Language Campus guest lecture: “De-mystifying machine translation and increasing machine translation literacy” (Lynne Bowker, uOttawa)

Watch the recorded lecture

Link to the video in Moniviestin.

Timestamps:

• 00:00:00 Introduction
• 00:02:00 First part: De-mystifying MT
• 00:38:40 Second part: Improving MT literacy
• 00:58:34 Take-away points and discussion

Introduction

Professor Lynne Bowker, University of Ottawa & and JYU Visiting Fellow

Opinions about machine translation are often extreme. One the one hand, supporters of this technology may present it as being almost “magical” and as the answer to overcoming language barriers. One the other hand, detractors sound the alarm about the sometimes laughable and sometimes horrible mistranslations produced by these tools.

Who is right? As with many things in life, the truth of the matter lies somewhere in between the two extremes. However, one thing that cannot be denied is that this technology is being widely used, and that people who use it may not always do so in a critical or informed way, which can lead to problems.

What can be done? In this presentation, I describe my work to develop a program of machine translation literacy, especially for people who do not have a background in translation. Machine translation literacy is less about acquiring techno-procedural skills and more about developing cognitive competences. I’ve piloted this program with first-year students at the University of Ottawa and received some positive feedback.

Join us for this talk where we’ll pull back the curtain and take a peek inside the world of machine translation to learn how this technology works, and where its strengths and limitations lie. You can pick up some tips to improve your own machine translation literacy and also take away suggestions for how you can help your students or other non-expert machine translation users (e.g. newcomers, teens) to improve their machine translation literacy skills too!

Sign up for live attendance or join with Zoom

The lecture is held on Thursday 9 December at 14.15–15.45.

You can attend the lecture at Lähde Library, B 347 Koski. The number of participants is limited to 35 people. Pre-registration is not compulsory, but if you want to secure your spot, sign up now using this form!

You can also watch the lecture via Zoom. Join using the Zoom link. If you join via Zoom, you don't have to register beforehand.

The lecture will be available as a recording after the event.

Bio

Lynne Bowker holds a BA and MA in Translation from the University of Ottawa (Canada) and a PhD in Language Engineering from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UK). She is Full Professor at the University of Ottawa, where she holds a cross-appointment between the School of Translation and Interpretation and the School of Information Studies. She is a certified (French-English) translator with the Association of Translators and Interpreters of Ontario. In 2020, she was elected to the Royal Society of Canada in recognition of her contributions to research in translation technologies. She is the (co-)author of numerous articles and several books, including Machine Translation and Global Research (Emerald, 2019). Her work on the Machine Translation Literacy Project is currently funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (2020-2025).

You can find out more about Lynne on her University of Ottawa page, on the Machine Translation Literacy Project website, or on Twitter.

Lynne Bowker's visit to Jyväskylä was made possible by LITHME (a COST Action network).

Image on top: Mohamed Hassan at Pixabay