Glossary entry (derived from question below)
Swedish term or phrase:
i sig själv (in this context)
English translation:
assimilate
Added to glossary by
stephen mewes
May 27, 2013 13:25
10 yrs ago
1 viewer *
Swedish term
United Kingdom
MA, BA, 20 years' freelance experience
Native in: English
Works in: Swedish to English, Danish to English, Norwegian to English
i sig själv (in this context)
Swedish to English
Bus/Financial
Business/Commerce (general)
Syftet med coachingen är då att omsätta lärande och/eller beslut i praktiken, dvs integrera kunskap, insikter och beslut i sig själv för att hitta rätt handlingar/beteenden.
It doesn't make sense to me!
It doesn't make sense to me!
Proposed translations
(English)
| 4 +1 | assimilate |
SafeTex
|
| 4 | themselves |
George Hopkins
|
| 5 -1 | Into oneself |
Mark Benson (X)
|
| 3 | within oneself |
Yvonne Tapper-Gardzina
|
| 3 | ---omission--- |
Mark Benson (X)
|
Proposed translations
+1
1 day 22 hrs
Selected
assimilate
Hello
I'm offering a verb and not a prepositional phrase like 'in themselves etc' which does not really go with the preceding verb (integrera/integrate)
You don't 'integrate into yourself' information and knowledge, you 'assimilate' it.
George had perhaps a similar feeling when he added remark
'It might be better with 'as a means to an end'.
Regards
I'm offering a verb and not a prepositional phrase like 'in themselves etc' which does not really go with the preceding verb (integrera/integrate)
You don't 'integrate into yourself' information and knowledge, you 'assimilate' it.
George had perhaps a similar feeling when he added remark
'It might be better with 'as a means to an end'.
Regards
Example sentence:
dvs ***assimilate*** kunskap, insikter och beslut i sig själv
Peer comment(s):
| agree |
Mark Benson (X)
: I withdraw my suggestion and leave it only as a reference. Your understanding and translation is perfect to my mind. I'm a native Swedish speaker, not a native English speaker.
2 days 22 hrs
|
|
Mark. Without the help of Swedes to explain to me what some of the Swedish expressions mean, I couldn't answer half the questions that I do.It is in many ways a team effort on the site so welcome to the team
|
3 KudoZ points awarded for this answer.
34 mins
Yvonne Tapper-Gardzina
United States
United States
Native in Swedish
&
English
United States
Swe-Eng & Eng-Swe translations
Native in: English (Variant: US) 
, Swedish
Works in: Swedish to English, English to Swedish
within oneself
Sounds like you take what the coach teaches you and do some soul searching to figure out a way to handle situations.
1 hr
themselves
In the specific context.
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Note added at 3 hrs (2013-05-27 16:28:34 GMT)
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It might be better with 'as a means to an end'.
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Note added at 3 hrs (2013-05-27 16:28:34 GMT)
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It might be better with 'as a means to an end'.
Peer comment(s):
| agree |
Deane Goltermann
: Agree here to 'as a means ...'
3 hrs
|
|
Thanks Deane.
|
|
| disagree |
Mark Benson (X)
: Incorrect. The text says: "to integrate ... into oneself". What it means can indeed be discussed, even in the Swedish itself...
4 days
|
-1
4 days
Into oneself
Apart from whether the sentence makes any sense in and of itself (i sig - pun intended)...
The pronoun is wrong and the phrase should have had "i en själv". As you may know, "en" is the object form of "man". As it stands, the "sig" now refers to either "syftet" or "coachingen".
The error is analogous to saying "det är bättre för sig själv" instead of "det är bättre för en själv".
This is one of the trickier parts of Swedish grammar.
The pronoun is wrong and the phrase should have had "i en själv". As you may know, "en" is the object form of "man". As it stands, the "sig" now refers to either "syftet" or "coachingen".
The error is analogous to saying "det är bättre för sig själv" instead of "det är bättre för en själv".
This is one of the trickier parts of Swedish grammar.
Example sentence:
The purpose of the coaching is to transform learning and/or decisions into practice and thus to integrate knowledge, insights and decisions into oneself.
Peer comment(s):
| disagree |
George Hopkins
: See my comment to your opinion of my suggested Answer. Sorry, my comment 'disappeared'.
2 hrs
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My answer should be taken as an auxiliary to SafeTex's suggestion, which is correct.
|
5 days
---omission---
As demonstrated by SafeTex's suggestion, "i sig själv" can easily be omitted.
Regardless of how you translate "integrera", you can safely omit "i sig själv".
As a matter of fact, it isn't only the incorrect grammar in the source that causes confusion, but also the the redundancy of the "locative".
Yes, "integrera" should be attached with the preposition "i" and an object. In this case the object is the "man" implied as a subject in the sentence. Given this, it would make more sense, inasmuch as "integrate" is at all an appropriate translation (a native would have a better grasp of this), to say for example:
"integrate into ones person"
"integrate into the soul"
"integrate into your heart"
"integrate into ... whatever it is that is you"
This is the meaning. First to transform learning and/or decisions into practice, and then that this can also be said in terms of "integrating" knowledge, insights and decisions "into"...
Again, it is "oneself" or "yourself". Or, perhaps a bit more exactly, "one's self" or "your self".
Perhaps this is best expressed by just saying "integrating"? It does indeed capture the vagueness inherent in the source. Thus I would regard it as quite a good solution.
