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# Translating from English

**On this page**

1. [1. Principles for an English source](#1-principles-for-an-english-source)
2. [2. Meaning before form: where English hides meaning](#2-meaning-before-form-where-english-hides-meaning)
3. [3. Register and style in an English source](#3-register-and-style-in-an-english-source)
4. [4. Terminology in English sources](#4-terminology-in-english-sources)
5. [5. False friends out of English](#5-false-friends-out-of-english)
6. [6. Grammar transfer from English](#6-grammar-transfer-from-english)
7. [7. Idioms, culture-bound items and songs](#7-idioms-culture-bound-items-and-songs)
8. [8. Names, numbers, dates and typography in English sources](#8-names-numbers-dates-and-typography-in-english-sources)
9. [9. Quality checks for translations out of English](#9-quality-checks-for-translations-out-of-english)
10. [10. Worked examples: one English sentence, several translations](#10-worked-examples-one-english-sentence-several-translations)
11. [11. Ambiguities of English to resolve before translating](#11-ambiguities-of-english-to-resolve-before-translating)
12. [12. English sources by domain](#12-english-sources-by-domain)
13. [13. Reading non-standard English sources](#13-reading-non-standard-english-sources)
14. [14. Institutional English and its idioms: the Europarl evidence](#14-institutional-english-and-its-idioms-the-europarl-evidence)
15. [15. How Mova handles it](#15-how-mova-handles-it)
16. [Sources](#sources)

This manual is about **reading English as a source**: what a translator must notice in an English text before writing a word of the target. English hides a great deal: gender, formality, aspect, the relations inside noun chains, the sense of a light verb or a phrasal verb. The target languages of this folder, French and Ukrainian, must say most of it. Writing English as a target is in [Translating into English](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/into-en/); the pair manuals [English and French: the pair manual](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/pairs/en-fr/) and [English and Ukrainian: the pair manual](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/pairs/en-uk/) go construction by construction. The grammar of English itself is in the [English manual](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/en/).

## 1. Principles for an English source

1. **Read the whole text first.** English leaves many choices open until late: the gender of *the doctor* may appear three paragraphs on; *you* may turn out to be a child; *it* may refer back a page. A translator who starts at sentence one into a language that forces those choices will have to go back.
2. **List what English did not say and the target must.** For every text, before drafting: the genders of people referred to by role; the formality of every *you*; which pasts are completed events and which are background; which noun phrases are definite.
3. **Find the register from more than vocabulary.** English marks register by contractions, phrasal verbs against Latinate verbs, sentence length, the passive, *shall* and *one*. A text with *commence*, *endeavour* and *in respect of* is official whatever it is about.
4. **Do not let English word order dictate the target's.** English order is grammar; in Ukrainian order is information, and in French the noun phrase is built the other way round.

## 2. Meaning before form: where English hides meaning

### 2.1 Light verbs and broad verbs

English uses a small set of very frequent verbs with very broad meanings: *get*, *make*, *take*, *have*, *do*, *put*, *go*, *come*, *give*. Their sense comes from the object or particle, and each sense has a different target verb:

| English | French | Ukrainian |
| --- | --- | --- |
| *get a letter* | *recevoir une lettre* | *отримати лист* |
| *get tired* | *se fatiguer* | *втомитися* |
| *get home* | *rentrer* | *дістатися додому* |
| *get it* (understand) | *piger* (colloquial), *comprendre* | *второпати*, *зрозуміти* |
| *make a decision* | *prendre une décision* | *ухвалити рішення* (official), *вирішити* |
| *take a photo* | *prendre une photo* | *сфотографувати*, *зробити фото* |
| *have a shower* | *prendre une douche* | *прийняти душ*, *помитися в душі* |

The rule is never to translate the light verb: translate the phrase.

### 2.2 Phrasal verbs

A phrasal verb (*give up*, *put off*, *run into*, *turn down*) is a single lexical unit, often with several senses, and usually more colloquial than its Latinate synonym (*give up* / *abandon*, *put off* / *postpone*). Three things to check:

1. **Which sense.** *Put off* is "postpone" (*put off the meeting*), "repel" (*the smell put me off*), "distract".
2. **The register.** The phrasal verb is usually the neutral-to-colloquial choice. French and Ukrainian render it with a single verb whose register is neutral: *I gave up smoking six months ago* → *J'ai arrêté de fumer il y a six mois* (`tatoeba:262293-181292`) → *Я кинув палити пів року тому*. The Ukrainian *кинути* is the exact colloquial match; *відмовився від паління* is the formal one.
3. **Separable particles.** *Turn it down*, *turn the radio down*: the particle may stand far from the verb, and a parser may miss it. Read the particle back to the verb before translating.

