Sleeping Beauty - Different Ending (Beatriz Reis)

Sleeping Beauty

A great party was to be held in the kingdom, for the King and the Queen, who had longed for an heir for many years, finally had their wish granted: a daughter was born. There would be a magnificent feast and all the subjects and the noblemen were invited to the christening. The most honored and exalted guests were, however, the 13 fairies, who would be the Princess’ godmothers. Unfortunately, His Majesty forgot to invite one of the Excellencies, and so the forsaken fairy, outraged by the lack of finesse of His Highness, appeared suddenly in the middle of the palace’s hall with a thump.
“Well, what a terrific assemblage, my King”, she said. “I really felt quite distressed of not receiving an invitation”.
“I hope you are not offended, your Excellency. We meant no harm”, answered the King nervously. She smiled her wicked smile, and it sent shivers down the royalty’s and the gentry’s spines.
“I have the impression that this awkward situation is nothing more than the result of a silly oversight. But I cannot be sure of that, can I, your Majesty?”
The King found no words to respond and the castle had never been so silent. The fairy, who had an extremely mean and vengeful heart, prepared her long scepter to cast a spell on the little Princess. The guards tried to stop her, but she was way too powerful to be interrupted.
“Listen well, all of you!” she brushed a lock of coal black hair from her face and everyone held their breath. “The princess shall grow in grace and beauty, beloved by all who know her… Nevertheless, she shall have no right to know the Arts or History, or to journey to any place in this world! She will never know curiosity or independence! She shall remain a little Princess forever!”
A blinding green light came from her scepter and the cradle, where the Princess laid, trembled slightly. The wicked fairy was content, but His Majesty sighed with relief, and the guests sniggered. It appeared that, for them, the spell had been useless. What would the Princess want with curiosity anyway? And which woman would ever want independency?
The fairy huffed, extremely fed up with those fools. They were a disgrace to the forces of evil. Being mean to close minded adversaries was simply boring. She shrugged and turned her back to those imbeciles. She would concentrate her efforts on something else…
The fairy then called the most skillful men and women to build the grandest and most modern university of all times, and she lived happily ever after as its Master. The kingdom, however, failed its people, for the vain Princess only brought them negligence; all she ever aimed was to sleep all day long, dreaming about a Prince. It was their turn to be forsaken.

Cinderella 2.0, by Caio Bonatti

     Once upon a time, a widowed man married a mean woman for she had him utterly under her influence. Each one of them had their own daughters from previous marriages: the lady had two girls as vain as their mother and the man had the fairest lass you could have ever seen, a rosebud called Meredith Grey.
     Life, despite Meredith’s kindness, was not kind to her; she was forced to do each and every task her stepsisters assigned her, and so did her stepmother, who thought of Meredith as no more than a maid for them. None complaint was made for her father, though; he was happy with the new wife, albeit she was selfish and abusive. Meredith would never take away her father’s happiness, “he has already suffered much because of mom’s death”, thought her.
     The only who called Meredith by her name was her father; the stepmother and stepsiblings called her ‘Cinderella’ for she was always covered in grayish dust after the housekeeping and, obviously, to mock with her surname: “Little Grey’s always gray / Will never find a feller / Her dream is faraway / ‘Cause she’s only Cinderella” they sang.
     Cinderella was gazing at the sunrise in the meadow one day when she heard her stepsiblings shouting frenetically inside the house. Excited as they were, Cinderella was told immediately the cause of all that noise: the prince was looking for a wife and would give a ball in order to find one. The two soubrettes were already planning their dresses and ignoring Cinderella again; Later, they went to the ball and left Meredith home because she did not have a proper dress to wear and her father was travelling with his wife, so they not even thought of letting her wear a dress of their own.
     Alone, Meredith cried. She wished her life was not miserable and begged for help; then, a miracle happened: suddenly the entire room was filled with light and a sweet voice said: “Do not be afraid, child, I am here to bless you. You deserve my gifts.”
     “Who are you? What gifts are you talking about?” replied Meredith.
     “I am your Fairy Godmother! I am the one who must grant you happiness” said the now materialized fairy, a vivacious and kindly grandma.
     “And how are you supposed to make me happy?”
     “By giving you a coach, a gown and glass slippers! So that you can meet your prince and marry him.” jolly said the fairy.
     “I’m sorry, but that’s not happiness… in fact, that sounds just like a bimbo life and I’m pretty sure I don’t want to serve my husband instead of serving my sisters. I deserve better.”
     “Oh my… so how could I help you, my darling?”
     Meredith grinned with glee and made her wish. She became a rich woman and was free to travel wherever she wanted to. Later she studied Medicine and wrote one of the most famous human anatomy textbooks of all time.

