Abstract

The rapid development of Neural Machine Translation (NMT) technology has transformed the landscape of translation, raising questions about its impact on translation education. This study reports a questionnaire-based survey on 146 trainee translators enrolled in several Chinese universities’ Master of Translation and Interpreting (MTI) program to investigate their uses and perceptions of NMT, with the objective of revealing whether the new generation of Machine Translation (MT) has adversely affected translation learning. The results show that the respondents frequently used NMT not only for translation learning but also for English as a Second Language (ESL) reading, writing, and speaking; they dealt with NMT output in a positive way; they were skeptical about the quality of NMT but believed that it would help improve the efficiency and quality of their translation; they showed varying degrees of anxiety about their future employment and current translation learning; they articulated the needs for teaching NMT knowledge and skills in translation courses. These results reveal two major challenges that MTI training may face in the era of AI: learners’ excessive use of NMT and their study anxiety. This article proposes that the teaching of MT technology be timely offered to meet the challenges.