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Publication Date: 2025
International Journal of Multilingualism (14790718)
Accessibility to healthcare information is contingent upon effective health communication, particularly for individuals with poor English ability. Communication is hampered by language problems, which can lead to miscommunication and restricted access to healthcare. While machine translation (MT) presents a potential solution, its effectiveness in healthcare remains understudied. This study assesses the linguistic comprehensibility of health-related translations using both MT and human translation (HT), aiming to identify challenges and opportunities for enhancing health communication. The study utilised mixed methods, combining qualitative thematic analysis with quantitative poll questionnaires. Health-related translations from the ‘Health Translations’ website were categorised and assessed for linguistic comprehensibility using comprehensibility using the Patient-oriented and Culturally-adapted (POCA) model's six categories. MT generally outperformed HT in generating high-quality translations, especially in technical or specialised terminology and abstract concepts. However, HT excelled in categories requiring nuanced language and context comprehension. Specific linguistic challenges identified included abstract translations, coherence issues, and complex sentence structures, hindering comprehension among non-native speakers. Despite challenges, MT showed significant progress in improving linguistic comprehensibility, particularly in health-related contexts. This study provides insights into MT and HT effectiveness in health communication. In healthcare settings, using precise language is essential to improving comprehension and minimising misinterpretation. © 2025 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
Publication Date: 2025
Language Related Research (23223081) 16(1)pp. 115-137
The representation of future pre-configuration through policy-making processes has been an in-vogue area of study in the field of discourse analysis. Equally important is the reconstruction of future pre-configuration in the institutional translations of political text and talk. The objective of this study is to investigate the conceptualization of futurity in the preemptive policy-making in the speeches of the Iranian Supreme Leader and their English institutional translations. The data for the present study comes from 20 speeches of the Iranian Supreme Leader and their translations, spanning from 2015-2020, issued by the Office of the Supreme Leader. We employed semantic-syntactic analytical tools such as mood, modality, and aspect to study the conceptualization of futurity in the policy discourse. In conclusion, the findings of the study indicate that these reconstruction of futurity in the preemptive policy-making process in the English institutional translations are to a greater extent similar to the semantic-syntactic properties of the original texts. However, modalization and mood transformation are instances of differences between original and translated versions of texts. Besides, we argued that any instance of the occurrence of similarity or differences stems from on-line dialectic relationships between micro-pragmatic and macro-pragmatic factors. © 2025, Tarbiat Modares University. All rights reserved.
Publication Date: 2024
International Journal of Multilingualism (14790718) 21(4)pp. 2307-2324
Health translation has gotten considerable attention recently because language diversity in multilingual societies often leads to language barriers. The present study evaluates the linguistic comprehensibility of translations in the “Health Translations Website” from the Victorian Government of Australia using the patient-oriented and culturally-appropriate health translation model (POCA). Seven documents were randomly chosen from the website with their translations and were analysed based on the six categories of the linguistic comprehensibility section of the POCA model. Then, they were given to the senior translation students in Iran to be translated again. After that, the same chunks of the two translations were put to the vote using the Telegram platform, and 132 lay people participated. The analysis revealed that senior students’ translations were more understandable than the website's in all six categories. Due to the sensitive nature of the healthcare field, this study suggests that the authorities in multilingual communities collect their audience's opinions, as ultimate users, to discover the language barriers and then take appropriate measures to remove them. Domestic translators can also enhance the translation quality and, subsequently, comprehensibility since they are more familiar with the culture of the intended language, which in this case is Persian. © 2023 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
Publication Date: 2022
Dictionaries (21605076) 43(2)pp. 167-196
Translators have often been regarded by lexicographers as identical to other users, and their needs have largely been neglected in spite of the fact that they are a major group of dictionary users. In recent years and with the flourishing of online dictionaries, the development of translation dictionaries has become an important topic as a result of emerging bonds between lexicography and translation studies. The present study is an attempt to develop a method for compiling bilingual specialized dictionaries with an emphasis on translators as the main audience. The project, which is called TransLex, is based on the idea of semantic networks. It makes use of a bilingual (English and Persian) comparable corpus of road traffic and transportation materials, annotated using a set of semantic frames as well as an ontology of the concepts of this domain. An online user interface was then designed to search the database. The main feature is semantic-as opposed to alphabetic-search, which is possible through the application of several search options. This provides translators with more natural ways of expressing the concepts of a specialized field in the target language. © 2022 Dictionary Society of North America. All rights reserved.