### 2.3 Noun chains

English stacks nouns as modifiers (*road safety awareness campaign*; *crude oil production statistics*). The relations between the nouns are not marked, and the bracketing is ambiguous. The EU's English style guide gives the case of *crude oil production statistics*, where only a hyphen (*crude-oil*) tells the reader that *crude* goes with *oil* rather than with *statistics* *(commission-1982)*. French and Ukrainian must spell the relations out with prepositions or cases, so the translator must decide them:

- *road safety awareness campaign* = a campaign (for raising) awareness (of) safety (on) roads → *campagne de sensibilisation à la sécurité routière* → *кампанія з підвищення обізнаності про безпеку на дорогах*.
- *child protection law* → *loi sur la protection de l'enfance* / *закон про захист дітей*; *child labour law* is a law *against* child labour, not one protecting child labour.

When the bracketing cannot be decided from context, ask; do not guess silently.

### 2.4 Polysemy and the English everyday words

High-frequency English words are polysemous in ways French and Ukrainian divide: *right* (correct, on the right, a right, just now: *right now*), *fair*, *still*, *even*, *issue* (problem, question, edition, emission), *case* (instance, lawsuit, box, grammatical case), *address* (a postal address, a speech, "deal with": *address the problem* → *traiter le problème*, *розв'язати проблему*; the calque *adresser le problème* is an error in French, see [Translating into French](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/into-fr/)).

### 2.5 Implicature, understatement and politeness

English, and especially British English, says less than it means:

- *Not bad* often means "good"; *quite good* in British English can mean "fairly good, not very"; *I'm not sure that's a good idea* means "no".
- *Would you mind …?*, *Could you possibly …?*, *I was wondering if …* are requests. Their target is a polite request in the target's own form (*Pourriez-vous …*, *Чи не могли б ви …*), not a literal question about minding or wondering.
- *With respect*, *I hear what you say* can be openly disagreeing.

The translation keeps the **force** (a request, a refusal, a criticism) and the **degree of politeness**, by the target's means. A literal *Ça vous dérangerait de …* is correct French for *Would you mind …*; *Я хотів би запитати, чи …* is heavier than its English source.

## 3. Register and style in an English source

### 3.1 Signals of register

| style | English signals |
| --- | --- |
| official, legal | *shall*, *hereinafter*, *pursuant to*, Latinate verbs (*commence*, *terminate*), nominalisations (*the implementation of*), defined terms with capitals (*the Member States*), long sentences with lists |
| neutral written | full forms, a mix of Latinate and Germanic words, the passive in moderation |
| colloquial | contractions (*don't*, *it's*), phrasal verbs, *you* for anyone, *like* and *so* as fillers, question tags, *gonna*, *kinda* |
| slang | the vocabulary of a group (*lit*, *sus*, *no cap* for a recent generation; *quid*, *knackered* for British colloquial) |
| song | §7 |

### 3.2 *You*

English *you* is singular or plural, formal or informal, specific or generic. The target must decide each:

- **Specific or generic.** *You never know* (generic) → *On ne sait jamais* → *Ніколи не знаєш* (Ukrainian uses the 2nd singular for the generic person too), or *Хтозна*. A generic *you* rendered by a specific *vous* changes who is talked about.
- **Singular or plural.** Context only; in instructions it is usually plural or impersonal (*Appuyez …*, *Натисніть …*).
- **Formal or informal.** §3.3 of the [general manual](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/general/). *You should have listened to me* is *Tu aurais dû m'écouter* in Tatoeba (`tatoeba:1726-3546`) because the sentence's tone suggests intimacy; with a stranger it would be *Vous auriez dû …*.

### 3.3 Singular *they* and gender

English has no gender outside the third-person pronouns and a few nouns, and it uses **singular *they*** for a person of unknown or unstated gender and for people who use it: *Someone left their umbrella in the hall*. French renders it with the possessive, which agrees with the thing possessed, not the owner: *Quelqu'un a laissé son parapluie dans le couloir* (`tatoeba:722023-2158933`); Ukrainian has the reflexive possessive *свій*, which is also gender-free: *Хтось залишив свою парасольку в коридорі*. The trouble comes later, with the past tense and adjectives, which in both languages agree: *Someone left. They were tired* → *Quelqu'un est parti. Il était fatigué* (default masculine) or a restructuring; *Хтось пішов. Він/вона був(ла) втомлений(а)*. The translator chooses between:

1. the target's grammatical default (masculine), which is still standard in both languages for an unknown person;
2. a restructuring that avoids agreement (*Quelqu'un est parti, épuisé* still agrees; *Quelqu'un est parti : la fatigue …* does not);
3. the target's inclusive forms where the house style uses them (French *iel*, the point médian; Ukrainian has no settled neutral pronoun).

