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Dumb down?

von Bruso, 15. Juni 2012

Beiträge: 7

Sprache: English

Bruso (Profil anzeigen) 15. Juni 2012 10:02:16

Anyone have a good way of translating "to dumb down" into Esperanto?

Something like "submalinteligentigi"? Not very elegant ...

erinja (Profil anzeigen) 15. Juni 2012 10:53:09

You have to translate the meaning, not the words.

To dumb down means to over-simplify something because you think someone is stupid.

I would say "trosimpligi" (to over-simplify). You could add an adverb as well to add some more nuance, "insulte trosimpligi" (to over-simplify insultingly).

You could technically say "fitrosimpligi" but I find that "tro" gets lost in the crowd and the word gets hard to parse (you want to read it as fitro/simpl/ig/i, whereas it's obviously meant to be fi/tro/simpl/ig/i).

Bruso (Profil anzeigen) 15. Juni 2012 11:01:50

erinja:
To dumb down means to over-simplify something because you think someone is stupid.
Well, in the context I was thinking of, the meaning is more like "to cause to be stupid".

As in the title of John Taylor Gatto's book Dumbing Us Down, in which the author argues that schools intentionally limit students' intelligence and capabilities.

I'd like to preserve both the meaning and the colloquial flavor of the phrase. I know, that's not easy in translation. But it's a common-enough phrase.

darkweasel (Profil anzeigen) 15. Juni 2012 11:07:19

Bruso:
Well, in the context I was thinking of, the meaning is more like "to cause to be stupid".
That’s stultigi - or doesn’t this fit for some reason?

sudanglo (Profil anzeigen) 15. Juni 2012 11:19:45

For the title of the book you could say 'Edukado Stultiga' or 'Mis-edukado'.

For describing, say, a science programme on TV as 'dumbed down', trosimpligita seems to fit.

Bruso (Profil anzeigen) 15. Juni 2012 13:44:25

darkweasel:
That’s stultigi - or doesn’t this fit for some reason?
That may be good. I decided to see if there had been any translations of the book and I found just one - in German. It was titled "Verdummt Noch Mal!". "Verdummen" is translated as "stultify" by most sources.

Hyperboreus (Profil anzeigen) 15. Juni 2012 15:16:34

Forigite

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