English to Nigerian Pidgin

Author: Kelechi Ogueji

Data

- The JW300 English - Nigerian Pidgin dataset.

Model

Default Masakhane Transformer translation model with JoeyNMT (trained for 200 epochs)
Link to google drive folder with best model

Analysis

The model learns some relationships between different references to the same entity. This can be seen in example 2, where David is referred to as a King.
In some other examples, the model makes hypothesis that are grammatically and qualitatively correct, but do not exactly match the reference translation.

Example 1

    Source:     How have Jehovah’s Witnesses shown that they engage in the preaching work with the right motive ?
    Reference:  Wetin show sey na the correct mind Jehovah Witness people take dey preach ?
    Hypothesis: How Jehovah Witness people take dey preach the good news ?

Example 2

    Source:     The psalmist David wrote : “ O Hearer of prayer , to you people of all sorts will come .
    Reference:  David write sey : ‘ You wey dey hear prayer , na you everybody go come meet .
    Hypothesis: King David write for Bible sey : ‘ E dey pray for una , because na you go choose well .

Example 3

    Source:     How do we know that Jehovah’s Witnesses have God’s spirit ?
    Reference:  How we take know sey Jehovah Witness people get holy spirit ?
    Hypothesis: How we take know sey Jehovah Witness people get holy spirit ?

Example 4

    Source:     Jesus told his disciples : “ If you ask anything in my name , I will do it . ”
    Reference:  Jesus tell im disciple dem sey : ‘ If una use my name beg for anything , I go do am . ’
    Hypothesis: Jesus tell im disciple dem sey : ‘ If una ask me anything , I go do anything wey I fit do . ’

Results

- BLEU dev :  12.78
- BLEU test : 24.29