Usage notes

"Translation" is often used loosely to describe any act of conversion from one language into another, although formal usage typically distinguishes "interpretation" as the proper term for conversion of speech. Conversion of text from one orthography to another (attempting to roughly establish equivalent sound) is distinguished as "transliteration", whereas translation attempts to establish equivalent meaning. "Literal", "verbatim", or "word-for-word translation" ("metaphrase") aims to capture as much of the exact expression as possible, while "loose" or "free translation" or "paraphrase" aims to capture the general sense or artistic affect of the original text. At a certain point, however, text which has been too freely translated may be considered an "adaptation" instead.