Papers by Maureen Ehrensberger-Dow (retired)
Many Swiss universities offer their students courses on writing research articles in English. Oth... more Many Swiss universities offer their students courses on writing research articles in English. Other academic genres, for example posters, are rarely taught, even though students are often required to prepare posters in English. For guidance, novice researchers rely on their supervisors or the lists of "dos and don'ts" they find in style guides. Although some of the conventions suggested in style guides are adopted by many poster writers, the final products differ greatly in their visual impact. In this study, we investigated 30 posters created, displayed and peer-evaluated by L2 PhD students at an ecology conference, to identify ways in which visual elements combine with academic language and the organisation of ideas to capture and hold the attention of potential readers. Using criteria that define semiotic force, we analysed (1) the posters that were rated most highly by the conference participants, and (2) a selection of posters that received no positive ratings. We suggest that the interaction of visual, linguistic and organisational elements may have been overlooked or taken for granted by the L1 writers of style guides. Our findings offer insights into the conference poster as a multimodal genre and supplement existing guidelines on creating posters
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The Interpreter and Translator Trainer
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Recharting Territories
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The Łódź-ZHAW Duo Colloquium on Translation and Meaning, online, Winterthur, 2-3 September 2021, Sep 3, 2021
Recent advances in artificial intelligence, natural language processing and ready access to freel... more Recent advances in artificial intelligence, natural language processing and ready access to freely available online tools are raising people's expectations that quality translation is easily accessible and practically instantaneous. In addition to the sobering reality of the risks and cultural inappropriateness associated with the misleadingly fluent output of some of the machine translation systems (cf. Martindale and Carpuat 2018), professional translators now often have to act as consultants and deal with unrealistic client expectations. Media citing research reports claiming human parity for neural machine translation (cf. Hassan et al. 2018) add to the strong underestimation of the complexity of translation work. Raising their clients’ awareness of the complex skills set required for professional translation and the risks associated with machine translation output (cf. Wahler 2018) has now become an important part of translators’ work. As a consequence, knowledge about the capabilities and limitations of the machines and tools with which translators are and will be working (cf. Massey and Ehrensberger-Dow 2017) is an increasingly relevant aspect of translation competence. This type of knowledge has been referred to as MT literacy by Bowker and Buitrago Ciro (2019), whose list of component competences includes: comprehending the basics of MT systems; appreciating the wider implications associated with the use of MT; evaluating how MT-friendly texts are; creating or modifying a text so that it could be translated; and modifying MT output to improve its accuracy and readability. In this presentation, we discuss how MT literacy can empower translators to bring their expertise as language professionals to the table and argue that it should be regarded as a means to foster translators’ agency and empowerment. We explore how it can be related to soft skills, such as a strong professional self-concept and self- confidence, in translator training. References: Bowker, L. and J. Buitrago Ciro. 2019. Machine Translation and Global Research: Towards Improved Machine Translation Literacy in the Scholarly Community. Bingley: Emerald Publishing. Hassan, H., A. Aue, C. Chen, V. Chowdhary, J. Clark, C. Federmann, X. Huang, M. Junczys-Dowmunt, W. Lewis, M. Li, S. Liu, T-Y. Liu, R. Luo, A. Menezes, T. Qin, F. Seide, X. Tan, F. Tian, L. Wu, S. Wu, Y. Xia, D. Zhang, Z. Zhang, and M. Zhou. 2018. “Achieving Human Parity on Automatic Chinese to English News Translation.” arXiv:1803.05567. Martindale, M. J., and M. Carpuat. 2018. Fluency over Accuracy: A Pilot Study in Measuring User Trust in Imperfect MT.” Proceedings of AMTA 2018 (1): 13–25. Massey, G., and M. Ehrensberger-Dow. 2017. Machine Learning – Implications for Translator Education. Lebende Sprachen 62 (2): 300–312. Wahler, M. E. 2018. “A Word is Worth a Thousand Words: Legal Implications of Relying on Machine Translation Technology.” Stetson Law Review 48: 109–139
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CIUTI Conference 2020 Artificial Intelligence & Intercultural Intelligence. Actions and interactions in translation, interpreting and target contexts, Online, 9-11 December 2020, Dec 11, 2020
References Bowker, L. & J. Buitrago Ciro. 2019. Machine Translation and Global Research: Towa... more References Bowker, L. & J. Buitrago Ciro. 2019. Machine Translation and Global Research: Towards Improved Machine Translation Literacy in the Scholarly Community. Bingley: Emerald Publishing. Earley, P. C. & S. Ang. 2003. Cultural intelligence: Individual interactions across cultures. Stanford, CA: Stanford Business Books. Federici, F. M. & C. Declercq, eds. 2019. Intercultural Crisis Communication. London: Bloomsbury Press. Forcada, M. L. 2017. Making sense of neural machine translation. Translation Spaces 6 (2): 291–309. Hassan, H., A. Aue, C. Chen, V. Chowdhary, J. Clark, C. Federmann, X. Huang, M. Junczys-Dowmunt, W. Lewis, M. Li, S. Liu, T-Y. Liu, R. Luo, A., Menezes, T., Qin, F., Seide, X., Tan, F., Tian, L., Wu, S., Wu, Y., Xia, D., Zhang, Z., & Zhou, M. 2018. Achieving human parity on automatic Chinese to English news translation. arXiv:1803.05567. Martindale, M. J. & M. Carpuat. 