Adequacy and acceptability of machine translation using An-Nakel Al-Arabi software: The case of selected Arabic and English magazine opinion articles.

摘要

With the globalization wave and the New World Order, editors have become interested in communicating, in different languages, with readers from various cultures around the world. However, many capable columnists have the competence to do so only in their first language. Translation is needed by the media to facilitate global communication. The need for Machine Translation (MT) has increased due to the size of information to be communicated and the speed In which they must be communicated.; Using MT is becoming more cost effective and may be leading to unbiased translation by eliminating human judgments in the translation process. However, the challenge for MT becomes more serious if there are significant linguistic and cultural differences between the two languages in which the translation process would take place, such as Arabic and English. A magazine opinion article may lose its power, effectiveness, appeal, or original mewing through the translation process. The researcher did not find any study of machine translated Arabic and English magazine articles, or articles that examined the problems of Arabic/English MT.; In this study, the researcher investigated native speakers' assessment of the adequacy and acceptability of MT. The An-Nakel Al-Arabi software was used by the researcher to translate selected Arabic and English opinion articles from Al-Magala and Time. An assessment sheet was designed by the researcher and was used by ten native speaker linguists in their assessment of the machine translations.; The native speakers' assessments of the machine translations showed that the Arabic and English translations could not be adequate nor acceptable to the native speakers of the language of translation, not even to the translators as a first draft. The challenge of the translation, however, did not originate from the use of the MT software, but from the articles themselves due to language and cultural barriers.; The software was found to be a useful training or educational tool for those who work in the field of translation and interpretation. With software upgrading, especially the ability of this software to learn new vocabularies and rules, and the possibility of using it as a tool by skillful translators, it appears that the potential of MT in multicultural media is good, particularly if the writers, when they write their articles, take into their consideration the readers of other culture.