Artificial intelligence language models and the false fantasy of participatory language policies

Abstract

Artificial intelligence neural language models learn from a corpus of online language data, often drawn directly from user-generated content through crowdsourcing or the gift economy, bypassing traditional keepers of language policy and planning (such as governments and institutions). Here lies the dream that the languages of the digital world can bend towards individual needs and wants, and not the traditional way around. Through the participatory language work of users, linguistic diversity, accessibility, personalization, and inclusion can be increased. However, the promise of a more participatory, just, and emancipatory language policy as a result of neural language models is a false fantasy. I argue that neural language models represent a covert and oppressive form of language policy that benefits the privileged and harms the marginalized. Here, I examine the ideology underpinning neural language models and investigate the harms that result from these emerging subversive regulatory bodies.

Translation as discrimination: Sociolinguistics and inequality in multilingual institutional contexts

“…It is easy to imagine a situation where the text on a prohibition sign is entirely incomprehensible, but addressees are nonetheless sanctioned for failing to follow the intended directive. Abuse of machine translation also exists with translation into institutional languages, particularly in the context of surveillance, as illustrated by an incident in 2017, when a Palestinian man was arrested by Israeli police after Facebook's machine translation tool rendered his Arabic post meaning ‘good morning’ with a phrase meaning ‘harm them’ in Hebrew (Lau 2021:9). As in the case of erroneous translation in punitive multilingualism, this case shows an institution putting blind faith in technology, instead of seeking verification from speakers of the subordinated source language, who are distrusted and suspected of deviant behavior.…”