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College of Liberal Arts
Department of World Languages and Literatures

Translation Services Center

Why translate your research?

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The demographics of Texas reflect a need for Spanish, German, French and other languages translation to increase the reach and impact of research at TXST.  

  • Hispanic communities total 39.4% of the state's population.
  • In Hays County, Hispanic communities total 39.% of the population. 
  • 35.1% of Texas households use a language other than English as their primary language at home.
  • About 14% of Texans claim German heritage. German language is spoken by 15,000 people in the Hill Country region.
  • In 2022, Texas trade with Germany totaled $ 17.3 billion, making Germany the 13th-largest trade partner with Texas.
  • France was Texas’ 12th-largest export destination in 2022 with nearly $11.5 billion in exports. Texas exports make up 25% of all U.S. exports to France.
  • More than 9,000 peer-reviewed scholarly journals are being published in other languages, with French (3,100), Spanish (2,900), German (2,700), and Chinese (1400) contributing the highest numbers.
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Human v. Machine Translation

There are numerous benefits to relying on human translation instead of machine translation (i.e., Google Translate, Amazon Translate, CrossLang):

  • Human translation ensures culturally competent word usage, especially for sensitive or complex topics.
  • Human translation is critical for words or phrases that have no direct equivalent when translating between languages.
  • Machine translation can translate complex sentences but doesn't consider preceding or subsequent text (Kenny, 2022). 
  • Human translation offers cohesion and coherences (Moorkens et al., 2018; Rabadán & Fernández Nistal, 2002). 

Translation Services Pilot Project: Data Science Pathways

Data Science Pathways (DSP) is sponsored by the Translational Health Research Center and was initiated with funding from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. 

DSP addresses a need for workers in the Texas Innovation Corridor who have data analytics competencies and credentials. The program also provides access to analytical and data literacy education to Texans regardless of undergraduate degree or preparation. 

In Fall 2022, Dr. Francis Méndez, DSP principal investigator and THRC Faculty Fellow, collaborated with World Languages to begin translating DSP modules into Spanish. 

The idea to translate DSP into Spanish grew from observing the increasing need for workers who have expertise in Artificial Intelligence and Data Science, and the increasing population in Texas of people whose first language is Spanish.

Under the supervision of Dr. David Navarro, a Spanish MA student translated almost 90 instructional videos for DSP. 

Translation continues in Spring 2023 with the goal of translating all of the DSP introductory modules. 

THRC + World Languages

THRC is developing a translation services program with the Department of World Languages and Literatures to give students applied experience in Spanish translation for health and resilience research at TXST. 

Students lead translation efforts under supervision from World Languages faculty, ensuring quality and accuracy of translated materials.

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