Spoken Language Translation

Aims.
The SIG SLT covers all aspects of spoken language translation ⁠— simultaneous translation and interpretation, speech dubbing, speech-to-text translation, speech-to-speech translation, cross-lingual communication including paralinguistic, emotional or multimodal information, and related areas ⁠ SIG SLT will (a) provide members of ISCA with a special interest in spoken language translation and its related areas with a means of exchanging news of recent research developments and other matters of interest in spoken language translation; (b) organize challenges and evaluation campaigns; (c) sponsor and organize the International Conference on Spoken Language Translation (IWSLT), meetings, satellites, and tutorial workshops in spoken language translation, operating within the framework of ISCA's by-laws for SIGs; and (d) make available open-source code and data resources, best practices and tools, and evaluation metrics relevant to spoken language translation.

Motivation.
Recent interest in speech translation and simultaneous translation by machine has been growing explosively, due to continued performance advances and a growing international need for simultaneous translation and interpretation, speech dubbing, speech-to-text translation, speech-to-speech translation, cross-lingual communication including paralinguistic, emotional or multimodal information, and related areas. The under-covered elements in the current research are, for instance, incremental simultaneous speech-to-speech translation, paralinguistic translation, speaking style translation across languages. The proposed SIG will be organized by the members who are interested in spoken language translation/interpretation from various related areas such as ASR, TTS, and MT.

SIG SLT emerges from over two decades of organizing the International Conference on Spoken Language Translation (IWSLT) and its predecessor C-Star, scaling operations in response to significant growth in the field. The organizers of IWSLT and partners believe it is now time to join with ISCA by creating an ISCA SIG. IWSLT has a 15-year track record of profitability; it runs the premier benchmarking campaign on spoken language translation annually accompanied by an international scientific conference to present and discuss results.

Board.
The officers for 2020-2021 are:

1. Chair and ISCA liaison representative: Satoshi Nakamura, Nara Institute of Science and Technology (NAIST), Japan (website)
2. Secretary: Marco Turchi, Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK), Trento, Italy (website)

SIG-SLT News:

• SIG-SLT Talk Series:   https://iwslt.org/lectures/

ISCA-supported event

• (more to come)

Other events

• International Workshops on Spoken Language Translation (IWSLT)
  • IWSLT 2020 Virtual, 9-10/7/2020
  • IWSLT 2019 Hong-Kong (China), 2-3/11/2019 (proceedings)
  • IWSLT 2018 Bruges (Belgium) 29-30/10/2018 (proceedings)
  • IWSLT 2017 Tokyo (Japan) 14-15/12/2017 (proceedings)
  • IWSLT 2016 Seattle (USA) 8-9/12/2016
  • IWSLT 2015 Da Nang (Vietnam), 3-4/12/2015
  • IWSLT 2014 Lake Tahoe (USA) 4-5,/12/2014 (proceedings)
  • IWSLT 2013 Heidelberg (Germany) 5-6/12/2013 (proceedings)
  • IWSLT 2012 Hong-Kong (China) 6-7/12/2012
  • IWSLT 2011 San Francisco (USA) 8-9/12/2011
  • IWSLT 2010, Maison de la Chimie- Paris (France), 2-3/12/2010
  • International Workshops on Spoken Language Translation (IWSLT):  https://iwslt.org/

Join the SIG: please contact Satoshi Nakamura, Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Japan