hour than to do it myself as I could earn an extra EUR 23 just by spending EUR 7 to get someone else to do something that I have to do but wouldn't earn anything or so much for.
, in reply to message 20.
Posted by Dame_Celia_ Molestrangler (U14257909) on Friday, 17th September 2010
doh.. not "on trying to do it myself" but "on trying to do it themselves".
Yes, well, DL of course you are right. But.
They do send people on courses to find out how to get funding through EU proposals, and they are really successful in all sorts of other ways and so this type of project funding is probably not top of the wish list.
And my original questions were - does anyone know if native speakers read the proposals (i.e. how important are creative adjectives going to be anyway) and does have anyone have any adjective tips?
Let's be honest, I'm the freelance English teacher at this place and although I already poke my nose into places it shouldn't be, I am not going to start telling them they should change their procedures so completely, or give my participants the feeling that their efforts are pointless and hopeless.
It's very useful being the one people turn to for advice on English. You get to see all sorts of documents that you wouldn't otherwise.
, in reply to message 23.
Posted by laReine-Astrid (U10636638) on Friday, 17th September 2010
I'm just wondering if they need all these adjectives in any case.
I don't know a lot about German writing, but Frnech tends to demand a lot of adjectives that English simply doesn't need.
Basically, you use a noun, you need an adjective.
It all gets very overblown and unnecessary in English.
I've done quite a lot of revision of researchers' work, and a lot of what I did was shortening it and cutting words out.
, in reply to message 24.
Posted by borneomom (U4770405) on Saturday, 18th September 2010
Yes, that was exactly my original wonder. They are mostly people who have been academically successful all their lives, and that means they learned to give teachers what they wanted. (My daughter, native English speaker, had a whole list of outdated idioms which she knew would bring her extra points in her Abitur English exam.)
I have the feeling that they all remember that when writing these proposals and sit thinking hard of things like 'to put it in a nutshell'.
My feeling is that often, less is more.
, in reply to message 25.
Posted by laReine-Astrid (U10636638) on Saturday, 18th September 2010
Borneomom
Just gone back to your OP.
I wouldn't ban "innovative". It's certainly overused at the moment, but, thankfully perhaps for us all, a lot of research work truly is innovative.
I would encourage your students to use the word when it's really appropriate.
And then to stop worrying about the adjectives. English doesn't demand them.
Oh, and then, I'd encourage them to use people like me to improve their reports!
I'll do my best!
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