Proceedings of the 17th Annual Conference of the European Association for Machine Translation

Proceedings of the 17th Annual Conference of the European Association for Machine Translation (EAMT

Translation, interpreting, cognition

Cognitive aspects of the translation process have become central in Translation and Interpreting Studies in recent years, further establishing the field of Cognitive Translatology. Empirical and interdisciplinary studies investigating translation and interpreting processes promise a hitherto unprecedented predictive and explanatory power. This collection contains such studies which observe behaviour during translation and interpreting. The contributions cover a vast area and investigate behaviour during translation and interpreting – with a focus on training of future professionals, on language processing more generally, on the role of technology in the practice of translation and interpreting, on translation of multimodal media texts, on aspects of ergonomics and usability, on emotions, self-concept and psychological factors, and finally also on revision and post-editing. For the present publication, we selected a number of contributions presented at the Second International Congress on Translation, Interpreting and Cognition hosted by the Tra&Co Lab at the Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz. Most of the papers in this volume are formulated in a particular constraint-based grammar framework, Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar. The contributions investigate how the lexical and constructional aspects of this theory can be combined to provide an answer to this question across different linguistic sub-theories

The way out of the box

Synopsis: Cognitive aspects of the translation process have become central in Translation and Interpreting Studies in recent years, further establishing the field of Cognitive Translatology. Empirical and interdisciplinary studies investigating translation and interpreting processes promise a hitherto unprecedented predictive and explanatory power. This collection contains such studies which observe behaviour during translation and interpreting. The contributions cover a vast area and investigate behaviour during translation and interpreting – with a focus on training of future professionals, on language processing more generally, on the role of technology in the practice of translation and interpreting, on translation of multimodal media texts, on aspects of ergonomics and usability, on emotions, self-concept and psychological factors, and finally also on revision and post-editing. For the present publication, we selected a number of contributions presented at the Second International Congress on Translation, Interpreting and Cognition hosted by the Tra&Co Lab at the Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz

Translation Theory and Practice

This book is compiled for students of English Department to help them understand about the basic of translation theory and practice. This book is a compilation of different popular translation books and some sources from the Internet. The theory is presented and followed by real-life practices and examples including with pictures and organized instructions (step-by-step). Therefore, students will not only understand the theory of translation, but also the practices of translation itself

A mathematics rendering model to support chat-based tutoring

Dr Math is a math tutoring service implemented on the chat application Mxit. The service allows school learners to use their mobile phones to discuss mathematicsrelated topics with human tutors. Using the broad user-base provided by Mxit, the Dr Math service has grown to consist of tens of thousands of registered school learners. The tutors on the service are all volunteers and the learners far outnumber the available tutors at any given time. School learners on the service use a shorthand language-form called microtext, to phrase their queries. Microtext is an informal form of language which consists of a variety of misspellings and symbolic representations, which emerge spontaneously as a result of the idiosyncrasies of a learner. The specific form of microtext found on the Dr Math service contains mathematical questions and example equations, pertaining to the tutoring process. Deciphering the queries, to discover their embedded mathematical content, slows down the tutoring process. This wastes time that could have been spent addressing more learner queries. The microtext language thus creates an unnecessary burden on the tutors. This study describes the development of an automated process for the translation of Dr Math microtext queries into mathematical equations. Using the design science research paradigm as a guide, three artefacts are developed. These artefacts take the form of a construct, a model and an instantiation. The construct represents the creation of new knowledge as it provides greater insight into the contents and structure of the language found on a mobile mathematics tutoring service. The construct serves as the basis for the creation of a model for the translation of microtext queries into mathematical equations, formatted for display in an electronic medium. No such technique currently exists and therefore, the model contributes new knowledge. To validate the model, an instantiation was created to serve as a proof-of-concept. The instantiation applies various concepts and techniques, such as those related to natural language processing, to the learner queries on the Dr Math service. These techniques are employed in order to translate an input microtext statement into a mathematical equation, structured by using mark-up language. The creation of the instantiation thus constitutes a knowledge contribution, as most of these techniques have never been applied to the problem of translating microtext into mathematical equations. For the automated process to have utility, it should perform on a level comparable to that of a human performing a similar translation task. To determine how closely related the results from the automated process are to those of a human, three human participants were asked to perform coding and translation tasks. The results of the human participants were compared to the results of the automated process, across a variety of metrics, including agreement, correlation, precision, recall and others. The results from the human participants served as the baseline values for comparison. The baseline results from the human participants were compared with those of the automated process. Krippendorff’s α was used to determine the level of agreement and Pearson’s correlation coefficient to determine the level of correlation between the results. The agreement between the human participants and the automated process was calculated at a level deemed satisfactory for exploratory research and the level of correlation was calculated as moderate. These values correspond with the calculations made as the human baseline. Furthermore, the automated process was able to meet or improve on all of the human baseline metrics. These results serve to validate that the automated process is able to perform the translation at a level comparable to that of a human. The automated process is available for integration into any requesting application, by means of a publicly accessible web service

