The Routledge Handbook of Public Service Interpreting

THE ROUTLEDGE HANDBOOK OF
PUBLIC SERVICE INTERPRETING
The Routledge Handbook of Public Service Interpreting provides a comprehensive overview of

research in public service, or community interpreting. It offers reflections and suggestions
for improving public service communication in plurilingual settings and provides tools for
dealing with public service communication in a global society.
Written by leading and emerging scholars from across the world, this volume provides
an editorial introduction setting the work of public service interpreting (PSI) in context
and further reading suggestions. Divided into three parts, the first is dedicated to the main
theoretical issues and debates which have shaped research on public service interpreting; the
second discusses the characteristics of interpreting in the settings which have been most in
need of public service interpreting services; the third provides reflections and suggestions on
interpreter as well as provider training, with an aim to improve public service interpreting
services.
This Handbook is the essential guide for all students, researchers and practitioners of PSI
within interpreting and translation studies, medicine and health studies, law, social services,
multilingualism and multimodality.
Laura Gavioli is a Professor of English language and English-Italian translation at the

University of Modena and Reggio Emilia and an expert in institutional, cross-cultural in-
teraction. Since the beginning of the 2000s, she has published work on interpreter-mediated
interaction, including a recent paper, with Cecilia Wadensjö, published in Health Communi-
cation (39/9, 2021).
Cecilia Wadensjö is a Professor of Interpreting and Translation Studies at Stockholm Uni-

versity. Since the early 1990s, she has published research on naturally occurring interpreter-
mediated institutional discourse, e.g. the book Interpreting as Interaction (Routledge, 2016).
She is a member of the editorial board of Interpreting: International Journal of Research and
Practice in Interpreting.
THE ROUTLEDGE
HANDBOOK OF PUBLIC
SERVICE INTERPRETING
Edited by
Laura Gavioli and Cecilia Wadensjö
Designed cover image: © Getty Images | CCeliaPhoto
First published 2023
by Routledge
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© 2023 selection and editorial matter, Laura Gavioli and Cecilia
Wadensjö; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Laura Gavioli and Cecilia Wadensjö to be identified as the
authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual
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Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced
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British Library Cataloguing-in-P ublication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-P ublication Data
Names: Gavioli, Laura, editor. | Wadensjö, Cecilia, 1954– editor.
Title: The Routledge handbook of public service interpreting /
edited by Laura Gavioli, Cecilia Wadensjö.
Description: First edition. | Abingdon, Oxon;
New York, NY: Routledge, 2023. |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022029106 | ISBN 9780367278427 (hardback) |
ISBN 9781032391151 (paperback) | ISBN 9780429298202 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Public service interpreting. | LCGFT: Essays.
Classification: LCC P306.947 .R68 2022 | DDC 418/.02—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022029106
ISBN: 978-0 -367-27842-7 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-39115-1 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-0 -429-29820-2 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202
Typeset in Bembo
by codeMantra
CONTENTS
List of contributors viii
Introduction 1
Cecilia Wadensjö and Laura Gavioli
PART 1
Theoretical and methodological approaches 15
1 General issues about public service interpreting: institutions, codes,

norms, and professionalisation 17
Carmen Valero-Garcés
2 The ambiguity of interpreting: ethnographic interviews with public

service interpreters 32
Kristina Gustafsson
3 Agency in and for mediating in public service interpreting 46

Claudio Baraldi
4 Cultural assumptions, positioning and power: towards a Social

Pragmatics of Interpreting 63
Ian Mason
5 Corpus-based studies of public service interpreting 76

Bernd Meyer
v
Contents
6 Technology use in language-discordant interpersonal healthcare

communication 89
Sabine Braun, Khetam Al Sharou and Özlem Temizöz
7 Public service translation: critical issues and future directions 106

Mustapha Taibi
PART 2
Exploring PSI settings 123
8 Public service interpreting in court: face-to-face interaction 125

Philipp Sebastian Angermeyer
9 Research on i nterpreter-mediated asylum interviews 140

Sonja Pöllabauer
10 Consecutive interpreting and multimodal sequences 155

Christian Licoppe
11 Vulnerable encounters? Investigating vulnerability in interpreter-

mediated services for v ictim-survivors of domestic violence and abuse 175
Rebecca Tipton
12 Public service interpreting in healthcare 192

Laura Gavioli and Raffaela Merlini
13 Challenges and remedies for interpreter-mediated dementia assessments 207

Charlotta Plejert
14 Public service interpreting in social care 225

Dorien Van De Mieroop, Antoon Cox and Koen Kerremans
15 A shared responsibility for facilitating inclusion in school settings

where sign-language interpreting is provided 242
Sigrid Slettebakk Berge
PART 3
Training and professionalization 259
16 ‘Interpreter’s mistake’: why should other professions care about the

professionalization of interpreters? 261
Hanne Skaaden
vi
Contents
17 Training sign language interpreters for public service interpreting 277

Christopher A. Stone, Cynthia B. Roy and Jeremy L. Brunson
18 Role play as a means of training and testing public service interpreting 292
Magnus Dahnberg
19 Monitoring in dialogue interpreting: cognitive and didactic perspectives 309

Elisabet Tiselius and Birgitta Englund Dimitrova
20 Blended learning is here to stay! Combining o n-line and on-campus

learning in the education of public service interpreters 325
Gry Sagli and Hanne Skaaden
21 The conversation analytic role-play method: how authentic data meet

simulations for interpreter training 342
Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen and Elizabeth Stokoe
22 Training interpreters in asylum settings: the REMILAS project 362

Anna Claudia Ticca, Véronique Traverso and Emilie Jouin
23 Interprofessional education … interpreter education, in or and:

taking stock and moving forward 383
Demi Krystallidou
24 Training public service providers in how to communicate via interpreter 399

Tatjana R. Felberg and Gry Sagli
25 Education and training of public service interpreter teachers 414

Mira Kadrić and Sonja Pöllabauer
Index 429
vii
CONTRIBUTORS
Khetam Al Sharou is a Researcher at the University of Antwerp and an Honorary Research

Associate at Imperial College London. Her research looks to improve machine translation
quality and multilingual communication solutions in medical and crisis situations. Her con-
tributions include several EU/U K-f unded cross-d isciplinary projects, working alongside
developers and users.
Philipp Sebastian Angermeyer is an Associate Professor in Linguistics at York University

in Toronto, Canada. He is the author of Speak English or What? Codeswitching and Interpreter
Use in New York City Courts (2015, Oxford). Since 2018, he is co-editor of the International
Journal of Speech, Language and the Law.
Claudio Baraldi is a Professor of Sociology of Cultural and Communicative Processes at

the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy. His main interest is in methods for di-
alogic facilitation and language mediation. He has published several papers in international
books and journals and has co-edited a volume on these topics in collaboration with Laura
Gavioli.
Sabine Braun is a Director of the Centre for Translation Studies at the University of Surrey,
and a Co-Director of Surrey’s Institute for People-Centred Artificial Intelligence. Her re-
search explores human-machine interaction and integration in translation and interpreting,
especially to improve access to critical information, media content and vital public services.
Jeremy L. Brunson holds a PhD in Sociology. He is the Executive Director of the Divi-
sion of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion at Gallaudet University. His published work includes
analyses of video relay service, the academic field of Interpreting Studies, the invisible labour
of deaf people and legal interpreting.
Antoon Cox is a Professor in Multilingual and Intercultural Communication at Vrije Uni-

versiteit Brussel, a Postdoctoral Researcher and Lecturer in interpreting studies at KU Leu-
ven and an honorary visiting scholar at the School of Medical Education at King’s College
viii
Contributors
London. His research focuses on interpersonal communication in stressful multilingual

medical settings.
Magnus Dahnberg, PhD, is a Senior Lecturer and Director of the Institute for Interpret-
ing and Translation Studies (TÖI), Stockholm University. He defended his thesis in 2015
on interpreter-mediated conversations as role play. He is the former head of Swedish Armed
Forces Interpreter School, a Swedish-Russian interpreter and translator.
Birgitta Englund Dimitrova is a Professor Emerita of Translation Studies at Stockholm

University, Sweden. Her research interests are mainly in Slavic linguistics, cognition, bilin-
gualism and translation/interpreting. Publications include monographs (Expertise and Explic-
itation in the Translation Process, Benjamins, 2005), edited volumes and special issues, and a
large number of papers.
Tatjana R. Felberg is an Associate Professor of interpreting in the public sector at

OsloMet – Oslo Metropolitan University. Her research interests include various aspects of
interpreting in the public sector, intercultural communication and crisis communication in
different languages.
Kristina Gustafsson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Social Work, Lin-

naeus University, Sweden. She has conducted long-term ethnographic research on public
service interpreting in spoken languages in public service institutions in Nordic countries.
Gustafsson’s main research interests include public service interpreting, cultural encounters,
democratic practices, linguistic justice and postcolonial perspectives.
Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen is an Associate Professor at Østfold University College,

