The European language technology landscape in 2020 : language-centric and human-centric AI for cross-cultural communication in multilingual Europe

• DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.4059155
• Publication Date: 2020-01-01
• Authors: Rehm, Georg; Marheinecke, Katrin; Hegele, Stefanie; Piperidis, Stelios; Bontcheva, Kalina; Hajic, Jan; Choukri, Khalid; Vasiljevs, Andrejs; Backfried, Gerhard; Prinz, Christoph; Gómez Pérez, José...; Meertens, Luc; Lukowicz, Paul; Van Genabith, Josef; Lösch, Andrea; Slusallek, Philipp; Irgens, Morten; Gatellier, Patrick; Köhler, Joachim; Le Bars, Laure; Anastasiou, Dimitra; Auksoriute, Albina; Bel, Núria; Branco, António; Budin, Gerhard; Daelemans, Walter; De Smedt, Koenraad; Garabik, Radovan; Gavriilidou, Maria; Gromann, Dagmar; Koeva, Svetla; Krek, Simon; Krstev, Cvetana; Lindén, Krister; Magnini, Bernardo; Odijk, Jan; Ogrodniczuk, Maciej; Rögnvaldsson, Eir...; Rosner, Mike; Pedersen, Bolette...; Skadina, Inguna; Tadíc, Marko; Tufis, Dan; Váradi, Tamás; Vider, Kadri; Way, Andy; Yvon, Francois
• Keywords: FOS: Computer and information sciences; 508004 Interkulturelle Kommunikation; infrastructural issues; Computer Science - Artificial Intelligence; multilingualism; 102001 Artificial Intelligence; 02 engineering and technology; 602011 Computational linguistics; 508004 Intercultural communication; 102001 Artificial intelligence; 0202 electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering; Digital Libraries (cs.DL); 602011 Computerlinguistik; National and international projects; Computer. Automation; Computer Science - Computation and Language; 602007 Angewandte Sprachwissenschaft; Computer Science - Digital Libraries; policy issues; 16. Peace & justice; Artificial Intelligence (cs.AI); national and international projects ; infrastructural issues ; policy issues ; infrastructures ; multilingualism; Languages; infrastructures; Computation and Language (cs.CL); 602007 Applied linguistics

Multilingualism is a cultural cornerstone of Europe and firmly anchored in the European treaties including full language equality. However, language barriers impacting business, cross-lingual and cross-cultural communication are still omnipresent. Language Technologies (LTs) are a powerful means to break down these barriers. While the last decade has seen various initiatives that created a multitude of approaches and technologies tailored to Europe's specific needs, there is still an immense level of fragmentation. At the same time, AI has become an increasingly important concept in the European Information and Communication Technology area. For a few years now, AI, including many opportunities, synergies but also misconceptions, has been overshadowing every other topic. We present an overview of the European LT landscape, describing funding programmes, activities, actions and challenges in the different countries with regard to LT, including the current state of play in industry and the LT market. We present a brief overview of the main LT-related activities on the EU level in the last ten years and develop strategic guidance with regard to four key dimensions.<br/>Proceedings of the 12th Language Resources and Evaluation Conference (LREC 2020). To appear<br/>