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Article In: Translation Spaces: Online-First Articles

When machines cannot stay silent

Exploring creative omissions and spectral material in translation

ORCiD logo with link | Universitat de València
 | Universitat de València
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Abstract
This study examines creativity in translation by analysing absences and disrupting presences in literary texts. It introduces the concepts of “creative omission” and “spectral material”, applying them to the analysis of five discourse markers in the EN–CAT triple-aligned corpus COVALT. Quantitative techniques, including percentage analysis and chi-square tests, are combined with qualitative case studies to compare human translations and machine output. This analysis is further complemented with a pilot study involving LLMs to test the validity of the results against the current technological scenario. Two hypotheses are tested, both of which are validated by the findings. The Creative Silence hypothesis posits that human translators employ significantly more creative omissions and demonstrate an ability to recognise “when to stay silent”. The Spectral Material hypothesis, by contrast, postulates that machine-generated output tends towards non-creative solutions that generate “spectral” effects. The study further characterises machine translationese as being misaligned with the interpretive and embodied practices that underpin human translation.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Discourse markers, the translation of feigned orality, and timely silences
    • 2.1Discourse markers
    • 2.2Feigned orality, narrative voices and discourse markers
    • 2.3Creative omissions vs. spectral material
  • 3.Materials and methods
    • 3.1Corpus data
    • 3.2Research questions, hypotheses and procedure
  • 4.Creative omissions: A comparison between human translations and machine outputs
    • 4.1Creative and non-creative translations
    • 4.2Creative omissions: Human translation
    • 4.3Creative omissions: Machine output
    • 4.4Comparison between human translation and machine output
    • 4.5Pilot study with LLMs
  • 5.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • Author queries
  • References
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