Glossary

Technical terms are explained in the text where they appear. The list below includes either recurring terms or potentially ambiguous expressions with a statement of what they mean in this book.

Artificial intelligence (AI) translation

– technologies that automatically convert texts and speech between languages, including large language models and systems developed specifically for language translation. Used synonymously with ‘machine translation’. For a full discussion, see Introduction.

Language mediation

– the process of facilitating communication between different parties which do not all speak the same language.

Language professional

– an individual who is paid and formally hired to provide a language service such as translation (written) or interpreting (spoken).

Linguist

– a language expert (includes ‘language professional’).

Low-resource language

– a language of low digital representation for which textual data and automatic text processing tools are less likely to be available. For a full discussion, see Chapter 5.

Machine translation

– used synonymously with ‘AI translation’. For a full discussion, see Introduction.

Multimodality

– a combination of multiple communicative modes, such as written, spoken, verbal and non-verbal. For a full discussion, see Chapter 3.

Service provider

– unless otherwise specified, a professional from one of the sectors examined in the book, such as nurses, paramedics, social workers, doctors or police officers.

Service user

– any member of a community who uses the services provided in one of the sectors examined in the book.

Source language

– the language translated from. For example, if a text in Spanish is translated into English, Spanish is the source language. Used synonymously with ‘input language’.

Target language

– the language translated into. If a text in Spanish is translated into English, English is the target language. Used synonymously with ‘output language’.