German Clean Questions by article translated

German Clean Questions

This is a thumbnail version of the Molecule of Perception, translated by Martin Römer and Hans-Peter Wellke. It is quite small to read here, however it is also available as a PDF attachment by clicking on the link at the very bottom of the last page of this article. Martin has produced a list of German Clean Language questions shown on the next page and is working on a list of the specialised questions. The German Clean Language site is at www.cleanlanguage.de

German Clean Questions

English	German	Erläuterung
Opening Question	Eröffnungsfrage
And what would you like to have happen ?	“Und was möchtest du gerne, dass geschieht ?“
Developing Questions	Entwickelnde Fragen
And is there anything else about ... ?	Und ist da noch etwas über {diese/s/n} ... ?
And what kind of ... is that … ?	Und was für eine Art ... ist diese/s/n ... ?
Location	Ort, Stelle
And where/whereabouts is ... ?	Und wo ist … ? Und wenn [benannte Stelle], wo genau ?	Im Englischen können die beiden Versionen in der Reihenfolge frei gewählt werden, im Deutschen kann man nur nach Präzisierung fragen.
Convert to Metaphor	Zu metaphorischer Beschreibung wechseln
And that’s ... like what ?	Und wenn du … mit einer Metapher beschreiben wolltest, dann ist … wie was ? Und ... ist ... wie was ?	Die Kurzform wird von den neuen Klienten beim ersten Mal i.a. nicht verstanden. Statt „mit einer Metapher“ kann man auch „mit einem Bild oder einer Analogie“ sagen. Unbedingt auch „wie was“ beim Sprechen extrem in die Länge ziehen.
Relationship	Relationen/Beziehungen
And is there a relationship between … and … ?	Und stehen … und … in Beziehung zueinander ?
And when/as ..., what happens to … ?	Und wenn/während ..., was geschieht mit/bei ... ?
Moving Time Questions	Zeitbezogene Fragen
Sequence	Reihenfolge
And what happens just before ... ?	Und was geschieht {direkt} davor ?
And then what happens ?	Und was geschieht dann ?
And what happens next ?	Und was geschieht {direkt} danach ?
Quelle	Ursprung
And where could … come from ?	Und woher könnte … herkommen ?
Intention Questions	Fragen zur Intension
And what would you/... like to have happen ?	Und was hättest du/hätte ... gerne, dass geschieht ?
And what needs to happen for …to … ?	Und was muss {für ...} geschehen, damit ... ? Und was braucht ..., damit ... ?
And can … … ?	Und kann ... ... ?

Syntax in German:

Und ... . Und wenn/während ..., [Frage] ?

Dear Phil,

attached you will find the Molecule in German as Word file.

<<...>>
In case you are interested on details of our translation:

headline: since we didn't find any direct translation of the English title which wouldn't have sounded very clumsy in German, we decided to abbreviate and that it would be legitimate to assume that the Molecule document is read with the context "clean language" in mind.

Especially difficult to translate was "... that's like what ?" since to the direct translation "... wie was ?" German clients unexperienced with CL in our opinion would usally react with "what do you mean ?" ...

So we assumed a client that is familiar with the term "Metapher", and thus would ask the first time "Und wenn du ... mit einer Metapher beschreiben wolltest, dann ist ... wie was ?" directly translated as "And if you would like to describe ... in metaphor, ... would be like what ?". Later on, the client then familiar with "... wie was ?" the faciliator could switch to the short form. Alas, there are plenty of German clients who can't make head or tail with the term "Metapher", so with those we would use the German translation of "And if you would like to describe ... with an image or analogy, ... would be like what ?". For reasons of breavity, we ommited that in the Molecule, but will put it on other lists of translations.

Actually, until two weeks I assumed that the "difficulty" with the translation of "like what" was specific to German, but then Hans-Peter mentioned that he has heard also from English facilitators of having un-understanding reactions of clients to the question "like what ?". What's your experience here, and what about translations in other languages ?

Kind regards,

Martin

p.s.:

As soon as we have further translations (specialized questions, clean space), we'll send you them.

Martin Römer

Reply from Phil Swallow: In my experience many clients are not sure what a metaphor is - and they don't need to know for the process to work. Preparing the ground is what is needed before using the 'like what?' question. This means finding the LOCATION of a perception (by asking where it is 2 or 3 times) and any ATTRIBUTES it may have. When this preparatory work is done, the 'like what?' question is asked and a metaphor normally emerges easily.