Publication Date: 2021
Hikma (24454559) 20(2)pp. 153-176
The idea of metaphor classification is regarded as how felicitously they are entrenched in the everyday language spoken by people. Metaphor conventionality can be regarded as a scale whose opposite ends constitute conventional and creative metaphors. Logic indicates that the majority of linguistic metaphors are conventional rather than novel, since an excess of novel metaphors may remarkably bring about «communicative surprise» (Rabadán Álvarez, 1991), thus increasing cognitive processing time. This study seeks to scrutinize the scale of conventionality in the Persian translation of A Fraction of the Whole done by Peyman Khaksar. Based on purposive sampling, some chapters of the novel along with their Persian translations were selected for analysis. MIP known as Metaphor Identification Procedure put forward by the Pragglejaz Group (2007) was employed in the study to identify metaphors. The findings reveal that, sometimes, the metaphors used in L1 are novel or creative, but the translator draws upon conventional or entrenched ones in L2, or vice versa. The aim is to show the translator's choice of metaphor in terms of a conventionality scale using some previous cognitive models in this regard. © 2021 Universidad de Cordoba,Servicio de Publicaciones. All rights reserved.
Publication Date: 2019
Meta (Canada) (14921421) 64(1)pp. 103-124
This study uses narrative theory and the concept of narrative framing, as elaborated by Somers and Gibson (1994) and Baker (2006), to study the paratextual mediation and discursive presence of different agents in Persian translations of political texts written by Western authors about the Iran-Iraq war. By exploring the narratives dominant in the paratexts, and more specifically in the prefaces and footnotes of Persian translations, this paper examines how these have played a crucial role in reframing the narratives of Western authors through paratextual material. To this end, the narratives in the paratexts have been analyzed using four framing techniques elaborated by Somers and Gibson (1994) and Baker (2006), which are framing by temporality/spatiality, selective appropriation, labeling and participant positioning. The analysis of paratextual material shows that, apart from their introductory and explanatory functions, paratexts can be viewed as a kind of metadiscourse on the actual translations. The paper concludes that paratexts in the Persian translations are used in political and ideological ways to guide target language readers and to express the appropriate interpretations, or deemed appropriate, by the various institutional participants involved in the translation process in Iran. © 2019 Presses de l'Universite de Montreal. All rights reserved.
Publication Date: 2019
Interpreter and Translator Trainer (1750399X) 13(2)pp. 132-151
While enacting innovative learner-centered practices has been reported to instigate, at least initially, student negative responses in diverse contexts, studies in translation education adhering to teaching approaches informed by social-constructivism have paid no great attention to student resistance, as one potential threatening factor, in response to the newly employed approaches. This study aims at addressing this under-researched but important aspect in the design, development, and implementation process. In a course redesign plan aimed at advancing towards a learner-centered approach in the course literary translation, we found student resistance as one major threat to the plan’s ultimate success. Although attempts were made to anticipate student resistance and enact several prevention strategies, by mid-semester we found the majority of the students still resistant. An investigation into student resistance types and sources revealed that the majority of the students did not perceive the problem as being instructor-owned. Data collected through the questionnaire on students’ characteristics alongside follow-up interviews highlighted students’ lack of motivation as one important variable worth investigating in the first place. Results from the analysis of motivational factors better justified student resistance. Implications were discussed in the light of the relevant literature for our pedagogical purposes in the upcoming semester. © 2018, © 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
Publication Date: 2018
XLinguae (13378384) 11(2)pp. 303-319
Literature on translation education over the past two decades covers studies that report on the successful application of teaching and learning practices informed by social-constructivism. These studies, however, do not give a clear report on the way the tenets of social-constructivism have been applied in the design of the teaching and learning activities used. This study attempts to demonstrate the applicability and effectiveness of Fink's (2013) integrated course design, which has been built upon his taxonomy of significant learning experiences (2013), in filling the gap. Within this framework, therefore, we have presented the structure of the units and materials designed for an undergraduate literary translation course, in an Iranian educational context, and outlined through sample materials the steps we took in developing activities aimed at achieving Fink's significant learning. © 2018, Slovenska Vzdelavacia Obstaravacia. All rights reserved.
Publication Date: 2016
Language Related Research (23223081) 7(4)pp. 149-173
This study is an attempt to compare the intralingual semantic relations among nouns in three WordNets: FarsNet, EuroNet and Princeton WordNet. For this purpose, first the structure of WordNet was introduced and then the relations among the noun syn sets in each WordNet were discussed. This study is a descriptive comparative one and tries to answer these questions: is there any difference between these WordNets with regard to the type and number of relations? If there is any difference, what is the reason? The result of the comparison indicated that some specific relations create the skeleton of these WordNets and these relations were common between them but there were other relations that increase the information about the synsets and as a result could add to the natural language processing capability of these tools. Although adding relations can increase the capabilities, too many relations have a negative effect on their computational ability and this is the reason of choosing a restricted number of relations in FarsNet. This finding can be used in building other WordNets including special WordNets. © 2016, Tarbiat Modares University. All rights reserved.
