Hey, everyone. I'm not sure if I'm posting in the right subreddit, but I wanted some advice about senmongakko and maybe career advice in general.
I currently hold N2 and went to a 日本語学校 for 1 year. I want to get into translation and there seems to be quite a few opportunities on job boards for translation, but with the requirement of experience and/or N1. I was wondering if it'd be worth it to complete a 2 year program at a senmongakko for translation in order to get both of those requirements but also just to see if it's a profession I'd be actually interested in.
I know some people will probably just say it's a matter of whether or not you can actually do the job, but that's why I'd want to do senmongakko; because I don't have N1, no professional translation experience, nor the time to be focusing on these things while working full time and I WANT to become able to work as a translator because I know my skills are lacking at the moment.
If anyone has had any experience actually going to a translation senmongakko, I'd be happy to hear your experience and if you think it's worth it. Here are a few other questions:
- To get into the field, I heard it's not so important to be 100% nativelike more so than it is to specialize in a single field. If this is true, how could I specialize in a field such as video game localization or literature translation?
- A lot of the schools I've researched are focused on getting Japanese students up to par for English skills. Are there any that do the opposite (basically, foreigner focused to get Japanese skills up to par)?
- I've had some volunteer experience with indie artists and game developers with J > E translation and/or QC. Would continuing to do these volunteer opportunities be useful on the resume or should I be trying to get paid gigs (my current work doesn't allow 副業)?
I work at an 英会話 if that matters.
by TotsIGots