If you know me well you’ll know I avoid CAT tools almost as assiduously as I avoid pineapple on pizzas. Two weeks ago a post on the excellent and always entertaining blog Ma_voisine_millionnaire covered some of the issues relating to CAT tool use and abuse much more succinctly than I’m ever likely to. My translation of the post is below (with the author’s permission). I’d like to add some thoughts of my own on the subject, and with a bit of luck I’ll have time to some time over the next few weeks. You can read the original Ma voisine millionaire post, and the debate it inspired, here.
“Man vs Machine: A False Debate?
I recently had the pleasure of attending the Tralogy conference, the theme of which was Translation Careers and Technologies: Convergence Points for the Future. The perfect organisation and the cohesion of the programme made the event a pleasure to take part in, and I look forward to attending next time. However, one thing struck me throughout, so I propose we continue the debate here.
As the main subject of the conference was technology, researchers from near and far came to present their work on translation technology. These projects – some promising, some still shaky – all shared the same ultimate goal: to produce satisfactory translations. Should we take this as meaning “to replace translators”? Decide for yourselves!
Several of these researchers are lecturers, and have tested their translation tools on their students. Not only that: many of them had pushed the use of CAT tools, machine translation and other technologies that are supposed to make work easier, very early on in their students’ courses. And you know what? That was what shocked me, much more than being told that one day a tool will do my job instead of me.
Let’s be clear on this: I’m 27, so I’m part of the generation that discovered mobile phones, computers, the Internet (at various bandwidths – I started out with a 56k modem) and all the inventions that go with them as teenagers, all at the same time. And I’ve adapted to everything, even translation memories. I’m not a technophobe – I’m even a bit of a geek! It’s just that I’m also someone who started learning to translate with a Word file and with online AND paper dictionaries. I took my translation exams without dictionaries (or with just one), and I got my degree. It wasn’t until I did my MA that I learnt to use Trados, Similis and Wordfast, and I found them to be wonderful tools, provided you know how to make use of them.
“What’s your point?” You’ll say. The point of that brief look back over my own experience is that I consider myself lucky to have learnt to translate without a translation tool, and that I’m concerned for the future of these students who are handed CAT tools right from their first year and will never know how to do anything with a non-segmented file (altruistic, aren’t I?).
These same students will want to turn freelance later on, and they’ll start off by buying Studio_2009 before they’ve even sent off their first translation quote.
Apart from wanting to let off steam just a little bit, more than anything else the conference made me reflect on the true values of the translation profession. What are they for lecturers? What are they for students? What are they for researchers?
For me at least (and I’m only speaking for myself, I don’t pretend to represent freelancers in general), my values as a translator are those I emphasise to my clients: time-keeping, quality, following the instructions given, etc. When I receive a text I start by reading it, I read the reference documents if there are any, I research the subject. So when I receive an assignment, you’ve guessed it – the first thing I do is read.
I do not launch Wordfast. In fact, I don’t use it when I’m translating, I use it as a concordancer to search for terms or expressions.
A text, however short, has a beginning, an end, a context, and translating it well means taking these into account. For me, a segmented text quite simply makes it impossible to think properly, it segments my thoughts as well and makes me think sentence by sentence instead of considering the document as a whole. Moreover, if you highlight style as a selling point, translating segment by segment cancels out everything that can make one translator different from another. And that’s such a shame!
Finally, translation tools are not a selling point when it comes to clients. Or rather, that’s something that still depends on the client. If you want to work with CAT tool-minded agencies, then yes, go ahead, buy all the licences you want. That way you can apply all the sliding-scale discounts you could ever dream of: fuzzy match, 50%, 30%, all the way down.
Be aware, though, that there are agencies that do not use these discounts, that do not insist on CAT tools and that are only interested in quality. Yes, it is possible.
Where direct clients are concerned, I’d say that to mention CAT tools to them is to shoot yourself in the foot. I personally can’t imagine myself telling clients that if their publications are repetitive, then if I translate a bit and they buy the software, after a while they’ll be able to do without me and have their texts filled in by a trilingual secretary. CAT tools are not a selling point.
When you’re trying to attract new clients, instead of highlighting your incredible mastery of translation tools, find out what your potential clients’ actual expectations are.
After Tralogy I decided that yes, perhaps convergence between translators and technology really was possible: translation tools would free translators from repetitive, boring texts and people would become post-editors. But even more than that I decided that, as in today’s market, some will be able to get out while the going’s good and the use these tools differently, to continue making translation a true profession. An idealistic view or a realistic one, what do you think? An activity is said to be proletarianised when the skills and knowledge it entails are lost. CAT tools: a new weapon in proletarianising translation? I give you the floor!”
