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- "La carne fue hecha hoy."
187 Comments
I disagree with this translatoin. Even though in spanish you do say meat is "hecha", it means it's cooked or prepared. You do not make meat. The proper english translation would be "The meat was done today". That way it also refers to preparing or doneness, which is the intent of the spanish sentence.
Actually, that is not true in every case. Duolingo often views it as acceptable when I translate a Spanish sentence by adapting it to fit the way it would make sense in English, even when a Spanish word is not directly/literally translated. The intent of the speaker or statement must be taken into consideration when translating.
Right.
We are supposed to be learning what is being presented and since we are but studernts taking a course in Spanish we need to shut the hell up and pay attention to what is being taught, and at least up to the point we can become fluent. Then maybe our opinions might amount to something higher than a hill of beans, a quality and knowledge level we don't presently have except for the self deluded. Their personally assessed rank naturally reaches to infinity.
I agree that the English translation is wrong but you also don't "do" meat. I wouldn't say "The meat was done today" unless I was muttering to myself; "Right, I've done the veg, I've done the meat, I've done the pudding/dessert..." i.e. 'I've finished that part of the preparation" but in reality, as you said, it appears that the intent is to discuss 'preparation' so I think they should change this to 'The meat was prepared today'.
There's no difference in formality between saying 'done' and 'finished' when talking about something being 'ready' - unless you're a prescriptivist and this is really important to you (no one else cares).
https://motivatedgrammar.wordpress.com/2011/03/17/done-and-finished/
I am sensing a bit of hostility here. I never said it was incorrect. If you want to go around spreading an elementary vocabulary, then go for it. Who am I to try to make you sound sophisticated? However for someone learning English, it might be in their interest to sound more impressive to a native speaking employer or group of peers.
Thank you for this link about prescriptivism. Reading it, I was struck by how strongly Eugene Tiffany is ruled by it. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."
That being said, I defend E.T. to the extent that there should be some prescriptive consistency, at least when it comes to spelling and punctuation. However, the inclusion of acceptable alternative translations is the holy grail of true bilingualism.
231
I agree and well written explanation that is easy to follow. This should one that does get changed.
I have received a few emails when I suggest translations or alternatives that sound better with an acknowledgement saying that phrase is now accepted and encouragement to keep it up and to continue providing valuable feedback. Duo is a community driven language tool so don't hesitate to try and contribute.
Yes, I have received emails thanking me and letting me know the change will take place. When they don't agree to change it though, they don't send an email to explain why not and I think that has to do with sheer quantity of feedback, so we are left to figure that out with dictionaries and grammar sites. This particular sentence did leave me wondering if they meant that the meat was butchered and packaged ready to sell or whether they meant that it was cooked.
1186
Yes, I have gotten notifications that they now accept my translations on several occasions..
189
This may be regional but in my part of the world we do use "made" to mean cooked or prepared. I made lasagna. I made chicken enchiladas. I made steak for dinner. It's very common.
817
Your examples are all in active voice, and they all contain a dish rather than an ingredient. "The milk was made"? "The water was made"? The lasagna and the chicken enchiladas probably were - they don't seem to grow on trees. "I made us some potatoes" sounds fine to me - I prepared them for eating, because we probably weren't going to bite into them raw and unpeeled. But "the potatoes were made"? Sounds odd to me.
704
Why would you ask that.? When was this turkey cooked or when was this turkey packaged would be more normal
301
It's intersting...in Spain whenever you do something on this same day, during this week, this same month, this year...even during this life...they use the present form of haber + past participle. Hoy he comido el desayundo, esta semana hemos hablado mucho con nuestros amigos, este año ellos han viajado mucho. I think in Latin America the simple past (Preterite) is used instead
Ha hecho is past tense according to my Spanish verb book. Does the "se" change that somehow? Regarding something you said it a post down page... are you saying that in Spanish you never use past tense if something happened today? That is very confusing to me since in English we use past tense as soon as the action is completed.
2486
I see and hear "hecho hoy," "hecho reciente," and "hecho por mano" all the time when referring to food, especially when trying to emphasize that the ingredients are fresh, particularly in advertisements and commercials.
This is nitpicking, E. T. I suspect that everyone at this level knows that "preparado" means "prepared." I'm just adding this comment to let others know, despite the downvotes, that you're correct when you post that "prepared" = "preparado." The gist of our disagreement is how far an interpretation can go before it becomes inaccurate, and your comment is a good example of when more flexibility is necessary.
184
You can make steak for tea, you can make pork chops to sell you can make anything for eating, selling. giving etc, etc. It's all in the preparation ;-)
339
As a native speaker I would use the reflective "la carne se ha hecho hoy" rather than the passive "la carne fue hecha hoy"
1660
Un filete muy/ poco hecho = a well done/ rare steak
At the kitchen:
"La carne se está haciendo" = the meat is being cooked.
At a restaurant:
-¿Cómo quiere el filete /la carne? = How do you want the steak / meat?
- Al punto, poco hecho / -a. = Rare.