Norway. Her doctoral research addressed the interactional accomplishment of interpreting
in v ideo-mediated environments and was carried out at MultiLing Center for Multilingual-
ism in Society across the Lifespan at the University of Oslo. Her research interests include
language, interaction and multimodality.
Emilie Jouin is a linguistics engineer at the CNRS and works at the ICAR laboratory. She
collaborates in studies on the analysis of natural interactions. She is specialized in legal and
ethical issues about the collection and processing of audiovisual data.
Mira Kadrić is a Professor of Interpreting Studies and Didactics of Translation at the Uni-
versity of Vienna. She obtained degrees in Translation and Interpreting, PhD in Interpreting
and Law and Habilitation in Interpreting Studies and Didactics of Translation. Her research
focuses especially on empirical work on legal, political and diplomatic interpreting.
Koen Kerremans is an Associate Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). He is currently

the chair of the applied linguistics section within VUB’s Faculty of Languages and Humanities.
His research focuses on topics related to terminology, multilingual and institutional communica-
tion, translation technology and public service interpreting and translation (PSIT).
Demi Krystallidou is a Senior Lecturer in Translation Studies at the Centre for Translation
Studies, University of Surrey, U K. Her research focuses on linguistically and culturally
ix
Contributors
mediated healthcare communication in primary, secondary care and mental healthcare, and
on interprofessional education in Health Sciences and Translation Studies.
Christian Licoppe is interested in conversation analysis and multimodal interaction anal-

ysis in mobile and institutional settings. He has developed several research programs on
v ideo-mediated communication, and the introduction of video links in French courts, with
a special interest in v ideo-mediated asylum proceedings and analyses of the interpreter’s
agency in multilingual courtroom proceedings.
Ian Mason is a Professor Emeritus at Heriot-Watt University. In his long career, he taught
translating, translation and interpreting studies. Recent work draws attention to a serious
mismatch between public expectations of interpreters’ performance and attested interpreter
behaviour. Current research focuses on matters of community, identity and communication
rights in interpreted encounters on n on-verbal communication and on reader response to
translations.
Raffaela Merlini is a Senior Lecturer in English language and Translation in the Depart-
ment of Law, Economics, Politics and Modern Languages at LUMSA University in Rome,
Italy. She has published in the field of Dialogue Interpreting, principally on the interactional
and socio-psychological dynamics of f ace-to-face interpreter-mediated talk in a variety of
institutional contexts.
Bernd Meyer is a linguist by training and Professor of Intercultural Communication at the

Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, Germany, in the Faculty for Translation Studies,
Linguistics and Cultural Studies. His research focuses on language barriers in public service
institutions and linguistic approaches to community interpreting.
Natacha Niemants is an Associate Professor at the University of Bologna (Interpreting

and Translation Dept.), where she teaches French-Italian conference/d ialogue interpreting.
Her research focuses on interpreting in healthcare and a sylum-seeking contexts, training,
transcription and conversation analysis, and is published in international books and journals,
one authored monograph and three co-edited volumes.
Charlotta Plejert is an Associate Professor of Speech and Language Sciences. Her research
interests cover atypical interaction, often with a focus on multilingualism. She has co-edited
several volumes, for example Multilingualism and Ageing (De Bot, Plejert & Gram Simonsen,
2020) and Multilingual Interaction and Dementia (Plejert, Lindholm & Schrauf, 2017).
Sonja Pöllabauer holds a position as Professor for Interpreting Studies at the Centre
for Translation Studies, University of Vienna. She has been involved in projects on in-
terpreting in asylum procedures, healthcare interpreting and interpreter-mediated com-
munication in institutional settings, as well as the organization of training courses for lay
interpreters.
Cynthia B. Roy holds a PhD in Sociolinguistics. She is a former professor of Interpreting

Studies at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C. Her major publications are Interpreting
as a Discourse Process, and The Academic Foundations of Interpreting Studies: An Introduction to Its
Theories with Jeremy Brunson and Christopher Stone.
x
Contributors
Gry Sagli is employed as an Associate Professor at O sloMet – Oslo Metropolitan Univer-

sity, in the Department of International Studies and Interpreting. She teaches and conducts
her research in the field of interpreting in the public sector. Sagli’s background is from stud-
ies in Chinese language and culture.
Hanne Skaaden is a Professor in the Department of International Studies and Interpreting

at Oslo Metropolitan University. Her research interests cover the process of professionaliza-
tion in public service interpreting, remote interpreting, and first language attrition and the
bilingual migrant. She has extensive experience in teaching interpreting in the Norwegian
public sector.
Sigrid Slettebakk Berge is an Associate Professor in Pedagogy at Norwegian University

of Science and Technology/N TNU, within the Department for Teacher Education. Her
research interest is on interpreter-mediated education for deaf students, and interpreting for
deaf blind persons. She previously worked as an interpreter and as a teacher for interpreting
students.
Elizabeth Stokoe is a Professor of Social Interaction at Loughborough University, UK.

She conducts conversation analytic research to understand how talk works – from first dates
to medical communication and from sales encounters to hostage negotiation. She is a Wired
Innovation Fellow and in 2021 was awarded Honorary Fellowship of the British Psycholog-
ical Society.
Christopher A. Stone is a reader (a ssociate professor) in Interpreting and Translation at the
University of Wolverhampton, UK. His research interests include multimodal interpreter-
mediated interactions, in situ or via broadcast media. He maintains an active interpreting
practice and at the time of writing is the president of the World Association of Sign Language
Interpreters ( WASLI).
Mustapha Taibi is an Associate Professor in Interpreting and Translation at Western Syd-

ney University. He is also the Editor of Translation & Interpreting. His publications include
Community Translation; New Insights into Arabic Translation and Interpreting; Translating for the
Community; Multicultural Health Translation, Interpreting and Communication; and Translating
Cultures.
Özlem Temizöz is a Researcher at the University of Surrey. Özlem’s research is on lan-

guage technologies and their impact on the process, product and translator. Having done
research on translation directionality and postediting workflows, she is currently investi-
gating multilingual communication in healthcare settings and concurrent translation with
collaborative technologies.
Anna Claudia Ticca is a Researcher in Linguistics. Her main interest is the study of v ideo-
recorded social interactions in multilingual contexts, in which interpreters may participate.
Her research is also dedicated to identifying the interactional skills of professionals and rein-
vesting the results into vocational training in education, health and interpreting.
Rebecca Tipton is a Lecturer in Interpreting and Translation Studies at the University of

Manchester. Her research has explored aspects of interpreting in asylum, police and social
xi
Contributors
work settings; more recent work focuses on the development of interpreting provisions in
m id-late 20th-century Britain, particularly in the voluntary sector.
Elisabet Tiselius is an Associate Professor at Stockholm University, accredited to the EU,

Swedish state-authorized Public Service Interpreter. She is the President of the European
Society for Translation Studies and member of the SPRINT research group (VR-project
2016-01118). She is affiliated with the MC2lab (Bologna-Forlí) and TREC, Western Nor-
way University of Applied Sciences (DEPICT WP funded by Norwegian Research Council).
Véronique Traverso is a time Researcher at the National Center for Scientific

Full-
Research, in the field of conversation analysis, interactional linguistics and multimodality.
She has worked on a large range of social situations, in French, Arabic and multilingual
contexts. Since 2010, she has led several research projects on interpreter-mediated medical
consultations with refugees in France.
Carmen Valero-Garcés is a Full Professor of Translation and Interpreting at the Univer-

sity of Alcalá, Madrid, Spain, C o-director of the Postgraduate Program on PSIT and Coor-
dinator of the Research Group FITISPos (https://fitisposgrupo.web.uah.es/). She is also the
founder and co-editor of the FITISPos International Journal (https://fitisposij.web.uah.es).ceci.
Dorien Van De Mieroop is a Professor of Linguistics at KU Leuven, Belgium. Her main

research interests lie in the discursive analysis of institutional interactions – including inter-
preted interactions – and of narratives, about which she has published more than 40 articles
in peer-reviewed journals. She is co-editor of the journal Narrative Inquiry.
xii
INTRODUCTION
Modern linguistics embraces the idea that human sense making of words and other commu-
nicative resources is a social, dynamic activity. Inspired by the literary scholar and philos-
opher Michail Bachtin (1986), among others, language and communication researchers are
increasingly applying a dialogical view of language and mind (see, e.g. Linell 2009). Dialogic
theory is also the basis for several studies of interpreter-mediated interaction. Applying a
dialogical view of language and mind means, among other things, that interpreters are per-
ceived of as active participants, with their own agency, rather than as passive instruments.
Also, the everyday perception of interpreting of spontaneous talk in interaction as a simple
transfer of clear-cut messages in one language to equally unambiguous messages in an-
other language must be dismissed. A significant number of studies show that spontaneous
interpreter-mediated interaction, spoken and/or signed, are complex events, both linguisti-
cally and socially. For instance, participants may produce talk not necessarily to add content,
but also to organize the very talking. Nevertheless, in a certain sense, interpreting can be
described as a ‘monologising practice in a dialogically organized world’ (Wadensjö 2004) in
that, when interpreters perform consecutively, they tend to treat participants’ talk chunk by
chunk, regardless of whether they have been allocated the turn or take it on their own initia-
tive. When an utterance is rendered in another language, if not checked for ambiguities, it is
thus treated as a more or less unambiguous chunk of talk. Doing so, interpreters are expected
to be observant of linguistic details and of how talk fits in with the on-going exchange, an
expectation which involves interpreters’ familiarity with the larger, institutional and cultural
contexts.
Within interpreting studies, indeed all authors in this volume, perceive of interpreters as
active participants with their own agency. Yet, it can be argued, in line with, for example,
Inghilleri (2012) and Määttä (2015), that also researchers who do not see interpreters as
translation machines, but assume that they are active, sense-making participants with their
own agency, paradoxically still tend to cement the simple conduit metaphor in the view of
both communication and interpreters’ work, by their exclusive focus on interpreters’ choice
of words and expressions in the other language, that is, looking at (a nd evaluating) interpret-
ing exclusively on the basis of the ‘monologizing’ component of their activity, as one would
look at source texts in relation to target texts.
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-1 1
What is ‘the conduit metaphor’?

