Bilingual Weddings / where to start?

[BB78910]

Hi all, does anyone have experience in having a bilingual wedding? DHTB and I are from different countries and have some family that will not understand English. Has anyone hired a translator? What did that look like on the day? Someone says a sentence in one language then pauses for the translation? Wedding invitations in both languages or some in English some in the other language?

Hi OP my DB & SIL had a bilingual wedding. Her siblings and some close friends from her home country are fluent in English so were able to translate for the non-English speakers.

It was a few years ago so can’t remember exactly how they did it. I think one friend translated part of the service, so the minister said a line, friend translated, and so on. Then her siblings took turns reading out the vows in the native language after the couple had said them to eachother in English. It flowed quite well, people who are used to translating can do it smoothly without leaving any silent pauses.

Invitations I think they sent in English to guests from UK and then in SILs native language to guests from her home country.

In Hindu ceremonies either the priest or his assistant will translate the prayers from sanskrit to English and prayers will be provided with translatoons for other languages on the day

But it can often be a waste of time and money as nobody really pays attention.

I had a bilingual wedding and some family members didn't understand the other language. Wedding was in the non-English speaking country. We did a few things:

• We had a translator who had an English translation of the service and read it out. They did a sentence at a time.
• We had two speeches, one person knew both languages so read out both. The other person only knew English and my friend translated on the fly.
• I created these cute little booklets 'Wedding dictionary' with common phrases, hello, my name is, do you want to dance etc.. that were a hit and people had a lot of fun with them. Great way for people to bond and not feel silly over not knowing the other language. Both our families are super friendly so that helped as well.

Also, our invites and directions, wedding programme - everything was in both languages.

Oh and once everyone was drunk it really didn't matter what language anyone spoke 😂

We had a bilingual wedding, sort of. We got married outside the U.K. The official stood there and said it in the local language and then the official translator translated it.

When my DB married a bilingual Spanish/Catalan girl, the service was in Spanish at the Ajuntamenta. Those English who didn't speak any Castellano had to muddle through, but it was fairly clear what was happening! The reception was fine...

The ceremony part of my wedding was in Hebrew. I sent the non-Hebrew speaking guests a guide to what would be said, and they seemed to enjoy it despite not understanding every word.

I went to a wedding that was in Latin. There was a paper translation handed out so guests could follow along.

Yes we did. We just did bits in each language, no translation.
About 50% of the guests understood both languages.
I have also been to a wedding abroad which was all in a language I didn't understand- I had no issues with this, wouldn't have occurred to me to expect a translation. There was a lot of music which was nice

Just to add this was during the ceremony. Reception and speeches were bilingual or all English in both cases.
Invitations were bilingual

My cousin married a Dutchman in a country where French is the language.
Most Dutch speak English, so it wasn't a matter of having to translate. The ceremony was conducted in French though, and they had a translation in the order of service. For the speeches my cousin learned enough to give hers mostly in Dutch to show effort - they would have understood it if she'd done it in English.
I recently attended a Sikh funeral and it would have been most helpful if the family had done an order of service for that, as many did not know Punjabi. It would have helped to know the reason behind some of the traditions too.
I think as an attendee a written translation would suffice at a wedding. And if I don't understand half the speeches? Well not that bothered.

I'm an interpreter, and did the honours at a marriage registration appointment at the register office and then at the bilingual wedding itself. Interpreted the standard ceremony consecutively sentence by sentence.

The bride and groom sent me their own (very long) vows in advance, and I translated the Word docs and just read them out on the day.

It was such an honour to do that :)

I think it depends on the type of wedding. I've been to catholic weddings (and indeed funerals) conducted in other languages but because you kind of know what's happening, it doesn't matter too much. A bit like going to a Latin mass or something. If it's something more personal, then I guess having a translator might be useful but I tend to pay not very much attention to the bits of the wedding service that aren't the actual 'I do' moments so I may not even notice much.

We went to a bilingual wedding. Invitations were sent in the language of the recipients. The service was in the language mainly spoken by the bride and groom as it's their ceremony. Quite informal so no speeches.

And yes, ideally the person speaks and then pauses for the interpreter to translate.
PM me with any questions if you like (am Down Under atm though).

I've been to a few bilingual weddings on account of having a lot of family in another country. I don't think the service is too important translation-wise because everyone will be more or less able to follow what is happening. For the service focus on the basic ceremony + music, try to avoid long readings or sermons. Ime invitations are usually in both languages.

For the reception the most successful way I've seen it done was to hand out physical copies of translations of speeches. I've never seen an interpreter at a wedding but I don't see why it wouldn't work!

Some ideas that transcend language are music, dancing, photographs of the couple (good if they can be used as adjuncts to speeches, or just on photo walls)... basically try to focus on things that don't rely heavily on shared language.

We went to a bloody brilliant trilingual wedding recently - Bride Polish/English & Groom Welsh
/English They had translators for the trilingual ceremony and it was fantastic - and the after party was incredible!

Thank you all for your replies! Some really great responses.

We are planning the wedding abroad (in the country where the other language is spoken) but majority of our guests will be English which adds a layer of complexity! We are doing so mainly because of cost (more for your money) as well as mobility as the other country's guests are mostly elderly hence the translator idea - younger generation mostly speak English to an extent.

For the benefit of DHTB (English speaking) the ceremony should be led in English but I don't even know if that is possible with the officiant being from the country the ceremony will take place 😅 that I will definitely research myself.

I have seen a company that does all translations - from legal documents through to ceremony and even one to one conversations between guests which I love. I'd really love my grandparents to be able to finally have a proper conversation with DP.

If costs are too high when I eventually enquire, I do like the idea of the speeches and vows etc being handed on nice card...

We had a bilingual wedding in my home country. Fortunately, the priest also spoke English so he combined both.
We printed out the whole service, with the readings in both languages, so people would be able to follow. We had readings in English and in Spanish.
Speeches were in the language the person spoke, my husband said a few words in Spanish and I did a speech in both languages.

My husbands parents have a limited understanding of English so we printed out the entire service in their language with notes/cues so they knew where they were if they got confused. But there was only a small number of people from his family at our wedding in the UK and the majority spoke English fluently so it didn't really make sense (especially on our limited budget) to have a translator.
At the wedding party in his home country it was mostly his language but key points were also announced in English (but again only me & my parents there so not much point to translate everything when it wasn't even very interesting lol)
I went to his brothers wedding in his home country and almost fell asleep because I was jetlagged and it was an insanely long catholic service in a language I'm not fluent in. They had the full service printed but in the same language so I was just trying to follow it avidly by reading it to keep myself awake so bare that in mind if you can't translate much then try to keep the ceremony/speeches as short as possible to spare those who don't understand!

We got married in Italy where church weddings have to contain at least the civil ceremony, then you can add what you and the priest want from the religious POV.

So we had two Italian witnesses (uncle and his partner) for DH and my DBro and SIL. They walked up the aisle before us and were at our side during the ceremony.

We had the same Bible reading in both languages, no hymns just music, the priest did his bit and the Italian witnesses signed the civil register with us.
Sorted.