Dr. Chan Sin-wai (Caritas Institute of Higher Education)

Revisiting the Future of Translation Technology

Translation technology has been fast-changing, so fast that five years after the publication of my book The Future of Translation Technology: Towards a World without Babel (Routledge 2017), I find it necessary to revisit my pet theme by re-examining some of the major issues in translation technology.

In my presentation, I will discuss the name and nature of translation technology, study the developments of different forms of translation, look at the division of work among the four types of translation technology, analyze the advantages and disadvantages of using machine translation, computer-aided translation, localization, and speech translation and look at the future of these technologies. I will conclude my presentation with four observations on the future of translation technology from a holistic perspective.

Bio

Chan Sin-wai is Dean of the School of Humanities and Languages, Caritas Institute of Higher Education, President of the Association for Translation Technology, and was a member of the Translation Technology Committee of the International Federation of Translators (FIT).

He received his Bachelor of Arts from The Chinese University of Hong Kong and his doctorate from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.

He has to date published 66 academic books in 75 volumes. His book publications on translation technology include The Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Technology (Routledge 2015, 2023, second edition), The Human Factor in Machine Translation (Routledge 2018), The Future of Translation Technology: Towards a World without Babel (Routledge 2017), The Teaching of Computer-aided Translation, (Chinese University Press 2010), A Topical Bibliography of Computer (-aided) Translation (Chinese University Press, 2008), A Dictionary of Translation Technology (Chinese University Press, 2004), and Translation and Information Technology (The Chinese University Press 2002).