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The research on machine translation carried out at the University of Edinburgh has led to the development of Moses, the dominant open source toolkit for building machine translation (MT) systems. The toolkit has found wide adoption in academic research worldwide: the Moses paper was the most cited paper in all of the Association for Computational Linguistics conferences in 2011. Moses has also been widely used by commercial concerns such as Adobe, Symantec and Sybase, and agencies such as the European Commission and the World Trade Organisation. The research contribution of the School of Informatics in the University of Edinburgh has significantly increased the commercial viability and availability of machine translation.
The toolkit has been one of the main drivers in lowering the barrier to entry to machine translation, making MT available to small and medium-size companies and opening up new markets and opportunities.
Today, Moses is one of the most widely adopted MT systems in the translation industry, dominating the open-source space for MT. Its maturity and quality, as well as its liberal open-source license, means that it is often preferred over proprietary systems.
In his 2004 and 2010 Oxford University Press translations of the Qur'an, based on over 30 years of rigorous scholarship, Professor Muhammad Abdel Haleem sought to make, "the Qur'an accessible to everyone who speaks English". Numerous accolades, including membership of the Arabic language Academy in Cairo, approval of his 2010 translation by Al-Azhar University, sales of 250,000+ copies and his receipt of hundreds of laudatory messages from readers around the world attest to both the faithfulness of his translation and its accessibility to a wide readership. Abdel Haleem has contributed substantially to interfaith understanding through his translations and interpretations and assisted interfaith dialogue globally.
As scholars and translators, Susan Bassnett, Maureen Freely, Michael Hulse and Tony Howard have driven translation theory and practice, and introduced new authors and new cultures to Anglophone readers. Their translations have provided economic benefits to authors and to independent publishing houses specialising in translation. Bassnett's and Freely's work with professional translation organisations has informed the development of professional translators, resulting in greater professionalization and increased public recognition.
Political events across Arab nations focus the attention of stakeholders in government and business, including publishing, on the imperative of culturally sensitive translations from Arabic. Increasing interest in Arabic literature necessitates professional-ethical standards in translating. Research-informed translations at University of Edinburgh by Marilyn Booth and research-based translator training supports development of more sensitive translations, thus aiding a granular understanding of socio-cultural complexity in Arab societies amid dynamic political change. Such translation activities refute `clash of civilisations' discourses and stereotyping of Arabs and Islam. The research and resulting training methods impact practice and enhance support for emerging UK and Arab-region translators, approximately 80 to date.
This case study explores the impact of RGCL's Translation Post-Editing Tool1 (PET) on Hermes Traducciones y Servicios Linguisticos (Hermes), NLP Technologies Ltd. (NLPT) and the Department of Translation, Interpreting and Communication (DTIC) at Ghent University. Hermes and NLPT are companies providing translation services in varied domains through a pipeline that combines translation technologies and post-editing. DTIC offers postgraduate courses on translation studies and interpreting, including subjects such as post-editing. PET enables the editing of pre-translated text, and the detection of `effort indicators'. This helps improve assessment of translation systems/approaches, the quality of pre-translated text, and the effort needed to convert it into a publishable form. At Hermes, workflows developed using PET have reduced post-editing time by 31-34%; at NLPT, workflows optimised using PET have saved an average of 66 seconds of post-editing time per sentence. At DTIC, PET has been used to enhance the courses Computer-Aided Translation and Technical Translation.
Since 1993, Professor Schäffner's work on translation competence development at Aston University has contributed to policy development within the European Commission and has led to an increased professionalisation of translator training across Europe. Specifically, it has helped generate a translator competence profile, adopted by the Directorate General for Translation as a benchmark for admitting postgraduate translation programmes to the European Master's in Translation (EMT) network. The DGT's overall aim is to improve the competence of translators and thus the quality of translation. Of about 500 programmes which exist across Europe, 54 have so far been admitted to the EMT network.
The present case study describes the impact of research at the University of East Anglia (UEA) on the practice, publishing and public understanding of literary translation. W.G. Sebald founded the British Centre for Literary Translation (BCLT) at UEA in 1989 to promote and encourage the translation of literary works, to support practising translators and to foster the study of translated literature. BCLT is a thriving international public cultural institute whose ethos and programme are shaped and informed by researchers working between the Centre and its academic home, the School of Literature, Drama and Creative Writing (LDC). Via workshops, publishing initiatives and a range of local, national and international events, the work of these researchers has had a significant impact on the public perception and understanding of literature in translation, and on the market for this literature within the UK and beyond.
This case study describes the impact generated by new thinking on the representation of the foreign in translation for the theatre. The main beneficiaries of the research are theatre audiences across the English-speaking world, as well as theatres, theatre companies and publishing houses. As a result of the project's insights into localisation and performability, theatre audiences have benefited from intellectual and imaginative engagement with a more authentic and lucid interpretation of Hispanic theatre and culture that challenges their own cultural values. The work has also contributed to the creative economy through the generation of income from the stage productions and the publication of translations.
The tales of the Mabinogion are one of the highlights of Welsh literature. Grounded in Celtic mythology, Arthurian romance and a view of the past as seen through the eyes of medieval Wales, they are replete in meanings, imaginative constructs, linguistic richness and insights into the relationship between the human condition and the supernatural realm. Davies' translation and research into the performative aspects of these tales has become the stimulus for a range of innovative acts of presentation, telling and reception in English language creative writing, heritage management and tourism, and contemporary storytelling.
The European Masters in Translation (EMT) is a partnership between the European Commission and higher education (HE) institutions in 27 member states that offer master's level translation studies programmes. The EMT sets a benchmark of quality and assesses MA programmes. Based on his research into low-quality translation in public discourse, revision techniques and the assessment of translation quality, Federico Federici co-authored policy documents to which all EMT partners must refer. His distinctive contribution is to ensure that, for the first time, the training of translators in EMT-accredited organisations should foster continuous learning skills and enhancement of skills so as to prepare students for lifelong careers as translators.