Another Snow White story

One day, the Evil Queen was bored, making herself up in front of her magic mirror. Then, as usual, she asked it: “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of all?”, to what the mirror replied: “Queen, you are full fair, 'tis true, but Snow White is fairer than you.”

She got mad. “Come on! You’ve always told me I was the fairest of all! You know I spend a fortune every week on hairdressers and anti-aging creams!”

The mirror said: “But Snow White is younger. Anyway, don’t worry: she is younger and fairer than you, but not sexier. Nor smarter. I’ve heard that the Prince has an eye on her, ‘cause he needs a wife…”

The Queen, who had been a widow for a while, thought it would be a good idea to date someone, just like old times. All in all, she was an independent woman who was no longer into girly fairytales. “The Prince? Yeah, he’s cute. I’ll show him what a real woman is.”

She prepared her magic caramel apple recipe and bought a witch costume in a Halloween store. That would be enough to fool Snow White.

When Snow White opened the door, the Queen in disguise grinned: “Tricks or treats?”

“Oh, it’s Halloween! I’ll give you some candy!”

“No, thanks, I’m on a diet! But you look so skinny! Please, have one of my yummy caramel apples for free!”

“How sweet! Thanks!”

“Idiot”, the Queen thought as she left.

Greedy Snow gulped the candy – which was so caloric that made she gain instantly 50 pounds and… cellulite! Bursting into tears, Snow White went to hospital in order to make a lipo.

The Prince ran to the hospital to visit Snow. She, who needed desperately a reason to grab the Prince, thought: “I hope he feels guilty for not having proposed me yet.” She started mourning: “Oh, that bad, bad woman fooled me, and now I look like Shrek! My life is over! Marry me! Kiss me! Show me you love me, or I’ll die!”

The Prince felt guilty and confused, but, when he was about to kiss her, he saw something that made him change his mind.

The Evil Queen was standing right in front of them. She opened her cape, showed the red Victoria’s Secret lingerie she was wearing, told the Prince: “Just in case you change your mind. Call me”, and left. The Prince couldn’t control himself – he wanted a queen, a woman, not a spoiled little princess.

“Sorry, Snow. It’s not you, it’s me. I can’t resist Victoria’s Secret.”

Snow White got mad and started screaming: “BITCH! You’ll pay for this!”, until she was anaesthetized by the nurses.

All in all, the Queen and the prince were happy… until she got fed up and dumped him. She has an eye on the Big Bad Wolf now.

Stereotypes in EuroTrip, by Caio Bonatti

     The movie EutoTrip was released in 2004 and depicts several clichés—chiefly national stereotypes—an American teenager may have about Europe and Europeans. The plot is the following: Scott is dumped by his girlfriend Fiona during their graduation; his best friend Cooper mocks him all the time for the footage of Scott crying over Fiona in public just after the dumping. Scott sends an e-mail to Mieke, his German friend telling the whole story and Mieke cheers him up, immediately making Cooper say Mieke is some kind of pervert. After a party on which the twins Jamie and Jenny are presented to us, Scott, in a drunken state, sends a furious e-mail to Mieke; in the morning, Scott finds out Mieke is in fact a German girl, not a man as he thought. For Mieke had blocked Scott’s e-mail address, he and Cooper decide to fly to Germany: Scott for Mieke, his recently discovered love and Cooper for European girls and adventure. After a manly night on an English Pub, they both wake up in a double decker on route to Paris, where they later get together with the twins. After the team is complete, they start travelling and hitchhiking through the continent and its common places.
      Sexism is a constant: everything must involve sex in a chauvinistic way, especially for Cooper, whose primary objective was to get laid; for him, Europeans women are all nymphets waiting for men like him. The macho man stereotype is also explored on the English people: according to the movie, English are all football fanatics, hooligans, rude and violent but slightly dumb. As said on the beginning, Scott and Cooper wake in a double decker, as the English they met were going to Paris to see a football match. Surprisingly, the French stereotype are not overexploited, there is just a French street artist with a thin mustache who performs a robot and fight with Scott.
      At a train station Fiona meets Christoph, a charming prince: handsome, polite and rich; later he will be revealed as bisexual and married (still, he tries to seduce Jenny). During the train travel, a perverted Italian man causes confusion in the cabin; apparently, Italians are very passionate, sexual and abusive, while showing a naïve look. And they always wear fine suits and grease on the hair, of course.
      Amsterdam is shown as a city of drugs and prostitution; also, the drugs are sold by Rastafarian/Jamaican bakers. Eastern Europe is, accordingly to the movie, so poor that American cents can buy a luxurious lifestyle; the whole scenario is bluish and devastated. And the last stereotypes presented are the Germans: first as a crazy and violent old man who takes the group to Bratislava and later as Mieke’s little brother, who, out of the blue, paints a Hitler mustache and stars marching like the füher when nobody but Cooper is seeing.
      The movie is indeed a sarcastic comedy, but we must remind that these stereotypes come from actual ideas many people have and are extremely dangerous if taken seriously.

