The Interpreter Hears Voices ... Academic and Professional Perspectives X-Rayed and Interpreted (original) (raw)
Related papers
Reconceptualising the interpreter’s role
Forum - Presses De La Sorbonne Nouvelle & Korean Society of Conference Interpretation, 2021
The interpreter's role and performance in interpreting-facilitated interactions have attracted considerable scholarly attention since the 1970s. Seminal field research on interpreting in courtrooms, in hospitals, and in war zones describe interpreters as active participants. Nevertheless, Hale (2006) and Pöchhacker (2006) critique that much data-driven research in the area suffers from a lack of theoretical conceptualisations, and is short of diversified sociocultural and linguistic contexts for investigation. To strengthen the theoretical background to research on interpreters' role, this study draws on social psychology theories of social identity and optimal distinctiveness, and the sociolinguistic notion of face, to develop an interdisciplinary framework for conceptualising how identity claims may influence interpreters' choice of linguistic strategies in delivery. The English-Mandarin political press conference interpreting context is examined to illustrate how the proposed framework may shed light on our understanding of interpreters' behaviour in action.
Summary. This essay traces some of the major epistemological shifts in the humanities over the last century, in particular anthropology, which have informed and profoundly altered language- and literary disciplines in Western academia, in particular those relating to the subjectivity of the observer (the anthropological ‘Gaze’), the complex interconnectedness of language and the surrounding socio-cultural network, the ephemeral nature of language itself, and the issue of textual authorship-ownership. Giving due appreciation to the institutional-practical nature of the discipline, the paper attempts to put into relief the interface of philosophical issues that arises as a result of these paradigmatic shifts with practical issues of professional ethics and role-definition in community interpreting. The paper also attempts to show that what emerged in translation studies as the ‘cultural shift’ has already taken place in community interpreting (not necessarily across the board in other forms of interpreting) due both to influences from other related domains and also to the specific cross-cultural nature of community interpreting itself.
The Changing Role of the Interpreter: Contextualising Norms, Ethics and Quality Standards
The Changing Role of the Interpreter: Contextualising Norms, Ethics and Quality Standards, Marta Biagini, Michael S. Boyd & Claudia Monacelli (Eds.), Routledge, 2017
This volume provides a critical examination of quality in the interpreting profession by deconstructing the complex relationship between professional norms and ethical considerations in a variety of sociocultural contexts. Over the past two decades, the profession has compelled scholars and practitioners to take into account numerous factors concerning the provision and fulfilment of interpreting. Building on ideas that began to take shape during an international conference on interpreter-mediated interactions, commemorating Miriam Shlesinger, held in Rome in 2013, the book explores some of these issues by looking at the notion of quality through inter-preters' self-awareness of norms at work across a variety of professional settings, contextualising norms and quality in relation to ethical behaviour in everyday practice. Contributions from top researchers in the field create a comprehensive picture of the dynamic role of the interpreter as it has evolved, with key topics revisited by the addition of new contributions from established scholars in the field, fostering discussion and further reflection on important issues in the field of interpreting. This volume will be key reading for scholars, researchers and graduate students in interpreting and translation studies, pragmatics, discourse analysis and multilingualism.
Role(s) of a community interpreter versus professional standards and ethics
Unpublished MA Thesis, University of Warsaw, 2010
The aim of the present thesis is to outline the community interpreter's roles in a variety of settings, particularly in asylum and refugee hearings. It is also intended to juxtapose the interpreter's actual performance with the provisions of professional standards and codes of ethics addressed to community interpreters. It is commonly believed by users of community interpreting that the interpreter should remain „invisible“ and should not excessively engage in interpreted communication between representatives of diverse cultures and social groups speaking different languages. His/her role is usually defined in terms of a „faithful“ translation of a source language utterance into the target language, i.e. „just translating“. At the same time, he/she is typically required to stay impartial and neutral by distancing himself from the contents of interpreted verbal exchanges and the primary interlocutors' behaviour. It also frequently happens that, when defining their own role, interpreters themselves refer to misconceptions which depict them as emotionally detached „translating machines“. This image of the community interpreter is further reinforced by the existing professional standards and codes of ethics aimed at practitioners of interpreting. This thesis accentuates the complexity of the community interpreter's role and underlines the non-feasibility of describing him/her as an „invisible“, „transparent“ or a „neutral“ person. In addition, it discards the myth according to which he/she is capable of interpreting faithfully each and every utterance, without introducing any changes to its form. In face of the great number of contexts in which community interpreters operate, developing uniform codes of conduct remains unrealistic and the existing role prescriptions, on the other hand, can hardly find application in real-life communicative encounters. As a result, community interpreters face ethical dilemmas since the normative role prescriptions they know strictly prohibit acting as a cultural mediator or one of the primary interlocutors' assistant, roles which they are frequently found to perform. In this situation it is also impossible to properly delimit the interpreter's role even in cases his/her involvement in interpreted interaction is objectively too extensive. The present thesis discusses in more detail all of the abovementioned issues relating to the community interpreter‟s role and presents potential solutions to the problems identified. The first chapter chronologically presents accounts of the community interpreter's performance developed within various disciplines, i.e. linguistics, medical sciences, social sciences and interpreting studies, and emphasizes his/her active and multi-faceted role in intercultural communication. At the same time, theoretical models and approaches employed to describe the interpreter's role and his/her performance, stemming chiefly from the field of sociology, linguistics and sociolinguistics, are enumerated. Some room is also given to the origin of the invisibility/neutrality myth which is perceived by the author to hamper understanding of the nature of community interpreting as well as the community interpreter's role. The accounts of the interpreter's actions referred to in the first chapter clearly prove that presenting him/her as a “translating machine” is highly unjustified. The second chapter juxtaposes the provisions of professional standards and codes of ethics with the interpreter's actual performance in the refugee and asylum context. This juxtaposition is intended to reveal the deficiencies of the interpreter's normative role prescriptions and draw the reader's attention to the fact that they reinforce certain misconceptions and myths concerning community interpreters on the part of individuals and institutions using interpreting services. These misconceptions and myths, in turn, hinder smooth cooperation between interpreters and representatives of other professions. Considering the deficiencies of the existing codes of conduct, chapter two postulates altering their provisions and suggests implementing professional development courses for interpreters and public institutions' employees as a means of facilitating their joint performance. The third chapter presents an analysis of the interpreter‟s performance in refugee hearings held in the Office for Foreigners in Warsaw. The analysis is based on the accounts of the interpreter‟s actions provided by the Office‟s employees. Its main aim is to verify whether interpreters in the Office ignore the principle of “invisibility” and faithfulness of interpretation in order to facilitate communication between participants of refugee hearings. In addition, the research is designed to identify any potential factors that could prevent interpreters from complying with such specified interpreting principles. Moreover, it was the author‟s intention to establish the extent to which the perceptions of the interpreter's role on the part of the officers are conditioned by stereotypes concerning community interpreting and to juxtapose the immigration officers' understanding of the interpreter's role with their expectations of him/her. The empirical part of the present thesis enabled the author to draw conclusions concerning the interpreter‟s profile and his/her role in refugee hearings held in the Officer for Foreigners. Lastly, recommendations for optimizing cooperation between immigration officers and interpreters are made and the need to improve interpreting quality during refugee hearings is signalled."