AN ENGLISH TO YORUBA BILINGUAL LEXICON FOR HEALTH SECTORS USING A DIRECT APPROACH TO MACHINE TRANSLATION
Oluwatoyin Bunmi Abiola, G.O. Babalola, O.O. Adaramola · 2015
The importance of indigenous languages in the dissemination of information to local people cannot be overemphasized. This paper is focused on the perceived benefits of one of the major indigenous languages in Nigeria (the Yoruba language), in the learning and usage of diseases names in health sectors. Machine translation (MT) has been defined as a subfield of computational linguistics that investigates the use of computer software to translate text or speech from one natural language to another. This system employed the use of the direct approach to machine translations in building a bilingual lexicon for English diseases names to Yoruba. The tool has been designed uniquely to provide an easy to use platform for medical practitioners. The effectiveness of the system was evaluated both formally and informally and the implementation was carried out using Visual Basic 6.0. This system will be of immense benefits to people in the health sectors.