Translation Memory Programs

Just as machine translation, translation memories have also been imposing changes in the way translators work, many of which with further ethical implications than they might appear to have at first sight.

The basis of translation memory programs lies in accumulating and storing translation solutions that are recycled as needed through the automated use of this terminology. In addition to the investment required in the acquisition of these programs and the training needed to use them properly, time is also another factor that directly influences their performance. Far from being immediate time-savers, translation memory programs are built up as they are used; therefore, the more frequently the translator employs them, the larger the database and, consequently the more useful it will be.

Although the literature on translation memories, which basically comprises descriptive and comparative analysis of the efficiency of the programs available in the market, highlights the remarkable gains in productivity translators have been able to achieve, especially in the realm of localization (e.g. Microsoft Windows-based software localization project), little consideration has been given to the controversial ethical issues arising once a terminological database is created.

Once a translator has compiled terminological options into a database as a result of previous work commissioned directly by clients or through translation agencies, it is usually expected that such database be provided along with the final translation, a usual procedure as these programs become widespread. When that database is incorporated into a larger one held by clients or translation agencies, this data will often be used as input to be provided to the same translator or other professionals working in future projects. Whenever a translator is provided with a memory database, clients expect compliance with the terminology and phraseology of the segment pairs included in that database. Moreover, always concerned with reducing costs, companies encourage translators to seek as many matches as possible and feel disappointed when the level of text re-use reported by translators is much lower than expected.

Just as in translation machine applications, the way translation memory programs are being designed by the industry, in a effort to achieve cost and time reductions to produce a translation, calls into mind the concept of translation as "a word-replacement activity" since most of the time, translators are invited to forget about the other elements configuring the text and concentrate on segments that might be recovered from translation databases or added to the latter.

The translator's interpretation of the source material and personal choices made in the formulation of the translated text might interfere with content management and consistency, even though the translator's option may at times be more appropriate for some specific context than the pre-selected options offered by the database. By reusing stored translation segments, translators might be giving the first step to relinquish the outcome of their research work as well, since clients may also require that the memory generated through a translation be provided along with the translated material.

The second step towards giving up the authorship of translation takes place whenever translators accept being paid only for what clients deem as translation per se, that is, segments that have not been translated yet. This is the result of the idea that 100% matches will keep the same meaning they had in previous texts and, for that, revision and adaptation of these words or segments are not worth being remunerated for. This situation has been met with criticism by some translators who defend that consistency does not guarantee comprehension since a text may have perfect terminological coherence, but it altogether may not make any sense to the target audience.

On the other hand, clients may not readily accept the idea that 100% matches cannot be used in a new context or even that segments that may be used inevitably gain new meaning and may still require careful revision and adjustments into the new context. For that reason, it is uncommon to remunerate the translator for corrections or adjustments in the terminological database, since it would mean accepting that previous translation work was faulty, and so unduly charged.

This discussion on commonly used approaches to machine translation and translation memories have led us to consider, for the translator's role to become more, rather than less, important in the informational age, it is paramount that these professionals do not be regarded as mere content transporters or text reviewers, but as communicators fully responsible for the meanings they confer to translated texts.

3. Co-existence but on What Terms?

If there is no denial translation practice has to evolve and conform to new modes of communication and work translators should ponder how they wish to be regarded by those who hire their services.

By conferring priority to discussions about time and cost reductions through the application of technological tools in the practice of translation, translators might be oblivious to what such tools really represent to the public in general and what consequences such representations might have in the way the profession is conceived.

The general idea is that, when applying technological tools such as machine translation programs, all that is left for the translator to do is give the text the final touches to make it coherent in the translated language. The impression is that the machine is the one that does the translation work and the translator is in charge of editing the final text. As for translation memories, the widespread reuse of already translated segments, in a way, also contributes to the idea that the translator is not solely responsible for the translated text.

The illusion that the machine is able to translate may affect the way translators will be seen in the future, an impression that should be given careful consideration, mainly when we remind ourselves of the multiplicity of texts, languages and cultures that are inevitably intertwined in translation.