Interpreting, particularly in public service, has not been of interest exclusively to linguists
and interpreting/translation scholars. In articles in Medicine and Law journals, one some-
times finds ‘the (generic) interpreter’ described in terms of a tool that, if only maneuvered
correctly by the medical or legal expert, will work so as to not affect the case in question
in any unpredictable way. This description may be motivated by a collegial request, that
medical and legal professionals take responsibility for handling encounters with patients or
clients with whom they do not share a language, rather than handing over what might seem
in their view ‘too much’ responsibility to the interpreter. Nevertheless, the tool metaphor for
the interpreter is based on a simple but unrealistic idea that interpreters are, or can be, some
kind of n on-subjects, or translation machines, programmed to switch between languages in
some automatized way. Moreover, this view of interpreters is based on a simplistic view of
language and human communication, what linguists usually refer to as the conduit metaphor
(Reddy 1979).
The conduit metaphor becomes visible in speech and writing in phrases such as ‘h is
words expressed strong feelings’, and ‘I took my ideas from her text’. In m eta-language about
language and communication, words and phrases appear as a kind of container, into which
the speaker or the writer puts thoughts, feelings and meanings, exactly the same thoughts,
feelings and meanings that listeners and readers are expected to eventually be able to re-
trieve. The conduit metaphor ignores that all individuals are interpreting subjects, who cre-
ate meaning of words and expressions based on their respective knowledge, experiences and
expectations; in other words, that human communication is seldom completely predictable.
At the same time, the conduit metaphor is firmly established in our everyday thinking and
talking about words. The idea of words as containers of meaning is perhaps so familiar that
we, in everyday life, even have a hard time to think about language and communication in
a different way. But applied in the area of interpreting, the conduit metaphor, in Reddy’s
(1979) sense, can be quite misleading, for various reasons.
In studies of interpreting, the conduit metaphor has sometimes been used also to depict
interpreters, based again on a perception of words as containers of meaning, which inter-
preters allegedly have the task to retrieve and then load onto other containers, that is, words
in another language. Again, interpreting is depicted as something individuals do in relation
only to words that ‘have’ a meaning glued onto them, as it were, rather than in relation to
other human beings in a social context. In her groundbreaking book on sign language inter-
preting, Roy (2000: 1 01–4), also drawing on Reddy (1979), notes that the conduit metaphor
implies a number of basic assumptions about language, and simultaneously demonstrates
that, in the professionalization process of sign language interpreters, the conduit metaphor
in certain ways responded to the interpreters’ need to identify less as helpers and more as just
this – professionals.
Strongly related to the conduit metaphor in meta-language about language and com-
munication is the everyday perception of (good) interpreters as performing word-by-word
translation. In their review of interpreting practices within the Australian legal system,
Laster and Taylor (1994) shed light on what appear to be conflicting attitudes between law-
yers and interpreters as to how interpreting can and should take place. They believe that the
professions’ different perceptions and knowledge of word-for-word interpreting in them-
selves constitute a breeding ground for mistrust and believe that this mistrust would rather
increase if interpreters were to sign an unrealistic demand for w ord-for-word interpreting.
Instead of thinking of the interpreter in terms of a channel or a machine, they suggest that
2
Introduction
the court should consider the interpreter as a communication promoter and point to the need
to build mutual respect for how representatives of each profession exercise their professional
discretion, that is, how the actors take decisions founded in w ell-established professional
knowledge and professional ethics (Laster and Taylor 1994: 126). This argument, published
already in the 1990s, is no less valid today. In this volume, interpreters’ mandate and obliga-
tions in terms of professional discretion are discussed by Norwegian scholar Hanne Skaaden
(Chapter 16).
Definitions of ‘interpreting’
Research on interpreting can roughly be divided into studies focusing on the interpreting
individual and/or this individual’s cognitive processes on the one hand, and, on the other
hand, on interpreting as linguistic, communicative and social interaction. These two cat-
egories of studies are characterized by their different ways of delimiting interpreting as a
research object. In the former case, a definition of interpreting similar to that proposed by
Franz Pöchhacker is applied:
Interpreting is a form of Translation in which a first and final rendition in another

language is produced on the basis of a one-t ime presentation of an utterance in a
source language (Pöchhacker 2016: 11, bold in the original).
In Pöchhacker’s definition, translation is written with a capital T and refers to translation

in a general sense. The definition emphasizes immediacy and volatility as characteristic
features of interpreting that distinguish it from translation of written texts, but the orality
of interpreting is not specifically highlighted, which makes this definition possible to apply
also to explorations of signed language interpreting. Following this definition, the inter-
preting individual, or the cognitive operations involved when producing renditions, are
the primary objects of study. In this definition, interpreting means producing renditions of
previously spoken utterances in a source language. This implies that those speaking with the
assistance of interpreters basically are perceived of as producing utterances to be rendered
in a target language. In other words, this definition tends to disregard participants’ other
communicative projects (such as organizing the interaction, searching for words, provid-
ing minimal responses like ‘m m’ and ‘a ha’ and so forth), as well as situations and contexts.
Seemingly, this definition of interpreting has grown out of an interest in simultaneous
interpreting, where the performing interpreter is working with prepared (often in written
form) talk, rather than in the conditions of spontaneous spoken interaction. No doubt, to
interpret written speeches places different demands than to interpret spontaneous spoken
exchanges.
Interpreting can also be defined as interaction, as suggested by Wadensjö (1992; 1998).
With such an approach, the primary object of study is the interpreter-mediated situation. In
order to explore situations of this kind, Wadensjö (1998) suggests to apply sociologist Erving
Goffman’s (1981) notion of situated system of activity. In other words, in order to fully under-
stand participants’ behaviour in a social encounter of some kind, the researcher considers
not just their talk, but also the social, cultural and institutional frames which this situa-
tion entails. Defining interpreting as interaction allows for studying interpreters’ utterances
not only on the basis of their function as translations, as source texts in relation to target
texts but also on the basis of their coordinating function in the situated activity. Exploring
3
interpreting as interaction implies that all interpreter utterances are seen as having a poten-
tial impact on the content and the progression of an interpreter-mediated conversation. The
notion of a communicative pas de trois (Wadensjö 1998: 12), a communicative dance for three,
if you will, is to express that a triadic, bilingual, interpreter-mediated encounter has specific
communicative conditions that are worthwhile exploring systematically in their own right.
In spontaneous spoken interaction, the meaning that participants attribute to what is said
and done is instantly co-created as interaction unfolds. In interpreter-mediated conversations,
the interpreter is deeply involved in this sense making. The content and the progression of
talk will depend on how and when the interpreter renders in a new language what has been
said in the other. In a social encounter where the interpreter interprets consecutively, most
of the interpreter’s renditions will function as implicit coordinating moves (Wadensjö 1998: 109).
The interpreter’s talk is a prerequisite without which the monolingual participants will have
trouble going on with their exchange. The better they adapt to this specific communicative
situation, by waiting for their turns and making room for the interpreter’s renditions, the
easier the interpreter’s task will be. By speaking in parallel, by addressing the interpreter or
someone else present for side comments, by speaking very fast, indistinctly or for a very long
time, they may elicit explicit coordinating moves (Wadensjö 1998: 109) from the interpreter,
such as asking for repetition, for clarification, for time to interpret or time to s elf-correct, or
advising participants to respect each other’s right to be updated. Obviously, the more compe-
tent an interpreter is in terms of vocabulary and contextual knowledge, interpreting and co-
ordinating ability, and linguistic fluency in both languages, the better the conditions will be
for the monolingual parties to participate in the interpreted conversation, provided though,
they are focused on being each other’s interlocutors. Clearly, talking through an interpreter
is not an easy task and, for some, it may be unusual or even feel odd. So, explicit coordinat-
ing moves may sometimes be ‘the way’ in which the interlocutors learn how to participate
in interpreted interaction. Thus, learning how to use explicit coordination smoothly and
collaboratively may be an important issue in interpreters’ professionalization.
Defining interpreting as interaction opens up for studies not just of participants’ speech
production but also of their sense making based on other communicative resources (gestures,
body orientation, gaze direction, handling of artefacts and more). From this broader defini-
tion of interpreting also follows that interpreters’ p rofession-specific task in conversational
situations is perceived of as t wo-fold – to render others’ talk in a new language and, to facil-
itate the m
icro-organization of participants’ turns at talk, which, in turn, enables translation
to take place. In conclusion, while interpreting definitely includes translation activity, the
risk in defining interpreting as ‘a type of Translation’ is that of narrowing the researcher’s
view specifically to focus on words spoken as a relation between source texts and target
texts, while defining interpreting as interaction broadens the possible constituent parts of
‘interpreting’ and allows for looking at interpreters’ and primary parties’ agency in the light
of the institutional structures and frameworks within which interpreters operate, and at the
specific conditions for communication inherent in triadic or multiparty, bilingual and me-
diated encounters.
The significance of empirical studies

