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Artificial intelligence could fundamentally change the world, boosting the language rights of the Hungarian community in Transylvania (Romania), reported Maszol.
The director of the Mikó Imre Association for the Protection of Minority Rights stated that artificial intelligence (AI) can help achieve both the written and spoken forms of language rights. It can fill the current gaps that have existed so far due to limited human resources or costs. AI has opened up such prospects in the field of language rights that it is necessary to examine how it can be used to help the Transylvanian Hungarian community.
Erika Benkő recalled that at the end of last year, she participated in the conference of the Federal Union of European Nationalities (FUEN). There she was confronted with the fact that
many European national minorities had already utilized this: they had used artificial intelligence with great success in the service of linguistic rights.
The Hungarian language is in a very good position from this point of view, because Hungary is a Member State of the European Union. Hungarian is one of the official languages of the EU, thus EU documents are also available in Hungarian.
The Mikó Imre Association for the Protection of Minority Rights constantly keeps the strengthening of language rights on the agenda. Benkő met with several mayors from Szeklerland to find answers to what obstacles there are to the wider use of the Hungarian language in official communication. From these conversations, she concluded that the main problems are the lack of human resources and money.
If a citizen addresses a local government on any matter, he or she has the right to submit the application in Hungarian, but
the authorities are obliged to respond primarily in Romanian, answering in Hungarian is only an option. This means that the official who carries out this work has to work harder when formulating the response in both languages, and this extra work is simply not paid for,”
explained Benkő. “On the other hand, it has never even occurred to me that Romanian verbatims, drafts, and resolutions could be translated into Hungarian, because this is a huge amount of work, but artificial intelligence translates volumes in minutes.”
Benkő wishes to implement AI in these fields and therefore considers continuous consultation with those involved and the mayors. In her opinion, a method “imposed on them” cannot be effective, their suggestions must be taken into account, and solutions can only really work if they are organically linked to the daily activities of the local government.
AI can ease the workload of public service by automating translations and responses. First, responses to public submissions can be instantly translated by an AI program, reducing human resource costs. Second, AI can handle council resolutions and verbatim translations, eliminating manual effort. Third, digital customer service windows can use AI to assist citizens in Hungarian, guiding them to the right forms and services, similar to successful models in Ireland.
Benkő said that she initially welcomed artificial intelligence with suspicion, but during constructive discussions it became clear that it can be used in many ways.
It is like a knife that is indispensable in the kitchen, but it can also be used to kill. AI is a tool, and it’s up to us how we use it,”
she stated.
“We need to consider and address how we can put artificial intelligence at the service of expanding the linguistic rights of Transylvanian Hungarians. There are already good examples of this. In the coming period, our task is to create the framework for this,” said the director of the legal protection service.
Via Maszol; Featured picture: Pexels