Don't Occupy Your Seat
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With apologies for the glare from the plastic covering, this sign comes from the canteen at Lingnan University in Hong Kong:
Here's what is written on the sign:
wēnxīn tíshì
wèi tārén zhuóxiǎng, qǐng wù bàzhàn zuòwèi
duōxiè hézuò
溫馨提示
為他人著想，請勿霸佔座位
多謝合作
Be Considerate Of Others, Don't Occupy
Your Seat, Thank You For Your Cooperation.
The English version omits the heading, which means something like "Gentle / Friendly / Warm Reminder / Tip".
Bàzhàn zuòwèi 霸佔座位 must mean "occupy [someone else's] seat", not "occupy [your] seat".
bàzhàn 霸佔 ("[forcibly] occupy; seize"), where bà 霸 means "hegemon; autocrat; feudal chief; tyrant; oppressor; dictate"; etc.) and zhàn 佔 means "seize; occupy; take over".
Overall, the translation is not bad. In fact, it sounds rather eloquent, if not elegant. The unnaturalness of the translation stems from the insertion of the pronount "your", which is not in the Chinese. The English needs something to tell us which / whose seat is being wrongly occupied. It's "someone else's", not "your". This happens on trains all the time too (see here).
Selected readings
- "Gentle reminder for women who approach the cenotaph of Genghis Khan" (8/4/22)
- "Beginning of the Semester Blues" (9/5/10)
- "Taiwan Railways Administration logo" (12/30/18)
- "Chicken hegemon" (12/2/21)
[Thanks to Yuanfei Wang]
GF said,
September 3, 2022 @ 3:09 am
I believe this is actually the "correct" translation, and is standard in Hong Kong libraries. The phenomenon it's addressing is students keeping their personal items, such as laptops, in place at desks in the library whilst they erstwhile go elsewhere, e.g. to eat lunch. This leads to no desks being available all day to students who don't "occupy" any seats early in the morning.
Victor Mair said,
September 3, 2022 @ 6:22 am
Thank you, GF. I suppose that makes sense even for the canteen, where people would normally be expected to come and go all day long.
Bathrobe said,
September 3, 2022 @ 6:25 am
GF's comment makes sense. It seems to be a common practice in a lot of places.
How to translate 霸佔 is another question. It could be translated as "hog", but I'm not sure it would convey the correct meaning to an English speaker.
Jonathan Smith said,
September 3, 2022 @ 7:16 am
Hmm, English seems challenged here… people appear to use 'claim' and 'save', often in quotes, in online discussions of holding parking spaces with chairs, beach chairs with books, etc… but yeah this sign should definitely read 'claim seats' or the like, not 'your seat'
Scott P. said,
September 3, 2022 @ 9:13 am
The phenomenon it's addressing is students keeping their personal items, such as laptops, in place at desks in the library whilst they erstwhile go elsewhere, e.g. to eat lunch.
Is theft not a problem?
yw said,
September 3, 2022 @ 9:29 am
Somehow, this reminds me of "occupy wall street," "occupy central"…
Ellen K. said,
September 3, 2022 @ 9:48 am
I don't think the wording works, even after reading GF's explanation. If it's their seat, why can't they keep their stuff there? The issue is it's not their seat; not a seat where they can just leave their stuff. And occupying their seat, that is, sitting in it, isn't the problem, it's putting stuff in a seat when not occupying it. (Occupy is not the right word, to my mind, for leaving stuff in a seat one's not sitting in. I might occupy a pair of seats, sitting in one and putting my stuff in the other, but I'm not occupying a seat my stuff is in. My stuff is occupying it.)
Andrew McCarthy said,
September 3, 2022 @ 5:25 pm
I think Ellen K. hits upon an important point – in the situation GF described, the seats are actually *unoccupied*, but people are using items to occupy them by proxy.
A better wording in that case might be "Please do not leave items in unoccupied seats" or "items unattended in empty seats".
Jonathan Smith said,
September 3, 2022 @ 5:59 pm
other relevant actual English usages from online include "to stake out" seats with belongings, as well as the clever 'move your feet, lose your seat'… a sign could of course simply read 'do not leave personal items unattended', but to name the problem I guess 'personal items left to claim seats will be confiscated' or some such
Peter Grubtal said,
September 4, 2022 @ 2:51 am
At the risk of derailing things into pedantry, I miss "do not try to reserve seats..".
UK travellers might be reminded of the great beach towel international conflict.
junkcharts said,
September 10, 2022 @ 2:01 pm
I like Bathrobe's suggestion of "don't hog your seat" as the closest to the intended meaning, and most concise. However, they may be worried that some people may not know the word "hog". "Hog" cannot be used without a sense of malice while "occupy" can be neutral.
When I first read "don't occupy your seat", it sounds very unnatural, as the seat does not belong to the person. However, when I imagine standing in front of someone who's been sitting there for half a day, telling the person "please don't occupy your seat [for the entire day]" makes sense!
The "gentle advice" title is important because a less gentle notice would have said "Each person is entitled to one hour of usage."