From the end of the 1990s, the interest of dialogue interpreting research has moved more
and more to on-field inquiries, based on the collection and analysis of data. Follow-
ing Wadensjö’s (1992; 1998) primary focus on dialogue interpreting as a situated activity,
video or audio-recorded interactions seem to provide suitable material to inquire into such
4
Introduction
situations. Collections of recorded encounters, then transcribed in detail for analysis, have
provided evidence of talk organization in interpreter-mediated settings and of interpreters’
practices in rendering and coordinating talk in interaction. Other studies like Tate and
Turner (1997/2002) or Leanza (2005; see Böser 2016 for a review) have instead collected data
through surveys or interviews with the participants in the interactions, both interpreters and
service providers, both individually and in focus groups. The latter data accounted for the
perceptions of the interlocutors about the interpreter-mediated encounters, based on their
expectations and experiences. The chapters in this volume refer, in various ways, to both
types of empirical research.
Empirical research, either showing interpreter-mediated interactional practices or high-
lighting the participants’ perceptions, has unveiled issues which make up for the debate in
public service interpreting nowadays. We deem four of them are particularly worth men-
tioning. The first is related to the features of talk in interaction, made evident in analyses
of authentic encounters. Studies on conversation, inspired by the work of sociologist Erv-
ing Goffman and then re-organized into an analytical methodology (Sacks, Schegloff and
Jefferson 1974), with a focus on institutional interaction (Drew and Heritage 1992), have
shown that no talk can be produced without the interlocutors reacting to each other’s con-
tributions and making sense of them. In conversation, even small interactional signals like
“m hm” or eye gaze, or even silence, contribute to the c o-construction of the interaction (see
Gardner 2001). These items may allow for the other interlocutor to go on or start speaking
or may indicate that they are expected to speak to someone else than the interlocutor who
is keeping silent. The fact that, in talk, even silence is a form of participation created more
than a challenge to a view of interpreting in which one of the interlocutors, the interpreter,
needs to interfere as little as possible in communication. In fact, interpreters do contribute
in talk sometimes with ‘co-constructive’ contributions like providing feedback to allow for
the interlocutors to actually produce talk. This is for instance the case in healthcare inter-
action where the interpreters help hesitating patients to go on talking (Leanza, Isabelle and
Rosenberg 2013; Theys et al. 2020) or in asylum seeking interactions where the interpreters
collaborate with the applicants’ narration development, while still allowing themselves space
to render (Pöchhacker 2012: 64–66; Pöllabauer, this volume and also Wadensjö, Rehnberg
and Nikolaidou 2022). How to precisely handle the features of talk, and participation in talk,
in the profession and in the training of professionals is still a matter of debate (see Ticca et al.
this volume, Niemants et al. this volume).
The second issue foregrounding empirical research concerns the subjects that are ob-
served, the interpreters in particular. The following are some questions pointing to the prob-
lems raised. If an interpreter, in the interaction, provides mhm and allows for continuation of
a participant’s turn, co-constructing an extended one, is it evidence of a feature of talk or of
the interpreter’s lack of professionalism? Is mhm the talk equivalent of note taking in speech
consecutive interpreting or a manifestation that the interpreter has lost talk coordination?
Focus groups and interviews show interpreters’ recurrent complaints that institutional pro-
viders and service seekers do not appropriately relate to the interpreters’ work, expecting
machine behaviour on the one hand or personal protection and even advocacy on the other.
Is this an expression of the interpreters’ n on-expertise? Of their inefficiency in coordinating
talk? Does it suggest the necessity of familiarizing interpreting service users with what it
means to talk through an interpreter? These questions have to do with the actual reliabil-
ity of the professionals observed in empirical studies. So, while on the one hand empirical
studies provide an amount of information about the interpreter-mediated encounter, infor-
mation may be skewed by the quality of informants. The quality of informants is, however,
5
‘ informative’ in sè, both in relation to the interpreting professionals available (a s well as the
professional service providers) and in the type of interaction they construe. The chapters in
this volume show the relevance of inquiries based on informants, but the problem of which
informants is likewise addressed (most explicitly in Chapter 16 by Hanne Skaaden).
The third issue raised by empirical research has to do with the specificities of the services
involved. While engagement in talk with one of the participants has been found relevant in
healthcare interpreting to optimise talk, putting the patients at ease (Penn and Watermeyer
2012) or encouraging them to talk about their problems (Gavioli 2012: 213–14; see also
Angelelli 2004), in other types of settings, such engagement may not work in the same way.
In immigration procedures, for instance, direct answers of interpreters to the service provid-
ers, though ‘quicker’ and possibly efficient in terms of talk exchange, reduce the opportunity
for the immigration applicants to show themselves as capable and competent, an opportunity
that is fundamental in this type of encounter (Mason 2009: 62). So, as in monolingual talk,
in interpreted talk different practices come at stake in different settings and may account for
the situated effectiveness of the interpreter’s work. The characteristics of the main settings
where PSI occurs, dealt with in section 2 of this volume, give a clear idea of the complexity
of public service interpreting work and account for the necessity that interpreters are able to
interpret the situation, together with (and ‘in’) the utterances that make it up, and are prepared
to exercise discretion in accommodating their interpreting practices to the situated activity.
The fourth issue highlighted by empirical data is the human intensity of the situations
involved in PSI. Illness, poverty, lack of freedom, rape, murder and other types of violence
are often the object of healthcare, legal and support services offered to foreign residents. Such
situations pose, more than others, the problem of empathic involvement of the interpreter
as a person as well as the problem of the treatment of empathy in talk (how to show its rele-
vance, how to render it). The problem is d ouble-sided, calling for the management of both
situations of potential sympathy for those who are perceived as the victims, and repulsion,
for those who are in horrible faults, like violent people and murderers (see Gustafsson this
volume). In these cases, it may not be easy for interpreters to discern what is the best possible
service that they can provide.
The chapters in the volume tackle the four issues summarized above by providing con-
crete examples as well as reflections helping interpreters and providers to grasp the nuances
and responsibilities concerning their participation in situations that may involve various
kinds of sensitivity and challenges. They provide more knowledge about the diverse situa-
tions and suggestions about how to provide effective service.
Interpreting as a resource for improving communication

in the public services
In this volume, interpreting is shown as a powerful resource to improve communication
in public services. There are at least three reasons why the public sector needs interpreting
services. The first and probably most obvious is that it is extremely hard for service providers
to communicate with users whose languages they cannot understand and speak. Although
this point has been debated, for instance in medical interpreting literature, where providers
have sometimes observed that the patients’ feelings and sensations are visible through their
bodies and faces and do not need translation (Hsieh and Nicodemus 2015: 1475), a desperate
need for interpreting has been made fully evident in situations where none is available. Lack
of availability has resulted, quite systematically, in an increasing involvement of ‘anyone-
translating-please’, be it a bilingual relative or friend, or staff member. The problems of
6
Introduction
these ad hoc solutions have been underlined in the literature (e.g. by Pöchhacker and Kadriç
1999), and possible ways of making them fruitful have been discussed (Bührig and Meyer
2004; Jansson, Wadensjö and Plejert 2017). What ad hoc interpreting has highlighted first
and foremost, however, is an unequivocal necessity for interpreting services’ availability in
public service encounters.
The second reason is related to the participation, in service encounters, of an interloc-
utor, the interpreter, specifically working on communication. The difference in language
is not the only difference highlighted in interpreter-mediated public service encounters, a
difference in the type of knowledge possessed by service providers and seekers is very much
at stake too. The work of interpreters (see, e.g. Raymond 2014) has highlighted the amount
of competence needed in building shared knowledge, by making clear or explicit those items
that may not mean much to one of the interlocutors (see also Mason 2006). While such a
difference in knowledge is well known from studies in monolingual interaction, interpreted
interaction as well as narratives of interpreters’ experiences give clear illustrations of (a) cases
in which the differences may be more relevant and crucial, and (b) ways in which they can be
treated. These cases show the functioning of asymmetric communication and may improve
communication in public services, not only when foreign speakers are involved, but for all
service seekers.
The third and possibly less obvious reason why interpreting is a powerful resource for
public services is that interpreters’ experience provides an incredibly rich amount of infor-
mation about what such services are in fact. A number of studies in this volume provide nar-
ratives showing that services may still be inadequate and unprepared to work in a changed
environment where service-seekers are no longer monolingual and autochthonous and sug-
gest possible improvements in the regulations or in the training of service providers. This
point too, which is well argued in Chapter 2 by Kristina Gustafsson, may provide benefits
not only for PSI, but for public services more in general.
Despite these strong points which make PSI an undoubtable resource, some studies, par-
ticularly in healthcare settings, have found that interpreters may negatively interfere in the
dynamics of public service encounters (Davidson 2000; Hsieh 2007; see Gavioli and Merlini
this volume). This poses again the problem of staff adequate preparation and the search for
effective ways of training both interpreting and service providers. In this volume, we have
dedicated an entire section, the third one to the problems associated with the training of the
personnel involved in PSI. These problems are related to poor knowledge of the PSI situa-
tions, including little or no knowledge of how interaction works, the languages involved and
the necessity to include also practical training, how to involve service providers, how to train
those who train interpreters and service providers.
Public Service Interpreting and Mediation

