English-Turkish Literary Translation Through Human-Machine Interaction

Sabri Gürses,Mehmet Şahin

doi:10.5565/rev/tradumatica.284

Sabri Gürses, Mehmet Şahin

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.5565/rev/tradumatica.284

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Abstract

This article investigates perceptions of technology-mediated translations of literary texts by two groups: translation students and professional literary translators. The participants post-edited an excerpt from a classic Dickens novel into Turkish using a machine translation (MT) system of their choice. The analysis of the post-edited texts, participants’ answers to survey questions, and interviews with professional translators suggest that MT is currently a long way from being an essential part of any literary translation practice for the English–Turkish language pair. Translators’ interactions with MT and negative attitudes toward it may change in a positive direction as MT improves and translation practice evolves.

Highlights

Literary translators have hitherto been relatively unharmed by the staggering developments in translation technologies, especially machine translation (MT)
Along with the findings presented in the literature, new questions continue to arise: Is post-editing a creative process, or a mechanical one? Does computer-assisted translation (CAT) really provide creative solutions, or does it lead to standard, prefabricated ideas? In our post-human world, we may feel like cyborgs (Robinson, 1998; Reynolds, 2016), whose work is no longer entirely human and whose translations lack authenticity
Because of the highly sophisticated language in the source text chosen for the experiment, the MT output that the participants worked on was of poor quality, which resulted in their negative opinion about the use of MT in literary translation

Summary

Introduction

Literary translators have hitherto been relatively unharmed by the staggering developments in translation technologies, especially machine translation (MT). Stylistic preferences may require in-depth analysis of source text authors and norms, and perhaps research on the target culture and its conventions. In such contexts, with the everincreasing volume and availability of texts in electronic format, corpora can benefit translators, as they can shed light on characteristics of language and culture in a specific period of time, register, or mode (Laviosa, 2002). We see examples of these two tools being used in literary translation (see, for example, Rothwell, 2018; Horenberg, 2019; Zakrajšek, 2020) They help ensure consistency in both individual and collaborative translations, provide a linear text structure to minimize any omissions, and facilitate the monitoring of the workflow (e.g., word count, deadlines, publisher requirements, list of Do Not Translate words). We can refer to the addition of such tools to the workflow as the fourth level of involvement with technology for literary translators

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