Chapter One
Electronic Translation Programs have being used widely since the technology revolution expanded and this way has advantages and disadvantages against the old ways of translation.
Translation is a very technical process which depends on conveying the meanings of a text from one language to another and this needs high professionalism because translation is not just turning the words from a language to another but there must be a preservation of semantics and features of the text in addition to forming the translated sentences in an understood way with the same literary style they were written in as in the original text. Translation is a process that depends on vocabulary understanding in addition to know how to form sentences and phrases correctly in the two languages used in translation so using dictionaries is a basis factor in the translation process. A dictionary could be defined as resources that provide the needed meanings of words, their origins, transcription, pronunciation, classifications as being parts of speech, antonyms and synonyms. A dictionary also provides examples of how words could be used differently in sentences and it provides words arranged according to the alphabetic order. There has been great changes in dictionaries throughout times and ages till there are today electronic dictionaries and electronic programs for translation or what is called Machine Translation (MT). Electronic dictionary is a kind of dictionaries which includes the same information that could be found in a paper dictionary but in a digital form and they can be accessed via the internet or saved on a CD or a DVD or any suitable computer hardware. It can be read or used on computers' software. The current research is discussing how electronic translation programs are used today for translation purposes and comparing it with human translation using paper dictionaries or electronic dictionaries mentioning the advantages and disadvantages of both methods.
Methodology
A: Hypothesis
Using electronic programs for translation became a phenomenon today. Such programs are found online easily and most of them are free which made people find it easy to use them even if the quality of translation is not as good as that of human translation. The use of electronic programs in translation was found to produce a translation output which is different from human translation in many aspects. The differences are in the lexical form of sentences, punctuation, phrases, semantics, structure of the output and in the mental outlook impression left on the translated texts. The prevalence of using electronic programs in translation does not mean that using such programs is not good but there are advantages and disadvantages for this. Many translators use electronic programs in translation and this is not a wrong thing but training on using such programs is very good and it makes the professional translator gets the utmost benefits of these electronic programs.
B: Sampling
Samples were collected from students in my college who are at level seven, they were gently asked to perform a task which will be helpful for this research as they were asked to translate some texts from English to Arabic. They were divided into two groups, the first group (group A) contained five students and the other group(group B) also contained five students, group A was delivered the three texts and paper dictionaries and was asked to translate, group B was delivered the same texts but with tablets that contained internet connection and they were asked to use google translate in their work. Time was calculated for each group.
Chapter Two
Using electronic programs for translation became one feature of today's world that depends mainly on technologies in everything. Today's world cannot do without the internet or computers, their software and applications but translation is a complicated process that humans are main factors in producing it properly.
The Reasons of Using Electronic Programs in Translation
There are many reasons for the prevalence of using electronic programs in translation by many people today among whom are professional translator, students who study English specifically and people who seek their work translated easily and cheaply. There are many reasons that make people of all kinds look for translation programs and electronic dictionaries to use them in purposes of translation, among these reasons are the following ones:
1-Internet Business
Due to the rapid movement of internet business today, business owners see that the English language is very important for them as people from all over the world can purchase items from any place in the world and most purchasing processes occur in English including banks transactions and other related matters which made business owners and also purchasers think of ways that enable them to use English easily even if they do not know anything about English, they find that it is easier to use a translation program to help them understand and do the translation of texts or perhaps whole sites to understand what they need on different websites and as their need of translation is not technical or professional, the use of such programs spread and it became common among youth and even aged people to log on any translation site and translate any text neglecting any defects that could be found in the output. You can find some websites which are translated to Arabic with sentences and words which are hard to be understood or with no relation to the site ,hence you understand that an electronic program was used to translate it as a whole. (Craciunescu, et al. ,2004).
2-The Desire for Reducing costs
Costs of human translation is usually high which lead people to search for other resources for translating their work such as google translate program, Babylon and others. They tend to get their work translated without paying extra money specially when the translation needed does not have to be perfect or terms are not used in it. Some businesses use electronic translation programs in addition to asking human translators according to the needed work as contracts and commercial papers cannot be well translated using electronic translation programs alone. The problem is that most people who seek electronic translation programs ask for human professionals in translation to retranslate the done papers by programs due to their lack of being convincing.
3- The Desire for Saving time
Some people use electronic translation programs to finish their translation tasks faster than if being given to human translators. People today are in need to save their time by any means specially those who work in business fields or in internet business so such programs sometimes help them save time and do tasks which are urgent in the business such as translating labels, cards, titles or other texts which are not very specialized.
4-Luxury life of today
Today most people live easy lives, they don't exert great efforts to watch a film for example or get a book, buy something from another country, make friends, talk to someone in a very far place in the world or even get a job as the communication revolution has changed many measurements of the past and made accessing to things easier than it was in past times, this attitude made people seek comfort and luxury life where everything is got easily and quickly. This theory can be applied to translation as most people think it is a difficult job to look up words into a dictionary and then consume more effort and time trying to form sentences in a new language rather than understanding the original text deeply and thoroughly to translate it properly. They go to electronic translation programs to make the translation task a more comfortable one.
5-Computer use
Using computers today became a phenomenon that made people and translators use PDF files and word documents to do the translation tasks they need and this way of using computer software instead of using paper documents made it easier to look up words in electronic dictionaries and use electronic programs to help them in the translation process and some people just put texts into the program and then wait to have them translated. Computer using which is prevailing everywhere around the world today helped increase the use of electronic translation programs.