Stereotypes in Anastasia - Beatriz Gil

Anastasia is a movie released in 1997. The story takes us back to the Imperial Russia in the period of 1917 when the country was governed by Tsar Nicholas II.  Rasputin plotted against Romanov family with the intention to kill all of its members, but the youngest Tsar daughter, Anastasia, with only six years old, was able to escape this terrible fate. However, after she ran away, she suffered from amnesia, a disease that made her forget all about her past and about who she really was. The story goes forward twelve years and now Anastasia is a beautiful eighteen years old girl, wondering about her history, who she really is and who are her relatives.

The purpose of this essay is to link the real Romanov family history with the story built in this particular movie and the stereotypes which originate from the Disney’s version. Here, the focus is to show historical stereotypes related to evil and American way of life (capitalism).

Before directly discussing the Disney movie, a panoramic view about the Romanov real history is necessary in order to understand this text’s point of view.  Russia was governed by Romanov royal family, following the capitalism way of life and the Imperial Russia was a country deeply miserable. During this period, a new economic trend starts to add followers through Europe: the Socialism. In 1917, in order to combat the Tsar dictatorship, the Bolsheviks invaded the Imperial Castle in Russia, which lead to the death of Tsar Nicholas Romanov and his family. Therefore, the death of Romanov dynasty symbolizes socialism ascension.

In the movie, evil is personified by the figure of Rasputin, a wizard who tries to destroy the Romanov family at any cost.  He is the responsible for the Royal Family destruction and Anastasia’s amnesia. In other words, he is a metaphor to Socialism. When he finds out that a member of Romanov family is still alive, he comes back from the Limbo, trying to find a way to kill the last Romanov. This attitude symbolizes the will of socialism to put an end to capitalism. Rasputin being killed by Anastasia at the end of the movie represents the victory of Capitalism over Socialism. The following song is proof of the stereotype which says that “socialism is a bad thing”:

St. Petersburg is gloomy!

St. Petersburg is bleak!

My underwear got frozen standing here all week!

Oh, since the revolution our lives have been so gray!

Thank Goodness for the gossip that gets us through the day! Hey!

Another point which is worth to be mentioned is the way Rasputin is characterized: as a thin tall ugly man. His hair and his beard are long and black; his skin is darker if compared to the other characters. He has a curious characteristic regarding his body, which can be decomposed. His arms, legs, head, fingers can separate from the rest of his body – for example, sometimes his head falls off of his neck. All of it together makes the stereotype in which everything that is ugly is bad.

            It is possible to see the constructions of two different stereotypes that are rooted in our culture by analyzing the relations between Disney’s fictional creation and the real history, and they are: a) the evil being represented by the ugly appearance and b) the capitalism as the superior way of life, meaning that what is different is bad and, therefore, must it be repressed.  This means that these stereotypes are constructed since childhood and they end up being accepted as a universal truth when in fact they are just reflecting the prejudice against different ways of perceiving the world.

Stereotypes in Disney’s ‘Beauty and the Beast’

The movie ‘Beauty and the Beast’ by Disney introduces us in a subtle, but effective way, lots of stereotypes and prejudices existing in our culture. 

At first, it can be possible to think of Belle as an independent woman, different from the other Disney’s princesses, as she likes reading and ‘wants so much more than this provincial life’ of her hometown. However, she is just another lost romantic who dreams about living in a fairytale: she looks forward to marrying a perfect prince and living ‘happily ever after’. Moreover, during the story, she is not able to do anything by herself: the only time she decides to leave the castle where she had been made prisoner, she gets into trouble and is rescued by the Beast – a man, of course.

Belle fits a modern standard of beauty: she is young, beautiful, thin, white and sexy, which makes her blessed – she will make a good marriage (the biggest dream a woman could ever have) and won’t have to worry about studying or working to survive. It can be noticed also in the three bimbettes, who are sexually attractive, but vacuous. And, after getting married, Belle will become like the rest of the women in town: old, fat, with lots of children to take care, a house to clean and a womanizer husband to tolerate for the rest of their lives – because, after all, any man is better than no man at all.

The Beast represents the violent man who changes: Belle taught us that a kind, patient and beautiful woman has the power to turn a rude man into a prince.

