The new ICTs and translation competences

Translation competence is the ability to carry out the transfer process from the comprehension of the source text to the re expression of the target text, with the characteristics of the target-text readers.

THE TRANSLATION NOW

Nowadays, language translation and interpreting services are being used in all spheres of daily life, from helping a student to enroll into a new school to interpreting for a corporate executive who has just purchased a new business in China. As language is continually changing, it will be years before an intelligent computer program appears in order to translate and comprehend as well as human does. Thus, translators and interpreter's job will be secured for years to come.

WHAT ARE COMPETENCE/ TRANSLATION COMPETENCE?

The PACTE group has been carrying out empirical- experimental research into translation competence and its acquisition in written translation since 1997. Research is being carried out from two complementary perspectives:

- the translation process,  through the collection and analysis of data obtained from experimental studies of the mental processes at work in translation,  and the competences and abilities required

- the translation product, through the collection and analysis of data obtained from the results of the translation process (translated texts) using discourse analysis and corpus methodology (electronic corpora).

GENERAL ICTs FOR TRANSLATORS  

1. The Internet

2. The use of corpus linguistics (The monolingual corpora & The bilingual corpora.

3. Concordance generator programs (Machine translation & Computer assisted translation)

Main phases of the translation process.

• The reception phase: a translator can use electronic encyclopedias, digital knowledge databases allowing him to combine text, domain and world knowledge to fully understand the content of the source text.
• The transfer phase: it requires deep cross-cultural understanding and strong inter cultural (communication skills).