Translation and technology: the new specialized translator

1
Translation and technology the new specialized
translator

• Dr. Anna Aguilar-Amat, anna.aguilar-amat_at_uab.es
• http//cc.uab.es/terminologia/aguilar.html
• Translation and Interpretation Department
• http//www.uab.es/dep-traduccio-interpretacio/
• Autonomous University of Barcelona

2
Index

• Catalonia and Translation Studies development
• The tools BACO as an example
• The new professional education

3
Part I

• Catalonia and Translation Studies development

4
The case of Catalonia

• Geographic situation North-East of Spain
• First industrial area of the state
• Opressed language since XV century until 1975
  (end of Francos dictatorship)
• Autonomous region (- federalism) within the
  nowadays democracy (14 autonomies in the whole of
  Spain)

5
Catalan Universities

• Girona, Lleida, Tarragona, Palma de Mallorca,
  Castelló, València, Vic
• Barcelona (capital) 6 universities
• Universitat de Barcelona
• Universitat Politècnica
• Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
• Universitat Pompeu Fabra
• Ramon Llull (private)
• Universitat a Distància

6
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona - UAB

• Public University founded in 1968
• 14 Schools and Faculties
• 50 Departments
• Several research Institutes
• Two UNESCO chairs in Peace Studies and
  Communication Studies
• 2500 professors, 1500 administrative and
  technical staff, 35000 undergraduate students,
  6000 postgraduate students

7
Translation market

• English as a target language other cultures
  literatures (10 ) -preserving exotic features
• Spanish as a target language scientific and
  technical translation (90) -lack of terminology
• Catalan as a target language administrative
  texts (60 ) -double lack of terminology

8
Facultat de Traducció i dInterpretació - FTI

• Founded in 1993. EUTI (Escola Universitária,
  University School) since 1972.
• Over 90 professors
• 11 languages Catalan, Spanish, English, French,
  German, Portuguese, Italian, Russian, Arabic,
  Japanese, Chinese.
• Specialization in Conference Interpreting. In
  project Audiovisuals and New Technologies.
• Exchange of students (over 600 go and 600 come
  every year through SOCRATES)

9
FTI Research Lines I

• Theoretical Studies
• Translation Paradigms (theoretical models from
  any point of view -linguistic, communicative,
  ideological, psychological, cognitive)
• Interaction between cultures
• Sociolinguistics and the case of minoritized
  languages

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FTI Research Lines II

• Applied Studies
• On the product (critical tools, historical
  analysis, typologies literary translation,
  specialized translation, software localization)
• On the process (empiric tools on the translator
  competence acquisition, Thinking Aloud Protocols
  -TAP)
• Translation and Technology (audio-visual
  translations, knowledge engineering,
  assisted-machine translation, assisted language
  learning, software localization)

11
Postgraduate studies on Translation and New
Technologies (TNT) at UAB

• 1998-1999, 1999-2000
• (48 hours) modular TNT-1 and TNT-2
• Advanced text edition
• Internet for translators
• Data bases
• Assisted Translation and Translation Memories
• Software Localisation
• 2000-2001
• (195 hours) TNT new diploma

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Tools

• Online dictionaries and encyclopedias
• Terminology and Knowledge bases
• Document bases (digital libraries)
• Translation memories
• Aided-Machine Translation Systems
• Assisted language learning programs
• Software localization tools

13
Interdisciplinarity of Translation

• Anthropology
• Psychology
• Cognitive Science
• Literature
• Linguistics
• Knowledge Engineering
• Documentation
• Technology

14
Technology on the Translation Academic Scope

• Applications
• Using corpora (subject-oriented parallel texts,
  translated texts) information extraction,
  statistics calculus and validation.
• Corpora from Internet new parameters on text
  theory, knowledge architecture, textual typology
• Expert Translation memories, with information on
  the text structure (i.e. contract shapes)
• Conversion of second grade localisation
  difficulties

15
Related disciplines I Computational Linguistics
(NLP) Text analysis

• Textual typologies
• Distribution of information in the text
• Functionalism
• Fidelity versus Lack of fidelity
• Lexical sets and meaningful texts