Gaston, the strong hunter, represents the ‘macho man’ stereotype: he never cries, never shows his weaknesses, has wide shoulders and huge muscles covered with hair. All his problems are solved with shouts and violence – therefore he is praised and admired by everyone in town. His biggest fan, Le Fou, lives to praise him, despite being constantly mistreated by Gaston.

Other stereotypes that can be seen in ‘Beauty and the Beast’ are: the crazy inventor (Maurice, Belle’s father), the responsible servant (Cogsworth, who is always giving and receiving orders), the casanova (the charming Lumière, who has an affair with the Featherduster) and the loving mother (Mrs. Potts, who lives to take care of her son).

These dangerous messages can be easily absorbed by children, who are not able to distinguish fiction from reality yet, and turn them into prejudiced adults, sexist men and naïve women, so frustrated for waiting a prince who will never come along. Children get fascinated by the beauty of the colors and the songs of the movie, but never wonder what comes after the ‘happily ever after’.

Stereotypes - Beatriz Reis

Stereotypes in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast

It is known that every Disney movie has uncountable stereotypes, and The Beauty and the Beast is not an exception.

Belle, the main character, seems to be an independent girl who loves reading and wants “more than this provincial life”, unlike other princesses who also lived happily ever after. However, during the movie she turns out to be a lost romantic and her aspirations, short sighted. The adventure she had been looking for is nothing more than finding love – she is a typical Disney princess. She also follows beauty and personality patterns: Belle has full lips, an astonishing hair, and thin waist; she is white, attractive and extremely sweet.

The Beast is the arrogant and violent male character whose temper and appearance is changed because of love, which could suggest that ugly people and animals are evil, and the beautiful ones are good. He is discriminated by the villagers the moment they learn he really exists, judging his character only by his looks. The Beast, being Belle’s prince, has to save her from violent snarling wolves.

Gaston, Belle’s suitor, is the villain of the plot. The handsome huntsman starts the movie as an extremely sexist, though humorous, buffoon. Later, nevertheless, he evolves to a menacing and murderous man. Despite his arrogant and vain behavior, he is hailed as the local hero for his strength and beauty, being, then, valued for his appearance. Gaston is that popular character whose social success comes from being powerful and a great match for all women.

The Beauty and the Beast has a crazy inventor too – Belle’s father Maurice. He is always misunderstood and no villager believes what he says. Le Fou, Gaston’s apple polisher, is a loyal (and stupid) friend, in spite of frequent abuse. The talking objects living inside the Beast’s castle can also be analyzed as examples of stereotypes: Cogsworth is a responsible servant, whose opinion is never taken into consideration, which can suggest that the rules, whatever they might be, are not so important. Lumière is the movie’s casanova, for he is a charmer and has an affair with the Featherduster. Mrs. Pots represents the loving mother, who takes care of everyone, gives the others pieces of advice, and spends most of her time in the kitchen.

The dumb blonde stereotype is also present in The Beauty and the Beast, being represented by the Bimbettes, the triplets who fawn over Gaston. Other women’s gender role in the movie is the one of the housewife, who takes care of the kids, likes to spread gossip and is worried about chores.

It is clear then that The Beauty and the Beast has plenty of stereotypes, a movie which presents its characters superficially and shows no psychological depth.

Newspaper story - Beatriz Gil

Are there strange creatures living in Fallen Angels?

Fallen Angels is a city located on the interior of Oklahoma, EUA. It was the exactly image of a countryside city: there are no more than 10,000 habitants; the most important monument is a central square where we can find the church. But this image of tranquility was the scenery of one of the most funny thing happened on the last decade.
October tenth, at one third a.m., an unconsciousness man came to the public hospital “Saint Patrick James” carried by three teenagers, all of them between fifteen and seventeen years old. No one was able to respond what happened to the fainted guy.
“I was walking on the street with my girlfriend. We were on the corner when an enormous animal, a werewolf jumped of a tree and fell over me. I was desperate and started screaming. After that, I do not know what happened. I was in a hospital when I wake up a nurse who was checking my temperature told that I had passed by an enormous emotional disturbance and blacked out” – said John Garred, a mechanical of twenty eight years old, approximately three hours after his access on the hospital.
The story spread quickly in the hospital and lots of people crowd in front of the werewolf victim door. But the general confusion ends when John’s girlfriend, the student Jessica, eighteen years old, burst furious into the hospital.
“Werewolf? Is that a joke? That enormous werewolf in reality was two funny boys wearing a wolf costume. If this clown didn’t black out, he would see the kids burst out laughing.” – She answered angrily when listen to the story of a werewolf walking around the city.
Until the sunrise, the parents of the teenagers responsible by the joke lecturing them and Jessica broke up with John, the motive: “no one wants date a dolt”!

