A Study on Techniques and Challenges in Sign Language Translation

Sign Language Translation (SLT) plays a pivotal role in enabling effective communication for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) community. This review delves into the state-of-the-art techniques and methodologies in SLT, focusing on its significance, challenges, and recent advancements. The review provides a comprehensive analysis of various SLT approaches, ranging from rule-based systems to deep learning models, highlighting their strengths and limitations. Datasets specifically tailored for SLT research are explored, shedding light on the diversity and complexity of Sign Languages across the globe. The review also addresses critical issues in SLT, such as the expressiveness of generated signs, facial expressions, and non-manual signals. Furthermore, it discusses the integration of SLT into assistive technologies and educational tools, emphasizing the transformative potential in enhancing accessibility and inclusivity. Finally, the review outlines future directions, including the incorporation of multimodal inputs and the imperative need for co-creation with the Deaf community, paving the way for more accurate, expressive, and culturally sensitive Sign Language Generation systems

English/Arabic/English Machine Translation: A Historical Perspective

This paper examines the history and development of Machine Translation (MT) applications for the Arabic language in the context of the history and machine translation in general. It starts with a discussion of the beginnings of MT in the US and then, depending on the work of MT historians, surveys the decline of the work on MT and drying up of funding; then the revival with globalization, development of information technology and the rising needs for breaking the language barriers in the world; and last on the dramatic developments that came with the advances in computer technology. The paper also examined some of the major approaches for MT within a historical perspective. The case of Arabic is treated along the same lines focusing on the work that was done on Arabic by Western research institutes and Western profit motivated companies. Special attention is given to the work of the one Arab company, Sakr of Al-Alamiyya Group, which was established in 1982 and has seriously since then worked on developing software applications for Arabic under the umbrella of natural language processing for the Arabic language. Major available software applications for Arabic/English Arabic MT as well as MT related software were surveyed within a historical framework.Cet article examine l’histoire et l’évolution des applications de la traduction automatique (TA) en langue arabe, dans le contexte de l’histoire de la TA en général. Il commence par décrire les débuts de la TA aux États-Unis et son déclin dû à l’épuisement du financement ; ensuite, son renouveau suscité par la mondialisation, le développement des technologies de l’information et les besoins croissants de lever les barrières linguistiques. Finalement, il aborde les progrès vertigineux réalisés grâce à l’informatique. L’article étudie aussi les principales approches de la TA dans une perspective historique. Le cas de l’arabe est traité dans cette perspective, compte tenu des travaux effectués par les instituts de recherche occidentaux et quelques sociétés privées occidentales. Un accent particulier est mis sur les recherches de la société arabe Sakr, fondée dès 1982, qui a mis au point plusieurs logiciels de traitement de langues naturelles pour l’arabe. Ces divers logiciels de TA arabe-anglais-arabe ainsi que des applications associées sont présentés dans un cadre historique

Machine Translation between Spoken Languages and Signed Languages Represented in SignWriting

This paper presents work on novel machine translation (MT) systems between spoken and signed languages, where signed languages are represented in SignWriting, a sign language writing system. Our work seeks to address the lack of out-of-the-box support for signed languages in current MT systems and is based on the SignBank dataset, which contains pairs of spoken language text and SignWriting content. We introduce novel methods to parse, factorize, decode, and evaluate SignWriting, leveraging ideas from neural factored MT. In a bilingual setup—-translating from American Sign Language to (American) English—-our method achieves over 30 BLEU, while in two multilingual setups—-translating in both directions between spoken languages and signed languages—-we achieve over 20 BLEU. We find that common MT techniques used to improve spoken language translation similarly affect the performance of sign language translation. These findings validate our use of an intermediate text representation for signed languages to include them in natural language processing research

TectoMT – a deep-­linguistic core of the combined Chimera MT system

Chimera is a machine translation system that combines the TectoMT deep-linguistic core with phrase-based MT system Moses. For English–Czech pair it also uses the Depfix post-correction system. All the components run on Unix/Linux platform and are open source (available from Perl repository CPAN and the LINDAT/CLARIN repository). The main website is https://ufal.mff.cuni.cz/tectomt. The development is currently supported by the QTLeap 7th FP project (http://qtleap.eu)

Polish Translation Studies in Action

Translation Studies has been in action in the Polish humanities since 1930s. The book gathers the most important contributions from Polish translation scholars working in the context of Literary and Cultural Studies as well as Linguistics. The essays offer insights into the conceptualisation of translation, stylistics and poetics, history and anthropology of translation. Most of them are made available in English for the first time. The editors’ introduction provides a panoramic backdrop for concepts, methodologies and applications. As part of the tendency to enlarge Translation Studies and include new contexts into its mainstream, this reader gives an overview of a rich area of translation scholarship from the centre of Europe, a crossroads of influences and traditions

Internet como factor central na tradução

Mestrado em Tradução EspecializadaThe main objective of this dissertation is to develop a guide for people who set about to carry out a translation. Nowadays, given the multitude of resources available online, translating a text has become much easier – one simply must know how to make the best of these resources. From my experience as a translator, I am aware of how valuable the discovery of a high-quality dictionary, glossary, or other resources can be both in attaining high quality translations and in expediting the processes, especially when it comes to performing a technical translation. I hope my work will help future and present translators in their professional lives.O objectivo principal deste trabalho é elaborar um guia para orientar as pessoas que se empenham em fazer uma tradução, quer ela seja de um texto oral ou escrito. Hoje em dia, face à grande quantidade de fontes de apoio à tradução disponíveis online, traduzir um texto torna-se muito mais fácil – mas é essencial saber como tirar o maior partido dessas fontes. Pela minha experiência como tradutor, sei o quanto a descoberta de um glossário, ou de um dicionário pode significar a diferença na qualidade final do produto de tradução e no tempo dispendido, especialmente quando se trata de uma tradução técnica, pois estes e outros instrumentos podem auxiliar e optimizar todo o trabalho de tradução

Quality aspects in institutional translation

The purpose of this volume is to explore key issues, approaches and challenges to quality in institutional translation by confronting academics’ and practitioners’ perspectives. What the reader will find in this book is an interplay of two approaches: academic contributions providing the conceptual and theoretical background for discussing quality on the one hand, and chapters exploring selected aspects of quality and case studies from both academics and practitioners on the other. Our aim is to present these two approaches as a breeding ground for testing one vis-à-vis the other. This book studies institutional translation mostly through the lens of the European Union (EU) reality, and, more specifically, of EU institutions and bodies, due to the unprecedented scale of their multilingual operations and the legal and political importance of translation. Thus, it is concerned with the supranational (international) level, deliberately leaving national and other contexts aside. Quality in supranational institutions is explored both in terms of translation processes and their products – the translated texts

Quality aspects in institutional translation

"The purpose of this volume is to explore key issues, approaches and challenges to quality in institutional translation by confronting academics’ and practitioners’ perspectives. What the reader will find in this book is an interplay of two approaches: academic contributions providing the conceptual and theoretical background for discussing quality on the one hand, and chapters exploring selected aspects of quality and case studies from both academics and practitioners on the other. Our aim is to present these two approaches as a breeding ground for testing one vis-à-vis the other. This book studies institutional translation mostly through the lens of the European Union (EU) reality, and, more specifically, of EU institutions and bodies, due to the unprecedented scale of their multilingual operations and the legal and political importance of translation. Thus, it is concerned with the supranational (international) level, deliberately leaving national and other contexts aside. Quality in supranational institutions is explored both in terms of translation processes and their products – the translated texts.