As machine translation continues to improve, undergraduate translators share their experience with post-editing machine-assisted translations.

As the world has become increasingly interconnected, the demand for translators has skyrocketed. The global market now expects documents and journal publications to be translated into multiple languages. Human translators can no longer keep up with the high demand; machine translation tools like Google Translate are often necessary to lighten the burden on human translators. For students who want to succeed in the translation industry, building skills in post-editing machine translations might be a determining factor. But what role does college play in building those skills?

THE RESEARCH

To examine how students develop post-editing machine translation (PEMT) skills in the college classroom,  Sri Harto et al. conducted the qualitative case study “Exploring Undergraduate Students’ Experiences in Dealing with Post-Editing of Machine Translation.” Their study involved 58 language education students in Indonesia enrolled in a Theoretical Foundation of Translating and Interpreting course. Using focused group discussions, survey questionnaires, in-depth interviews, and analyses of student translation documents, the researchers explored the students’ classroom experiences with PEMT.

Each student translated an Indonesian journal article into English using Google Translate. They then split into eight groups and revised the machine translations. They corrected grammar, vocabulary, sentence structure, and spelling, then identified inconsistencies between the source and target texts. Afterward, the students completed questionnaires that asked about their experience using Google Translate and the problems they faced. 

The researchers used thematic analysis to find themes in the data. These themes suggest four benefits of taking a PEMT course: 

  1. Students can gain practical experience in identifying the weaknesses of machine translation. 
  2. Students can recognize that PEMT is useful for academic texts but less useful for literary works.
  3. Students can acquire essential experience in post-editing different subjects, which was heightened by encountering new technical terminology.
  4. Students can analyze their own PEMT skills, and they struggled most with grammar and vocabulary.

THE IMPLICATIONS

These findings highlight the value of PEMT training for undergraduates, whether that be in internships or educational courses. This experience can aid students in ensuring that “the information and messages…are achieved in the target language” (Harto et al. 2022, 705). Specifically, exposure to machine translation tools and post-editing practices in the classroom can strengthen students’ linguistic awareness and help them recognize when it is appropriate to utilize machine translation.

The PEMT experience [can help ensure that] the information and messages…are achieved in the target language.”

Harto et al. (2022)

Based on these findings, students can recognize that machine translation is a tool and not an end result. Errors are normal and require careful human revision. By combining improved translation technology with practical training, universities can better prepare future translators and translation editors to meet professional standards in a digitally-dominated field.

To learn more about post-editing machine translations, read the full article:

Harto, Sri, Fuad Abdul Hamied, Bachrudin Musthafa, and Sri Setyarini. 2022. “Exploring Undergraduate Students’ Experiences in Dealing with Post-Editing of Machine Translation.” Indonesian Journal of Applied Linguistics 11 (3): 696–707. https://doi.org/10.17509/ijal.v11i3.42825.

—Janna Miller, Editing Research

FEATURE IMAGE BY GERD ALTMANN

Find more research

Check out Jean Nitzke, Carmen Canfora, Silvia Hansen-Schirra, and Dimitrios Kapnas’s (2024) article for help determining which projects are suitable for machine translation: “Decisions in Projects Using Machine Translation and Post-Editing: An Interview Study.” The Journal of Specialised Translation (41):127–48. https://doi.org/10.26034/cm.jostrans.2024.4715.

Take a look at Marian Flanagan and Tina Paulsen Christensen’s (2014) article for additional translation training tips: “Testing Post-Editing Guidelines: How Translation Trainees Interpret Them and How to Tailor Them for Translator Training Purposes.” The Interpreter and Translator Trainer 8 (2): 257–75. https://doi.org/10.1080/1750399X.2014.936111.