Editorial - Changes in USP: good or bad? - Beatriz Gil

In this letter, I would like to make some consideration about the article "Changes in USP" published on 09.22.2010, in the newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo. The article was about a reformulate pretending b USP in its curriculum.
USP has seen its budget increase about 40%, because the increase of state money in the over past five years. It was know that this increase, however, was not reflected in a development of scientific output in the university. Regarding the quality of the courses existing in this university, it is impossible to do a measurement because the USP refuses to participate in the Enade, an examination of the Ministry of Education that could compare it to other Brazilian institutions.
It was recently published a ranking electing the best 500 universities around the world, which USP is 232rd. Incontestably, this is an important mark for Brazilian teaching, but also this may be an indication of a lag in some aspects of the college, such as incentives on research, one of the criterion to make the ranking.
As a public university, USP cannot abdicate the task of cultivating and spreading a kind of knowledge that cannot find space on the banks of private colleges. For this reason, in my view, it would be more interesting another kind of changes.
Besides the review of careers, the rector of the institution, João Grandino Rodas, announced its intention to curb the increasing number of graduate vacancies, which rose 50% in the last eight years. Will it be a good change?
Interestingly, the rector is conscious that these changes may not be favorable to the University and impair the quality of education. Now it remains await the results of this analysis, see what the measures are taken by the university and hope that it propels towards an improvement.

The mysterious hitchhiker - Beatriz Gil

A few days later, Carlo went back to find that mysterious beautiful girl. He went next to the building where the girl stopped. There an old woman with pale face was staring the building and crying her heart out. Worry, Carlo approached of the woman and asked if everything was fine; she looked at him and started to tell a long story. She had a twenty years old daughter, Anita, that one day, couple of years before, was walking next to that building and was hijacked and murdered. He asked how the girl looked like and, surprisingly, the description corresponded exactly of the girl who Carlo borrow his jacket. Incredulous, he thought it was a coincidence and gave up of look after the girl.
Three months later, it was the death anniversary of Carlo’s mother, and then he went to the cemetery to put some of her favorite flowers, white lilies, on the grave. After some time on the cemetery, he decided to go away. As he was leaving the cemetery, something caught his attention. Full of suspense, he walked into another grave. When he was closer, he noticed the thing that caught his attention: his own jacket on another gravestone! When he picked it up, he almost had a heart attack; on the grave stone he saw the photograph of Anita, and now he was sure: she was the girl he had given a lift to. Since then, Carlo goes to the psychiatrist once a week.
 

Newspaper Story - Beatriz Reis

The sleepwalking thief

            For several weeks the citizens of Crookston, in Minnesota, have been puzzled by the vegetables that were missing every morning at the only market in town. They were extremely intrigued by the fact that every day at least a whole sack of tomatoes was just gone, and nobody knew how it happened, or who could be responsible for the thefts, for the city was always peaceful and secure.

            “We never considered it could be anyone from Crookston. I mean, everybody knows each other here, there was no way it could have been one of us”, said Mary Parker, the owner of the robbed market.

            The gossip about the thefts was spreading, and Parker was about to fasten her place a few more padlocks, when one night Harold Goldman, 53, was found in his basement peeling hundreds of carrots at 3 a.m., dressed in his pajamas. His wife was shocked by the scene, and before waking him up, she is sure to have heard him exclaim, “A very, very good soup for everyone!”

            The mystery was then solved when all the vegetables, which had been stolen during the night by a sleepwalking Goldman, were found in his house. But nobody knows yet how he managed to get into Parker’s market, not even the thief himself. “I never knew I was a sleepwalker. I don’t even remember dreaming about a soup!” he attested, blushing slightly. He paid everything his dreams owned to Mary Parker and became the newest myth around the city. Goldman is the owner of Crookston’s book store, and he is considered to be a beloved person to everyone in town. Being a sleepwalker only added to the affection of the other citizens towards him.

The mysterious hitchhiker - Beatriz Reis

The mysterious hitchhiker

            She never left Carlo’s thoughts though, for he kept thinking about that beautiful yet ghostly face for days after he had seen her wandering alone. She was so quiet, but her silence wasn’t normal; it filled the air with absence. Carlo couldn’t tell why it happened, but every time that unique ride came back to his mind, he had goose bumps.

            Intrigued by that young girl and how different she was from any other he had met, he had knew that getting his jacket back would be a perfectly reasonable motive for him to go back to that narrow street and meet her again. Carlo looker for her, but since she wasn’t there, he decided to ask about her to a neighbor. However, the old lady who lived next door told him that no such girl had ever lived or stepped into that building, and slammed the door in his face.

