Accounting for style in machine translation. DiMarco, C. & Hirst, G. In Third International Conference on Theoretical Issues in Machine Translation, Austin TX, June, 1990.
abstract   bibtex   

A significant part of the meaning of any text lies in the author's style. Different choices of words and syntactic structure convey different nuances in meaning, which must be carried through in any translation if it is to be considered faithful. Up to now, machine translation systems have been unable to do this. Subtleties of style are simply lost to current machine-translation systems.

The goal of the present research is to develop a method to provide machine-translation systems with the ability to understand and preserve the intent of an author's stylistic characteristics. Unilingual natural language understanding systems could also benefit from an appreciation of these aspects of meaning. However, in translation, style plays an additional role, for here one must also deal with the generation of appropriate target-language style.

Consideration of style in translation involves two complementary, but sometimes conflicting, aims:

  • The translation must preserve, as much as possible, the author's stylistic intent — the information conveyed through the manner of presentation.
  • But it must have a style that is appropriate and natural to the target language.

The study of comparative stylistics is, in fact, guided by the recognition that languages differ in their stylistic approaches: each has its own characteristic stylistic preferences. The stylistic differences between French and English are exemplified by the predominance of the pronominal verb in French. This contrast allows us to recognize the greater preference of English for the passive voice:

  • (a) Le jambon se mange froid.
    (b) Ham is eaten cold.

Such preferences exist at the lexical, syntactic, and semantic levels, but reflect differences in the two languages that can be grouped in terms of more-general stylistic qualities. French words are generally situated at a higher level of abstraction than that of the corresponding English words, which tend to be more concrete (Vinay and Darbelnet 1958, 59). French aims for precision while English is more tolerant of vagueness. (Duron 1963, 109).

So, a French source text may be abstract and very precise in style, but the translated English text should be looser and less abstract, while still retaining the author's stylistic intent. Translators use this kind of knowledge about comparative stylistics as they clean up raw machine-translation output, dealing with various kinds of stylistic complexities.

@InProceedings{	  dimarco7,
  author	= {Chrysanne DiMarco and Graeme Hirst},
  title		= {Accounting for style in machine translation},
  booktitle	= {Third International Conference on Theoretical Issues in
		  Machine Translation},
  address	= {Austin TX},
  month		= {June},
  year		= {1990},
  abstract	= {<P>A significant part of the meaning of any text lies in
		  the author's style. Different choices of words and
		  syntactic structure convey different nuances in meaning,
		  which must be carried through in any translation if it is
		  to be considered faithful. Up to now, machine translation
		  systems have been unable to do this. Subtleties of style
		  are simply lost to current machine-translation systems.</p>
		  <P> The goal of the present research is to develop a method
		  to provide machine-translation systems with the ability to
		  understand and preserve the intent of an author's stylistic
		  characteristics. Unilingual natural language understanding
		  systems could also benefit from an appreciation of these
		  aspects of meaning. However, in translation, style plays an
		  additional role, for here one must also deal with the
		  generation of appropriate target-language style.</p> <P>
		  Consideration of style in translation involves two
		  complementary, but sometimes conflicting, aims:</p>
		  <UL><LI> The translation must preserve, as much as
		  possible, the author's stylistic intent --- the information
		  conveyed through the manner of presentation. <LI> But it
		  must have a style that is appropriate and natural to the
		  target language. </UL> <P> The study of comparative
		  stylistics is, in fact, guided by the recognition that
		  languages differ in their stylistic approaches: each has
		  its own characteristic stylistic preferences. The stylistic
		  differences between French and English are exemplified by
		  the predominance of the pronominal verb in French. This
		  contrast allows us to recognize the greater preference of
		  English for the passive voice:</p> <UL> <LI> <I>(a)</I> Le
		  jambon se mange froid.<BR> <I>(b)</I> Ham is eaten cold.
		  </UL> <P> Such preferences exist at the lexical, syntactic,
		  and semantic levels, but reflect differences in the two
		  languages that can be grouped in terms of more-general
		  stylistic qualities. French words are generally situated at
		  a higher level of abstraction than that of the
		  corresponding English words, which tend to be more concrete
		  (Vinay and Darbelnet 1958, 59). French aims for precision
		  while English is more tolerant of vagueness. (Duron 1963,
		  109).</p> <P> So, a French source text may be abstract and
		  very precise in style, but the translated English text
		  should be looser and less abstract, while still retaining
		  the author's stylistic intent. Translators use this kind of
		  knowledge about comparative stylistics as they clean up raw
		  machine-translation output, dealing with various kinds of
		  stylistic complexities.</p>}
}
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