2018. Fluency over accuracy: A pilot study in measuring user trust in imperfect MT. Proceedings of AMTA 2018 1: 13-25. http://aclweb.org/anthology/W18-1803 Massey, G. & M. Ehrensberger-Dow. 2017. Machine learning – implications for translator education. Lebende Sprache 62 (2): 300-312.The recent advances in artificial intelligence, natural language processing, and ready access to freely available online tools are raising people's expectations that quality translation is only a click away, with media dramatically citing research reports claiming human parity for neural machine translation (NMT; Hassan et al. 2018). Neglected in this discourse is the sobering reality of the risks and cultural inappropriateness associated with the misleadingly fluent output of some of these systems (cf. Martindale & Carpuat 2018). Within translation studies and among the professional translation community, interest in digital literacy with respect to recent advances in NMT has been growing (e.g. Forcada 2017). It now seems generally accepted that translation students should develop the capacity to decide on the deployment of language technologies by learning about the capabilities and limitations of the machines and tools with which they are and will be working (cf. Massey & Ehrensberger-Dow 2017). This type of knowledge has been referred to as MT literacy by Bowker and Buitrago Ciro (2019), whose list of component competences probably seems familiar to most institutions currently involved in translator training (e.g. comprehend the basics of MT systems; appreciate the wider implications associated with the use of MT; evaluate how MT-friendly texts are; create or modify a text so that it could be translated; modify MT output to improve its accuracy and readability). MT literacy can inform judgements about the appropriate genres, quality expectations, risks, and limitations that call for intervention by human translators. Although rarely mentioned in this context, those judgements also necessarily draw on the rich intercultural awareness that translators bring to their work. As intercultural mediators, they have been trained to recognize and deal with cultural differences, potential ambiguity, terminological inconsistencies as well as conceptual and lexical gaps as they transfer meaning from one language to another (e.g. Federici & Declercq 2019). This is very much in line with Earley and Ang’s (2003: 9) multidimensional concept of cultural intelligence, which they define as “a person’s capability for successful adaptation to new cultural settings”. The extension of this concept to “intercultural intelligence” captures the reality of translators shifting back and forth between the context of the source text and that of the target text. Conceptualising MT literacy as being at the interface between language-related artificial intelligence and intercultural intelligence allows for the integration of apparently opposite poles of the human-machine spectrum. Such a conceptualisation can provide the space to encourage the development of expertise in language technology and at the same time foster the uniquely human dimensions of intercultural mediation, intuition, creativity, and ethical judgement
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Self-determined motivation is fostered when students experience autonomy in the learning process.... more Self-determined motivation is fostered when students experience autonomy in the learning process. This study examined the English students' motivation in two countries that arguably differ in the value placed on individualism and collectivism: Japan and Switzerland. Contrary to expectation, autonomy was the most important predictor of motivation in both countries
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Various methods have been developed to access the metalinguistic awareness that translators have ... more Various methods have been developed to access the metalinguistic awareness that translators have of what they are doing, and why, when they translate. In this paper, concurrent verbalization and cue-based retrospection are compared in a small study designed to monitor the translation processes of novices working into their first language (German) or strongest second language (English). A number of measures were devised to address the question of whether and how these two methods affect the quality of the translation process, the metalinguistic data, and the target text itself. An attempt is made to operationalize translators' metalinguistic awareness of their translation practices and strategies when translating from and into their first or second language. Finally, the possibilities and limitations of the combinations of methods employed in this type of translation process research are discussed
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L'utilisation des technologies a conduit à s'intéresser à leur impact sur les processus c... more L'utilisation des technologies a conduit à s'intéresser à leur impact sur les processus cognitifs et les traductions. En se fondant sur des données émanant de traducteurs professionnels et d'étudiants, les auteurs s'interrogent sur la traduction outillée en tant qu'activité cognitive et organisationnelle. Ils recommandent que les traducteurs s'approprient mieux les outils d'aide à la traduction, depuis la conception de ceux-ci jusqu'à leur intégration dans l'organisation de l'activité.
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Papers by Maureen Ehrensberger-Dow (retired)
volume aim to contribute to this discussion through conceptual and/or empirical research. Drawing on different theoretical and methodological frameworks, they offer insights into diverse translation and interpreting situations, in a number of different countries and cultures, and their consequences for individual and collective cognition. Originally published as special issue of Translation Spaces 5:1 (2016).
Please note that I have no give-away-copies of this volume, so unfortunately, I won't be able to send it to you, even if you request it. I hope you will find it in a library near you.