What is community-based translation and why?
In Japan, there are only 6 B Corporations as of May 2021. It has not increased in the past few years.
One of the reasons is a language barrier between English and Japanese.
To break through this situation, 30 people got together (virtually) from various regions in Japan across industry sectors and occupations to translate “The B Corp Handbook” as a community.
Throughout this process, we dived into the background of B Corp, sometimes exploring outside of the book; basketball history makers, democracy & economy etc… and discussed how each chapter should / can be translated considering the context in Japan.
This process helped each of us to pause and think about the essence of B Corp and to learn each other to cultivate the ‘B Corpness’ within individuals and as a community. Then, this is the beginning of the movement.
Summary of the community-based translation
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Organized by VALUE BOOKS Co, Ltd. ( BIA in progress) and blkswn publishers Inc.
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26 members by public invitation + organizers
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Virtually gathered for 2+ hours to review the translation and to discuss once a month for 6 months from Jan to June 2021
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Online events as annex (Approx. 200 participants x 3. Themes were company, government, finance. To be continued)
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Communication in Discord
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Sub sessions by small groups (BIA demonstration, translation review, networking)
This panel aims to show examples of how we used the publication of “The B Corp Handbook” (Japanese edition) to build community and how it drove actions based on localization of global context.
