What’s so hard about What’s so hard about translation?translation?

Ed KenschaftEd Kenschaft

University of MarylandUniversity of Maryland

UMIACS, CLIP LabUMIACS, CLIP Lab

Translation Needs (1)Translation Needs (1)

AssimilationAssimilation News monitoringNews monitoring Intercepts, noisy documentsIntercepts, noisy documents

High recall, low precisionHigh recall, low precision

Translation Needs (2)Translation Needs (2)

DisseminationDissemination UN, EUUN, EU Commercial documentationCommercial documentation Bible translationBible translation

High recall & precisionHigh recall & precision

Translation Needs (3)Translation Needs (3)

EmergencyEmergency MilitaryMilitary MedicalMedical Disaster reliefDisaster relief

High precision, moderate recallHigh precision, moderate recall

SIL InternationalSIL International

Faith-based Christian organizationFaith-based Christian organization Partner with speakers of languages that Partner with speakers of languages that

have never been written downhave never been written down PurposesPurposes

preserve the language and culturepreserve the language and culture document the language for studydocument the language for study translate the Bible and community translate the Bible and community

development materialsdevelopment materials Documented 1400+ languages in 70+ Documented 1400+ languages in 70+

countriescountries

Challenges [1]Challenges [1]

Ultra-low-density languagesUltra-low-density languages mostly unwrittenmostly unwritten no large (or small) parallel corporano large (or small) parallel corpora no Bible for bootstrappingno Bible for bootstrapping

Challenges [2]Challenges [2]

Untrained translatorsUntrained translators 66thth grade education grade education

One trained linguist for 10 languagesOne trained linguist for 10 languages

Challenges [3]Challenges [3] Exceedingly rich domain of discourseExceedingly rich domain of discourse

approximates all of natural languageapproximates all of natural language GenresGenres

historical narrativehistorical narrative dialogdialog poetrypoetry personal letterspersonal letters

TopicsTopics business, politics, sex, relationships, diet …business, politics, sex, relationships, diet … no controlled vocabularyno controlled vocabulary

Challenges [4]Challenges [4]

Demand for 100% accuracy/fluencyDemand for 100% accuracy/fluency Life-changing lessonsLife-changing lessons Easy to misinterpretEasy to misinterpret

Challenges [5]Challenges [5]

Nearly endless variety of target Nearly endless variety of target languageslanguages ~6800 languages~6800 languages ~1400 written, ~5400 unwritten~1400 written, ~5400 unwritten ~half will survive next century~half will survive next century ~2000-3000 remaining~2000-3000 remaining

Linguistic VariationLinguistic Variation

Phonological variationPhonological variation Morphological variationMorphological variation

three-boys-shot-arrows-at-the-gazellethree-boys-shot-arrows-at-the-gazelle Syntactic variationSyntactic variation

grammatical markers (e.g. dual, grammatical markers (e.g. dual, causative)causative)

discourse markers (e.g. topic/focus)discourse markers (e.g. topic/focus) honorificshonorifics

Cultural VariationCultural Variation Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be

clean;clean;wash me, and I will be whiter than wash me, and I will be whiter than

snow.snow.(Psalm 51:7, NIV)(Psalm 51:7, NIV)

What is hyssop?What is hyssop? What is snow?What is snow? What does it mean to be white?What does it mean to be white?

Cultural VariationCultural Variation Cleanse me with a plant indigenous to the Cleanse me with a plant indigenous to the

lands of the ancient Near East, used in lands of the ancient Near East, used in Jewish religious ceremonies, and I will be Jewish religious ceremonies, and I will be whiter than the precipitation that falls like whiter than the precipitation that falls like rain when the weather is very cold, which rain when the weather is very cold, which indicates a state of moral purity.indicates a state of moral purity.

Intelligibility ≠ Fidelity (1)Intelligibility ≠ Fidelity (1)

Moses had horns.Moses had horns.

Intelligibility ≠ Fidelity (2)Intelligibility ≠ Fidelity (2)

Where there is no vision, the people Where there is no vision, the people perish. (Proverbs 29:18a, KJ21)perish. (Proverbs 29:18a, KJ21)

Intelligibility ≠ Fidelity (2)Intelligibility ≠ Fidelity (2)

Where there is no vision, the people Where there is no vision, the people perish. (Proverbs 29:18a, KJ21)perish. (Proverbs 29:18a, KJ21)

When people do not accept divine When people do not accept divine guidance, they run wild. (Pr 29:18a, guidance, they run wild. (Pr 29:18a, NLT)NLT)

Waste of Time?Waste of Time?

Can a computer solve all these Can a computer solve all these problems?problems? Not on your lifeNot on your life

Can a computer replace a translator?Can a computer replace a translator? Limited domains onlyLimited domains only

What can it do?What can it do? Word-processingWord-processing Data storage & analysisData storage & analysis First draft?First draft?

General ApproachGeneral Approach

CAT vs. MTCAT vs. MT Linguistically informed systemsLinguistically informed systems Supervised learningSupervised learning Exploit all available resourcesExploit all available resources

SL resourcesSL resources Existing TL dataExisting TL data

Data RepresentationData Representation

Text encodingText encoding UnicodeUnicode

FontsFonts GraphiteGraphite

Interlinear textInterlinear text LinguaLinks, Toolbox, FieldWorksLinguaLinks, Toolbox, FieldWorks

Elicitation & AnalysisElicitation & Analysis

Elicit syntactic & morphological dataElicit syntactic & morphological data AVENUE, EXPEDITIONAVENUE, EXPEDITION

Elicit word lists for language surveyElicit word lists for language survey WordSurvWordSurv

SL ResourcesSL Resources

Related language adaptationRelated language adaptation CARLACARLA

Projection across word alignmentProjection across word alignment GIZA++, Multi-Align, Parser ProjectionGIZA++, Multi-Align, Parser Projection

NLGNLG

Rich interlinguaRich interlingua TBTA (Tod Allman)TBTA (Tod Allman)

Statistical fluency enhancementStatistical fluency enhancement (Sebastian Varges)(Sebastian Varges)

EvaluationEvaluation

Need for automationNeed for automation Multiplying documentsMultiplying documents Shortage of expertsShortage of experts

BLEUBLEU How well does it work?How well does it work? What does it mean?What does it mean?

METEORMETEOR Stresses recallStresses recall

The Limits of NLPThe Limits of NLP

Who knows?Who knows?