In-progress Arabic menu. Every menu has a button that takes the viewer to the Main Menu and a button for Languages. |
This is the Languages menu. Down Syndrome: The First 18 Months in Spanish! Arabic! Chinese! Vietnamese! English, too! |
The Chinese version. I should note at this point that the translated Chinese and Arabic shown above has not been proofed. It will be. |
Almost as soon as it was published in 2004, people started asking me about a Spanish translation of Down Syndrome: The First 18 Months. With the help of two magnificent Down syndrome organizations at opposite ends of the world, the DVD will soon be available in five languages, in PAL format and in NTSC format.
The Chinese, Arabic and Vietnamese translations were done by the Down Syndrome Association of New South Wales in Australia and were complete in February. The DSANW's work includes outreach to people in their community who speak a variety of languages. The association's president, Jill O'Connor, spoke to me at the World Down Syndrome Congress in 2006 to propose the project; Helen Haigh of the DSANW coordinated the project with me, starting in early 2009.
Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, Gail Williamson, head of the Down Syndrome Association of Los Angeles, agreed to have Sandra Baker on her staff translate Down Syndrome: The First 18 Months into Spanish. That work is still going on but will be complete soon.
Production of the multi-language DVDs is under way. I hope to have them by early June.
One kind of cool thing I am doing is using subtitles at the top of the page (supertitles, they're called) to deliver the meaning of the words that pop up onscreen. I hope to have a supertitles track for every language offered on the DVD. |
