In the first episode of the series, Beca Harries talks to Dr Sarah Cooper and Dewi Jones from Bangor University to discuss the latest developments in Welsh language technology.
Dr Sarah Cooper is a lecturer in Bangor University, specialising in phonetics, bilingualism and speech technology. Dewi Jones is a Software Engineer in the Language Technology Unit at Bangor University, specialising in Welsh language software and system development.
This episode focuses on the development of speech technology as over 57% of people within Wales now use a smart speaker, and it’s an area that continues to innovate and develop.
Dr Sarah Cooper emphasised the need for the technology:
If you think about it, it’s important that we can speak and use the language that we’re comfortable with. So, if we think about English speech recognition or text to speech that only creates speech in English, it might not be useful for us as a bilingual community. We live and use two languages or more, and maybe we need to think about how we communicate from day to day.
The pair discuss how the technology impacts accessibility, and the future of the Welsh language. Dewi Jones said that it’s important to “normalise the Welsh language in the world of technology, similar to the digital world” to “avoid digital extinction”.
This episode was recorded in August 2021.
Listen to the full episode here:
Listen to more Rhywbeth Creadigol episodes here.
Mentioned during the episode:
Bangor University - Language Technology Unit: http://techiaith.cymru