16
Related disciplines II Sociolinguistics on
Translation

• Different cases, different policies
• International language (English)
• Technical languages (En, German, French)
• Major languages (Fr, De, En, Spanish, Chinese)
• Lesser-Used languages (Swedish, Norwegian)
• Minority/opressed languages (Basque, Catalan,
  Welsh)
• Colonised/opressed languages (Phulbe, Wolof,
  Nahuatl)

17
Part two

• The tools BACO as an example

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Terminology applied to translation

• Knowledge Engineering
• Equivalents
• Contrastive conceptology
• Normalization (minoritized languages)
• Normalization (international)
• Normalization (industrial sectors)

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BACUS (BAse de Coneixement UniverSitari)

• Onomasiological term set descriptions from
  scientific and technical fields, mainly
• Concept featurization
• - 7,000 concepts 30,000 forms (three or four
  equivalents per concept plus synonymous forms and
  variants)
• Source updated texts from the same register and
  level
• MultiTerm for Windows (TRADOS)

20
Methodology

• Students of the last course (-200 per year)
• 45 concepts per group of three people
• Domain free with expert assessment (an unexplored
  one or an already worked field enlargement)
• Narrow boundaries (ex. Southern New Mexico
  Cockroaches feeding habits)
• Conceptual scheme of the chosen level of
  specifity (conceptual field tree)
• Work on MultiTerm demo version

21
Philosophical criteria

• Conceptual relativity
• Grammar exclusion
• Knowledge atomization
• Conceptual navigation networks

22
Conceptual relativity

• Hanunoo marara
• English brown specific
• English red specific
• English orange specific

English brown Hanunoo marara generic
English red Hanunoo marara generic
English orange Hanunoo marara generic
23
Grammar Exclusion

• Items can be a phrase or a chunk or a terminology
  collocation or a simple term and have any of
  these things as an equivalent
• Verbs and predicative nouns are considered
  conceptual synonymous
• Part of speech marked when it isnt a noun
• Gender marked when fixed, opened in the other
  cases

24
Knowledge atomization and Conceptual navigation

• Logical relations
• Ontological relations
• Infra-logical relations
• Ana-logical relations
• Supra-logical relations
• Argument relations

25
Logical relations

• Equivalents (attributes generic, specific,
  similar sense)
• Synonyms (indexed)
• Quasi-synonyms
• Antonyms
• Hiperonyms
• Hiponyms

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Ontological relations

• Whole/Part
• Cause/Effect
• Etymology
• Coordinated with

27
Infra-logical relations

• Location
• Material
• Shape
• Colour
• Previous/Subsequent
• Producer/Product
• Transmitter/Receiver
• Instrument

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Ana-logical relations

• Metaphor
• en continous mining machine
• es minador continuo
• es oruga (caterpillar) metaphor
• Metonymy
• es picasso (painting) metonymy

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Supra-logical relations I

• Relevance
• en fox
• Domain Mammalian feeding habits
• Relevance hen
• en fox
• Domain Industry
• Relevance fur

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Supra-logical relations II

• Salience
• es zorro m (fox)
• Domain (any)
• Salience astucia (guile)
• en fox
• Domain (any)
• Salience craft
• Salience slack

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Argument Relations(Noun/Process collocations)

• Argument of / Object
• en astigmatism argument of correct, to
• en kick, to object ball
• Agent of / Agent
• en contracting state agent of adoption
• en whinny agent horse
• Benefactive
• en prednisolone benefactive asthmatic process
• Used for
• en oil used for fry

32
Field boundaries on BACO puzzle

• Domain (maximal)
• Work-title (minimal)
• UNESCO codification (international
  classification)
• Conceptual Location (branch on the conceptual
  tree)

33
Part III

• The new professsional education

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The specialized translator

• Expert clients
• Searching, building, applying resources
• Taking decisions as a linguistic mediator

35
Expert clients

• Industrials
• Scientists
• Translation Agencies

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Industrials translation needs

• Export/import
• Relationship with European Community and other
  Administrations
• Manpower at third countries
• Mail and other docs (user manuals, technitian
  manuals, contracts), publicity

37
Industrial distrust on translators

• Specilized concepts and terminology lacks
• Ignorance on the knowledge field
• Lack of fitting criteria
• So industrials self-translate with negative
  effects on language