Service seekers requiring interpreting services are typically people who not only speak a dif-
ferent language, but who often come from backgrounds with different institutional systems,
traditions, habits and values. These differences, grouped together, are referred to as ‘cultural’
differences and provide a reason why PSI may be considered as a form of intercultural com-
munication. Cultural differences create concern in the public services, for the possibility
that the seekers’ different expectations about what the service can do for them might lead to
non-compliance with the service requirements. Possibly for this reason, ‘mediating’ cultural
differences in PSI has sometimes been considered prior and in some way additional to the
interpreting activity at stake (Merlini 2009).
7
Indeed, as will be shown in the chapters in this volume, in an asymmetric type of interac-
tion as we have in public service encounters, little or no familiarity with the services combined
with little or no knowledge of the language used make interpreted PS interactions even more
asymmetric, leading to argue that this, sometimes, huge imbalance needs to be addressed in
interpreting to allow for communication to occur (Mason and Ren 2012). As explained by
Claudio Baraldi in Chapter 3, the concept of mediation comes from studies in monolingual
conflict management, and, as such, conflict may easily be intended as an idea inherent to me-
diation, even in reference to interpreted mediation. Since huge asymmetries may provoke con-
flict, then mediation in PSI may involve dealing with potential or emerging ‘cultural’ conflicts.
While, as this volume shows, there is no doubt that PSI occurs in situations of strong
asymmetry and with vulnerable participants, attributing asymmetry and vulnerability to
cultural differences may have several drawbacks. First, using culture as an explanatory tool
for obstacles in communication may result in ‘othering’ minority patients, thus hiding rather
than highlighting communication problems (Felberg and Skaaden 2012). Second, interpret-
ers’ attempts to explain what may be perceived as unusual participants’ behaviour in terms
of different habits, traditions or values may in fact result in the production of stereotypes
(Barbieri 2009). Third, mediating ‘cultures’ by attributing individuals to cultural groups
deprives these individuals of the opportunity of participating in the interaction ‘as per-
sons’, with personal expression being interpreted (a nd possibly misinterpreted) in the light of
‘g roup features’ (Baraldi 2012: 323).
While mediation of ‘cultures’, whatever it means, may be one way to look at mediation
in PSI, restricting the concept to cultures has clear limitations. Studies observing interpreted
interactions (for instance Wadensjö 1998; Angelelli 2004, 2012; Penn and Watermeyer 2012)
have suggested that interpreting work can enhance both understanding and positive rela-
tionships through interactional practices. Possibly the strongest theoretical explanation of
mediation as occurring through interpreting work is provided by Wadensjö’s concept of co-
ordination (1998: 105), which we discussed above. In their coordinating activity, interpreters
are active agents who influence and regulate communication, generating a common focus
and sustaining the definition of encounters.
Coordination occurs through the selection of rendition forms as well as other interpret-
ers’ contributions, including forms of intercultural mediation: original utterances’ intended/
possible meaning is negotiated interactionally and the renditions to follow are designed as to
allow participants share understanding and rapport.
Shared understanding and rapport does clearly not necessarily mean that the interlocutors
are empathic with each other or that they can accommodate with each other perspectives.
Quite the contrary, as shown in the volume, problematic and even conflictual situations
occur in PSI and there may be cases where ambiguity and deception are involved too. Inter-
action, even conflictual interaction, however, occurs with at least two – in the case of in-
terpreted talk at least three – participants ‘participating’ – even to construct ambiguities,
deception and conflict. Even though the latter situations pose tough constraints on interpret-
ing and possibly the necessity of pointing to the existence of ambiguity (or deception) quite
explicitly, t alk-coordination, we believe, is the type of mediation activity mostly at stake in
interpreter-mediated work.
The contributions in this volume

The volume is divided in three parts. The first is dedicated to the main theoretical issues
and debates which have shaped research on PSI; the second discusses the characteristics of
8
Introduction
interpreting in the settings which have been most in need of PSI services; the third provides
reflections and suggestions on interpreter as well as provider training, with an aim to im-
prove PSI services. Below, we provide a sketch of the main issues dealt with in each chapter,
in the order given in the table of contents. The threads connecting the chapters are however
many more than those that can be highlighted in this introduction: a section called ‘Related
topics’ at the end of each chapter guides the reader to explore links and connections among
the topics and problems dealt with in the contributions.
The opening chapter by Carmen Valero-Garcés offers an overview of the main challenges
characterising the field of Public Service Interpreting, most notably, the great variety of lan-
guages to cope with (together with a lack of interpreters for many of these languages), the
asymmetric relationships involved in situations where health, freedom and other fragilities
are at stake, and the effort of the public sector in providing adequate (or sometimes inade-
quate) services in these situations. The main controversies are discussed regarding interpret-
ers’ ethics and participation in the development of PSI as a profession.
The following three chapters deal with qualitative research perspectives and discuss, from
different angles, ways in which interpreters’ participation in public service encounters gives
evidence of and may contribute to social change. Kristina Gustafsson in C hapter 2 introduces
an ethnographic approach to the study of PSI. On the basis of interviews with interpreters
working in public settings, she shows unexpected features of building dialogic relationships
guaranteeing equal access and representation in the interaction. Besides illustrating an ap-
plication of the ethnographic approach to the study of PSI, Gustafsson suggests that the per-
spective of interpreters as well as the narration of their experiences may be a rich source of
information not only about the provision of interpreting service, but also, and most notably,
about the provision of public service to minorities, showing aspects that would otherwise get
overlooked. In Chapter 3, Claudio Baraldi discusses sociological approaches to the notion
of agency suggesting that agency does not cover any action by participants in the interaction,
but those which create visible social change. While this perspective on agency may be chal-
lenging for interpreters’ participation, in that interpreters have the task to guarantee that the
other participants participate first and foremost and in their own will, Baraldi shows examples
from authentic interpreter-mediated interaction where mediators are given the opportunity
and take the chance to make a difference, by promoting migrant women’s inclusion and
providers’ attention for their health and psychological conditions. In Chapter 4, Ian Mason’s
contribution discusses notions foregrounding a pragmatic view of PSI research. Starting
from the ideas of identity, position and power, Mason first highlights a distinction between
institutional and interactive power and then looks at how interactive power may affect in-
stitutional power through conversational uptake, reinforcing weak participants’ voices or,
alternatively, the power of institutional representatives. Mason’s reflection offers a compre-
hensive outlook on the complex relationship between language and context and shows that
notions like positioning, cultural assumptions and power are dynamic ones. He suggests that
the intersections among these notions account for the construction and rendition of meaning
in context, thus moving towards what may be called a social pragmatics of interpreting.
An increasing interest of PSI studies for data, like transcripts of interpreted interactions, has
brought to the creation of collections that can be stored and classified as to become shared re-
search materials. Thus corpus-based methods of archiving, categorizing and interrogating the
data are now finding their way into interpreting studies in general, and PSI studies in particu-
lar. This expanding field of research is presented and discussed by Bernd Meyer in Chapter 5,
together with an illustration of one of the few, possibly the only publicly available corpus of
PSI today, the Community Interpreting Database (A ngermeyer, Meyer and Schmidt 2012).
9
The two chapters concluding part 1 reflect on the integration of different media in public
service interpreting and translation. First, the use of technology to assist, complement and/or
replace human interpreters has started to expand in the PSI area, with an increased demand
for distant communication to both cope with the problem of finding suitable interpreting
services when needed and to deal with isolation requirements, which not least the Covid-19
pandemics brought to the fore. In C hapter 6, Sabine Braun, Khetam Al Sharou and Özlem
Temizöz discuss the main types of technologies used in interpreting interaction in healthcare
and focus on the ways in which technology re-shapes the interaction as well as the connected
challenges for interpreters and service providers. In the seventh and last chapter of part 1,
Mustapha Taibi discusses the issues involved in translating written documents for the public
service. While the medium, written rather than spoken language, allows for more consulta-
tion with the public service stakeholders, the issue of accessibility is one of fundamental im-
portance in public service translation, requiring a strong commitment of translators to orient
to the readers’ expectations and knowledge as well as the situation in which these documents
need to be read and understood. A possibly extreme example given by Taibi, still offering a
clear idea of what ‘situated’ public service translation may mean, is that of crisis scenarios, in
which full and clear information may help reduce the loss of lives.
Moving to part 2, the first three chapters deal with PSI in legal settings, face-to-face and
remote. Philipp Angermeyer in C hapter 8 highlights general as well as particular contextual
issues affecting interpreting in court, for instance distinguishing between interpreting in
cross-examination or inquisitorial proceedings, in which questions have different purposes
and targets. The chapter also discusses the contribution of studies from different disciplines,
like linguistics, anthropology, sociology and law and addresses the crucial issue of personal
deixis in situated court interpreting activities. In Chapter 9 Sonja Pöllabauer outlines the de-
velopment of the subfield ‘interpreter-mediated asylum interviews’, providing an overview
of recurrent and salient issues on research exploring authentic discourse data. One of these
issues is dealt with at length in Chapter 10 by Christian Licoppe. Drawing on video record-
ings of naturally occurring courtroom proceedings concerning asylum cases, this chapter
demonstrates how the introduction of video links in courtrooms can affect the conditions
for interpreters’ work, and also for the production of other participants’ questions and nar-
ratives. Using ethnomethodology and Conversation Analysis (EM/CA), Licoppe generates
new knowledge about the impact of participants’ location in relation to each other, and about
the interdependence between actors’ communicative projects. At the same time, he demon-
strates the explanatory power of EM/CA as a theoretical and methodological approach to
studies of consecutively interpreted interaction. A very particular type of legal setting is that
of v ictim-survivors of domestic violence and abuse, dealt with in C hapter 11 by Rebecca
Tipton. Besides showing cases of testimony of women’s experiences of domestic violence, the
chapter offers a more general reflection on the idea of personal and contextual vulnerability.
The other major traditional area in which PSI services are most needed, besides court
and other legal settings, is health care. Laura Gavioli and Raffaela Merlini in Chapter 12
discuss clinician-patient interpreting on the basis of two apparently divergent purposes, that
of providing appropriate medical therapy and that of giving patients care, attention and reas-
surance. Following studies on healthcare in monolingual contexts, eliciting patients’ stories
of experience, worries and fear is helpful for the clinicians to provide adequate cures and it
is thus part of the task of interpreting to consider this double goal in medical encounters.
Still in the medical area, C hapter 13 by Charlotta Plejert deals with the specific situation of
mental health. Here, patients’ tests include work based on repeating sounds, naming familiar
or unfamiliar objects, recognising situations. While such tests may not be easy for patients
10
Introduction
with mental disorders in general, in c ross-cultural encounters where familiarity of sounds,

