There are more and more tools on the market that facilitate tasks related to communication. Currently it is the most common to use automatic translation vs. human translation systems. These are much faster and have a high level of accuracy.
If these systems are so effective, it is valid to question whether they have definitively replaced the work of translators. We present below some cases in which the intervention of a human translator will be necessary.
Ability to transliterate
An automatic translation is not always as accurate as a human translation for the simple reason that human translators can transliterate. Humans can find cultural equivalents that an automatic translation would not take into account.
Take, for example, proverbs and idioms. We can say in English that it rains “like cats and dogs”, but in Mexican Spanish we would translate it something like it rains “a cántaros”; A literal translation would not be accurate at all.
That is why the use of automatic translators is very valid and useful, but, at least until now, it is necessary that the resulting text goes through a human review to rectify these small errors that we can still find in automatic translations. And not only that, but also to localize and standardize the language used in the documents produced, what do I mean by this?
Locate content
Let’s say that a manual or instruction manual needs to be translated into different languages. In Spanish alone, there are many dialect variants and regionalisms. On the one hand, there is peninsular or European Spanish; on the other hand, American Spanish. The different embodiments that a language has for geographical reasons are known as dialects.
Within American Spanish there are the dialects of countries such as Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Dominican Republic, Uruguay, Venezuela and Puerto Rico.
In the Mexican Spanish dialect we prefer the personal pronoun tú, while Argentinian has the form vos. And even within the same States that make up Mexico, we call certain things differently; Thus, a person in Yucatán can ‘ir a wishear’ while in Mexico City ‘va al baño’.
These give us an idea of the huge linguistic variety that a single language presents. We could even go further and note that within the same group of people, the way in which individuals express themselves varies: the particular way that each speaker has of using the language is known as idiolect.
For all of the above, when a translation is carried out, it is necessary to adapt the documents to the linguistic variant(s) of the speakers of a certain geographical area, that is, to localize the contents.
Let’s say, in the case of a translation localized in Spain, the use of terms like ‘ordenador’ vs ‘computadora’ will be preferred, since although it could be understood that it is the same concept, local speakers prefer certain forms over others.
Standardize a document
The standardization of the criteria applied to a translation is important, especially if more than one person was involved in its completion. Depending on the publishing house or the media in question, there will be various criteria to adhere to, for example, it will be preferable to talk about you or you to the reader, certain regionalisms will be considered valid or a more common or standard Spanish will be chosen, and these criteria will be applied consistently to all documents.
Another reason why human translations are still important (or revised, post-automatic translation), is the accuracy in the use of technical or specialized terms.
According to linguist Teresa Cabré, we only consider that a text is specialized if it was produced by an expert in the area of knowledge it deals with. The level of specialization can be high, if the receiver is another specialist; medium, if the receiver is a student; or low, if the receiver is a layman or novice in the subject of study. Therefore, reviews made by humans are of vital importance in scientific, medical, legal texts, etc.
In the case of your corporate documents, your social networks and your website, it is necessary to adopt a more personalized translation according to the region where your users are located. Although it may be much faster to do an automatic translation, it is better to invest in a professional translation, in which a human does a transliteration process, so that you can communicate your offer effectively, since readers (your potential customers) will feel more identified with your brand.
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