That reminds me of going to school at the University of Arkansas back in the '70s. The school's mascot is a razorback pig, and someone got the bright idea to make a sweat shirt with two razorbacks in a rather compromised position with the title "Makin' Bacon". It was hilarious. Unfortunately the admins did not think so and they cracked down on that. Ah, the '70s...
296
I make corned beef. One can make sausage or smoked meat. And it could have been made today.
1605
I agree. It is my common to be specific and say "I am making chicken tonight or I am making beef tonight, rather than I am making meat, but I would still accept I am making meat today.
513
Hecha... first time I am hearing of this in spanish. Hecho I have heard and am familiar with. but not hecha. what expression is this
Sometimes we do use the term made with meat but usually it is when referring to the meat in the cooked state. I made roast turkey. I made roast beef. I made meatloaf. I made Fried Chicken.
It could also refer to meat that you have processed to a point. I made stew meat.
I can't think of a single instance when you would otherwise say I made meat in normal conversation.
All this said, it is good for Duolingo to give more direct translations because we are not translating to help someone else understand what a foreign language speaker is saying. We are translating so that we can understand the words that are being said. It is helpful to know that the phrase I made meat in Spanish means I prepared to me in English and the only way to do that is for the translation to be direct
English is an annoying language, it is a total confusion of words in many ways, I say that as an English person. So I am not going to explain it, I wrote a long detailed analysis of why its wrong.. but it made me look like a madwoman..so I am just echoing what people have said previously - the meat could be prepared, cooked, butchered, chopped, done (within the kitchen before serving) even but it can not be made today.
1605
Maybe my recollection is off, but wasn't it Como solo carne cocinado. Is carne masc. or fem.?
1325
is there a native Spanish speaker who could explain when 'hecha' would be used as 'off-the-peg'?
How do u make meat? U literally tear off the flesh of an animal (hopefully ;)) unless you're a cannibal, and prep it- uless you're 1 of thise freaks thatveats it raw ;p. Oh Duo, The Lil' Owl, u, u can be so freaking nasty at times. :) But, I guess, u truly are a cannibal, since u eat ur other animal species- LIIIIVVVVE! :D
They're of different tenses, "hizo" and "hecho". You still need "hizo" for that because that's a simple past (preterite) construction (if indeed that was what you intended to express). "Hecho", as a verb, is a participle (past), so you need another verb to go with it. Just like in English construction, we say "have/has made" (he/has/ha/hemos/han hecho). Of course, the tense would have then changed from simple past to present perfect.
On another page, with the present tense sentence "La carne es hecha hoy," I translated it as "The meat is fresh today." Taking a cue from the prescriptivism extolled by Eugene Tiffany—or , E. T., as I affectionately call him to myself—I wanted to translate "hecha" as literally as I could while still maintaining the original meaning of the Spanish in its English translation. This interpretation was tricky, since "made" (hecha) brings up connotations of either conception or miraculous creation, and "done" (hecha) is a common English idiom used to say that a food has stopped cooking. By narrowing the meaning of the past participle "hecha" to the time slot of "hoy," I came up with the adjective "fresh." This worked as an acceptable, connotative interpretation of the present tense, although I admit it is a colloquial interpretation because, logically, meat is usually fresh on the day that it is prepared.
That was a few years ago. Now, having learned more Spanish grammar, I would approach this translation differently and more literally. Keeping in mind that "hecha" is a past participle, I would cast around for another past participle that also works in English and would come up with "finished" and "prepared." Then, I would narrow my choice down to "prepared" because, in my opinion, it best combines the two Spanish meanings of "hecha" to convey both "done" and "made." Best of all, taking a part-of-speech approach means that "prepared" can be viewed as a predicate adjective (rather than as a participle) and thus can be used with either present tense verbs or past tense verbs in both languages. For example, "La carne es hecha hoy" (The meat is prepared today) OR "La carne fue hecha hoy" (The meat was prepared today). Parsing these two examples, you can see that using "ser" + a past participle is grammatically equivalent to an English passive voice sentence in any tense. This is key, because the trick to maintaining the same meaning in the English translation is to recognize that someone prepared the meat, and that someone would be the subject of the sentence if said sentence were translated into English active voice.
Unfortunately, idiomatic translation is sometimes unavoidable. However, it is a good work-around when you don't have all of the vocabulary or all of the syntactical knowledge requisite to translate as literally as you might like. Unfortunate, also, is that we all don't have E. T. 's vocabulary or understanding of Spanish grammar rules. While his emphasis on literal translation is commendable because this usually leads to the best translations, I say "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." This is why my admittedly less "correct" interpretation of "hecha" as "fresh" worked connotatively when I translated "La carne es hecha hoy" as "The meat is fresh today." This is also why I advocate that learners take a grammar-based approach that uses the grammar of both languages. This last is something that E. T. has written against, which is a shame because he has so much knowledge to offer about how Spanish actually works, if only he would take the time to explain its "why's" and "how's" through the use of examples and comparisons. All hat no cattle.