Inclusive language
Inclusive language is an accuracy standard.
How register, terminology, and cultural convention are handled in translations we deliver, and the firm's nondiscrimination policy.
The premise
Equal access is what the purchase is for.
Title VI treats failure to reach limited-English-proficient residents as national-origin discrimination. A rendering can be defensible word by word and still fail the reader it is addressed to.
Wrong regional variety, register pitched above the reader, a name for the reader’s own community the community does not use: we treat these as accuracy failures for review to catch. Health and human-services programs often work to the national CLAS standards, pairing language assistance with culturally appropriate service; the sections below are the written-translation share of that, stated concretely enough to be checked.
In the text
Six places inclusion is a translation decision.
Each comes up on ordinary public documents, and each has a wrong answer for the reader in front of it.
- Regional variety and script
- Spanish for a Mission District audience differs from the Spanish of a Madrid style guide, and Chinese is a choice of script before it is anything else. Variety and script are set for the readership at intake and the choice is recorded on the job.
- Reading level
- The reader's level governs, not the statute's. A notice is translated at the level of the person who has to act on it, and the drift that pushes a plain English source back toward legalese is one of the error classes review checks.
- Community-preferred terms
- Names for communities, identities, and conditions are rendered the way the communities in question currently use them in the target language, checked in that language rather than assumed from English. Where usage is moving or contested, we say so in writing and follow your decision.
- Gender in gendered languages
- English steps around gender easily; Spanish, Russian, and Arabic mark it in the grammar. Where your source is deliberately gender-neutral, we set out what the target language offers (paired forms, recasts that avoid marking, conventions your readers will recognize) and apply the option you choose consistently across the program.
- Sexual orientation and gender identity
- Public-health and family-services material (HIV care, PrEP outreach, services for LGBTQ residents) reaches readers who are deciding whether a program is safe to approach. Terms for orientation and identity are rendered in current, respectful usage in the target language, never in wording a reader would hear as diagnosis or slang. Chosen-name and pronoun fields on forms keep their distinctions through translation.
- Disability language
- Person-first and identity-first conventions differ by community, by language, and by style guide. Where your guide states a preference, it is applied. Where the target language's own convention differs from English practice, the difference is flagged with the delivery rather than settled silently.
Each of these ends as an entry in your program glossary: the option chosen, the alternatives set aside, and who decided. Later jobs are prepared against that record in every language you publish in. Your style guide wins by default, and an approved glossary is applied as written. Where you have no stated convention, we put the options in writing with a recommendation. The glossary is yours, in a portable format, at any time.
Policy
Our nondiscrimination policy.
Vendor files routinely need a nondiscrimination policy from the vendor. Here is ours, complete.
Civic Translation does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, citizenship or immigration status, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital or domestic-partner status, pregnancy, disability, medical condition, or veteran status. This governs how linguists are engaged, assigned, and paid; how the people we work with are treated; and how clients and members of the public are served.
The reviewer list is built on one axis: competence in the language pair and the register, demonstrated on a sample before any paid assignment. Nothing else enters the decision.
Where a contract requires a nondiscrimination affirmation on your jurisdiction’s own form (San Francisco’s contracting code includes one), we complete and sign it as part of normal vendor paperwork. If your file needs this policy as a signed statement on letterhead, ask, and you will have it same business day.
Related
- Quality standardsThe error classes review checks.
- Language access rulesThe frameworks behind the requirement.
- AccessibilityWeb access and what deliverables preserve.
- LanguagesScripts and varieties set per audience.
- Capability statementFor the vendor file.
- How agencies buy from usQuotes, purchase orders, records.
Name the audience with the file.
Send the document, the languages, and who the translation is for, and these questions are settled in writing before work starts. A quote comes back same business day.