38
Academic solutions

• Student/expert close-up
• Training on pseudo-expertise
• Logic tools for representation
• Free data bases without grammatical restrictions

39
Scientists needs

• International communication with other experts
• Publishing in well known scientistic reviews with
  strict editorial rules on formal questions

40
Technology and the new professional

• Working in an agency free-lance translators as a
  team on the same project
• Text becomes a non-lineal unit that needs a
  post-edition process
• The coordinator has the responsability on
  coherence and cohesion
• Sharing data and criteria terminology,
  translation memories, typographic criteria, style

41
The new professional education

• Translators as communicators more than a second
  author
• Combining both humanistic and technical
  education
• Acquiring technical skills as postgraduate
  training?
• Reducing subjects like language, theory or
  culture?
• One year enlargement of the degree?

42
Searching, building, applying resources I

• Searching through Internet using booleans to
  reduce time
• Own resources data base designs
• Translation Memories Transit (Star), Workbench
  (Trados), Dejà Vu (Atril-Ampersand), Translator
  Manager (IBM)

43
Searching, building, applying resources II

• Target texts information recovery
• Lexical information retrieval, terminological and
  atributive collocations (Word Smith Tools)

44
Taking decisions as a linguistic mediator

• Specilized final work
• Respecting technical idiosincrasy
• Taking care of the natural system structures and
  coherence
• Fitting general criteria about calcs and loans to
  concrete cases
• Being in touch with planification organisms
  (http//www.termcat.es)

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Fitting examples

• air-bag -gt coixí de seguretat (bossa daire,
  globus, bossa de seguretat) - afinitat amb
  cinturó de seguretat
• carpintería metálica -gt tancaments metàllics
  (fusteria metàllica -matèries primeres
  paradoxals)
• oil press -gt almàssera -gt premsa doli
  (matització conceptual)

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More on sociolinguistics of translation careless

• English text (NMSU laundry, drinkable water
  machine)
• Center gallon container on top shelf
• Note gallon 3785 l

• Spanish translation (NMSU laundry, drinkable
  water machine)
• Centro galon contenido sobre la repisa
• Correct translation
• Centre el contenedor de un galón sobre la repisa
• contenedor/recipiente o garrafa

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More on sociolinguistics of translation too much
care

• DIN 820, page 1 (Deutsches Institut fur Normung -
  German Standards Institute)
• Standardization is the planned unification of
  material and immaterial objects which the
  interested parties carry out for the benefit of
  the public. In no circumstances should it be in
  response to a desire for individual profit.
  Standardization promotes rationalization and the
  guarantee of quality in the economy, science and
  administration. It is at the service of human and
  material safety and the improvement of quality in
  all aspects of life. It also serves to establish
  a reasonable order, to facilitate information in
  the respective areas subject to standardization.

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More on Sociolinguistics of Translation
translators lexical choices

• Conceptual purism
• False friends, Dis-collocation, Semantic
  distorsion, Conceptual paradox, Contamination,
  Doubling metaphors, Conceptual-Etymological lost
• Market oriented choices
• Inter-español, International English
• One-way enterprises

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Examples I

• False friend
• en school of fish -gt es escuela de peces
• banco de peces
• Dis-collocation
• en domestic flight -gt es vuelo doméstico
• vuelo nacional /(internacional), vuelo interno
• Syntax-semantics distortion
• en science fiction -gt es ciencia ficción
• ficción científica
• Conceptual paradox
• es carpintería metálica -gt ca fusteria
  metàl.lica
• tancaments metàl.lics

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Examples II

• Contamination
• es perro suelto -gt ca gos suelto
• gos aviat
• Doubling metaphors
• en light pen -gt es pluma linterna (Mex),
  lápiz óptico (Esp)
• lector óptico
• Conceptual -Etimological lost
• en sign -gt es firmar -gt ca signar -gt firmar

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Market oriented choices

• International languages
• en strikebreaker, es esquirol (Spain), es
  rompehuelgas (Latin-America)
• en celule, es teléfono móvil (Spain), es
  célula (Latin-America)
• One way enterprises
• en file, es archivo (Microsoft), es fichero
  (IBM)