"Furthermore, the survey revealed that attendees were very satisfied with the amount of sessions offered in the fields of systems and technology" - report in tcworld, the trade journal of tekom, the German professional association for technical communication and Information-Development
A bit embarrassing this one. tekom is a sister organisation of my trade body, the ISTC. In the very same issue of its magazine, a contributor explains the importance of not only translating the words, but also the meaning and culture, of a text.
A native English speaker will sense (if not knowing why) that amount of sessions is wrong, because amount refers to a measurable quantity of something (like 100 grams of sand or 2 litres of water), not an integer number of discrete things (like six buckets of water).
I have mentioned before that it is unwise, if one wishes to be taken seriously, to rely on DIY translations without using the services of a native speaker to - at least - proof a translation. I might have hoped that an organisation of professional writers would do the same!
21/03/08 @ 23:22