Perceived and observed translational norms in biomedical translation in the contemporary Portuguese translation market : a quantitative and qualitative product- and process-oriented study

At the intersection of Descriptive Translation Studies and Social Sciences, this interdisciplinary, empirical, experimental and descriptive study addresses the question of ascertaining whether and to what extent translators’ decision-making processes are influenced by what translators believe to be the expectations of other agents, namely revisers and readers. Whereas preferences by translators have previously been described and explained in the literature, it is still unclear what revisers’ and readers’ translational preferences are and what expectations they have about translators and the translated text. In addition, there is still a lack of understanding about how translators translate, how translators think they should translate, and what translators believe to be the expectations of other translators, revisers, and readers. In order to address these issues, this study focuses on the distinction between observed and perceived norms in the translation of biomedical texts from English to European Portuguese in contemporary Portugal. It zooms in on preferences regarding source and target orientation in translation, comparing both the practice and beliefs of sixty agents with different roles and levels of experience: novice translators, experienced translators, revisers, and health professionals (representing the intended audience of the target text). In particular, the specific question which drives this research is: considering English to European Portuguese biomedical translation in the contemporary Portuguese market, are the observed translational norms and perceived translational norms of translators, revisers and readers similar or different regarding source and target orientation? Mainly informed by the metatheoretical, theoretical, and methodological discussions of Toury (1995, 2012), Hermans (1991; 1996; 1999a; 1999b; 2000), Bicchieri (2006, 2017a, and 2017b), and Rosa (2016c), norms and expectations emerge as a powerful descriptive tool in studying norm-governed behavior and specifically to capture and further understand the complexities of decision-making processes in translation. Based on an exploratory and preliminary case study, this dissertation first sets out to explore the practice of biomedical translation in Portugal to understand who the agents involved in biomedical translation are, what they do, what for, in what types of texts, with what function and for whom. To this end, a mixed corpus of 700,000 words of different text-types of medical and biomedical content translated from English to European Portuguese was analyzed, including e-mail exchanges between translators and project managers. This analysis shows that biomedical translation involves a complex structure of translation agents performing different translation tasks, among which revisers play a pivotal role. The most common text-type identified is instructional texts about medical devices aimed at health professionals. Following this preliminary assessment, for the main study, a mixed methodology based on quantitative and qualitative product- and process-oriented approaches was employed to study (i) thirty translations of an instructional text about a medical device intended for health professionals, (ii) the translational preferences of fifteen revisers and fifteen health professionals regarding the same instructional text, and (iii) the expectations of these translators, revisers, and health professionals about biomedical translation. The experiment involved eliciting data from fifteen novice translators and fifteen experienced translators asked to translate an instructional text. The data included keylogging and screen recording data, interim versions and target texts, and it was triangulated to produce an empirical description of translation phenomena of biomedical content. The data was analyzed in terms of (i) the translators’ translation problems, (ii) the corresponding observed translation solutions, and (iii) the source and target orientation of the solution types. In addition, the thirty translators, together with fifteen specialized revisers and fifteen health professionals, were asked to answer a questionnaire aimed at eliciting different types of beliefs and expectations to (i) analyze the translators’ expectations and perceptions about how they should translate and how other translators, revisers, and readers believe translators should translate, (ii) identify the revisers’ and health professionals’ translational preferences, and (iii) describe an elaborate network of beliefs and expectations affecting the translators’ decision-making processes that result from the interaction of several agents with different roles and levels of normative control, and (iv) to propose explanatory hypotheses for the identified translation phenomena. From the product analysis, the study found that (i) the novice and experienced translators opted for both source- and target-oriented translation solutions, while (ii) the revisers and health professionals opted for the