objects and situations may not be shared, they may be particularly hard to handle and in-
terpreters are tackled with the double task of (a) finding suitable equivalents in the patient’s
language, fitting the test purposes and (b) refrain from supporting patients’ comprehension,
which would invalidate the test.
Public service interpreting in social care is the topic dealt with in C hapter 14. As the
authors Dorien Van De Mieroop, Antoon Cox and Koen Kerremans state, interpreting in
social care is less studied than interpreter-mediated legal and medical encounters. The chap-
ter first provides an overview of some of the most explored topics in this subfield. Among
these is the issue of interpreters’ involvement, which hardly is unique to the field of social
care, but which has been scarcely explored on real life empirical data drawn from social care
encounters. The very presence of an interpreter, or of a certain interpreter, as well as the
absence of any interpreter, or the use of other bilingual professionals (or non-professionals)
in the role of interpreter – all are factors that may complicate the establishment of rapport
between institutional representatives and clients, the authors argue, emphasising that rapport
is crucial in social care contexts. The last chapter in the second p art – Chapter
15, by Sigrid
Slettebakk Berge, focuses on a likewise not much studied PSI area, that of educational set-
tings. Drawing on unique video recordings from classrooms, where students with signed and
spoken language respectively are together, she explores the conditions for interpreting, for
learning and for teaching and concludes that these conditions can be considerably improved
if interpreters and teachers collaborate in class in a systematic way.
Part three of the handbook has more on participants’ collaboration. Interpreter edu-
cation is discussed as a key element to enhance interpreter status and consequently their
professionalization, but also as a way to improve public services. In the first chapter, Hanne
Skaaden, within a general model of professionalization, shows that although public service
interpreting fulfils the performative aspects of professional activity, the organizational aspect
in terms of education, is not sufficiently developed. The author argues that this situation does
not only hold back the process of interpreter professionalization, but may also have negative
consequences for the professional integrity of those in charge of institutional encounters and
subsequently for the integrity of their clients. The following chapter, written by Christopher
Stone, Cynthia Roy and Jeremy Brunson, suggests that the education of signed language
interpreters for public service interpreting has much to offer for organisers of spoken lan-
guages PSI. In Chapter 17 in fact the authors describe the development of signed language
education in the European Union, the United States and in Australia and show that there
are fewer differences between spoken and signed languages than many may think when it
comes to education and practice. Quite some space is devoted to innovative curricula and
teaching. For instance, v ideo-recorded student role-plays and how these can constitute situ-
ated learning are discussed at length. C hapter 18 by Magnus Dahnberg is focused entirely on
role play as a means of training and testing PSI for signed and spoken languages alike. The
author draws on sound recordings of spoken role plays to demonstrate their various design
and suitability for specific purposes. For example, role plays based on detailed manuscripts
differ in significant ways from role plays relying on role cards, which also implies that their
suitability for learning and testing purposes differ.
In Chapter 19, Elisabet Tiselius and Birgitta Englund Dimitrova, using discourse data
from scripted role plays, focus on interpreters’ cognitive processes and suggest to use the
concept of monitoring, as defined in three different research traditions, to discuss the im-
pact and importance of interpreters’ cognitive abilities in face-to-face encounters. As the
authors demonstrate, interaction shows evidence of interpreters monitoring the discourse
11
in adjusting their contributions (for instance in self-repair and in asking for clarification or
repeat). It is not likewise easy to establish the relationship between interpreters’ memory
load to their coordinating competence or to various types of contributions from the other
participants, to participants’ knowledge of institutional procedures, mutual expectations and
so forth. The chapter gives food for thought for reflections on such a link/connection and
suggests that exercises on monitoring cognitive load are needed in the training of interpret-
ers for PSI.
Covid-19 accelerated the development of online education worldwide, even if the phe-
nomenon is far from new. In C hapter 20, Gry Sagli and Hanne Skaaden provide an overview
of research on what has been called blended learning, that is, combination of online and
on-campus education, as this has developed in various disciplines and educational programs.
Subsequently, the authors account for the blended learning model that has been established
in the BA programme for public service interpreters at Oslo Metropolitan University. The
chapter shows what learning aims can be acquired online and for what aims on-campus ac-
tivities seem more appropriate. Also, the authors emphasize that didactics that stimulate stu-
dent interactivity is essential in creating opportunity for learning, whether on-site or online.
The two following chapters focus on the use of recordings and transcripts of authen-
tic mediated encounters in the training of interpreters. Natacha Niemants,
interpreter-
Pedersen Belisle Hansen and Elizabeth Stokoe in Chapter 21 explore the use of the so-called
Conversation Analytic Role-Play Method (CARM), originally developed to train for dispute
mediation, in the training of interpreters. While this method, as other types of role-plays,
involves simulation, it has the advantage of showing interpreting problems which really took
place, selecting them over a range of authentic materials and asking trainees to discuss how
the problem might be solved in the specific situation. Similar to what occurs in conversa-
tion analysis, in which recordings and transcripts allow researchers to repeat the event in a
sort of ‘slow-motion’ mode which makes the event analysable, in CARM training, trainees
can deal with the interpreting problem ‘in slow-motion’, discussing possible renditions and
their consequences. C hapter 22 by Anna Claudia Ticca, Véronique Traverso and Emilie
Jouin provides a recounting of the REMILAS (Refugees, Migrants and their Languages
in healthcare services) research project. The project examines communication and mutual
understanding in multilingual health, mental and social care consultations, thus linking up
to other contributions in the volume both dealing with asylum seeking and healthcare. The
focus of the chapter is on the development of a training program used to train both interpret-
ers and providers and based on natural interpreter-mediated talk. Besides providing more
suggestions about how to use authentic data in training, the chapter shows a completely new
program based on self-learning modality and accessible via digital instruments.
Chapter 23 aims at introducing a specific kind of interprofessional education (IPE) as a
teaching and learning model in the field of PSI. Demi Krystallidou takes education in the
healthcare s ector – where IPE was first d eveloped – as a case in point and shares her experi-
ences and critical reflections concerning the use of IPE in h ands-on training sessions, where
PSI students and medical students learn to collaborate in practice. In Chapter 24, Tatjana R.
Felberg and Gry Sagli share their experiences of training public service providers represent-
ing different institutions in how to communicate via interpreters. The authors argue for the
importance of such training and for making it easily available for various groups of public
service providers. The final chapter in the handbook is devoted to education and training of
public service interpreter teachers. In C hapter 25 Mira Kadrić and Sonja Pöllabauer outline
research on the education of teachers for dialogue interpreting, with a specific focus on PSI,
without differentiating between signed and spoken language interpreting or any particular
12
Introduction
institutional setting. The chapter discusses methodological and didactic approaches to teach-
ing and learning which implies that the issues, knowledge and skills brought up can be ap-
plicable not just to teachers but in a wider field of interpreting.
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14
PART 1
Theoretical and methodological

approaches
1
GENERAL ISSUES ABOUT
Institutions, codes, norms, and professionalisation
Introduction
Although public service interpreting (PSI) is one of the first forms of intercultural commu-
nication in history, it has only recently been defined as a professional and communicative
activity. It has also become the subject of academic research. According to Wadensjö (1998:
49), whose definition of PSI was one of the first to be recorded, PSI refers to interpreting
in public services to facilitate communication between staff and laypeople meeting for a
particular purpose. While Wadensjö refers to PSI as a form of social interaction, capturing
the perspectives of both parties involved in institutional encounters, Mikkelson (1996: 19)
offers a definition based on PSI as a concern at the macro level of society, considering it an
activity that facilitates equal access to legal services, healthcare, education and social services
to groups of people belonging to cultural or linguistic minorities who generally have lower
levels of education and income and are often unfamiliar with or unaccustomed to the new
social reality in the country in which they reside. Ozolins (2000: 32), among many others,
emphasises what he calls the ‘institution-driven’ characteristic of PSI, which highlights how
the institutional policies of each country affect its professionalisation.
The difficulties in defining this field of practice are also illustrated by the absence of a
common name. The variety of expressions used to address this activity illustrates the point:
community interpreting, liaison interpreting, interpreting in social services, dialogue inter-
preting, PSI and translation, and there are even specific names based on professionals and
their areas of expertise, such as healthcare interpreter, intercultural health mediator, cultural
interpreter, community interpreter, legal interpreter or public service interpreter to name
but a few. The two terms most used nowadays to refer to the activity are PSI and commu-
nity interpreting. The latter is the most employed expression in some countries, including
the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. The United Kingdom and some
European countries prefer PSI or public service interpreting and translation over community
interpreting to prevent confusion with translation/interpreting work performed by amateurs
on a voluntary basis (Corsellis 2002: 32).
Since the second half of the twentieth century, PSI has developed significantly as an aca-
demic discipline within Translation and Interpreting Studies (TIS). A closer look at research
in TIS shows abundant literature describing cases where family members, children, friends
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-3 17
or anyone speaking or understanding two languages may help break language barriers in
hospitals, police stations, social work offices or immigration departments. The literature
also highlights training experiences or projects related to lesser-used languages (Bot 2003;
Burdeus-Domingo et al. 2020).
What emerges from this literature is PSI’s journey from an informal activity to an occu-
pation and eventually to a fully fledged profession. Tseng’s (1992) professionalisation model
of new occupations in four stages might serve as a framework of reference (for an analysis of a
different model of the professionalisation process, see Skaaden, 2018). Tseng’s model outlines
four stages: (1) market disorder and fierce competition among the practitioners of the pro-
fession in question, with a complete lack of social recognition; (2) development of consensus
about practitioners’ aspirations; (3) creation of professional associations and codes of conduct,
giving professionals higher social recognition and prestige; (4) adherence to the code of eth-
ics and control of entry to the profession, which consolidates the profession’s establishment.
Nevertheless, as Mikkelson (1996) points out, progressing from stages 1 to 4 does not happen
overnight, and boundaries between the different stages may be blurred and not identifiable.
This chapter explores some of the controversies and critical issues that have dominated
this process. It will include reflections on critical issues related to institutional relationships
and PSI, codes, norms and PSI’s professionalisation.
Institutional contexts and PSI

