Preparing for the interpreter’s role in the social drama of law: Interpreting as performance in the liminal space

Sebnem Bahadir, Fachbereich Angewandte Sprach- und Kulturwissenschaft, Arbeitsbereich Interkulturelle Germanistik, Johannes Gutenberg Universität Mainz in Germersheim

According to the ethnologist Victor Turner (1975), jural actions can be described as part of a social drama which reflects a disharmonic process arising out of a conflict. Although rituals rely on repetitive structure, in any social drama there is potential for liminality: The state of liminality can be viewed as an interim period in which something unexpected might happen. On the limen, the actors get a chance/are forced to take a step aside from their fixed social positions. In my paper I would like to argue that interpreting in legal settings (and not only there) can be regarded as a liminal activity and the interpreter as liminal actor in the social drama of law. The case of the legal interpreter Camayd-Freixas in the USA will be the starting point of my argument for a different method of training legal interpreters, concentrating on legal procedures as enactments and the persons involved in the legal scenarios as actors and agents (cf http://judiciary.house.gov/ hearings/pdf/Camayd-Freixas080724.pdf; for the methodology, cf Schechner 1985). The interpreter has to be trained as an ‘expert of the liminal space’, aware of the scope of her responsibility as well as her freedom, in order to account for the complexity of the legal frameworks and the political contexts of court interpreting, and in order to be prepared for the multiple forces exerting power on her (cf Vermeer 2006, Dizdar 2006, 2009, Bahadir 2007, forthcoming).

Ethical dilemmas of an interpreter trainer

Mary Phelan, School of Applied Language and Intercultural Studies, Dublin City University

In response to lack of training for interpreters in Ireland I set up the Graduate Certificate in Community Interpreting in 2004. We have trained interpreters for French, Spanish, Polish, Russian and Romanian. But as time goes on and there is no drive for quality from the authorities, we find that our trained interpreters are not necessarily prioritised for work. In addition to that, the rate of pay for court interpreters has been reduced. Indeed, the overall volume of interpreting work appears to have reduced due to the recession. For example, the income of one of our Polish graduates has been halved this year compared to last year. This raises the question: Is it worth training interpreters if they cannot earn a living in this area?

Meanwhile there is pressure from the university for greater numbers of students and an unwillingness to run modules for small numbers of students. The temptation could be to accept students who are unsuitable purely to increase numbers.

If we concentrate on languages that are widely spoken in Ireland then interpreters who work in other languages get no training. For example we have trained interpreters in 5 languages but over 170 are spoken in Ireland. We can continue with a purist approach and an emphasis on Interpreting Practice by language or we can consider a more generic approach. Or a combination.

Finding lecturers to teach interpreting practice in unusual languages is not easy. We need people who have worked as interpreters in Ireland, who are familiar with the system here, who have undergone some interpreter training themselves, understand interpreter ethics and who can teach. It can be very difficult to find suitable people. Even if we can tick all these boxes, examinations can still be problematic because very often this will be the first time that the lecturers have assessed interpreters. It is essential to have capable external examiners who can provide feedback.

Meanwhile, other low level courses are springing up around the country. It is difficult to justify low level initiatives to train members of the community when fulltime interpreters find it hard to make a living. At the same time, if we cannot cater for more languages, then it is perfectly understandable that people would take these courses.

Another issue is advocacy – rather than doing research on Interpreting, a lot of time is spent writing submissions, raising awareness and campaigning.

Testing interpreters: Issues regarding the development, administration and grading of court interpreter examinations

Lois M. Feuerle, Former Coordinator of Court Interpreter Services, Office of Court Administration, New York State Unified Court System, Former Coordinator of Court Interpreter Certification, Testing & Training, Oregon Judicial Department

Currently there are three major tests administered nationally in the USA to assess Spanish interpreting skills in courtroom settings in the United States (Federal Certification exam, Consortium exam and the exam developed by the National Association of Judiciary Interpreters and Translators). In addition, New York and California, based on their historical position as states that have traditionally received large numbers of immigrants, developed their own testing programs which pre-date the work of the Consortium. These examinations share many commonalties, but they are also different in a variety of ways. This presentation will provide an overview of these testing models, outlining their similarities and differences and evaluating some of the advantages and disadvantages of each model. The presentation will also address the special issues that arise when it is necessary to assess language skills and interpreting abilities in the languages for which the interpreter need is not as great, including the languages of limited diffusion

Continuing education courses for Estonian court interpreters at the university of Tartu

Mall Tamm, University of Tartu

Andrei Muršak, Civil Court of the County of Harjumaa, Tallinn

In the years of regained independence the very first continuing education courses for Estonian court interpreters were organized by the University of Tartu in 2006-2008. The course of 30 hours provided an overview of general issues of the standards of conduct, the role of court interpreters, the Code of Ethics and Professional Responsibilities with respective canons. Consecutive interpreting with note-taking and simultaneous interpreting together with public speaking skills occupied the major part of the course. Speeches for interpretation were prepared by the teachers and the participants whose speeches closely reflected their work situations in criminal, civil, administrative and circuit courts. At the end of the course a simulated court session was carried out allowing each participant to play the role of a judge, a prosecutor, etc. and act as an interpreter.

Professionals and their interpreters in multilingual societies

Gertrud Hofer, Department for Applied Linguistics, Zurich University of Applied Sciences, Winterthur

In Switzerland, as in many other countries, the need for language mediation professionals has increased sharply as a result of globalization. For many languages, there is a lack of trained interpreters to interpret in police stations, prosecution offices, courts and in medical or social settings. Informal solutions are sometimes available, but the quality of these services varies greatly. Results in research have indicated that public service interpreting, in particular legal and medical interpreting, does not always satisfy the parties involved: the client or end user, the interpreter and the defendant or patient. Such dissatisfaction or even mistrust is partly due to differing perceptions of the role and the tasks of the interpreter.

Against this background, the following questions have been asked: how can quality be evaluated, who is qualified to evaluate and how can quality in interpreting be improved?

Awareness of the need of competent interpreting is, however, growing. This paper describes 1) experience gained during a language-independent training program for interpreters that has been running for five years and 2) selected results from a study in which end users as well as interpreters were questioned on the task of interpreting and on the quality standards that interpreters should fulfil. It reveals that attitudes towards interpreting differ considerably among police officers, prosecutioners and judges as well as among medical staff and interpreters who very often work in different areas and that differing attitudes clearly have an impact on the quality of interpreting.