most target-oriented translations. The most common target-oriented translation solutions (i.e., explicitation, implicitation, hyponymy/hypernymy, omission, addition, and other information changes) were also analyzed in terms of their textual function and potential motivations to propose explanatory hypotheses. From the process analysis, the comparison of the translators’ interim versions and final versions indicated that while (i) the novice translators proceeded from less source-oriented versions to more source-oriented ones, (ii) the experienced translators proceeded from more source-oriented versions to less source-oriented ones. From the analysis of the beliefs and expectations, the study found that (i) while the novice and experienced translators described the appropriateness of a translation using both source- and target-oriented criteria, (ii) the revisers and health professionals reported target-oriented criteria as the most important to describe the appropriateness of a translation. Overall, the novice and experienced translators’ behavior and expectations suggested initial norms of source and target orientation, revealing that aspects of both the source and target cultures and languages are valued. The analysis of the processes of the novice and experienced translators also suggested that there are other possible motivations for source and target orientation connected with (i) the number of translation problems and (ii) the time taken to translate the source text. Revisers’ and health professionals’ behavior and expectations suggested an initial norm of target orientation, revealing a higher valuation of the target culture, language, and prospective reader. The study also found that even though accuracy (a source-oriented criterion) is a common expectation among all agents, expectations regarding literal translation (source-oriented), transparency, and invisibility (target-oriented) are not shared by translators, revisers, and health professionals. By showing how perceptions and expectations about source and target orientation may influence translators’ textual regularities, the findings of this descriptive, target-oriented study add to our understanding of translational norms in general and in biomedical translation in particular. The main implications of this study are of four different types: theoretical, methodological, practical and didactic. This study raises theoretical implications that have a bearing on translational norms. In particular, it proposes a definition of translational norms that (i) allows for a distinction between object- and meta-level discourses (building on Rosa 2016c), (ii) explicitly includes the role of agents’ expectations as a driver of behavior, connoting what is considered appropriate and inappropriate (adapted from Bicchieri 2017a), and (iii) stresses the need to address different and sometimes conflicting perceptions of what is considered appropriate and inappropriate in a particular community. In addition, the study also offers methodological tools to address norms by proposing that translational norms can be further studied through the comparative analysis of a detailed taxonomy of beliefs, attitudes, and expectations elicited from different agents with various roles (adapted from Bicchieri 2017a). It also describes how translation problems can be identified based on keylogging and screen recording data through a fine-grained classification of translation units based on primary and secondary indicators of translation problems (building on Krings 1986; and Göpferich 2010b) in order to reconstruct the decision-making processes of the translator and, in particular, the methodological distinction between an interim solution and a consciously postponed decision. The described regularities and expectations expressed by the data also have implications for translation practice and translator training. The findings can be used to develop concrete solutions to address translation competence and best practices for the language industry. It is recommended that students should be specifically trained to raise self-awareness to monitor and assess, in their translation and revision decision-making processes, how their expectations about translation and their perceived expectations about revisers and readers can be related to their translation solutions. Given that communication between professional translators and revisers can be a factor for the distinct perceptions identified regarding expectations, best practices for peer feedback are also proposed. In addition, universities are called to action to promote communication among professional translators, revisers and readers in specialized domains, addressing at the same time the gap between academic work and the language industry.Posicionando-se na intersecção dos Estudos Descritivos de Tradução e das Ciências Sociais, o presente estudo interdisciplinar empírico-experimental aborda a questão da influência dos processos de tomada de decisão dos tradutores pelo que os tradutores acreditam ser as expectativas de outros agentes, nomeadamente se os processos dos tradutores são influenciados pelas expectativas das expectativas de outros tradutores, revisores