ABOUT ME

Hi, my name is Qianxue Jin (金千雪). Welcome to my website.  

Growing up bilingual in Mandarin and Japanese, translating and thinking about languages have always been my second nature. However, it never came across my mind that I would make it my career. I majored in Philosophy for my undergraduate education at Mount Holyoke College, dreaming to be a philosopher (Actually, I still want to be one). It was when I became a language assistant for the Japanese program that I started to immerse myself into the Japanese language and literature, and eventually declared East Asian Studies (with a focus on Japanese studies) as my second major. This decision brought me back to Japan as an exchange student in the Japan Women’s University, where ignited my passion for translation. 

The literary translation course I took there, translating several pieces of stories from English to Japanese, changed how I perceived translation. When I was little, “translating” was just a fun game for me; I loved to think or repeat what I said from one to the other language, and I was excited whenever I found the most appropriate and natural expressions. I realized later, however, that translation is much more than a little game that I entertained myself; It requires precision, creativity, and a profound understanding of cultural context, and being bilingual would not spontaneously make me qualified as a translator/interpreter. 

I decided to further my education, and in the summer of 2022, I received my MA degree in Translation and Interpretation at Middlebury Institute of International Studies with a language pair of English and Japanese. This rigors program has enabled me to explore the field of translation and interpretation with professionalism. 

Currently, I’m working as a Japanese instructor at Mount Holyoke College and also as a freelance translator/interpreter.