Regardless of how you translate "integrera", you can safely omit "i sig själv".
As a matter of fact, it isn't only the incorrect grammar in the source that causes confusion, but also the the redundancy of the "locative".
Yes, "integrera" should be attached with the preposition "i" and an object. In this case the object is the "man" implied as a subject in the sentence. Given this, it would make more sense, inasmuch as "integrate" is at all an appropriate translation (a native would have a better grasp of this), to say for example:
"integrate into ones person"
"integrate into the soul"
"integrate into your heart"
"integrate into ... whatever it is that is you"
This is the meaning. First to transform learning and/or decisions into practice, and then that this can also be said in terms of "integrating" knowledge, insights and decisions "into"...
Again, it is "oneself" or "yourself". Or, perhaps a bit more exactly, "one's self" or "your self".
Perhaps this is best expressed by just saying "integrating"? It does indeed capture the vagueness inherent in the source. Thus I would regard it as quite a good solution.
Discussion
Translating is a tricky business. In the latest Swedish translation of the Bible (year 2000) for example God is no longer Allsmäktig (Almighty) he is only Väldig (Mighty), which is perhaps more sympathetic. And we no longer 'walk in the valley of the shadow of death, etc.'. Was the earlier version a tanslation or a flight of phantasy? But then, we could go on discussing for ever and ever. Amen.
I wasn't trying to 'read minds' as such but I do believe that there is a tremendous amount of 'pragmatic' work that we do when we use language that many people are not aware of that is akin to 'mindreading'
This work is normally done against the background context
Take for example the apparently simple phrase
'The tall boy and girl'
Is only the boy tall or the boy and girl?
Both are possible but only if we can see both the boy and girl do we know pretty sure what the speaker means (how tall does the girl have to be to be called tall though?)
But when we translate, we don't always have the full picture and so we 'interpret' what the author probably means. This looks like 'mind reading' but you could call it 'interpreting without the full context'
Even with the full linguistic content, we still don't always have enough info to really know
Anyway, I was 'interpreting' what I think you meant in English and actually agreed with this assumed interpretation.
But this post has become horribly complicated
Best regards
This is sure because 1) the source is not exactly correct Swedish and 2) the context doesn't give any room for other interpretations.
The writer intends to say "inombords" with "i sig själv". Not entirely uncommon. This should have been written "i en själv" in this case. The error consists in using a reflexive pronoun instead of an indefinite pronoun. "I sig själv" is an adverbial phrase ("rumsadverbial") where "sig" is a reflexive pronoun and "själv" is an adjective. This doesn't make sense because the phrase should have had the indefinite pronoun "en" instead of "sig".
Pronouns can be difficult to use for natives sometimes, as I mentioned earlier in my suggestion (see the link too if this is interesting). Until you understand this widespread "ignorance" among Swedes, these cases might be puzzling.
Being a native Swedish speaker and fluent in English, I certainly can't relate to any other way of translating being correct than yours. Even though we see things differently, the distance might not be so great after all
The little lesson on the intricacies of Swedish here is very really very useful.
Thank you, really . However, after George gave his explanation, I don't think that he did actually misunderstand the sentence.
I believe that George was thinking along the (English) lines of
"One must master these things in themselves' which is as problematic to explain in English grammar as the point you raise in Swedish grammar
I think this would be or at least has the meaning of 'i och för sig' in Swedish
But what with the complexities here of both the Swedish and English grammar, I'm not sure of anything anymore !!! (I may be wrong in my analysis or in interpreting George's interpretation)
Good luck to Quincey when making his choice
Consider the difference here:
Ex. 1
"Forskare tror att man använder alkohol för att man tror att den tar fram det bästa i en själv."
(Researchers believe that alcohol is used because people are convinced it brings out the best in them.)
Ex. 2
"Problemet i sig är inte att vi tagit emot så många invandrare."
(The problem as such/in itself isn't that we have received so many immigrants.)
There's a difference. Depending on how you use "i sig (själv)" it means different things.
In this case, it's used with the meaning of ex. 1. Unfortunately the source is poorly written and "sig" is used instead of "en", which is an error that isn't necessarly very uncommong even among natives.
Either way, I think you might have missed to see this difference and this would then be what makes you think of using "themselves" here. Let me know!
2) "Man" is singular in Swedish; all attributes in congruence.
3) The reflexive points back to the subject.
I don't know how to explain it to you, George, but you've misunderstood the meaning of the sentence. There is no way you can translate with "themselves" without changing the meaning.
Also, please understand that it does not make sense to think "i sig":
1) It would have said "i sig", if that was intended.
2) "I sig" doesn't make any sense at all - in the context. Please read carefully; "transforming into practice" would be another way of saying "integrating into themselves". What sense does it make? None. It may be new age, spiritual mumbo jumbo, but it's still language.
3) If it was to be taken as totally meaningless nonsense, the Swedish would have had "i sig själva".
Now I understand you better but without changing the verb to 'learn', you would have go 'they learn to assimilate xxx in themselves' which is a bit risky. Maybe make a new suggestion with learn + in themselves ?
Have added a note to my answer.
An approach is to see this as a likely 'tranlsation' from Eng to Swe. The Swede doing so likely didn't understand the English. Here's a good source http://www.solutionsdevelopment.ch/startup_010.php