Law - Literature - Environment    

Highlights

• Registered Australian business 

• Swiss-secure mail and VPN

• Speaker of Thai for 35+ years and Vietnamese for 30+years

• Passed 1 million translation words (TH 70% VI 30%) in 2017

• Passed 5+ years full-time translation in 2019 

• In-house publications editor on Southeast Asian topics in USA

• 3.5 years accredited PhD research in Thai Linguistics (discontinued)

• Experienced in SDL Studio 2019, Wordfast, and Memsource

My Story 

I first learnt Thai as a teenager on a year-long exchange program in Thailand (1982), my then fifth language. Several years later I took up Thai and Linguistics at the Australian National University (1988) where advanced Thai was supplemented with units on Southern Thai, Lao, and Vietnamese. I studied intermediate Vietnamese in Hanoi in 1990 and sat my Advanced Vietnamese certificate in Ho Chi Minh City in in 2007.

My early career was university-based, first as an officer of the National Thai Studies Centre (Australia) (1992-1995) working in multimedia language learning development, and contributing independent research on Tai/Thai dialects and phonetics (1993). I then undertook doctoral research on Thai/Cognitive Linguistics (1995-98), worked on my first paid project as a translator (100,000 words, Medical Anthropology/Isan dialect (2000)), lectured in linguistics in Bangkok (2000-1), and worked as an academic editor of Southeast Asian Studies publications in the USA (2002-4).

I became involved in Thai literary translation from 2003-2015, while spending over a decade in neighboring Vietnam alternating ESL teaching, and freelance translation and editing freelance for writers, a regional publisher and a writers association. From November 2014 to early 2020 I engaged in 5+ years full-time registered commercial translation based in Vietnam and Australia before taking a  break. As of November 2023, I am available again. 

Services

Tasks. Thai or Vietnamese to English translation and English to Thai or Vietnamese review. I am adaptable to work in a range of CAT tool formats or from page to page.

Content. My  interests focus on prose texts: contracts, procurement documents, legislation, ministerial orders, court documents, evidence, journalism, statutes , procedures, HR and customer feedback, testimonials, and short and long literature.

Method. Detail-oriented and analytical. I seek to translate in-context and conduct background research as necessary. In both my work processes and translation product, I seek to reduce redundancy.

Growth Areas

• Transcription translation and subtitling.

• Environmental translation, land regeneration, holistic management, marine and coastal change.