6-Lack of Trust in Human Translators
Today's world is characterized with the lack of trust in general so most people think that human translators do nothing but using translation programs and then get paid for a work they did not make effort in so they try to do the translation by themselves as a result of their doubts in human translators' abilities and hard work.
7-The Availability of Electronic Translation Programs
Because it is not easy to find a human translator who is good at his or her work, people think it is easier to them to do translation tasks by themselves using the available electronic translation programs found on the internet and save the time wasted in finding a good translator then waiting to receive their texts translated.
Examples about Using Electronic Translation Programs
1-Using Google Translate Program
Using Google Translate program became very familiar and common today due to many reasons as even people who are not good at a specific language can do some translation with the help of this program. It is also used by students and teachers, even professional translator use it sometimes instead of traditional ways of translation and it has many advantages in fact. It is considered a free service available 24/7 provided for everyone in the world. This program can translate from about 80 languages to other different languages instantly and it also provides new services everyday such as adding the service of voice translation and adding a service of translating documents and large texts. Although the program has many advantages, it also has many disadvantages that limit its use by professionals and those who study languages academically. (Google, 2014)
2-CAT tools
Such electronic translation programs are usually used by professional human translators who are well trained on them for purposes of saving time and effort in addition to improving the translation quality. These tools depend on a system which keeps many things during the translation process a human translator is doing such as keeping translated terms, idioms and even full sentences and phrases that may be repeated within a text to be translated so this memory system helps a translator a lot during the translation process. These programs have disadvantages also besides their advantages as they need high levels of training on them before working with them which may cost a human translator to spend money to take training courses on how to use them and this also consumes some time of the translator time. (Sánchez, 2014)
Effect of Using Electronic Translation Programs
The use of different electronic translation programs left great effects on the language use today. Among such effects, there are negative effects and positive ones. Using these programs gave people who are not good at languages at all some self confidence in using languages which made them think themselves are really good at a specific language or perhaps many languages and this can be a positive effect when those people use the translation program properly or in good things but it can be a negative effect if their use was too much and they exploited such sites and programs in bad affairs, it also could be a bad effect if they fill the web with bad quality translation which is spreading and is accepted by many people everywhere in the world.
Using electronic translation programs made the translation movement more energetic in fact as they encourage beginner human translators to be trained on how to use them properly and get the utmost benefits from them, they also saved their time and effort.
Learners of a language who are in the beginners levels also get benefits from these programs and throughout time, they can improve their translation and stop using these programs for getting whole texts translated but to use them as helpers only.
It was clear that each of the two groups of students was following a communicative approach in translation as they all worked together to produce the translation outputs as soon as possible. The two groups were separated and each group worked by itself. The outputs were compared according to terminology, spelling mistakes, meaning completeness, clarity, punctuation, editing, language and style. Group A which worked with paper dictionaries took longer time than Group B that used Google Translate program. Both groups translated three texts from English to Arabic. Group A took 90 minutes translating the three texts while group B took only 60 minutes to translate the same texts. Each text contained about 37-44 words, the output was evaluated according to a trusted translation kept only with me. All students mother tongue was Arabic and they all study English as a foreign language. Group A used AlMawred paper dictionaries and group B used Google translate program on their tablets devices. The translation process of the two groups went under the same conditions of the university.
As shown in table 1, total mistakes of group A were less than the total number of mistakes of group B. Lexical mistakes were more in group B than in Group A. Spelling mistakes were more in Group A while group B did not have spelling mistakes. Group A had grammar mistakes and also was group B. Group A had eight mistakes while group B had fifteen mistakes. Mistakes of group B shows that they depended on the program greatly and did not exert the needed effort to perform the task properly as their mistakes were almost in meanings, grammar formation, wrong word order but their punctuation and spelling were correct compared to group A. Group A had spelling, punctuation and grammar mistakes but less than those of group B, their meanings and style were better than those of group B.
Differences in
|
Group A
|
Group B
|
Translation Method
|
AlMawred Paper Dictionary
|
Google Translate Program
|
Time Consumed
|
90
|
60
|
Number of Mistakes
|
8
|
15
|
Spelling and Punctuation
|
poor
|
good
|
Semantics, style, word order and Syntax
|
good
|
poor
|
Table1: Differences between translations of the two groups
Advantages and Disadvantages of each translation method used
Results show that the use of electronic translation programs such as Google Translate had its advantages as it helped the human translators save time and effort and provided them with Arabic words in the correct spelling but it also had disadvantages as it made them neglect forming the sentences carefully, make grammatical mistakes and produce translation that lacks elaborated literal style. It was clear that paper dictionary use or the traditional translation method had advantages as it made translators more aware of forming sentences in a good style keeping their semantics and grammar while it also had its disadvantages such as it is time consuming and it puts all the effort and hard work over the translators.
Chapter Three
Conclusion
The current research is discussing a very common problem around the world today which is the vast use of electronic translation programs against traditional methods of translation using dictionaries such as paper dictionaries and this problem was discussed according to a test made for students of my college who were divided into two groups, one that used paper dictionary to translate three texts and the other used Google Translate to translate the same three texts. Results showed that each method has its advantages and disadvantages.
In my own opinion, I think that it is important to cope with new technologies and not to be old fashioned but at the same time, it is important to use human minds against the full use of machines so as to add a natural feeling on the translation output as translation is a way of communication and exchanging cultures not just meanings.
The solution for this problem is to mix the use of the two methods together by using electronic translation programs by human translators but with great care and not to depend on them fully in translation in addition to raise people's awareness about these programs and how to use them.
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