Role nouns are the larger case. English *the nurse*, *the doctor*, *the teacher*, *my cousin*, *the minister* carry no gender, and a translation must give one. Tatoeba shows the default the translators reached for: *The nurse gave me a shot* → *L'infirmière me fit une piqure* (`tatoeba:20973-1597817`): the nurse became a woman, and nothing in the English said so. Europarl shows the reverse: *I too would like to congratulate the rapporteur on her excellent work* → *je voudrais également féliciter le rapporteur pour son excellent travail* (`europarl-v8:465`): English said the rapporteur was a woman; the French institutional form *le rapporteur* and the gender-free *son* lost it. Rules:

- **Look for the gender in the text** (a later pronoun, a name, a photo caption) before choosing.
- **When it is known, show it**, with the target's feminine where usage supports it (*la rapporteure* is now usual in French institutions; Ukrainian *доповідачка*).
- **When it is unknown**, follow the brief's house style; without one, the target's default, and never a stereotype in place of evidence.

### 3.4 British and American sources

Know which English the source is in; some words differ in meaning, not only in spelling:

| item | British | American | trap |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| *first floor* | one above the ground floor | ground floor | French *premier étage* = British *first floor*; Ukrainian *перший поверх* = American *first floor* |
| *public school* | private fee-paying school | state school |  |
| *billion* | now 10⁹ in both; older British texts 10¹² | 10⁹ | French *milliard* = 10⁹, *billion* = 10¹²; Ukrainian *мільярд* = 10⁹, *більйон* = 10¹² |
| dates | 6/7/2026 = 6 July | 6/7/2026 = June 7 |  |
| *pants* | underwear | trousers |  |
| *quite* | "fairly" (often) | "very" (often) |  |
| *table a motion* | put it forward | postpone it |  |

## 4. Terminology in English sources

- **Defined terms.** Legal and technical English defines terms with capitals (*the Licensee*, *the Product*). Keep a list and render each once, consistently.
- **English as a lingua franca.** Much English is written by non-native writers (EU drafts, international organisations, research papers). Its terms may be calques from the writer's language; the EU style guide lists French–English interference spellings such as *adresse* → *address*, *exemple* → *example* *(commission-1982)*. Before translating a strange English term, ask what the writer's first language would call it.
- **Anglicism pressure.** The target language may already have borrowed the English term. Whether to use the borrowing is decided by measured usage in the target's register (general manual §4.3), not by its resemblance to the source.

## 5. False friends out of English

The lists by pair are in the pair manuals. The most frequent from English into French and Ukrainian:

| English | means | French look-alike (means) | Ukrainian look-alike (means) |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| *actual(ly)* | real(ly), in fact | *actuel(lement)* (current(ly)) | *актуальний* (topical, relevant) |
| *eventually* | in the end | *éventuellement* (possibly) | *евентуально* (rare, "possibly") |
| *sympathetic* | compassionate | *sympathique* (nice) | *симпатичний* (nice, good-looking) |
| *magazine* | periodical | *magasin* (shop) | *магазин* (shop) |
| *library* | library | *librairie* (bookshop) | *(лібрарія*: not a word) |
| *control* | direct, master | *contrôler* (check, often) | *контролювати* (check, supervise, often) |
| *decade* | ten years | *décade* (ten days, mostly) | *декада* (ten days) |
| *accurate* | exact | *(accurate*: not French) | *акуратний* (neat, careful) |
| *data* | data | *données* | *дата* (date) |
| *fabric* | cloth | *fabrique* (factory) | *фабрика* (factory) |
| *intelligent* | clever | *intelligent* (same) | *інтелігентний* (cultured, well-mannered) |
| *realise* | understand | *réaliser* (carry out; "understand" is a contested anglicism) | *реалізувати* (carry out, sell) |

In Europarl v8, *eventually* (1 305 English sentences) is rendered *finalement* in 367 and *éventuellement* in 35 (counted 2026-11-06); some of the 35 are true errors, others co-occurrences (general manual §5).

### 5.1 The pair lists and the most frequent traps

The full lists, both directions, by domain and measured in the parallel corpora, are [False friends: English and French](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/false-friends/en-fr/) and [English and Ukrainian: false friends](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/false-friends/en-uk/); the renderings of English words that depend on context are in [English and French: renderings by context](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/context/en-fr/) and [English and Ukrainian: renderings by context](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/context/en-uk/). The English source words that the corpora meet most often among the listed traps (counted 2026-11-06; English–French counts are dominated by Europarl and DGT, English–Ukrainian by Tatoeba): into French, *regulation* (an EU act is *règlement*), *implement* (*mettre en œuvre*), *support* (*soutenir*, not *supporter*), *provision* (*disposition*), *application* (*demande*, *candidature*), *policy* (*politique*), *control* (*maîtriser* outside EU terms), *issue* (*question*, *problème*), *relevant* (*pertinent*, *compétent*), *people* (*personnes*, *gens*); into Ukrainian, *any* (✗ *любий* through Russian *любой*; ✓ *будь-який*), *be* as a copula (✗ *являтися*), *help* (*допомагати кому*, dative), *right, correct* (*правильний*; *вірний* is "faithful" in careful style), *city* (✗ *город*, a garden plot; ✓ *місто*), *money* (plural *гроші*), *consider* (✗ *рахувати*, "count"; ✓ *вважати*).

