Intralingual respeaking and machine translation for live subtitling: A study on quality and perception
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5007/2175-7968.2025.e102708Keywords:
subtitling quality, interlingual live subtitling, intralingual respeaking, machine translation, linguistic accessibilityAbstract
This case study analyzes the quality of live interlingual subtitles produced through a workflow combining intralingual respeaking and machine translation. The study follows a qualitative, descriptive approach. The corpus consists of Spanish subtitles derived from an English-language interview. The NTR model was applied to calculate the accuracy rate and assess additional quality parameters such as delay, reading speed, and audiovisual coherence. Furthermore, the perceptions of 31 participants were collected via a questionnaire designed to measure literal, inferential, and critical comprehension, as well as subjective evaluation of quality factors. The results revealed an accuracy rate of 97.57% (4/10), which falls below the minimum acceptable quality threshold. Participants also reported difficulties related to subtitle legibility, significant delay, and challenges in literal comprehension. The study concludes that, within this workflow, machine translation remains the main barrier to achieving high-quality subtitles, primarily due to frequent errors in form.
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