Why Multilingual LA Is Perfect for the Olympics (& Voice-Over Too!)

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Los Angeles is so ready for the Olympics. Yes, the Games won’t be until 2028, and there are several logistical obstacles to overcome before then. But LA is in a position to be a great host city, in part because of its demographic make-up. In particular, the incredible linguistic diversity of the city and its surrounding county – which makes it a great place to record multilingual voice-over – will be a huge plus when it comes to putting on a global event.

This post will look at how Los Angeles’ multilingual population will be a huge asset to the 2028 Olympic Games.

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Los Angeles’ Olympic bid is unique in-and-of-itself

Los Angeles scored a great deal for the 2028 games. Not only does the city have an unusually long time to prepare, but it also got extra payments for the longer wait-time. Moreover, the International Olympic Committee agreed to an advance payment of $160 million for youth sports programs city-wide. Best of all, the city already has a lot of event infrastructure in place from the 1984 Olympics, and made reusing it part of the official bid – this is critical, since LA is pushing to expand its public transportation system substantially by the time the Games start, and funds will be needed for that.

Picture of park with people sitting in benches, lake and downtown Los Angeles skyline in the background, and a statue in the foreground.

Los Angeles has one other quality that makes it especially apt to host athletes and visitors from all over the world (and a great place for multimedia localization services) – that it is a worldwide hub for languages. Let’s look at what this means exactly.

1. Large number of bilingual residents

It’s difficult to overstate the linguistic diversity of Los Angeles. According to the United States Census, in 2016 there were 185 languages spoken at home in the Los Angeles metro area. Over half the metro population age 5 or older speaks a language other than English at home – which is also usually a marker of relative fluency. On top of that, almost a third of residents of Los Angeles County were born outside the US – meaning that this trend for bilingual fluency expands well beyond the city itself.

English is most commonly spoken, and Spanish follows with over 3 million speakers in the county. Chinese, Tagalog, Korean, Armenian, Vietnamese, Farsi, Japanese and Russian round out the top ten. But this doesn’t tell the whole story – for example, there are are nearly 8,000 native speakers of Urdu in the county, but this language is barely in the top thirty demographically.  This should give you an idea of the depth of LA’s linguistic diversity, and why it’s such a great hub for native-speaker, foreign-language voice talents.

2. High level of localization support already in place

California is the most linguistically diverse state in the nation, with 16 languages with over 100,000 speakers each. State and county laws require making government and service agency materials accessible to non-English speakers who are part of their intended audiences, so there is already a large infrastructure in place to support localization – which will be relied on to translate event and organizational materials for the Games. And naturally, the same interpreters who work for courts and state-wide events, as well as in-studio interpretation sessions, will be invaluable to successful visitor interactions and the smooth operation of the contests themselves.

3. Multimedia powerhouse

Finally, Los Angeles is a global hub for multimedia. It’s where dubbing was invented, after all. And, because of its large number of non-English speaking communities (and even expat communities), LA is home to scores of multilingual marketing agencies and localization production houses like JBI Studios.

In fact, marketing efforts for residents of Los Angeles and California already use transcreation regularly to reach out to different communities in the area. That’s just what companies need to do to compete for customers here. The 2028 Games will benefit hugely from this robust multilingual multimedia support, on everything from live broadcasts to merchandising, to online and social media video marketing.

Support for athletes and countries at the events

There’s one more way in which LA will be a great host city that shouldn’t be overlooked. Los Angeles – both the metro area and the county – is made up largely of recent or second-generation immigrants, with strong ties to their home countries. Remember that almost 1 in 3 current residents were born outside the US, after all. Although LA is expecting millions of visitors for the Games, the city itself already has large communities of fans to cheer on athletes from around the world – and all they’ll have to do to get to the events is take public transportation or brave the freeways. City officials are expecting massive, enthusiastic crowds at the 2028 Olympic Games – and given the linguistic diversity of the city, county and surrounding state, they have very good reason to do so.

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