Can simultaneous interpretation help machine translation?

Abstract

It is well known that Machine Translation (MT) has not approached the quality of human translations. It has also been noted that MT research has largely ignored the work of professionals and researchers in the field of translation, and that MT might benefit from collaboration with this field. In this paper, I look at a specialized type of translation, Simultaneous Interpretation (SI), in the light of possible applications to MT. I survey the research and practice of SI, and note that explanatory analyses of SI do not yet exist. However, descriptive analyses do, arrived at through anecdotal, empirical, and model-based methods. These descriptive analyses include “techniques” humans use for interpreting, and I suggest possible ways MT might use these techniques. I conclude by noting further questions which must be answered before we can fully understand SI, and how it might help MT.