Linguistic diversity and AI in the EU
a challenge and a driver for learning opportunities: The case of French language
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.60054/PEU.2025.12.327-334Keywords:
Artificial Intelligence, peech-to-text tool, linguistic diversity, linguistic rights, French languageAbstract
This proposal follows from a classroom activity involving students learning French as a foreign language. It concerns the use of YouTube’s speech-to-text tool in order to transcribe automatically oral speech and to revise it in the post-editing process with students. Speech-to-text tools will be considered as a driver for developing new innovative learning opportunities for foreign languages in the EU at a university level. Nevertheless, this opportunity could only be experimented if a language is written and gathers a linguistic repository for all levels of communication. In the EU, all the official languages are recognised and have the same rights in the official communication, but the same does not concern regional and/or minority languages, nor other languages spread in the EU. Hence, after drawing the status of the EU languages and the functioning of speech-to-text tools, it will be shown that the most represented language in AI is English, despite many other official or non-official languages. The discussion that will be presented deals with the respect of linguistic rights and diversity in the EU, and with the way in which EU initiatives may contribute to it, also by developing proper AI technologies.
References
Agresti, G. (2023). Intelligence artificielle et langues minoritaires: Du bon ménage? Quelques pistes de réflexion. In R. Raus et al. (Eds.), De Europa special issue. Multilinguisme et variétés linguistiques en Europe à l’aune de l’intelligence artificielle (pp. 47–68). Ledizioni LediPublishing. https://www.collane.unito.it/oa/items/show/132
Dufraux, A. (2022). Exploitation de transcriptions bruitées pour la reconnaissance automatique de la parole [Thèse de doctorat, Université de Lorraine]. http://docnum.univ-lorraine.fr/public/DDOC_T_2022_0032_DUFRAUX.pdf
Kneubühler, M. (2022). Qu’advient-il de la sémantique et de l’interaction dans les transcriptions automatiques d’un logiciel ? Regard praxéologique sur le speech-to-text. Revue d’anthropologie des connaissances, 16(2). https://journals.openedition.org/rac/27069
Le Goffic, P. (2001). La phrase revisitée. Le français aujourd’hui, 148(1), 55–64. https://www.cairn.info/revue-le-francais-aujourd-hui-2001-4-page-96.htm?try_download=1
Le Goffic, P. (2005). Grammaire de la phrase française. Hachette.
Oger, C. (2005). L’analyse du discours institutionnel entre formations discursives et problématiques socio-anthropologiques. Langage et société, 114(4), 113–128.
Raus, R. (Ed.). (2023). Per un’intelligenza artificiale a favore del multilinguismo europeo. Raccomandazioni strategiche rivolte ai decisori europei. https://www.collane.unito.it/oa/items/show/153#?c=0&m=0&s=0&cv=0
Raus, R., Silletti, A. M., Zollo, S. D., & Humbley, J. (2023). Multilinguisme et variétés linguistiques en Europe à l’aune de l’intelligence artificielle. In R. Raus et al. (Eds.), De Europa special issue. Multilinguisme et variétés linguistiques en Europe à l’aune de l’intelligence artificielle. Ledizioni LediPublishing. https://www.collane.unito.it/oa/items/show/132
Sarasola, K., Aldabe, I., & Aranberri, N. (2023). Enabling additional official languages in the EU for 2025 with language-centred AI. In R. Raus (Ed.), De Europa special issue. Multilinguisme et variétés linguistiques en Europe à l’aune de l’intelligence artificielle (pp. 91–105). Ledizioni LediPublishing. https://www.collane.unito.it/oa/itemsshow/132
Silletti, A. M. (2023). Investire in tecnologie “made in UE”. In R. Raus (Ed.), Per un’intelligenza artificiale a favore del multilinguismo europeo. Raccomandazioni strategiche rivolte ai decisori europei (pp. 78–81). https://www.collane.unito.it/oa/items/show/153#?c=0&m=0&s=0&cv=0
Silletti, A. M. (2025). La transcription automatique au service de l’apprentissage des langues: Quelques réflexions sur la phrase complexe en français. LANGAGES, 237, 131–152.
Tancoigne, E., Corbellini, J.-P., Deletraz, G., Gayraud, L., Ollinger, S., et al. (2020). La transcription automatique : Un rêve enfin accessible? Analyse et comparaison d’outils pour les SHS. Nouvelle méthodologie et résultats [Rapport de recherche]. MATE-SHS. halshs-02917916v2
Vetere, G. (2023). Elaborazione automatica dei linguaggi diversi dall’inglese: Introduzione, stato dell’arte e prospettive. In R. Raus et al. (Eds.), De Europa special issue. Multilinguisme et variétés linguistiques en Europe à l’aune de l’intelligence artificielle (pp. 69–87). Ledizioni LediPublishing. https://www.collane.unito.it/oa/itemsshow/132
