Assoc. Prof. Özgür Şen Bartan on Translation Quality: Revision and Post-editing

On May 20, 2025, the Department of English Translation and Interpreting at Izmir University of Economics hosted a seminar titled “Refining The Outcome: Understanding Translation Revision and Post-Editing”, featuring Assoc. Prof. Dr. Özgür Şen Bartan from Kırıkkale University as the invited speaker.

The event began with a welcoming address by Research Assistant Dr. Nazlıgül Bozok. Afterwards, one of our undergraduate students, Gözde Cenk, introduced Assoc. Prof. Şen Bartan, who opened her talk by discussing the fundamental differences between revision and post-editing. She approached both concepts from theoretical and practical perspectives, offering an interactive overview.

In the first part of her presentation, Assoc. Prof. Şen Bartan drew on Brian Mossop’s framework to explain that translation quality should be assessed not only in terms of grammar, but also through semantic, structural, and visual aspects. She guided the audience through Mossop’s revision parameters, including accuracy, completeness, smoothness, audience appropriateness (tailoring), genre-specific language use (sub-language), idiomaticity, mechanics, and layout.

In the second half of the seminar, the focus shifted to post-editing, particularly in the context of rapidly evolving AI-based translation technologies. Şen Bartan explained the distinction between light and full post-editing, with the former focusing on minimal corrections to ensure meaning is conveyed, and the latter involving comprehensive attention to style, grammar, punctuation, and terminology. Based on TAUS (Translation Automation User Society) guidelines, she illustrated these practices with detailed examples and addressed common challenges such as gender and plurality mismatches, misinterpreted homonyms, unnatural phrasing, and syntactic errors.

In the final part of the session, Şen Bartan presented comparative examples of human and machine translation. She also shared a mini guide outlining the steps involved in effective post-editing.

The seminar attracted strong interest from students of the Department of English Translation and Interpreting, as well as participants from outside the university, and concluded with an engaging Q&A session.