e leitores e em que medida. Embora as preferências dos tradutores já tenham sido descritas e explicadas na literatura, as preferências tradutórias de revisores e leitores, assim como as suas expectativas referentes aos tradutores e ao texto traduzido, foram ainda pouco abordadas. Uma outra lacuna na literatura diz respeito a como os tradutores traduzem, como os tradutores pensam que deviam traduzir e o que os tradutores acreditam ser as expectativas de outros tradutores, revisores e leitores. Para abordar estas questões, o presente estudo centra-se na distinção entre as actuais normas observadas e as normas presumidas na tradução biomédica no par de línguas inglês-português europeu em Portugal. O foco recai sobre as preferências referentes às culturas e línguas de partida e chegada na tradução, comparando práticas e convicções de sessenta agentes com diferentes cargos e níveis de experiência: tradutores júnior, tradutores experientes, revisores e profissionais de saúde (em representação do público-alvo do texto de chegada). Assim, a questão que norteia esta investigação é: no contexto da tradução biomédica contemporânea no par de línguas inglêsportuguês europeu, serão as normas tradutórias observadas e presumidas de tradutores juniores e experientes, de revisores e de leitores relativamente às culturas e línguas de partida e chegada semelhantes ou diferentes? As normas e as expectativas, fundamentadas pelos debates metateóricos, teóricos e metodológicos principalmente de Toury (1995, 2012), Hermans (1991; 1996; 1999a; 1999b; 2000), Bicchieri (2006, 2017a, and 2017b) e Rosa (2016c), apresentam-se como uma ferramenta descritiva robusta para o estudo do comportamento regido por normas e, em particular, para descrever e aprofundar o conhecimento em relação às complexidades dos processos de tomada de decisão em tradução. Com base num estudo de caso exploratório e preliminar, a presente dissertação estabelece como primeiro objetivo explorar a prática de tradução biomédica em Portugal, de forma a compreender quem são os agentes envolvidos na tradução biomédica, o que fazem, com que objetivos, em textos de que tipo, qual a função dos mesmos e para quem. Neste sentido, foi analisado um corpus de 700 mil palavras de diferentes tipos de texto de conteúdos médicos e biomédicos traduzidos de inglês para português europeu, incluindo mensagens de correio eletrónico trocadas entre tradutores e gestores de projeto. Esta análise demonstra que a tradução biomédica involve uma rede complexa de agentes de tradução que levam a cabo diferentes tarefas tradutórias, nas quais os revisores desempenham um papel fundamental. O tipo de texto mais comum identificado é o texto instrutivo de dispositivos médicos dirigidos a profissionais de saúde. No seguimento desta avaliação preliminar, para o estudo principal foi adoptada uma metodologia mista com base em abordagens quantitativas e qualitativas do produto e processo, de forma a estudar (i) trinta traduções de um texto instrutivo de um dispositivo médico dirigido a profissionais de saúde, (ii) as preferências tradutórias de quinze revisores e quinze profissionais de saúde relativamente ao mesmo texto instrutivo e (iii) as expectativas destes tradutores, revisores e profissionais de saúde sobre a tradução biomédica. A experiência envolveu a elicitação de dados de quinze tradutores júnior e quinze tradutores experientes, a quem foi pedido que traduzissem o texto instrutivo. Os dados incluíram registo de movimentos no teclado do computador e gravação do ecrã, versões preliminares e textos de chegada; os mesmos foram triangulados de modo a possibilitar uma descrição empírica do fenómeno tradutório de conteúdos biomédicos. Os dados foram analisados em termos (i) dos problemas tradutórios dos tradutores, (ii) das correspondentes soluções de tradução observadas e (iii) da orientação dos tipos de solução para as culturas e línguas de partida e chegada. Estes trinta tradutores, conjuntamente com os quinze revisores especializados e quinze profissionais de saúde, foram também convidados a responder a um questionário com o objetivo de elicitar os diferentes tipos de convicções e expectativas, de forma a (i) analisar as expectativas e perceções dos tradutores sobre a forma como estes traduzem e como outros tradutores, revisores e leitores acreditam que os tradutores deviam traduzir, (ii) identificar as preferências tradutórias dos revisores e dos profissionais de saúde e (iii) descrever uma rede complexa de convicções e expectativas que afetam os processos de tomada de decisão dos tradutores e que resulta da interação entre vários agentes com diferentes cargos e níveis de controlo normativo (iv) para propor hipóteses explicativas referentes ao fenómeno de tradução identificado. Com base na análise do produto, o estudo concluiu que (i) os tradutores juniores e experientes optaram por soluções de tradução regidas pelas culturas e línguas de partida e chegada e (ii) os revisores e os profissionais de saúde optaram pelas traduções maioritariamente regidas pela língua e cultura de chegada. As soluções de tradução regidas pela cultura e língua de chegada (i.e., explicitação, implicitação, hiperonímia/hiponímia, omissão, adição