(Clockwise from top left): Alex Gauthier, Sébastien d'Auteuil, Professor Christine York, Ugo Ellefsen, Émilie Robertson, Juvéna Harfouche, Marla Kennedy and Myriam Gervais-O'Neil. | Photo by Alain Boisvert
Translation team captain Émilie Robertson: “Les Jeux gets you talking to people who love words as much as you do.” | Photo by Alain Boisvert
Along with Robertson, Concordia’s team included Myriam Gervais-O’Neill, Sébastien d'Auteuil, Ugo Ellefsen, Juvéna Harfouche and Marla Kennedy. The students were coached by Alex Gauthier, a former team member, and accompanied by Christine York, an instructor from the Département d’études françaises.
Robertson, Ellefsen and d’Auteuil are also members of the Institute for Co-operative Education. Robertson interned at marketing firm Cossette and communications firm Anglocom, while Ellefsen interned at community organization Federation CJA, localization and translation firm Lionbridge and translation firm Idem, where he now works. D’Auteuil, meanwhile, cut his teeth with an internship at Federation CJA and another through Traducta, a program that helped students land intern work at various firms.
For York, the win was a milestone.
“I’m so proud of our team,” she says. “I knew they were really good, but this weekend, they outdid themselves.”
Though the competition was the event’s focus, students also took advantage of networking opportunities with graduates and translation professionals — and, of course, their peers from other schools — at dinners and cocktail events during the weekend.
Robertson is already looking ahead to next year’s games. Because she graduates this April, she won’t be eligible to compete, but she is planning to attend as a volunteer or coach.
“It’s a really important event for developing a community among translators in Canada,” she says. “Translation can be an isolating field because you’re mostly working at a computer, but les Jeux gets you out there talking to other translators — to people who love words as much as you do.”