            Even more interested with the girl’s story, and fearing to have had hallucinated, he decided to go back to the cemetery, where she had been when he first saw her. He followed her steps, and the more he walked, the more he came to notice the details of the scenario to which he was heading: the road was made of stoned with different patterns, remaining of the time of the Roman Empire. Carlo raised an eyebrow and then started walking faster, not for one minute he doubting the answer he had been looking for so avidly and which those patterns in the stones were now giving him.

            He finally got to the alley, and then to the apartment. He tried the handle, and surprisingly, the door was open. Right in front of him was a wide window through which he could see the Coliseum. Content, he sighed with relief, and left.

Indenizar e acepções em língua inglesa

Hi Louise and everybody,

I copied a text talking about the possible translations in English (according to the context) for the verb "indenizar" im Portuguese. It was taken from the site http://www.migalhas.com.br/LawEnglish/74,MI80671,41046-Indenizar+e+suas+acepcoes+em+lingua+inglesa

Take a look. Maybe we can also discuss on your translation in your "Letter to the Editor". What´s more, you can also file it in case the term comes up in a translation.

Regards,

ADriane

Indenizar e suas acepções em língua inglesa

Em português, o lexema indenizar corresponde a 'reparar, compensar, ressarcir' (Aurélio).

Em inglês, há diversas traduções para o termo indenizar. A tradução mais adequada dependerá sempre do contexto.

Entre as possibilidades de tradução há mais de 40 possíveis correspondentes – sempre dependendo do contexto.

No caso do correspondente indemnify, por exemplo, de acordo com Santos¹ (2007):

"indemnify (v.) Mais fiel à etimologia, o v. ing. guarda noção de prevenção e proteção prévia, e não só a de reparação ou compensação posterior; traduz-se por proteger, segurar, dar proteção legal contra: It was a plan indemnifying workers against time loss trough illness, Era um plano que segura os/dava cobertura aos operários contra faltas por doenças."

Como a indagação da semana não contempla um contexto específico, agrupamos algumas acepções de indenizar em inglês a partir de campos semânticos definidos por termos em português retirados de corpus compilado em Carvalho (2007).

a) Restituir

1) give back

2) pay

3) pay back

4) redeem

5) remunerate

6) return

b) Reparar

7) answer for

8) make good

9) make good against anticipated loss

10) make up for

11) offer compensation

12) offer reparation

13) offer satisfaction

14) restore

15) redress

c) Reembolsar

16) repay

17) requite

18) return money paid out

19) refund

20) reimburse

d) Isentar de responsabilidade

21) save harmless

22) hold harmless

23) answer for

24) secure against damage

25) secure against loss

e) Indenizar por perdas e danos

26) give satisfaction for damage

27) give satisfaction for injury

28) pay compensation

29) pay reparations

30) recompense

31) recompense for past loss

32) compensate

33) compensate for injury

34) compensate for loss sustained

35) make good, make good against anticipated loss

36) make reparation

37) make restitution

f) Indenizar em dinheiro

38) grant monetary compensation

39) pay monetary compensation

40) make monetary payment

g) Assegurar (indenizar quantia paga por seguro)

41) indemnify

42) guarantee

43) insure

Por fim, lembramos aos leitores que, para responder à pergunta de qual a melhor tradução para um determinado termo do português em uma língua estrangeira, qualquer que seja, é sempre necessário examinar o contexto em que o determinado termo ocorre. Só assim é possível apresentar traduções idiomáticas, isto é, traduções em uma linguagem que naturalmente ocorre em inglês e que não desperte estranheza no público-alvo da tradução.

Referências:

a) Santos, A. S. (2007). Guia Prático de Tradução Inglesa. São Paulo: Campus Elsevier.

b) Carvalho, L. (2007) A tradução de binômios em contratos de common law da linguística de corpus. São Paulo: FFLCH/USP (Corpus compilado em dissert. Mestrado)

_______

¹Além de ser um excelente guia de tradução em língua geral, Santos (2007) também traz diversos verbetes com informações relativas à linguagem jurídica em inglês

LOOKING FORWARD TO YOUR LETTER AND PARTICIPATION

Hi everybody!

I´ve just arrived from Porto Alegre and, to my surprise, few students took part in the the task of writing the letter as well as posting comments on the other classmate's paperwork.

Anyway, I don't give up. I expect that, until tomorrow, more students will be engaged in the activity.

See you,

Adriane

Justin Bieber punches foreigner fan in a concert

[NEWSPAPER STORY]

Justin Bieber: 'I have no clue of what happened to me.'

