Ken Wagner has been a freelance Japanese-English translator since 1987, specializing in health sciences and chemical engineering. He has been involved with ATA’s Japanese-English certification program since 1996 and served as Japanese-English language chair for the certification program from 2000-2003 and from 2008-2014. He also served on the ATA Certification Committee from 2012-2015 He is a former secretary-treasurer, assistant administrator, and administrator of ATA’s Japanese Language Division and served as a judge for the Japanese-English portion of the Japan Association of Translators’ annual translation contest from 2004-2023.
Translation organizations like the JLD were crucial prior to the internet. Individual translators could not communicate with one another unless they lived in close proximity. There was a universal distrust of the “middleman” – translation agencies, most of which sought to drive rates down. Unable to meet, it was difficult for translators to receive professional training or communicate about their work. Translators are really interested in their work and like to talk about it. Even attending meetings of local translation organizations, J-E translators had little in common with translators of romance languages. The ATA had a membership directory, a massive alphabetical print listing of members names and contact information only, but for all practical purposes it did not have a services directory that could be used to find translators by language pair, specialty and qualifications. In this article, I will share my experiencing participating in and volunteering for the Japanese Language Division (JLD).
My off-and-on service for the JLD spanned more than a decade during which the Division faced monumental changes. I should probably start with the caveat that I’m living in Japan, away from my paper records in Seattle. So, I’ve had to rely on my spotty memory, the JLD Website, and JLD History Project volunteers [1]to fill in some of the gaps.
I served as secretary-treasurer of the JLD from 1993 to 1995. It was the first administration with three officers [administrator, assistant administrator, secretary-treasurer], after John Bukacek founded the division six years earlier. Everything was new. Administrator Jim Davis had to flesh the organization out in a full-fledged division. But, back then, several things were quite different from today (2025).
First, translators and interpreters were almost completely isolated from one another because the internet was not fully developed. So, the services and fellowship provided by organizations like the JLD were even more important than today. The newsletter (the JLD Times) was an important means of communication, and the newsletter editors had to make sure the newsletter was published every quarter. The JLD also produced a print directory, listing members’ specialties, qualifications, and language directions. This was a vital and unique function of the division. The ATA did not offer such a free directory at the time. The JLD Directory was the responsibility of the assistant administrator. It was a monstrous undertaking, and I remember how hard Assistant Administrator Miho Kite worked on it. Later, in 1997 to 2000, then Assistant Administrator Izumi Suzuki ended up retyping the entire thing due to formatting incompatibilities.
Also, there were dues for membership in all ATA divisions and the divisions had budgets consisting of 100% of their dues. This also meant that there was a third officer position: secretary-treasurer. I only attended one ATA conference during my term, so I only wrote one set of minutes of the JLD business meeting. I am very sorry about that. However, I did fulfill my treasurer duties, keeping tabs on JLD revenues.
After 1995, I didn’t hold a JLD position again until 2000 to 2003, when I was assistant administrator. By that time the ATA Directory was online and the JLD Directory no longer maintained. With the biggest job of the assistant administrator eliminated (I have to say that I lucked out on that one), I had mostly a supportive role with most of the work performed by the Administrator Izumi Suzuki; the JLD Times editors, Ben Tompkins and Manako Ihaya; and the conference organizing committees.
For the 2003 to 2005 term, I moved up to the position of administrator and had to make sure that the JLD Times was published, there was a full slate of useful conference presentations, and arrangements were made for the JLD dinner. Irith Bloom was the tireless and devoted JLD Times editor, serving for three years. Craig McGinty added color and volume the JLD Times with a detailed account of his hiking adventures in Japan.
We had several devoted conference planning committees who found industry experts to give truly educational presentations and who found distinguished speakers to educate and entertain us. Divisions can pay distinguished speakers an honorarium, which serves as small enticement. The Division wouldn’t have been able to present our excellent line-ups of ATA Conference speakers without the help of Conference Planning Committee members Aaron Ernst, Craig McGinty, Yoshiko Guy, Rob Albon, Keiko Best, Hirai Tetu, Fujii Hiromi, and others over the years. Devoted JLD member Hiroki Fukuyama oversaw many JLD Dinners.
By this time, the ATA accountants had convinced the ATA Board that they could not give the divisions the entire amount of division dues due to the administrative overhead costs involved in supporting the divisions. The era of division budgets was about to end. Taking advantage of one of the JLD Division’s last annual budgets, I used much of the JLD’s savings and the budget for that year to fund a day-long pre-IJET seminar on chemical engineering translation at IJET-16 in 2005 in Chicago. With the approval (or acquiescence) of the membership and a sorely needed crash course on tactfulness for myself from former ATA President and fellow Seattle area resident Anne MacFarlane, several division representatives and I went to the ATA Board to request the money for the seminar. Our delegation consisted of IJET-16 Chairman Ben Tomkins, JAT Representative Cliff Bender, JLD Assistant Administrator Carl Sullivan, and Secretary Treasurer Rika Mitrik. At that time, other divisions, notably the Spanish Language Division, had division-only national conferences at a different time of year from the ATA conference. I had hoped to offer the same option. To our surprise, the ATA Board approved our proposal, and we were able to present the seminar. Jim Davis, originally a chemical engineering professor before he started teaching Japanese technical translation, used his contacts to recruit a full slate of chemical engineers and we were able to present the full-day seminar in what had been, up to that time, a chronically under-represented specialty area. It is heartening to see the Division still flourishing under the leadership of the past several administrations. Through their efforts, the division offers an ambitious slate of monthly online activities and projects such as this current JLD History Project.
[1] What’s described as “JLD History Project” is officially known as the “JLD Commemoration Task Force.”
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