## 6. Grammar transfer from English

### 6.1 Tense and aspect

- **The present perfect** (*I have lived here for ten years*) is a state still true: French and Ukrainian use the **present** with *depuis* / *вже … років*: *J'habite ici depuis dix ans*, *Я живу тут уже десять років*. Tatoeba: *I've been waiting for hours* → *J'attends depuis des heures* (`tatoeba:2314-4169`) or *Ça fait des heures que j'attends* (`tatoeba:2314-1533585`). A past rendering (*✗ J'ai habité ici pendant dix ans*) says the speaker has left.
- **The progressive** marks an ongoing or temporary action; it has no French or Ukrainian form. In Ukrainian it maps to the **imperfective** aspect; in French to the present or imperfect, with *être en train de* when the ongoing action is the point.
- **The simple past** covers both completed events and states or habits in the past. French splits it into passé composé or passé simple (events) and imperfect (background, habit, state); Ukrainian into perfective (completed) and imperfective (process, habit). *When I was a child, I read a lot* → *Enfant, je lisais beaucoup* → *У дитинстві я багато читав* (imperfective). *I read the letter and left* → *J'ai lu la lettre et je suis parti* → *Я прочитав листа й пішов* (perfective).
- ***Just*** with a past or perfect is the recent past: *I just arrived* → *Je viens d'arriver* (`tatoeba:257520-6531`) → *Я щойно приїхав*.
- ***Will* and *going to*** are both future; *will* is also willingness (*He won't open the door* = refuses) and habit (*She'll sit there for hours*).

### 6.2 Modals

English modals are ambiguous between kinds of modality:

| modal | senses | trap |
| --- | --- | --- |
| *may* | permission; possibility | *You may go* vs *It may rain* |
| *must* | obligation; strong inference | *He must be tired* is inference: *Il doit être fatigué*, *Він, мабуть, утомився* |
| *should* | advice; expectation; (UK formal) conditional | *It should arrive tomorrow* is expectation, not duty |
| *shall* | legal obligation; (UK) future 1st person; offer (*Shall I …?*) | legal *shall* is not a future: see [English and French: the pair manual](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/pairs/en-fr/) on the French present for legal obligation |
| *can* | ability; permission; possibility |  |

### 6.3 The passive

English uses the passive in neutral prose to keep the topic first or to omit the agent. French and Ukrainian use it less, and Ukrainian's passive with an agent in the instrumental is heard as bureaucratic. Before translating a passive, ask: is the agent stated? Is it the topic that is first, or the event? Then choose the target's means (*on*, a pronominal verb, an active, the Ukrainian *-но/-то* form or third-person plural). See [Translating into French](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/into-fr/) and [Translating into Ukrainian](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/into-uk/).

### 6.4 Articles and definiteness

The English article is information: *a man came in* introduces someone new; *the man came in* refers back. French keeps the information in its own articles (with differences: generic *the* is *les* and generic plurals take *les*; *I like coffee* → *J'aime le café*). Ukrainian has no articles and moves the information into word order (the new last), demonstratives or *один* ("a certain"): *A man came into the room* → *До кімнати зайшов чоловік*; *The man came into the room* → *Чоловік зайшов до кімнати*.

### 6.5 *-ing* forms

The English *-ing* form is a participle, a gerund or a verbal noun, and it attaches loosely: *Walking home, the rain started* is a dangling participle the writer did not intend. Decide what each *-ing* is and whose action it is before translating; French has the *gérondif* (*en marchant*) and the present participle; Ukrainian has the *дієприслівник* (*ідучи*), which must share its subject with the main verb.

### 6.6 Ellipsis and pro-forms

English uses *do so*, *one*, *that of*, VP ellipsis (*She can swim and so can I*), and tags (*You're coming, aren't you?*). Each needs the target's own means: *Elle sait nager, et moi aussi*; *Вона вміє плавати, і я теж*; tags become *n'est-ce pas ?*, *hein ?*, *так?*, *правда ж?* according to register.

