THE SPANISH TRANSLATION OF THE REDESIGNED

CURRENT POPULATION SURVEY - LESSONS LEARNED

Ruth B. McKay

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Adalberto Aguirre, Jr.

Department of Sociology

 University of California, Riverside

The intent of this paper is to share lessons

learned in the course of developing the Spanish

version of the redesigned Current Population Survey questionnaire. These lessons draw on a cultural

analysis of: differences in goals between the

members of a translation team; characteristic

patterns of interaction between various Hispanic

ethnic groups; culturally-patterned perceptions and

evaluations of language use across Hispanic ethnic

groups.

 The Spanish translation of the CPS questionnaire

was a joint effort of the Bureau of Labor Statistics

(BLS) and the Bureau of the Census. (SLIDE ONE

See next page) It involved a multi-stage translation

process which called for: translation of the English

questionnaire into Spanish; back-translation of the

Spanish questionnaire into English by a team of

Hispanics representing the major Hispanic ethnic

groups; reconciliation of disparities arising from

back-translation; evaluation of the resulting

questionnaire by

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focus groups of bilingual CPS interviewers;

cognitive research on the questionnaire with

respondents in the field.

While this plan was sensitive to possible ethnic

group differences in language, it did not take

account of characteristic ways in which different

Hispanic ethnic groups interact nor Hispanic ethnic

group differences in value systems regarding

Spanish language use.

 (In this paper, "value" is being used in the

sociological sense of a "conception of the desirable

and the undesirable.")

 Although survey planners would be expected to

learn about the professional training and experience

of a translator, we do not usually inquire about the

translator's view of the intended goal of the

translation process. Thus, we assumed that the

member of the translation project team

who would actually do the initial translation into

Spanish, a Cuban who had translated other

government survey

questionnaires, shared our goal of producing a

questionnaire that would be understood by the

widest possible range of

Spanish-speaking Hispanic respondents. Belatedly,

we learned that the goal of our translator was to

produce a questionnaire written in fine literary

prose. (We believe the latter goal of literary

excellence was reinforced by the

use of the back-translation approach.)

 The difficulty caused by differences in beliefs

about

 4.

the desired goals of the translation effort was

compounded by differences in ethnic group

background of the translator, Hispanic CPS

interviewers, and CPS respondents. While nonHispanics tend to assume the existence of a

somewhat monolithic Hispanic ethnic group, this

view ignores the characteristic patterns of interethnic group interaction, and evaluation of language

patterns across Hispanic ethnic groups. Cubans

and, to a lesser extent, Puerto Ricans, tend to see

themselves as guardians of the Spanish language in

the New World. Mexicans, at the other extreme,

have a genius for incorporating English loan words

into their language.

 Thus, when the Spanish CPS was evaluated in a

teleconference call linking bilingual Hispanic CSP

interviewers from different regions of the United

States, it soon became apparent that interviewers on

the East coast, most of whom were Puerto Rican or

Cuban, believed that their views of language use

were the "correct" ones that should be adopted.

Interviewers from the southwest and California,

most of whom were of Mexican background, tended

to defer to the Puerto Rican and Cuban

interviewers.

 Approximately 65% of the Hispanic respondents

in CPS are of Mexican origin, and less than 50% of

Mexican origin persons over 25 years of age have a

high school diploma.

Allowing the views of the East Coast Cuban and

Puerto Ricans to predominate over those of the

West Coast Mexicans led to

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a questionnaire that was not adequately sensitive to

language patterns of the majority of CPS

respondents. Subsequent field-testing of the

questionnaire with Mexican-origin populations in

California revealed that respondents there had

difficulty in understanding the questions, both

because of the very formal language used in the

questions, as well as their lack of familiarity with

some of the vocabulary used.

 The problem caused by differing assumptions

about the goal of translation and, to a lesser extent,

ethnic

differences in language usage, can be illustrated in

the following example. Our translator and the

back-translation

group had decided that the word "inquilino" was

the best Spanish word for "boarder." (This is an

important term for

the CPS because previous ethnographic research

had revealed that some of the Hispanic undercount

in CPS may be

attributable to respondents not knowing that they

are supposed to include boarders as members of

their households.

 When cognitive research on the questionnaire

was carried out with Mexican-origin populations in

California, none of the respondents reported having

boarders. During cognitive debriefing, several

respondents said that they did

indeed have boarders, whom they call "renteros."

None of the Mexican origin respondents were

familiar with the term "inquilino."

 6.

 When it was suggested that we add the term

"rentero" to the household roster flashcard which is

given to respondents during the CPS interview, the

translator protested. "Rentero" was not "good"

Spanish. Good was defined as something one would

not be embarrassed to show to a well-educated

Spanish speaker. Other members of the backtranslation group, Hispanic economists from

Central America, Cuba, and Puerto Rico, supported

the translator. This was a United States

government form, they said, and one would not

want to use a level of language that would reflect

badly on the government.

 (I should add that although we arranged for a

Mexican-origin translator to produce a

backtranslation of the original Spanish translation

back into English, there was no regular Mexicanorigin member on the BLS Hispanic translation

team. Mexican input into the work of the

translation team came from a California-based,

Mexican-origin sociolinguist who conducted the

cognitive field interviews. In retrospect, we realize

that we should have arranged for a regular

Mexican-origin participant in the ongoing work of

the translation team.)

 There are no "right" answers to some of the

problems we encountered in the course of

developing the Spanish version

of the redesigned Current Population Survey..

However, to understand the problems caused by

differences in beliefs

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about the proper goal of translating a survey

questionnaire into another language, as well as

problems caused by the

attitudes of some Hispanic groups towards other

Hispanic groups' language patterns, in cultural

rather than personal terms, should contribute to

more objective and rational resolution of these

problems.