The Canadian pop-R&B teen singer Justin Bieber hit a fan last Saturday (09) during a concert in Colombia. Jasminda Velásquez won a competition promoted by a TV channel which would give to the winner the opportunity of singing a song with Justin on the stage. According to sources, Justin was extremely irritated by the fact that the girl pronounced his name wrong.

‘It’s Justen! Jus-ten!’, repeated constantly Justin Bieber. As the girl was unable to say it correctly, the singer lost his mind and punched her in the face. Jasminda collapsed and was taken to the hospital, while the fans started rioting. Then Justin was taken away from the stage; naturally, the concert was ended immediately.

One day later, Justin apologized to Jasminda and to the rest of his Colombian fans. ‘I shouldn’t have done that. I have no clue of what happened to me. I just wanted people to know how to pronounce my name right. Is it that impossible to say Justen? I don’t think so.’

His manager Scooter Braun defended him. ‘Justin is tired and has been working hard. It’s his first world tour; he is not used to it yet, therefore he had a stress crisis. We have to be more understanding to him.’

Jasminda was shaken; her family didn’t want to comment what happened. But they indicted Justin Bieber for aggression and personal injury. The singer will have to indemnify them in $ 10000.

The mysterious hitchhiker

Carlo was intrigued by that mysterious girl. He was still trying to understand who she was, what took her there, why she was there, wearing such thin dress in such cold winter night. He was thinking so much about that, that he just couldn’t sleep at night for days – and, when he was able to sleep, she appeared in all his dreams: dead. That really worried Carlo, so one day he decided to find her to check if she was okay.

In the morning, he drove to that old narrowed street of Rome. There was an old woman passing by – then he decided to ask her about the mysterious hitchhiker. And when he did it, the lady opened her eyes wide and didn’t say anything. She was about to leave without saying a word, when Carlo stopped her; he needed to know what was going on. She gulped, then said: “Are you sure we are talking about the same green-eyed girl who used to live over there? She was abandoned by her jealous boyfriend in the road and froze until death a couple years ago. And what is strange is that she was found days later wearing exactly that dress.”

Carlo shivered; then he thought the old lady was raving and left. He decided to forget that girl.

Three months later, Carlo drove to the cemetery to put some red roses on his mother grave – the very same cemetery where he saw the mysterious hitchhiker nearby. As he was leaving the cemetery, he shivered when he noticed his jacket hanging on a gravestone. When Carlo picked it up, he noticed that something fell from it: the photograph of the green-eyed girl he had given a lift to. Same shy smile, same gaze, same dress.

Letter to the Editor by Caio Bonatti

Mr. or Mrs. Editor,

The so-called review published in your website about Christopher Nolan’s latest work, Inception, is wholly worthless. I see no more than a text entirely ideological, presenting political criticism in a poor and deliberately partial way. When one reads a movie review, certain patterns and characteristics are expected, mainly criticism about the movie, not about the ‘Glorification of Masculine Violence’ and ‘Cliché Hetero-Monogamous Love Story’. I do not know even how to start complaining but I can make an effort.

Violence is indeed a constant through the film, and thanks Nolan for that; a blockbuster without action would be unbearable. As you may think, violence is not on screen to pervert the audience; it is there because we want to see it. The rapture effected by fights and conflicts is in human nature; the thrill captivates us and Hollywood always knows how to please the major public. About the ‘Normalization of Violence against Black People’, seriously, stop nitpicking. In a cast in which we have actors and actresses from USA, England, Canada, Japan, France and one of Indian descent it is contradictory to talk about ‘Lack of Diversity’. Moreover, it is very prejudiced to call Dileep Rao a ‘vaguely middle-eastern type’.

I will skip over the ‘No Originality’ and ‘Cheerleading for Capitalism’ issues as they would demand so much talking; just a few words: originality does exist in the movie and Capitalism is the current economic system, get used to see it everywhere. To finish, the ‘Cliché Hetero-Monogamous Love Story’ as described by you is pointless and comes from a radical feminist point of view. Should we burn every copy of Romeo & Juliet?

The premises of the text are not based on qualities or flaws of the movie; instead, they are deliberately based on social-political issues that do not interest the audience of Inception. It is a heist film with psychological suspense, not a definitive portrait of modern society.

Caio Bonatti

Source: http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2010/09/09/18658327.php 

Letter to the Editor

Mr(s). Editor,

I write you concerning the article titled “Atriz diz que assistente acusada de envenená-la é psicopata” published in the journalistic section of the website you manage.

