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Dissertation
Translating for Linguistic Minorities : Translation Policy in the United Kingdom

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Abstract

In contemporary Europe, state languages come in contact with a fluidtapestry of immigrant languages and an set of ever more legitimized regional orminority languages. In this context, policy makers are faced with changingdemographics and attitudes about rights and integration. Translation policiesplay a key role in realizing minorities language rights and integration.However, in current research on language policies, the key role of translationremains a blind spot. This Ph.D. project will shed light on that blind spot.Adapting Spolkys 2004 definition of language policy, the project will address translation policy, understood astranslation management, translation practice, and translation belief.Translation policy, however, will not be explored as an end unto itself.Rather, the study will aim at highlighting that when it comes to linguistic integration and inclusion, the role oftranslation policy ought to be considered. To do this, the study will derive data mainly from a case study. Namely,translation policy will be studies in the context of the United Kingdom ()UK. Datawill be gathered from overt and covert policy action in the UK, as found inlaws, policy documents, and reported practice. The research will also have apan-European dimension, reflected on the analysis of translation obligationsunder international law. The study will thus focus on policy as reflected ininternational treaties and national laws that mandate translation (if therewere any to be found). In order to achieve this, theoretical notions from lawand political philosophy will be explored and applies as necessary to mattersof translation studies. This implies an interdisciplinary, large-scale approachto the study of translation policy.

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Dissertation
The impact of metadata on translator performance : how translators work with translation memories and machine translation.
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Year: 2014 Publisher: Leuven KU Leuven. Faculteit Letteren

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This thesis investigates whether and how translation metadata affect translator performance in a workflow that combines suggestions from translation memories and machine translation. The study is based on a translation process experiment with 10 professional translators working from English into Spanish in a workplace setting. The keystroke logging tools Inputlog and MTeval allowed for the collection of data on translation times and typing effort. BB FlashBack was used for screen and face recording. A Tobii eye tracker was used to identify how the translators shifted their attention between different parts of the screen. The final translations were assessed for quality by two professional reviewers using an error-score system. Finally, interviews were used for eliciting opinions from participants about certain aspects of their performance.The quantitative data were analysed with mixed-effects linear(ised) regression models.^ The results show that translation metadata affect translation time and typing effort, and that the effects vary according to the type of translation suggestion (exact matches, fuzzy matches, machine translation). As a complementary finding, the current study identified no significant correlation between the translators performances while typing and their performances while translating. The qualitative data obtained from the interviews show a mismatch between the translators perceived performance and their measured performance. They tend to prefer an environment with translation suggestions and metadata, even when this environment does not correspond with better performance. Translators mentioned metadata as a helpful feature in the translation tool, among other reasons because metadata help them adapt their translation strategies more easily according to the suggestion type.^ Task familiarity was also identified as an important factor affecting translators perceptions.The results obtained in this study suggest the need to advance research on how translators interact with translation tools, with a view to increase not only productivity but also job satisfaction. I hope this thesis has also contributed to the field in terms of the methodology of workplace studies, by presenting some challenges and solutions. An important lesson is the need to find an optimal balance between ecological validity and data validity when conducting translation experiments in realistic scenarios.

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