Die ‘Rolle’ des Community/Public Service-Doltmetschers (original) (raw)

Interview: Interpreter Consumer and Deaf Advocate Filip Verstraete

International Journal of Interpreter Education, 2015

Filip Verstraete has been involved in advocacy work for Deaf people in Flanders, Belgium, since he was a young adult. Belgium has three official spoken languages (Dutch, French, and German), and is divided into three communities. Moreover, the signed languages used in the Dutch speaking community (Flemish Sign Language or VGT) and the one in the French speaking part (la Langue des Signes Francophone-Belge or LSFB) are also recognised by the regional parliaments. The Flemish Community exercises authority in the Flemish-speaking region, whereas the French community exercise authority in the French and German speaking regions. The Flemish and French communities both have authority in the bilingual Brussels-Capital area. Filip's work has included giving lectures and presentations, lobbying at the highest level, and generally raising awareness of the rights of Deaf people in Flanders. Filip was recently appointed Director of FEVLADO: the Federation of Flemish Associations of the Deaf. In this interview, Filip shares his experiences in working with interpreters in healthcare settings, his views on remote interpreting services in Flanders, and recommendations for interpreter educators, students and practising sign language interpreters. The interview follows a presentation by Filip at a medical interpreting congress organised by the University of Leuven in December 2014.

Professional recognition for Deaf interpreters in the UK.

This paper will document some of the history of Deaf interpreters (DIs) in the UK, with examples given of Deaf people working as translators and interpreters since the 17 th century. Then the recent process leading towards professional recognition and registration with NRCPD 1 , the Deaf Interpreter Consortium and its work to ensure DIs can register on a par with their hearing colleagues will be described. The article concludes by showing how the varied traditional work of DIs has been codified into the current registration system and national standards.

Deaf Voice and the Invention of Community Interpreting

The goal of this article is to propose three, action learning “hypotheses” to be considered by interpreter educators as conceptual pillars for a comprehensive pedagogical framework that reinvigorates the original Deaf invention of community interpreting. The theoretical claim is that temporality is neglected in most discourse and research about simultaneous interpreting because it has been taken for granted that the speed of information transfer is a highly significant and non-negotiable measure of effective interpretation. Arguments about the values and benefits of taking or using time to generate better interpretations and/or guarantee mutual understanding among interlocutors have been absent from scholarly reflection about simultaneous interpretation but present in Deaf criticism. This criticism shows how engineering-based metaphors about the interpreter as a transmission machine perpetuate an informational bias at the expense of relationships: the ideology of speed interferes with the Deaf voice. To counter this, “holding time” is suggested as the essential function of an authorized interpreter using role space according to culturally-Deaf principles for the special intercultural communication practice of community-oriented simultaneous interpretation. This relational model pre-exists within traditional Deaf cultures and can therefore be considered a Deaf invention.

Deaf nondeaf interpreter teams and the complexity of professional practice

This chapter draws on data from open-ended interviews with 4 Canadian Deaf interpreters (DIs) and 4 Canadian non-deaf interpreters (nDIs) examining their experiences providing interpreting services for Deaf people across a range of community based settings. Four major themes emerged from the informants' interviews: (i) The strategies required of DI/nDI teams when working with recent deaf immigrants are unique; (ii) Describing DI work is often confusing to both Deaf and non-deaf consumers; (iii) The types of communication strategies used in some settings may fall outside the perceptions of ethical tenets of interpreting; (iv) The specialized work may be better served by referring to the DI's work as " language specialist " in some contexts. These findings are contrasted with existing literature that frames interpreting in general and specifically with DI, raising questions about some of the current approaches used to educate DI and the dominant philosophical curriculum assumptions (Boudreault, 2005; Forestal, 2014). We ask if the current approaches to training DI is predominantly skewed to working with Deaf consumers who use American Sign Language (ASL). We consider how DI learn to work with consumers who are recent immigrants, who are not fluent in ASL, who may not possess another signed language, and who may never have had access to education in a formal sense. The findings challenge the nomenclature that is used to describe the work in appointments where there are language and cultural complexities that are unique. These results are discussed in relation to norms and practices that are embedded in our field's current DI training. Finally, recommendations are offered for further advanced research and evolving professional practices within the field of Deaf interpreting.

Communication Problems with a Deaf Client: The Role of an Interpreter

About five percent of the American population suffer some degree of hearing loss while 400,000 Americans are classified as deaf. Generally given less-than-adequate education, these people are forced into the lower socioeconomic levels of society and frequently isolated from the hearing world by an inherent communication barrier that serves only to deprive them further of social interaction and elevation. The social worker called upon to counsel a deaf person often finds that the communication barrier may well be the first and foremost problem to overcome before rehabilitation of the deaf client can proceed. Unindoctrinated in the esoteric communication systems of the deaf, the social worker may ultimately realize that the services of a competent interpreter are necessary. This paper points up some of the communication problems arising in a social worker's relationship with the deaf client in the four service delivery systems highlighted in the NASW Symposium. 1) Juvenile and criminal justice: Thirty-eight states have no legal provisions to require the employment of an interpreter in court cases involving deaf persons. In addition, courts all too often press into service interpreters who may otherwise be well qualified but who have no knowledge or expertise in the peculiarities of legal interpreting. 2) Health and mental health: Adequate health and mental health opportunities are only now being afforded the deaf, but many deaf people fear to take advantage of the services offered because they have insufficient communication with the doctors and counselors. 3) Public education: The very systems that are given the responsibility of preparing deaf children for their future lives frequently deny those children their basic human rights to communicate with their natural language—American Sign Language. 4) Employment: Not only discriminated against in employment but many times rejected for job training and counseling to secure good jobs, the deaf become victims of a vicious cycle perpetuated due to a lack of proper utilization of interpreter services.

Expectations of qualified deaf interpreters (DIs)

STRIDON: Studies in Translation and Interpreting

Qualified deaf interpreters (DIs) are starting to enter the sign language interpreting market in Norway. This poses a challenge for both the interpreter profession and interpreting agencies, which have thus far provided work for hearing interpreters offering interpreting services for deaf individuals, not by them. This explorative study shows that more information is needed regarding the way in which DIs influence the interpreting market. At the same time, hearing interpreters see opportunities for their own professional development when collaborating with DIs, specifically for the improvement of their own linguistic and cultural competences.

Training Deaf Learners to Become Interpreters: A Pilot Project

2018

This article reports on a pilot project to train 20 Deaf learners in an attempt to equip them with the skills and knowledge required for interpreting assignments, including how to manage visual communication in various service settings and apply ethical standards to their interpreting practice. This is the first time such training has been delivered in a tertiary environment in Victoria, Australia. The project chose three non-language-specific units of competency from the national qualification of Diploma of Interpreting under the Public Sector Training Package. In addition to outlining the curriculum design and student learning outcomes, this article presents insight and qualitative feedback collected from semistructured interviews with the educators engaged for the project. Recommendations made at the conclusion of this project serve as a stepping-stone to delivery of a full Diploma of Interpreting for Deaf learners in the near future.

Belgian reflections on the dialogue of the deaf

European Journal of Policing Studies

The relationship between police practitioners and researchers has been described as a 'dialogue of the deaf' (MacDonald in Bradley, 2005), a 'dialogue of the listening' (Johnston & Shearing, 2009) or a 'dialogue of the hard-of-hearing' (Bronitt, 2013). Relying on their experiences into research on, for, by and with the police in the last decade, Easton & De Vlieger recount their Belgian reflections on these dialogues. Their experiences in the research related to these partnerships are described and the key barriers and essential enablers for nurturing these partnerships discussed.