## 7. Idioms, culture-bound items and songs

- **Idioms** are translated by equivalent idioms, paraphrase or, rarely, literally (general manual §7.1). English idioms that look transparent are the most dangerous: *go out of one's way* ("take trouble") rendered literally is a calque; *вийшов зі свого шляху* is listed among the errors of a WMT 2025 English–Ukrainian system *(grozea-2025)*.
- **Sport and money idioms** are frequent in English and culture-bound: *a level playing field*, *move the goalposts*, *ballpark figure*, *step up to the plate*, *a quid pro quo*. They usually become plain paraphrase or a target idiom of another image.
- **Realia**: the school system (*sixth form*, *high school*, *college*, which is not a French *collège*), the political system (*the Speaker*, *the Senate*), food, holidays. General manual §7.2.
- **Songs**: English lyrics depart from written grammar as a matter of course: *ain't*, double negatives (*I can't get no …*), *me and him went*, dropped subjects (*Ø Woke up this morning*), dropped auxiliaries (*Ø You ever been …?*), *-in'* spellings, rhyme-driven order. These are **marks of the song register**, not errors to be corrected: the translation keeps the register with the target's own song grammar (general manual §9.3). A double negative in English is non-standard; in Ukrainian negative concord (*ніхто нічого не знає*) is standard, so the colloquial mark must be carried by something else.

## 8. Names, numbers, dates and typography in English sources

- **Names**: keep personal names; check whether a place name has a target exonym (*London* → *Londres*, *Лондон*); render institutional names by their established target form if one exists.
- **Numbers**: English decimal point and thousands comma (*1,234.5*) become *1 234,5* in French and Ukrainian. Check *billion* (§3.4).
- **Units**: imperial and US units (miles, pounds, Fahrenheit, fluid ounces, which differ between the UK and the US) are converted only if the brief says so.
- **Dates**: decide British or American order before converting a numeric date.
- **Capitals**: English capitalises nationality adjectives, languages, days and months, and title words; French and Ukrainian do not (*French* → *français*, *французький*; *Monday* → *lundi*, *понеділок*).
- **Quotation marks** become the target's (general manual §8.3).

## 9. Quality checks for translations out of English

Add to the general checklist:

1. Every *you* has a decided number, formality and genericity, consistent across the text.
2. Every person referred to by role has a gender supported by the text or the brief, not by a stereotype.
3. Every English simple past has the right French tense or Ukrainian aspect; every present perfect of a continuing state is a target present.
4. Every noun chain's bracketing was decided, not guessed.
5. No phrasal verb, light verb or noun chain was translated part by part.
6. Imperial units, *billion*, numeric dates and the floors of a building were checked for the source's variety.

Typical MQM-like labels (general manual §11.1): *accuracy / mistranslation / false friend* (*actually* → *actuellement*); *accuracy / mistranslation / wrong tense* (present perfect → past); *style / unidiomatic* (calqued phrasal verb); *audience appropriateness* (gender stereotype); *locale conventions* (decimal point kept).

## 10. Worked examples: one English sentence, several translations

Tatoeba keeps several translations of one English sentence, each by a named contributor, in French and in Ukrainian. Read side by side, they show exactly which choices English leaves open. (Examples from tatoeba and `en-uk/tatoeba/`; the direction of a Tatoeba link is not recorded, but these English sentences have the lower ids and were written first.)

### 10.1 *Do you speak English / French?*: formality and the verb

| id | target | choice |
| --- | --- | --- |
| `tatoeba:378270-379467` | *Ви знаєте англійську?* | polite *ви*; *знати* "know" |
| `tatoeba:378270-1584615` | *Ви говорите англійською?* | polite *ви*; *говорити* + instrumental |
| `tatoeba:378270-1584616` | *Ти говориш англійською?* | informal *ти* |
| `tatoeba:415441-14077` | *Parlez-vous français ?* | *vous*, inverted (formal) |
| `tatoeba:415441-1171008` | *Sais-tu parler français ?* | *tu*; *savoir parler*, "know how to speak" |
| `tatoeba:415441-7281436` | *Tu parles français ?* | *tu*, intonation (spoken) |

English *speak* covers ability and habit; French *parler* and *savoir parler*, Ukrainian *говорити* (or *розмовляти*) and *знати* divide them. The English sentence fixes neither formality nor register; each translation fixes both.

### 10.2 *I just arrived now*: gender and means of travel

| id | target | what the target added |
| --- | --- | --- |
| `tatoeba:257520-5733622` | *Я щойно приїхав.* | the speaker is a man; arrived by vehicle (*при-їхати*) |
| `tatoeba:257520-5733625` | *Я щойно приїхала.* | the speaker is a woman |
| `tatoeba:257520-6797414` | *Я щойно прилетів.* | a man, arrived by air |
| `tatoeba:257520-6531` | *Je viens d'arriver.* | nothing: French *arriver* is gender-free here (*je suis arrivé(e)* would not be) |

Ukrainian forces two facts English left open: the speaker's gender (in the past verb) and the means of motion (on foot *прийти*, by vehicle *приїхати*, by air *прилетіти*). The translator must find them in the context; a sentence in isolation, as in Tatoeba, gets several correct translations.