After reading it very attentively, I could notice some mistakes and information that could be given in a better way in order to grant more serious status to your product. First of all, I want to call your attention to the name of the actress Gabriela Spanic. I think you don’t have a close relationship to call her by a nickname such as Gaby, and even if you did, I don’t think this kind of reference could bring your website a good image.

Moreover, I, as a Translation Course’s student whose one of the studying languages is Spanish, feel the obligation to advert you that the word “asistenta” is “maid” and not “assistant” as your virtual newspaper showed us. Of course you could keep the literacy translation, but it seems that this translation was made with no attention and no knowledge of Spanish language.

 Still considering the translation presented, some fragments sounded artificial, accusing that the one who translated it has done a bad work.

Besides what has been presented above, I verified misspelled words ­– “inteligante” – and unnecessary terms – “Sinto que que alguém…” -, which confirms what I complain here: lack of attention at writing the text.

Although many errors reported, I found your article impartial and I liked the way you presented the case, showing that the maid is only a suspect and not the guilty of the murder attempt. I hope you can receive the suggestions well in order to improve your website’s quality and require more attention at reviewing texts.

Yours truly,

 

Fábio.

 

Source article: http://noticias.terra.com.br/mundo/noticias/0,,OI4692169-EI8140,00-Atriz+diz+que+assistente+acusada+de+envenenala+e+psicopata.html

Letter to the editor - Shen

Mind control: Is the internet changing how we think?

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/web/09/16/internet.brain.carr/index.html?hpt=Sbin

The internet has become an indispensable instrument of communication and an entertaining media. Nowadays, almost everything depends on it, so, how can it be harmful for us? As far as I am concerned, internet, as well as everything in our life, must have control and limits. If we can make a good use of this resource, it can help us a lot; otherwise, it can really change our minds and control us.

We are surrounded more and more by the internet and we are amazed by its convenience (actually, it is a mixture of TV, radio, book and all the other medias). Therefore, people become so dependent on it and do not even think about the consequences of its overuse. Obviously, everything must have limits and control. When we overuse something, of course, it will be harm for us. However, we cannot let it control what we think, but we have to make a good use of it.

If we know how to make a good use of the internet, it is probably the best instrument of working, entertaining, communicating, etc. So, my conclusion is that, although the internet is very useful, we have to discern it from our reality, it means, we have to be aware of the resources around us, it does not matter which kind of instrument is (TV, radio, videogame, etc), by this, we can have the capacity to control them, and not the opposite.

Louise Mira - A letter to the editor of The Sun newspaper

Last July, during the World Cup, you wrote an article listing the worst players of the competition. And I must confess I was really surprised by the way you talked about the players, specially Kaka.
Just because they didn’t play the way everyone expected it doesn’t mean they didn’t try hard to. Sometimes you just seem to forget that human being make mistakes! And as a tabloid all you want is to exaggerate the news so that they look more interesting. But you lie and judge all the time! Is it what you call ‘job’? I use to call it ‘shame’.
The arguments used in the article don’t make any sense at all. You refered to Kaka as ‘the UN's youngest World Food Ambassador’, because ‘he gave his opponents everything on a plate’. Do you think it is funny? I don’t! Kaka did an amazing job – he was hurt, and even so he played and did his best for Brazil. And you didn’t even consider it.
Congratulations, The Sun. That’s why you are the worst newspaper in UK and that’s why I don’t believe a word you say.

Based on http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/football/worldcup2010/3052919/World-Cup-worst-XI.html

Letter to the editor - Beatriz Reis

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/celebritynews/3210142/BBC-period-drama-The-Tudors-is-gratuitously-awful-says-Dr-David-Starkey.html

            Letter to the Editor:

            As an avid reader of the Daily Telegraph and fan of historical narratives, I must say that I was very much surprised and upset by the article on the BBC series The Tudors, for it was actually described with a single word: inaccurate.

            It is known that The Tudors’ episodes have historical errors and inaccuracies: an important pope substituted by his successor, a Henry VIII that never got fat, and others related to the wardrobe of the characters, which belonged to the Victorian era, as well as coaches. The scriptwriters may indeed have taken liberties with the historical facts, but it has to be said that the BBC series has also succeeded in re-creating the drama and atmosphere of Henry VIII's royal court, with its intrigues, scandals, accusations and betrayals. It is also undeniable that the show has stimulated interest in British history all over the world, due to its involving and highly entertaining plot, based, and that only, on the beginning of the dynasty's story.

            The Tudors is a historical drama, not a documentary, and, for that reason, its improbable storylines, dodgy costumes and inaccurate details are perfectly forgivable; the show has so many other qualities that it will remain worth watching.

Beatriz Costa Reis

biac.reis@gmail.com

São José do Rio Preto