非雜文的期許 a bilingual plan

我最近在思考要怎麼救回我的中文寫作, 又不會犧牲我依然不是很理想的英文表達能力.

Recently I am wondering how to rescue my degrading Chinese writing skill but not to impede the progress of my never-perfect English skill.

交替著寫中英文可能不是最好的練習方式, 那只是會變成有點突兀或是不三不四的雜文.

Alternating Chinese and English may not be the best practice, and it may read awkward.

所以來試試看用中英文表達同一件事情.

Therefore, I am trying to express the same idea or make the same statement with two different languages.

這超難的啦, 因為要避免怪腔怪調的直翻, 就要考慮兩種語言在表達方式上的不同.

This proves super difficult. I have to avoid weird verbatim translation and at the same time have to consider the language-specific structures so that sentences will make sense.

例如中文常常省略主詞, 英文非常介意用字的精準度.

For example, the subject of a sentence is often omitted in Chinese while it would be considered non-standard in English. The precision of wording in English is more important than that in Chinese.

從以上的練習, 又可以看出中文用字比英文精簡.

From the above, one can see that to reflect the same meaning, a Chinese sentence is more succinct than its English counterpart.

當然可能是因為中文是我的母語, 好歹也用了一輩子. 英文及使天天用, 依然不及中文流利.

Of course the reason for shorter Chinese sentences may be due to the fact that Chinese is my native language, which I have used for my whole life time. Meanwhile, although I've used English daily for a decade, my English is still not as good as my Chinese.  

但是我就是無法用中文表達我的專業領域, 非常懊惱.

Despite of the advantage of the Chinese language in me, I am simply unable to express my profession in Chinese. This is frustrating.

所以我要練習中英文互用, 這樣不僅是中英文打字能力可以一起維持住水準, 有一天我也可以用中文跟麻嗎說明我到底在美國做甚麼.

To address this issue, I am going to set a goal: One day I will explain to Mama what I am doing in the States in Chinese. To reach this goal, I will practice writing, i.e., typing, English as well as Chinese. The beneficial side-effect will be that both my English and Chinese typings will stay at a pretty good level.

其實, 她是看得懂英文的. 但是隔行如隔山, 她就是沒辦法理解認知神經心理學家到底是在幹甚麼.

Actually, she can read English. But people in different professions are like people believe in different religions. She simply cannot understand what a neurocognitive psychologist does.

我個人認為"認知神經心理學" 需要重新命名. 這樣的直翻就好像三流的電影翻譯一樣, 詞不達意, 徒增不必要的神祕和困擾.

I personally think "neurocognitive psychology" should be renamed or re-branded in the Chinese-speaking science community. The literally direct translation does not convey the meaning, like poorly translated foreign movies that induce unneccessary mistery and confusion.

應該叫做"腦與行為學".

I would propose the new label "the Study of Brain and Behavior."

雖然依然很難懂, 但是就沒有"認知" 或是"心理學" 這些字眼來攪局.

Although the proposed new label may still be confusing, there is no "cognitive" or "psychology" that invites wrong interpretation.

那我要怎麼說明 "空間忽略症" 呢?  我再想想...  今天的中文練習就先這樣.

And how should I explain the disorder of spatial neglect? Let me think about it. I'm done with today's Chinese practice.