Publication Date: 2016
3l: Language, Linguistics, Literature (01285157) 22(3)pp. 49-63
Mandelblit's cognitive translation hypothesis investigates the translatability of metaphors at the conceptual level by considering two possible alternatives of same mapping condition (SMC) and different mapping condition (DMC) facing translators. His model incorporating other ideas about cultural models presumes conceptual metaphors as intertwined with cultural models. Additionally, in philosophy aesthetics has been defined as a way to access truth (constructed, situated and embodied rather than absolute). Therefore, the aim of the present study is to aesthetically evaluate Khayyam's Rubayyat and its English translation by Whinfield as a case study in order to gauge the issue of aesthetic equivalence with regard to the integrated model based on ideas of Mandelblit, Tabakowska, and Al-Zoubi et al. Thus, firstly, SMCs and DMCs are investigated in Whinfield's translation and secondly, aesthetic experiences of the two cultures involved are evaluated in terms of conceptual metaphors; finally, an attempt is made to modify the integrated model in terms of aesthetics. The research findings reveal that the translator has been mostly successful in maintaining conceptual equivalence by changing generic schemas and cultural models compatible to his Western community in cases of DMCs. This indicates the interrelation of conceptual metaphors and cultural models and demonstrates the overall applicability of the integrated model. Also confirmed is the necessity of supplementing the said model by factoring in aesthetics, defined by Heidegger and Nietzsche as the very understanding of a community about realities.
Publication Date: 2016
Language Related Research (23223081) 6(6)pp. 75-103
This study investigated the mapping between Farsnet and Princeton English WordNet (PWN) and tried to answer these questions: Are the unmapped synsets in FarsNet with Princeton WordNet Persian specific lexical items? How can these cases be classified? Is it possible to find equivalents for some of these cases in PWN? In other words, were all of the equivalents of these lexical elements not lexicalized in English or there is another reason for that? For this purpose, a sample including 2000 synsets of FarsNet was selected and unmapped synsets were analyzed. Out of the sample, near 15 percent of the synsets had no mapping. The Categorization and analysis of the selected synsets showed that less than two third of these synsets were Persian specific words and more than one third were synsets that were unmapped due to other reasons and therefore those are not specific lexical items in Persian. By enriching and completing the information in PWN and then FarsNet a lot of these cases can be mapped with PWN synsets. © 2016, Tarbiat Modares University. All rights reserved.
Publication Date: 2013
Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences (discontinued) (20392117) 4(2)pp. 59-70
The present study reports on the findings of a questionnaire which focused on the recruitment criteria of official translation agencies. To this end, 25 managers of official translation agencies in four cities of Iran were requested to complete a questionnaire about the basic requirements for becoming a member in translation agencies. The results indicate that the most important factors according to the managers are translation competence, language competence and experience in translation. Aspects such as academic degree (B.A. or M.A.) in Translation Studies do not seem to be of high value to the managers. The findings show that graduates in Translation Studies ought to improve their skills and gain practical experience in translation. Otherwise, they will not be considered qualified enough to be the members of translation agencies. Also, the results might contribute to more considerable attention to translation practice and better translation training in universities or translation institutes.
Publication Date: 2012
Theory and Practice in Language Studies (20530692) 2(4)pp. 843-849
This study tries to investigate the relationship between learners' listening strategy use, cognitive, metacognitive, social/affective, while they listen to the texts and some of their individual differences. In order to study this relationship, 40 Iranian university EFL (English as a Foreign Language) students were surveyed with four structured questionnaires and an ILTES listening test. The questionnaires were Listening strategy use (Vandergrift, 1997), learning style (Soloman and Felder, 2001), motivation (adapted from Laine, 1988), and the Revised NEO- FFI. In order to comprehend whether there is a relationship between variables, and to see which group of individual differences use which listening strategy more, statistical analysis of Multiple Regression analysis, Chi Square test, one way ANOVA, at the p< 0.05 level, were used. The results suggested that there was a significant relationship between the level of motivation and the listening strategies. After motivation, learning style, also, had some effect on the listening strategies use. The other variables had no significant effect on the use of the three listening comprehension strategies. In addition it should be mentioned that social/ affective strategy was omitted in the analysis because the mean of this strategy use was so low. It means that no individual groups used this kind of listening strategy. Finally, the aim of this article was to clarify on little-investigated area, namely, listening comprehension strategies and some individual differences, and the findings discussed in the area of English language teaching. © 2012 ACADEMY PUBLISHER Manufactured in Finland.
Shamsfard, M. ,
Hesabi, A. ,
Fadaei, H. ,
Mansoory, N. ,
Famian, A. ,
Bagherbeigi, S. ,
Fekri, E. ,
Monshizadeh, M. ,
Assi, S.M. Publication Date: 2010
This paper describes the development process of FarsNet; a lexical ontology for the Persian language. FarsNet is designed to contain a Persian WordNet with about 10000 synsets in its first phase and grow to cover verbs' argument structures and their selectional restrictions in its second phase. In this paper we discuss the semi-automatic approach to create the first phase: the Persian WordNet. © Global Wordnet Conference, GWC 2010. All rights reserved.
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