e outras alterações de conteúdo) também foram analisadas quanto à sua função textual e potenciais motivações para propor hipóteses explicativas. Com base na análise do processo, a comparação entre as versões preliminares e os textos de chegada indicou que, embora (i) os tradutores juniores progredissem de versões menos orientadas para a partida para mais orientadas para a partida, (ii) os tradutores experientes progrediram de versões mais orientadas para a partida para menos orientadas para a partida. Com base na análise das convicções e das expectativas, o estudo concluiu que (i) enquanto os tradutores juniores e experientes recorreram a critérios regidos pelas culturas e línguas de partida e chegada para descrever a “correção” de uma tradução, (ii) os revisores e os profissionais de saúde indicaram critérios regidos pelas culturas e línguas de chegada como sendo os mais importantes para descrever a “correção” de uma tradução. Em suma, o comportamento e as expectativas dos tradutores juniores e experientes apontam para as normas iniciais de orientação para a cultura e língua de partida e de orientação para a cultura e língua de chegada, revelando assim uma valorização de aspetos de ambas as culturas e línguas. Também se apontam outras possíveis motivações para as orientações para as culturas e línguas de partida e de chegada baseadas na análise dos processos de tradutores juniores e experientes referentes (i) ao número de problemas de tradução e (ii) ao tempo empreendido para traduzir o texto de partida. O comportamento e as expectativas dos revisores e profissionais de saúde apontam para uma norma inicial regida pela cultura e língua de chegada, revelando uma valorização superior das culturas e línguas de chegada e do leitor prospetivo. O estudo concluiu também que embora a exatidão (um critério regido pela cultura e língua de partida) seja uma expectativa transversal a todos os agentes, as expectativas referentes à tradução literal (regida pela cultura e língua de partida), transparência e invisibilidade (regida pela cultura e língua de chegada) não são partilhadas pelos tradutores, revisores e profissionais de saúde. Ao descrever como as perceções e as expectativas referentes à regência das culturas e línguas de partida e chegada podem influenciar as regularidades textuais dos tradutores, as conclusões do presente estudo descritivo constituem um contributo para o aprofundamento do conhecimento sobre as normas tradutórias, em geral, e da tradução biomédica, em particular. As principais implicações do presente estudo são de quatro tipos: teóricas, metodológicas, práticas e pedagógicas. Ao nível teórico, este estudo propõe uma definição de normas tradutórias que (i) considera a distinção entre discursos ao nível objeto e ao nível meta (baseando-se em Rosa 2016c), (ii) inclui explicitamente o papel das expectativas dos agentes enquanto força motriz de comportamento, conotando o que se considera “correto” e “incorreto” (adaptado de Bicchieri 2017a) e (iii) enfatiza a necessidade de abordar perceções diferentes e, por vezes, contrárias em relação ao que é considerado como “correto” e “incorreto” numa comunidade específica. Além disso, o estudo apresenta também ferramentas metodológicas, propondo que o estudo das normas tradutórias possa ser aprofundado através da análise comparativa de uma classificação pormenorizada de convicções, atitudes e expectativas elicitadas de diferentes agentes com cargos diversos (adaptado de Bicchieri 2017a). Também descreve como os problemas tradutórios podem ser identificados com base em dados dos registos de movimentos no teclado do computador e gravação de ecrã através uma classificação detalhada das unidades de tradução baseada em indicadores primários e secundários de problemas tradutórios (adaptado a partir de Krings 1986 e Göpferich 2010b) para reconstruir os processos de tomada de decisão do tradutor e, mais especificamente, a distinção metodológica entre uma solução preliminar e uma decisão conscientemente adiada. As regularidades descritas e as expectativas expressas também têm implicações para a prática de tradução e para a formação de tradutores. Os resultados podem ser integrados na prática tradutória e na formação de tradutores, de forma a desenvolver soluções concretas para abordar as competências tradutórias e boas práticas na indústria das línguas. Recomenda-se que os estudantes sejam formados especificamente no sentido de se promover a consciencialização de modo a monitorizarem e avaliarem, nos seus processos de tomada de decisão de tradução e revisão, de que forma as suas expectativas sobre a tradução e as suas expectativas presumidas sobre os revisores e leitores têm impacto nas suas soluções de tradução. Dado que a comunicação entre tradutores profissionais e revisores pode contribuir para as perceções distintas identificadas relativamente às expectativas, também são propostas boas práticas para o feedback entre pares. Além disso, as universidades são chamadas a atuarem para promoverem a comunicação entre tradutores profissionais, revisores e leitores nos domínios especializados, contribuindo simultaneamente para colmatar o fosso entre as comunidades profissional e académica