As a native Russian speaker, I wouldn't translate "to walk the plank", 'cause there's no equal expression in Russian... In fact, there are lots of expressions/words that find no equivalent in two languages. For example, all the English phrasal verbs - there's no such concept in Russian. And it is not about one single word having no equivalent, it's about the hole concept!
However, it seems you've got everything right about "по профессии". But this meaning of "по" is not the most common. It's only used with profession, nationality, religion and may be translated roughly as "by". Just imagine some selection query from the database: query by profession. So the translation may look like asking a person "who are you by profession/nationality/religion/area of expertise?" As it looks like a query from some list of possible options.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2008-09-19 05:32 pm (UTC)In fact, there are lots of expressions/words that find no equivalent in two languages. For example, all the English phrasal verbs - there's no such concept in Russian. And it is not about one single word having no equivalent, it's about the hole concept!
However, it seems you've got everything right about "по профессии". But this meaning of "по" is not the most common. It's only used with profession, nationality, religion and may be translated roughly as "by". Just imagine some selection query from the database: query by profession. So the translation may look like asking a person "who are you by profession/nationality/religion/area of expertise?"
As it looks like a query from some list of possible options.