### 10.3 *I miss you*: the roles

| id | target |
| --- | --- |
| `tatoeba:1308-3124` | *Tu me manques.* (the missed one is the subject) |
| `tatoeba:1308-385358` | *Vous me manquez.* |
| `tatoeba:1308-6134766` | *Я сумую за тобою.* (the one who misses is the subject) |
| `tatoeba:1308-6134767` | *Мені тебе бракує.* (dative experiencer; the missed one in the genitive) |
| `tatoeba:1308-520409` | *Сумую без тебе.* (subject dropped; "I grieve without you") |

### 10.4 *I read the book*: an English homograph

*Read* is present or past; the English sentence alone does not say which. Tatoeba has both readings: *Я прочитав книгу* (past perfective, `tatoeba:989164-1567040`) and *Я читаю книжку* (present, `tatoeba:989164-6388023`). In a text the context decides; a translator who does not notice the homograph will choose silently. Other English homographs of this kind: *put*, *cut*, *set*, *hit*, *let*, *shut*, *cost*, *hurt* (present and past alike), and the noun/verb pairs *record*, *present*, *object*, *contract* (stress differs, spelling does not).

### 10.5 *I have a car*: register in the possessive

*У мене є машина* (`tatoeba:252272-5948717`), *Я маю машину* (`tatoeba:252272-5957990`) and *Я маю автівку* (`tatoeba:252272-735595`): the first is the neutral spoken construction, the second more formal or western, the third with the colloquial, recently revived *автівка* for "car". All are correct; the register coordinate (general manual §3.1) chooses.

### 10.6 *You should have …*: modality

*You should have told him the truth* → *Ти повинен був сказати йому правду* (`tatoeba:15827-492594`); *You should have attended the meeting* → *Ти мусив би відвідати зустріч* (`tatoeba:16240-471597`); *You should have visited Kyoto* → *Тобі треба було відвідати Кіото* (`tatoeba:51297-471177`). Three Ukrainian constructions for one English one: obligation in the past (*повинен був*), a conditional of necessity (*мусив би*), an impersonal of need (*треба було*). The last is the most colloquial and the most common in speech; the first carries a masculine *you* (*повинна була* for a woman), which the English did not say.

### 10.7 *The nurse*: a default gender

*The nurse looked after the babies* → *Медсестра доглядала за немовлятами* (`tatoeba:20972-505561`); French Tatoeba likewise has *L'infirmière* (`tatoeba:20973-1597817`). Both translators gave the nurse a feminine noun on no evidence. In a text where the nurse is a man, *медбрат* and *l'infirmier* are required; in a text where nothing is said, the house style decides (§3.3).

### 10.8 *Where is the library?*: a contested verb

*Де бібліотека?* (`tatoeba:270700-4591572`) and *Де знаходиться бібліотека?* (`tatoeba:270700-4591573`). The second uses *знаходитися* "be located", which purist guides criticise as a russianism in this sense (native: *бути*, *розташовуватися*, or nothing); it is very common. The zero copula of the first is the safest Ukrainian.

### 10.9 *He put his hand on my shoulder*: possessives

*Він поклав руку мені не плече* (`tatoeba:2439719-384384`) drops *his* and turns *my* into the dative *мені* ("put the hand to me on the shoulder"), the native construction for body parts. The corpus sentence also has a typo (*не* for *на*): corpora are evidence of usage, not proofread texts. *He put his hands in his pockets* → *Він поклав руки собі у кишені* (`tatoeba:292724-651746`) uses the dative reflexive *собі* in the same way.

### 10.10 *A man came up to me*: order

*A man came up to me and asked for a match* → *Чоловік підійшов до мене і попросив сірник* (`tatoeba:27625-1565865`). The Ukrainian keeps the English order, which is grammatical but reads the man as given; *До мене підійшов чоловік і попросив сірника* puts the new subject last and uses the partitive genitive *сірника* ("a match, some match"). Both are attested Ukrainian; the second is closer to the English *a man*.

