Functional Study of the Arabic Translation of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner: Artificial Intelligence Versus Human Intelligence in Literary Translation
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This paper investigates the Arabic translation of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by an AI translation application QuillBot and another one by AbdulWahab Elmessiri as an example of human literary translation. In his translation, Elmessiri tried to preserve the aesthetics of poetic language. The cultural knowledge of Elmessiri is reflected in the accuracy of choice of words and expressions in his human translation. On the other hand, the QuillBot translation is accurate, fast, and concise, but it does not reflect the essence and the intended meaning of the literary text as much as the human translation does. This study compares and contrasts the two Arabic translations of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, namely, the AI and human translations using the framework of functional translation theory, first known as Skopos theory. “Skopos” is a Greek word meaning “purpose” or “function”. In functional translation theory, the main concern is the function of the source and target texts. The approach of Skopos theory being applied in this study is Nord’s 2005 approach that adds loyalty to the purpose of the source and target texts. Findings of the study show how artificial intelligence translation lacks cultural sensitivity and deep understanding of the source text and hence does not achieve the function of literary translation appropriately. Human intelligence, in contrast, shows profound understanding of the source text and transfers cultural nuances and poetic aesthetics in the target text achieving the purpose of literary translation properly.
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