PSI can be broadly understood as interpreting in institutional contexts when public service
providers and users speak different languages. The relationship between the institutional
contexts and multilingual PSI encounters will be carried out in three distinct steps: (a) types
of interactions, (b) identification of challenges and (c) methods and tools to cope with such
challenges.
Types of interactions
Narrowing the gap between the administration and each resident in a specific area requires a
smooth operating system which Corsellis (2008: 71–89) visualises as a chain formed by three
fundamental components: public service providers; interpreters, mediators or intermediaries
that make communication possible; and users that are not proficient in the language in which
the services are provided.
Institutional encounters have many traits in common, but the interactions are diverse
(Agar 1985). There is an institution-individual relationship, and there is also an individual-
individual relationship. In the first type of interaction – institution-individual – the mi-
grant approaches the institutions or public service, seeking a service that existed before the
migrant/individual arrived at the host location. Consequently, the institutions have estab-
lished protocols, values, and operations specifically required to access their services. In the
second type of interaction – that is, individual-individual – providers do not systematically
apply the same criteria to every service-
seeker: instead, they act according to a personal
framework supported by the training they have received, their familiarity with potential
cultural differences, their linguistic knowledge, their own life experience within and outside
their country, or even their prejudices. Furthermore, the complexity of intercultural rela-
tionships that vary depending on the context of the interaction (legal, medical, educational,
social) must be considered; this leads to various relationships between actors from horizontal
to hierarchical ( Jiménez Salcedo 2010: 45). Thus, eliminating the language barrier is not the
18
General issues about public service interpreting
only issue in such encounters; other barriers must be overcome to facilitate understanding
and provide or receive the service in question.
The interaction’s success depends on the collaboration of all the actors involved in the
communicative chain described by Corsellis (2008). The mere linguistic involvement of the
interpreter is not sufficient; other professionals that act as providers (social workers, NGO
workers, public sector workers, and so on) must also collaborate. Such collaboration may,
however, be hindered for several reasons. Corsellis’s volume (2008, Chap. 7 and 8: 118–

7 4) describes the importance of training public sector workers to work with PSI and across
cultures. She underlines the need to promote interdisciplinarity between all the parties in-
volved and explores ideas about the policy and management skills needed to provide an
organisational framework. In her words, ‘Management of change requires a clear analysis of
an existing situation, identification of targets and the development of practical incremental
steps to cover the gap within agreed timescales’ (Corsellis 2008: 9). Accordingly, she claims
that the first step in achieving this objective is policy: a national commitment to providing
what is needed. In addition, she recommends a coordinated national approach ‘because a
piecemeal approach has associated challenges and risks’. Related topics are discussed in this
volume by Felberg and Skaaden, and by Krystallidou.
Challenges
One of the most significant challenges to providing accurate PSI is the vast number of lan-
guages that PSI services require and the difficulties of providing language-
specific training
and education for interpreters in many such languages, particularly those of limited diffusion.
This situation has given rise to some complaints, mainly in the legal sector (EULITA 2016),
concerning the qualifications held by the interpreters contracted and the actual quality of
their work. Moreover, low pay rates are causing many experienced and qualified interpreters
and translators to reject working for the public sector. Consequently, as Benhaddou (2012:
93–95) reports, Spanish institutions have lowered the required minimum qualifications,
which stems from the reality that otherwise no qualified interpreters would be available.
Low payment and lowered qualifications have affected PSI also in the United Kingdom, as
Staton (2019) shows. Related issues and other problems affecting PSI will be discussed below.
The power relations between institutions and service users present another challenge.
These relations precede any difficulties immigrants who do not speak the language have
when they establish contact and eventually apply for service. The privileges that institutions
have over citizens are legitimised by the executive power from which they arise and, there-
fore, allow institutions to impose their rules. Institutions’ power also implies responsibili-
ties, for example, communicating with their clients. Both Prunč (2012) and Skaaden (2018)
have considered this duality. Researchers like Lippi-Green (1994), Skutnabb-K angas (1999),
Blanchet (2016) and Wallace and Monzó-Nebot (2019) have highlighted the limits of the
tacit policies of institutional and individual monolingual practices. These researchers call
for measures to alleviate the substantial economic, administrative, and ideological obstacles
encountered when individuals and institutions attempt to support and maintain linguistic
and cultural diversity.
This complex situation requires institutional adaptation. It is the task of institutional
powers to take the first step to adapting services in cases of significant multiculturalism.
The act of calling on an interpreter or mediator represents an effort by providers to adapt
an existing protocol of action to a new need. This adaptation can hardly be a smooth one
for providers in that it introduces a change in the service culture of institutions that have
19
never considered communication a problem. As Wallace and Monzó-Nebot (2019) note,

along with many others, the public sphere is now multilingual, and yet monolingual policies
have been favouring the hegemonic pursuit of the most powerful Western languages while
the essential nature of multilingualism has been silenced, thus disenfranchising the different
(l inguistic) minorities.
Modern societies pose relatively new challenges to public institutions. Research (Aguilar-
Solano 2015; Angelelli 2015; Burdeus-Domingo et al. 2020; Valero-Garcés 2020) has re-
vealed situations in which professional and non-professional interpreters and translators share
social spaces, identify issues and challenges that act as obstacles to professionalisation. More-
over, in research interviews, interpreters have suggested measures to bring public institutions
closer to effectively fulfilling their duties. If communication in public institutions does not
work satisfactorily across languages, they risk losing the public’s trust. This undesired conse-
quence highlights the institutional importance of PSI services straightforwardly as possibly
the only means to enable successful communication between institutional representatives
and m inority-language-speaking clients. Thus, research that provides data and exemplifies
the risks and benefits of interpreters’ work may help raise awareness of their value and even-
tually improve their working conditions in the public sector.
PSI facilitates multilingualism in a myriad of situations in the world today. This reality
also stresses the heterogeneous nature of the interpreting business and its dependence on
public funding. Decisions to distribute resources must consider many factors, interdepen-
dencies, risks and possible outcomes. Beyond mere time constraints and the influence of cir-
cumstances such as the 2008 economic crisis, funds have been heavily cut while complexities
have become more and more visible against a background of more and more diverse societies
with demands for increasingly participatory and representative practices.
Coping with challenges

A solution adopted by many institutions to cope with the challenges of providing adequate
PSI services is to outsource translation and interpreting services to private companies: this
is, however, not ideal. Based on research conducted in S pain – though the statement may be
applied in many other cases – Garcia-Beyaert (2015: 53) affirms:
(…) outsourced management by a private company has not proved ideal, but policymak-
ers have shown little sensitivity. Despite criticism of the lack of guarantees for quality in
the original contract (which focused on language ability and devoted little attention to
interpreting), the requirement for competence in interpreting completely disappeared
from the new request for tenders in 2012.
In line with the above, other problems found in the institution-

migrants relationship include
difficulties in recruiting not only well-prepared interpreters but also interpreter trainers.
This problem is well addressed by Kadriç and Pöllabauer in this volume. The scarcity of
language resources and translation technologies for minority languages is likewise among
the issues and challenges to be considered (Balogh, Salaets and Van Schoor 2016: 6). Thus,
bridging the gap between the right to an interpreter and the actual availability of interpreters
is still a work in progress worldwide. And this shapes the path towards the professionalisation
of PSI by not fulfilling yet the dual role that PSI has of (1) providing the means for public
sector workers to maintain their professional integrity when performing their duties, grant-
ing access to essential services for all; and (2) guaranteeing individuals’ rights of access to
20
those services (Wallace and Monzó-Nebot 2019). As the Covid-19 pandemic has evidenced,
safe communication between society and its minorities is in the interest of society at large.
Different countries have adopted similar solutions to cope with PSI’s challenges: special-
ised qualifications exist, although not always in languages of lesser diffusion, yet govern-
mental authorities still fail to make them a requirement. As a result, many language service
providers appoint non-professionals (often at a lower rate of pay) who cannot undertake
highly specialised interpreting, thus putting the rights of migrants and the integrity of insti-
tutional representatives at risk.
The aim to guarantee the right to communicate and the need to improve the quality of
translation and interpreting services has led several organisations at national and interna-
tional levels to call for the further professionalisation of PSI, especially for court translators
and interpreters. For instance, the European Legal Interpreters and Translators Association
(EULITA) was responsible for pushing the adoption of Directive 2010/64/EU (on the adop-
tion of this Directive in other European countries, see Giambruno 2014b). The association
has repeatedly called upon the EU to ensure that all Member States have transposed the
Directive into domestic law since the deadline to do so was in 2013. Yet, almost ten years
later, many countries have failed to do so (EULITA 2019).
Codes, ethical principles, and standards