## 11. Ambiguities of English to resolve before translating

English's few endings and loose attachment leave ambiguities that French and Ukrainian cannot keep. List and resolve them in the first reading:

| kind | example | readings | what the target must choose |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| attachment | *She saw the man with the telescope.* | she had it / he had it | French *avec le télescope* keeps it; Ukrainian *з телескопом* keeps it, but a clearer order resolves it |
| noun chain bracketing | *old book collector* | an old collector / a collector of old books | *vieux collectionneur de livres* / *collectionneur de livres anciens*; *старий колекціонер книжок* / *колекціонер старих книжок* |
| scope of negation | *All the students didn't pass.* | none passed / not all passed | *Aucun étudiant n'a réussi* / *Tous les étudiants n'ont pas réussi*; *Жоден студент не склав* / *Не всі студенти склали* |
| *or* | *tea or coffee* | one of / either or both | usually the same in both targets |
| *since*, *as*, *while* | *Since you left, …* | time / cause | *depuis que* / *puisque*; *відколи* / *оскільки* |
| pronoun reference | *The minister told the official that he would resign.* | who resigns | gender sometimes helps in French and Ukrainian; otherwise a name |
| *-ing* | *Flying planes can be dangerous.* | planes that fly / to fly planes | the target must choose a noun or a verb |
| *any* | *You can take any book.* | free choice / existence | *n'importe quel livre*; *будь-яку книжку* |
| generic *you*, *they*, *one* | *They say …* | people / a specific group | *on*; *кажуть* |
| British irony | *That's an interesting idea.* | praise / polite rejection | keep the irony with the target's means, or the speaker sounds sincere |

## 12. English sources by domain

- **IT and software.** English interface terms are often verbs used as nouns (*a download*, *an update*, *a log-in*) and nouns used as verbs (*to text*, *to google*). French and Ukrainian need a proper noun or verb: *un téléchargement*, *une mise à jour*, *une connexion*; *завантаження*, *оновлення*, *вхід*. Read each as its class in the sentence before choosing.
- **Science.** English scientific prose prefers the passive and *we* (*We show that …*); French uses *nous* or *on*; Ukrainian uses the first person plural with a dropped subject (*Показано, що …*, *Ми показуємо, що …*) or the *-но/-то* form.
- **Medicine.** English clinical abbreviations (*b.i.d.*, *p.o.*, *MI*, *BP*) are expanded or replaced by the target's (*deux fois par jour*, *per os*, *IDM*, *TA*; *двічі на день*, *перорально*, *ІМ*, *АТ*). A missed abbreviation in a dosage is a critical error.
- **Law (common law).** English legal terms of the common law (*tort*, *trust*, *equity*, *consideration*, *barrister*, *solicitor*) have no civil-law equivalents in French or Ukrainian law: describe or keep (general manual §12.3). EU English (*Member State*, *shall*, *recital*) has fixed French equivalents in the DGT memory and established Ukrainian ones in the translations of the EU acquis (*держава-член*, *преамбула*).
- **Business and marketing.** English marketing copy is dense with borrowable buzzwords (*engagement*, *insights*, *leverage*, *seamless*); judge every borrowing by the target market's usage (§4.3 of the general manual), and render the persuasive force rather than the words.

## 13. Reading non-standard English sources

A non-standard English source is the standard plus deltas (general manual §3.7 and §13.1). Read the deltas for their function before translating:

- **African American English and rap** use zero copula (*she Ø fine*), habitual *be* (*he be working*: "he regularly works"), *ain't*, double negation, *finna* ("about to"). Habitual *be* carries a meaning the target must keep (a habit, not a present event): *Il bosse tout le temps*; *Він постійно працює*. The variety's social meaning is not mapped to a target dialect (§3.5).
- **Scots and Irish English**: *dinnae*, *wee*, *ken*; the Irish *after* perfect (*I'm after eating* = "I have just eaten") → *Je viens de manger*, *Я щойно поїв*.
- **Early Modern and biblical English**: *thou* is singular and intimate (or divine address), not formal: KJV *thou* → French *tu*, Ukrainian *ти* (`bible-kjv-lsg:EXO_20:13` *Tu ne tueras point*; Kulish *Не вбивати меш*, `bible-kjv-kulish:EXO_20:13`). *Want* means "lack" (*I shall not want*, `bible-kjv-kulish:PSA_23:1`: Kulish *не мати му недостатку*).
- **Internet English**: abbreviations (*lol*, *tbh*, *imo*), lowercase, emoji, irony markers (*/s*). They are a register: the targets have their own (*mdr*, *ptdr* in French; *лол*, *хз*, *імхо* in Ukrainian).

