87898 - Methods and Technologies for Interpreting

Learning outcomes

The student – knows and is able to use the ICT resources, both traditional and electronic, required for the interpretation of oral speeches. S/he knows and is able to use the terminography tools necessary for the interpretation of oral speeches. S/he has the basic terminology skills required for the interpretation. S/he is able to autonomously build terminology databases necessary for the interpretation of oral speeches.

Course contents

The module is delivered in the second semester and is one of the two modules that make up the METODI, TECNOLOGIE E LINGUISTICA PER L'INTERPRETAZIONE course, toghether with LINGUISTICA PER INTERPRETI.

The course focuses on various aspects of documentation and terminology research, which are closely linked to each other.

The first part of the course focuses on the various documentation strategies, traditional and electronic, useful for the preparation of conference interpreters. Following an overview of advanced techniques for web searching using search engines, special emphasis will be placed on the construction (with the help of BootCaT) and use of electronic specialised corpora aimed at terminology extraction.

Then the theoretical basis of terminology are presented together with the basic tools for the detection of terminology, namely AntConC. Moreover, some of the main terminography tools for creation and management of glossaries and terminology databases are presented (MultiTerm, Interplex, InterpretBank).

Readings/Bibliography

During lessons based on theoretical aspects, the teacher will be using the following bibliographical references:

Biber, D., Conrad, S., & Reppen, R. (1998). CORPUS LINGUISTICS: Investigating language Structure and Use. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Cabré M.T., 1993. “La terminología. Teoría, metodología, aplicaciones”, Editorial Empúries

Dubuc R., “Manuel pratique de terminologie”, Conseil international de la langue française

Berber-Irabian, 2010. “New Technologies and Electronic Tools in Conference Interpreting” Doctoral dissertation ISG Tarragona

Faini, P. (2014) Terminology Management and the Translator. From Project Planning to Database Creation. Trento: Tangram

Fantinuoli C. (2018) "The use of comparable corpora in interpreting practice and teaching". The Interpreters' Newsletter 23, 133-149

Fantinuoli C. (2019) "The technological turn in interpreting: the challenges that lie ahead". Proceedings of the conference Übersetzen und Dolmetschen 4.0. - Neue Wege im digitalen Zeitalter, 334-354

Fantinuoli C., Pisani E. (2021) "Measuring the impact of automatic speech recognition on interpreter’s performances in simultaneous interpreting", In: Empirical studies of translation and interpreting: the post-structuralist apporach, Edited by Caiwen Wang and Binghan Zheng. Routledge

Felber H., 1984. “Terminology Manual”, Infoterm-UNESCO

Gnoli C., 2004. “Classificazione a faccette”, AIB

Gouadec D., 1990. “Terminologie: constitution des données”, Association Française de Normalisation

Kalina, S., 2010. “New Technologies in Conference Interpreting” in Lee-Jahnke & Prunc (eds.), Am Schnittpunkt von Philologie und Translationswissenschaft. Festschrift zu Ehren von Martin Forstner. Bern: Peter Lang, 79-96

Kockaert, H. J. and Steurs, F. (eds.) (2015) Handbook of Terminology. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

Manning, C. and Schütze, H. (1999).Foundations of Statistical Natural Language Processing. MIT Press. Cambridge, MA

Magris M., Musacchio M. T., Rega L., Scarpa F., 2002. “Manuale di terminologia, Aspetti teorici, metodologici e applicativi”, Hoepli

Rey A., 1992. “La terminologie noms et notions”, Presses Universitaires de France,
Rondeau G., 1997. “Introduction à la terminologie”, Gaëtan Morin

Sager J. C., 1990. “A Practical Course in Terminology Processing”, John Benjamins Publishing Company

Sinclair, J. (1991). Corpus, Concordance, Collocation. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Wright, S. E. & Budin, G., 2001. “Handbook of terminology management”, John Benjamins Publishing Co.

Teaching methods

Lessons take the form of workshops and combine theoretical aspects with a strong practical and applicative component.

The theoretical aspects are presented by the lecturer and deepened independently by the students through readings assigned during the course. 

The applied part consists of hands-on practice in the laboratory and homework exercises. These are discussed during troubleshooting sessions in the following class, so as to constantly monitor progress in the development of the technological skills that make the object of the course.

As concerns the teaching methods of this course unit, all students must attend Module 1, 2 on Health and Safety online.

Attendance is compulsory (at least 70% of lessons need to be attended).

Assessment methods

The final exam consists in an oral test. The student will be asked to present a documentary and terminological research project prepared at home.

The project must contain:

• two specialized bilingual corpora built with semiautomatic methods (BootCaT)
• a terminology database in different formats containing the specific terminology extracted.

Moreover, during the oral exam, the use of the tools presented in class and the knowledge of the theoretical basis of terminology will be ascertained (in particular Interplex and IntrepretBank).

The project is worth 20 points: major errors or omissions will be penalised by 2 points each, distracting or minor errors will be penalised by 1 point each.

The oral presentation is worth 10 points. The evaluation criteria will be: correctness, completeness and clarity of the information presented. 10 points will be awarded for an excellent presentation; 7-9 points for a presentation with minor errors; 4-6 points for an incomplete presentation and partial acquisition of the required knowledge; 1-3 points for a sufficient presentation, but with evident limitations in knowledge; 0 points for an insufficient presentation.

The overall mark for the integrated course METODI, TECNOLOGIE E LINGUISTICA PER L'INTERPRETAZIONE will consist of the arithmetic mean of the modules Metodi e Tecnologie per l'Interpretazione and Linguistica per interpreti.

The final marks are published a few days later through the Moodle platform.

Teaching tools

Lessons are held in a computer lab with internet connection, beamer and software useful for didactics.

Since lessons take the form of workshops, with substantial time devoted to pratical hands-on exercises, students have the possibility to become acquainted with the main software programs used in the fields of documentation and terminology, both proprietary and open-source/free.

Support materials (texts, slides, instructions etc.) are made available through the Moodle e-learning platform.

Links to further information

https://moodle.sslmit.unibo.it/enrol/instances.php?id=1471

Office hours

See the website of Claudia Lecci