In recent years, machine translation technology has made significant strides, with major players in the tech industry investing heavily in developing advanced translation algorithms. Since its inception in the 1950s, machine translation (MT) has evolved significantly, with rule-based translation giving way to statistical MT and, most recently, neural Machine Translation.
While machine translation has made it easier and more efficient to translate large volumes of text, it is not without its limitations. Even the most sophisticated machine translation technology is still behind human translation in one crucial area: its inability to pick up on the idioms, cultural references, and nuances inherent to any language. This is where adding the human touch to machine translation becomes essential.
This blog will talk about the limitations of MT, the benefits, challenges, and best practices for giving MT a personal touch.
The Limitations of Machine Translation
Machine translation uses software algorithms to translate writing from one language to another. While this technology has expanded over the past few years, it has limitations.
One of its biggest challenges is that machine translation has difficulty comprehending context. For instance, the term “bank” can indicate several things based on the surrounding text.
“J’ai déposé mon argent à la banque” is French for “I deposited my money at the bank,” but “Je me suis assis sur la rive” is also a possible result of a machine translation of “I sat on the riverbank” (French for “I sat on the riverbank”). The word “bank” was translated incorrectly because the machine translation service did not fully grasp the context.
Idiomatic language and cultural references are particularly difficult for machine translation. There may not be a literal translation of these idioms into another language because they are specific to that language and culture. The English term “break a leg” means “good luck,” yet the precise translation into another language would be absurd.
Benefits of Employing a Combination of Machine & Human Translation
Here are a few benefits of adding the human touch to Machine Translation.
Readability
Adding human review to machine translation also boosts readability. It is not uncommon for machine translations to sound strange and be challenging to read. Having a human translator proofread and modify the content guarantees a fluent and straightforward translation.
Cultural Sensitivity
Some cultural nuance may be lost in translation when employing a machine. Human review guarantees cultural accuracy and sensitivity in the translated text. A human translator will make sure the text makes sense to its target audience by adapting it to their culture.
Increased Accuracy in Translation
Machine translations give you a sense of what a document, message, etc., is about and what it means at a basic level. However, culture impacts language, and translation machines cannot account for cultural nuance.
Professional translators are fluent in both languages, know the context when selecting words, and can spot slang, jargon, and idioms. They make decisions based on their discretion and judgment. So, a human touch adds a further degree of interpretation and comprehension.
Thus, the human touch is required to ensure that translations are accurate and true to the original meaning. Machine Translation algorithms sometimes miss the mark regarding local understanding and cultural context, but human translators can make up for it.
Cost Savings
The cost-effectiveness of Machine Translation is one of its primary benefits. Companies can balance savings and quality by incorporating human editors into the MT workflow. By editing the Machine Translation output in a timely and cost-effective manner, human editors can minimize the requirement for full human translation.
Natural-Sounding Translations
It is common for translations made by machine translation algorithms to sound stilted or artificial. Human translators have the unique ability to create translations that read as though a human originally authored them.
Challenges of Adding the Human Touch to Machine Translation
Here are a few challenges of adding the human touch to Machine Translation.
Finding the Right Balance
Finding the sweet spot between human involvement and automation is essential when integrating machine translation into human editing workflow. Costs and turnaround time for translations can rise with too much human involvement, while quality can suffer from too little.
Maintaining Consistency
Consistency issues arise when human editors are integrated into the MT process. There could be vocabulary, style, and tone errors if numerous human editors worked on the translation.
Finding Skilled Translators and Editors
Locating competent translators and editors who are conversant in both languages and the subject matter at hand can be difficult. Professional translators and editors are required for the translations to be accurate and of high quality.
Best Practices for Adding the Human Touch to MT
Here are the best practices for adding the human touch to machine translation.
Use a Hybrid Approach
According to research conducted by Common Sense Advisory Services, businesses that combine machine translation with human post-editing saw a reduction in per-word costs of 30-40% and an increase in translation volumes of 50-70%.
A hybrid translation strategy uses the best features of both machine translation (MT) and human translation. In this strategy, Machine Translation is employed initially, then human review and correction are implemented. This method speeds up the translation process without sacrificing quality while reducing costs.
Use Consistent Terminology
Quality and accuracy in translations depend on translators using a shared lexicon. All translations will be more accurate and consistent if you use the same terminology throughout. A company can build and manage its own terminology database for use by MT algorithms and human editors.
Invest in Skilled Translators and Editors
To guarantee the precision and quality of translations, investing in trained translators and editors is essential. Businesses would do well to put in the time and effort required to find and educate competent translators and editors with subject and language pair expertise.
Use Style Guides and Guidelines
Consistency and accuracy in translations are impossible without style rules and guidelines. Organizations must create and update style standards to ensure all translations have the same language, tone, and general style.
Post-Editing
A study by SDL found that post-editing can reduce translation costs by up to 40% while maintaining translation quality.
Post-editing evaluates and modifies machine-translated information to increase its quality, readability, and accuracy. A skilled translator with knowledge of both the source and destination languages can do this. Depending on the requirements of the task at hand, post-editing might be performed on a sentence-by-sentence basis or on a more global scale.
Conclusion
Although machine translation has come a long way in recent years, some problems can only be fixed with human knowledge. Machine translation can be improved by incorporating human review to ensure it is accurate, understandable, and respectful of the target culture.
The human touch can be added to machine translation in several ways, such as post-editing, translation memory, human-assisted machine translation, terminology management, and quality assurance. Each of these approaches has unique value, and all of them can be appropriate depending on the specifics of a given project.
There will be more and more chances for human and machine translators to work together in the future as machine translation technology advances. The trick is finding a happy medium between the various methods so that we can produce translations that are both fast and accurate.
Transform Your Machine Translation Experience with Translation Source
The ultimate goal of incorporating human review into machine translation is to produce works that accurately reflect the original text’s meaning, tone, and linguistic accuracy. To accomplish this, one must have a comprehensive grasp of not just the languages involved but also the target audience and the intended purpose of the translation.
Looking for a trustworthy translation service that recognizes the importance of the human element in machine translation? Translation Source can help. Our experienced linguists and translators have years of experience creating sector-specific translations that are accurate and respectful of the target culture.
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