## 14. Institutional English and its idioms: the Europarl evidence

Parliamentary and EU English is full of idioms and buzzwords that look transparent. Europarl v8 shows how its French translators rendered some of them (English side matched, French side counted; a sentence may hold several renderings or none of those listed; counted 2026-11-06; the direction of each sentence is not recorded):

| English (sentences) | French renderings (sentences) | lesson |
| --- | --- | --- |
| *address the issue / problem* (1 581) | *aborder* 425, *traiter* 243, *résoudre* 172, *s'attaquer à* 85, *répondre à* 50, *adresser* 10 | choose the verb by what is done to the problem; *adresser* is the calque |
| *level playing field* (661) | *règles du jeu* / *mêmes règles* 50, *(sur un) pied d'égalité* 33, *conditions de concurrence égales* 20; also *terrain d'égalité* (`europarl-v8:10178`), *situation équitable pour tous* (`europarl-v8:56355`), *uniformisation des règles du jeu* (`europarl-v8:32143`), and once left in English (`europarl-v8:53028`) | an idiom with no fixed equivalent: the translators paraphrased it each time |
| *at the end of the day* (621) | *en fin de compte* / *au bout du compte* 290, *finalement* 75, *à la fin de la journée* 20 | the literal rendering is right only when a real day is meant |
| *stakeholders* (1 368) | *parties prenantes* 575, *acteurs* 324, *parties concernées* / *intéressés* 173 | *parties prenantes* became the term during the period; *acteurs* is the older French |
| *empower(ment)* (474) | *habiliter* 72, *autonomie* / *autonomiser* 51, *donner les moyens* / *renforcer* 34, *responsabiliser* 18 | no settled term; paraphrase by what is given (rights, means, autonomy) |

The literal *at the end of the day* shows the decision. In `europarl-v8:978215`, *may we come out safely at the end of the day* is about Hungarian miners coming up from the pit, and *sortir sains et saufs à la fin de la journée* is right: a real working day. In `europarl-v8:438461`, *If, at the end of the day, we cannot get an agreement …* about a vote set for 9 April is the idiom ("in the end"), and *Si, à la fin de la journée, nous ne sommes pas parvenus à un accord* is a mistranslation that a careful reader may still decode. In `europarl-v8:272096`, *Otherwise, at the end of the day, our agenda would be totally out of place* is ambiguous (the day's agenda), and the literal rendering may be right. Only context decides; a counter of renderings cannot.

Into Ukrainian, the same idioms have the same problem: *address the issue* → *розв'язати*, *вирішити*, *розглянути*, *порушити питання* (by what is done; *адресувати проблему* is a calque); *level playing field* → *рівні умови (конкуренції)*; *at the end of the day* → *зрештою*, *урешті-решт*, *кінець кінцем*; *stakeholders* → *зацікавлені сторони*; *empowerment* → *розширення прав і можливостей* (the term of development agencies), or a paraphrase.

## 15. How Mova handles it

**Today.**

- Mova reads English with its own stack: tokens, Universal Dependencies tree and PTB tags, frames and world ([English manual](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/en/); register in [en 37](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/en/37-register-and-variation/), multiword expressions in [en 19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/en/19-lexicon-mwe-register/)). Phrasal verbs, noun compounds and modals are parsed as the English manual describes; the forced choices of a target language (gender of a role noun, *tu/vous*, aspect) are not computed, because Mova has no French or Ukrainian generation.
- [tools/translate](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/tools/translate/) translates **from English only into other English**: between Bible editions (JPS 1917, KJV, WEB, ASV and the other eBible editions with `translate many`) and into Hebrew site pages (`heb_enc.rs`). Its interlingua lexicon learns which English words and phrases are one concept across editions (*it came to pass* and *it happened* are one concept, `come_to_pass`; *thou*, *ye* and *you* are one concept), and its function-word tables swap what a target edition never writes (*unto* → *to*, *thee* → *you*) for trained pairs. This is the English-internal form of §2: one meaning, several forms, chosen per author.
- Register is modelled per **author delta**: the school's plain, conversational (half-slang) and exam styles have their own deltas over the standard English encoder. This is the closest Mova has to reading the register of an English source.
- The logic layer counts contradictions (negation, modality, names in roles, numbers) and reversals between two English readings of the same event, the critical accuracy checks of §9.

**Planned and being built.** The English Nightingale 🐦 (tools/nightingale, being built) would measure naturalness against the English Wikipedia, which Mova already holds; for translation out of English, its role is on the target side, so the French and Ukrainian Nightingales matter more here (see [Translating into French](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/into-fr/), [Translating into Ukrainian](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/into-uk/)). The Eel's rounds `tr-en-fr` and `tr-en-uk` (being built) would train and measure those directions; only English–French has parallel data today.

**Where Mova stops.** No gender, formality or aspect decision for a target language; no false-friend list; no noun-chain bracketing beyond the parser's attachment; no song register.

## Sources

*(commission-1982)* (EU English Style Guide, interference and hyphenation); *(grozea-2025)* (calques in English–Ukrainian MT); the general manual's sources. Corpus examples: Tatoeba (CC BY 2.0 FR; authors in each row's provenance), Europarl v8. Counts made 2026-11-06 on pairs.tsv; English–Ukrainian Tatoeba examples from pairs.tsv (CC BY 2.0 FR), the Kulish/Puluj Bible (1905, public domain) from `en-uk/bible/`.

*The Elamur team*

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