LECTURE 7

THE TRANSLATORЎ¦S INTELLIGENCE

Plan

1.The Translator's Memory

2. The Representational and Procedural Memory

3. The Translator's Learning Styles

3.1. The Varieties of Learning Styles

4. The Processing of Information by Different Learners

5. The Response

At first glance the desires to translate faster and to translate reliably might seem to be at odds with one another. One commonsensical assumption says that the faster you do something, the more likely you are to make mistakes, the more slowly you work, the more likely that work is to be reliable. The reliable translator shouldn't make (major) mistakes, so s/he shouldn't try to translate fast.

But increased speed, at least up to a point, really only damages reliability when you are doing something new or unfamiliar, something that requires concentration, which always takes time. "Old" and "familiar" actions, especially habitual actions, can be performed both quickly and reliably because habit takes over. And there are important parallels between this "bodily memory" and translation. Experienced translators are fast because they have translated so much that it often seems as if their "brain" isn't doing the translating ЎX their fingers are. They recognize a familiar source-language structure and they barely pause before their fingers are racing across the keyboard, rendering it into a well-worn target-language structural equivalent, fitted with lexical items that seem to come to them automatically, without conscious thought or logical analysis. Simultaneous interpreters don't seem to be thinking at all - who, the astonished observer wonders, could possibly think that fast? No, it is impossible; the words must be coming to the interpreter from somewhere else, some subliminal or even mystical part of the brain that ordinary people lack. It should be clear, however, that even at its most "habitual" or "subliminal," translation is not the same sort of activity as tying your shoes or brushing your teeth. Translation is always intelligent behavior - even when it seems least conscious or analytical. Translation is a highly complicated process requiring rapid multilayered analyses of semantic fields, syntactic structures, the sociology and psychology of reader- or listener-response, and cultural difference.

1. The Translator's Memory

Like all language use, trans­lation is constantly creative, constantly new. Even translators of the most formulaic source texts, like weather reports, repeatedly face novel situations and must engage in unexpected problem-solving. And most translation tasks are enormously more complex than those. If you're good at finding the one right answer to life's multiple-choice questions, you're smart. But there's more to being intelligent - a creative aspect, whereby you invent something new "on the fly." This captures the element of novelty, the coping and groping ability needed when there is no "right answer," when business as usual isn't likely to suffice. Intelligence is about the process of improvising and polishing on the timescale of thought and action.

Translation is an intelligent activity, requiring creative problem-solving in novel textual, social, and cultural conditions. As we have seen, this intelligent activity is sometimes very conscious; most of the time it is subconscious, "beneath" our conscious awareness. It is no less intelligent when we are not aware of it - no less creative, and no less analytical. This is not a "mystical" model of translation. The sublimated intelligence that makes it possible for us to translate rapidly, reliably, and enjoyably is the product of learning - which is to say, of experience stored in memory in ways that enable its effective recall and flexible and versatile use.

This does not mean that good translators must memorize vast quantities of linguistic and cultural knowledge; in fact, insofar as we take "memorization" to mean the conscious, determined, and rote or mechanical stuffing of facts into our brains, it is quite the opposite. Translators must be good at storing experiences in memory and at retrieving those experiences whenever needed to solve complex translation problems; but they do not do this by memorizing things. Memory as learning works differently. Learning is what happens when you're doing something else - especially something enjoyable, but even something unpleasant, if your experience leaves a strong enough impression on you. Translators learn words and phrases, styles and tones and registers, linguistic and cultural strategies while translating, while inter­preting, while reading a book or surfing the Internet, while talking to people, while sitting quietly and thinking about something that happened. Communicating with people in a foreign country, they learn the language, internalize tens of thousands of words and phrases and learn to use them flexibly and creatively in ways that make sense to the people around them, without noticing themselves "memorizing." Translating the texts they are sent, interpreting the words that come out of a source speaker's mouth, they learn transfer patterns, and those patterns are etched on their brains for easy and intelligent access, sometimes without their even being aware that they have such things, let alone being able to articulate them in analytical, rule-governed ways. All they know is that certain words and phrases activate a flurry of finger activity on the keyboard, and the translation seems to write itself; or they open their mouths and a steady stream of target text comes out, propelled by some force that they do not always recognize as their own.

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