Tricky Words in this week's OVI
Finally I've been given a proper opportunity to use the word 'jubilee' in one of my translations, because its use is (or I think should be) quite limited in English compared with the Slovak
equivalent. The word comes from Hebrew expression for ram's horn (baraní roh, part of the animal, not a hot pepper), used as trumpets to announce a special period of restitution and celebration
which came round officially every fifty years in Jewish history. So in English the word jubilee is used to mark very special occasions, specifically the 25th, 50th or 60th anniversaries of the
monarch's coronation, or the annversary of the founding of a town if it is a multiple of fifty. Now that the corporate summer games have reached their 25th edition, I think the use of the word
'jubilee' is justified on this occasion.
Andy's Wordshop
Initially when I had to translate 'letné/zimné športové hry' I was reluctant to combine the English words 'sports' and 'games' in the same expression. My main reason was the difference in
definition of the two words: sport meaning an entertaining activity, and game meaning a rule-based event usually with two sides (players or teams) chasing or trying to hit something (usually a ball
or some kind of target), which is a substitute for hunting animals. Now I can see a different approach. Accepting that there are some sports that are typical for summer and others for winter, I can
make adjectival phrases "summer-sports" and "winter-sports", and then use "games" in the sense of Olympic/European/corporate games, so now I'm OK with "corporate summer-sports games". Remember
we're officially not allowed to use any form of the word 'Olympic' for copyright reasons.
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