Machine Translation: its History, Current Status, and Future Prospects

Elements ot the history, state of the art, and probable future of Machine Translation (MT) are discussed. The treatment is largely tutorial, based on the assumption that this audience is, for the most part, ignorant of matters pertainln to translation in general, and MT in particular. The paper covers some of the major tit R&D groups, the general techniques they omploy(ed), and the roles they play(ed) in the development of the field. The conclusions concern the seeming permanence of the translation problem, and potential re-integration of MT with mainstream Computational Linuistics.