Every profession sets its standards for professional conduct that guides actions. These stan-
dards are usually published as a code of ethics or a best practice guide regulating professional
activity. Most ethical codes are based on meta- ethical principles, which are sometimes re-
ferred to as prima facie duties. Classic examples of such meta-ethical principles (Ross 1930/
2002) are as follows: do no harm (nonmaleficence); do good (beneficence); fidelity (keeping
one’s promises and contracts and not engaging in deception); reparation (repairing the inju-
ries that one has caused to others); gratitude; justice and equality; self- improvement.
These meta-ethical principles are at the core of studies on ethics in different contexts
within the field of PSI. For example, C amayd-Freixas (2013), Baixauli-Olmos (2013) and
Inghilleri (2012) focus on the area of law, while Dysart-Gale (2005) looks at healthcare.
These studies show that while the professional codes of practice used by each group of
professionals converge on fundamental principles, there are nevertheless specific disparities
that may lead to conflict or incongruent judgments in terms of the fulfilment of the ethical
tenets when two professionals work together, for instance, civil servants and PSI (Valero-
Garcés 2017). More examples can be found in collective papers focusing mainly on ethics in
interpreting: (Re)Visiting Ethics and Ideology in Situations of Conflict (Valero-Garcés and Vita-
laru 2014), Ethics of Non-Professional Translation and Interpreting, Special issue of Translation and
Interpreting Studies (Monzó-Nebot and Wallace 2020) and Ethics in Public Service Interpreting
(Phelan et al. 2020).
Thus, when PS interpreters are asked to define their role, no unanimous consensus exists
beyond the transmission of information across languages (Pöchhacker 2002: 63; Angelelli
2004: 47–48); they usually assert that their role is not restricted to merely translating. Inter-
preters’ notions of what their role should be are conditioned by norms they have embraced
over the years, both consciously and unconsciously (Inghilleri 2003: 259), and the realities
and demands of the domain in which they have acquired their professional experience. Dis-
crepancies have also been pointed out between the norms declared by interpreters and what
they do in the field (Anderson 1978; Wadensjö 1998; Bot 2003: 34; Inghilleri 2003: 257;
Pöllabauer 2004; Valero and Gauthier 2010: 8).
21
These discrepancies have been the object of numerous studies, articles and seminars con-
cerning not only interpreters but also the perception that providers and clients have of their
ethics and how language services carry out their role (Gentile 2016).
The principles that guide action in PSI may be influenced by several factors, such as the
society in question, the culture(s) the society is in contact with, the participants’ educational
background and even their personal or private ethics. When two different professions with
respective codes coexist in the same context, there may be overlap, disagreement or mis-
alignment. When it comes to achieving or practising the ethical principles that guide each
profession, ethical conflicts may arise if and when different solutions clash. This tendency is
gaining support in some instances and points to the need to re-examine theories on PSI and
guidelines established in codes and principles (Wallace and Monzó-Nebot 2019: 12).
Research on the professionalisation of PSI illustrates a first era during which the conduit
metaphor (Roy 1993/2002) was taken as an inspiration to guide practice and draft codes of
conduct (Merlini 2015: 28) to claim some authority and prestige. Nowadays, an increasing
number of studies show how interpreters engage their ethics (Bot 2003; Inghilleri 2010;
Valero-Garcés 2017), thus transgressing the requirements of impartiality by mediating, tak-
ing on additional tasks and making decisions unconsciously or n ot – as to when omissions
and additions are used effectively to support an ongoing encounter while also not siding
exclusively with one of the parties (Martin 2000). Interpreters may also perceive power im-
balances and even go a step further to take measures to compensate for inherent asymmetries
(Bancroft 2017: 2 05–10).
Exploring interpreting as social interaction, Wadensjö (1998) finds that in situated en-
counters, mediation is inherent in interpreting. Wadensjö (1998: 1 05–6) writes,
In dialogue interpreting, the translating and coordinating aspects are simultaneously pres-
ent, and the one does not exclude the other. These aspects condition each other. Seen
like this, it is not an empirical question whether interpreters are translators or mediators –
they cannot avoid being both (italics in the original).
In other words, to understand how interpreter-mediated interaction works, we need to

consider two aspects of interpreter practice: interpreters are simultaneously rendering and
coordinating talk in interaction, implicitly or explicitly.
Pöchhacker (2008: 9) argues that mediation is a crucial aspect in understanding the con-
troversies surrounding the concept of the interpreter’s role in PSI and identifies three dimen-
sions of mediation in interpreting: linguistic/cultural, cognitive and contractual.
The line between mediating and interpreting has been one of the most debated in PSI,
leading to associate mediation with cultural differences and interpreting with linguistic ones.
Jiménez Salcedo (2010: 50) argues that the characteristics of a mediator and an interpreter in
PSI overlap, mainly in the level of biculturality and the ability to master two languages – not
only linguistically but also in terms of body language, proxemics, and semiotics. However,
the concept of ‘culture’ is highly complex, and the task of cultural mediation must not be
interpreted narrowly to avoid falling into culturalist readings without an appropriate con-
textualisation (Weiss and Stuker 1998: 46 and see also Baraldi this volume and Skaaden this
volume).
The main question remains: What degree of mediation is adequate and realistic to in-
clude in order not to compromise the ethical principles of impartiality or neutrality and
fidelity? In their efforts to propose solutions to this problem, some studies (Angelelli 2004;
Zimányi 2009; Lee and Llewellyn-Jones 2013; Aguirre 2019) have identified different role
22
prototypes for interpreters placed along an imaginary continuum according to the degree
of mediation involved. Terms used in the literature to refer to the interpreter’s role include
active participant, assistant, cultural broker, advocate, conciliator middleman, broker, go-
between, gatekeeper, clarifier, explainer, cultural mediator, helpmate or agent. Although
these terms are metaphorical descriptions, they may turn into prescriptive ones. If each term
(or role description) came with an ethical code of its own, that would contribute to creating
confusion rather than a shared professional identity. The diversity of fields and situations PSI
covers may need descriptive but flexible classifications with no clear- cut borders if each set
of circumstances requires different actions and choices by the interpreter (Angelelli 2004:
47). Some examples of the complexity of the role of the interpreter in PSI include the di-
agrammatic tool devised by Zimányi (2009), the notion of Role-Space coined by Lee and
Llewellyn-Jones (2013) and Aguirre’s multi-layered continuum (2019).
One of the characteristics of PSI that triggers the idea that the complexity of the role
can be split into different sub-roles is the diversity of public services involved. Runcieman
(2020), for instance, suggests that the interpreter’s interactive role is more visible and relevant
in some fields than in others. For example, there is greater demand for cultural sensitivity and
understanding of both the source and target cultures in asylum interpreting. Here, he argues,
the interpreter must continually mediate between diverse sociocultural conventions where the
potential for misunderstandings may constantly arise. As an example, Runcieman cites the
application process: the asylum seeker may have no understanding of a different judicial
system or have heightened levels of distrust towards state officials and/or strong suspicions
about the potential abuse of power of the state. In their verbal communication, the asylum
seeker might also have fewer or very different politeness markers or use more elaborate hedg-
ing strategies, which could make them seem too aggressive or too evasive, potentially lead-
ing to an unfavourable outcome in their appeal. Moreover, many asylum interviews elicit
petitioners’ narratives about their lives and experiences, which can be a source of frustration,
incomprehension, or doubts about their veracity for officials due to differences in the cultural
canons of what constitutes a compelling, plausible narrative. For some or all these reasons,
interpreters often intervene or even assume the role of interviewers. At times, they may even
alter the style and register of interviewees’ statements (Pöllabauer 2004; Runcieman 2020).
In court interpreting, Berk-Seligson (2002) and Hale (2004) also indicate that interpreters’
interventions like altering the style and register can make the difference between a defendant
being found guilty or innocent.
In the healthcare setting, there may appear to be a tendency for the interpreter to act
more as a conduit, conveying information from one language to another without a personal/
cultural contribution (Wilcox and Shaffer 2005: 4), particularly, when communicating the
medical practitioners’ prescriptions regarding medicines and curative therapies (but see Gav-
ioli and Merlini, this volume, for a discussion about dealing with facts and emotions in
interpreter-mediated interaction in healthcare). Again, the interpreter acting as a conduit
might not be as straightforward as it seems in the case of emergency room care or doctor-
patient interactions in healthcare centres. Relevant factors include different socio-cultural
and socioeconomic backgrounds with differing levels of education and socioeconomic status,
which, makes some explanations necessary for effective communication (Angelelli 2008).
Who has the responsibility/competence to explain the professional context or concepts in
such situations seems to be a never-ending topic of discussion.
Another reason to look at PSI as specific to sub- areas or settings is that health and legal
settings cover a lot of PSI work. In countries where PSI is more developed, such as Austra-
lia or Canada, healthcare interpreting has gained much attention and court interpreting is
23
widely recognised as a profession. As Sasso and Malli (2014) suggest, if policy recognition
is desired, then perhaps fragmenting the field is an alternative approach. This is reflected in
the existence of different ISO standards, now specifically elaborated for the healthcare and
legal areas.1 However, Corsellis (2008) also warned about the impact that fragmentation may
have on PSI compared with the advantage of standing together and potentially becoming
stronger as a profession. Evidence has shown that significant milestones have been achieved
as a unified body, including the publication of the first international standard for community
interpreting, the ISO norm Interpreting: Guidelines for community interpreting in 2014. A revision
of these standards has been initiated in 2021.
Directly or indirectly, existing ISO standards may leave room for discussion. Besides,
the differences between countries are so extensive and intricate that PSI could evolve in
many different directions. As Moreno-Rivero (2020) points out, now, the provision of PSI
in legal and healthcare settings in the EU is only regulated by Directive 2010/64/EU. More
specifically:
Directive 2010/64/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 October 2010,
on the right to interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings, grants access to
translation of all relevant documentation and court interpreting in c riminal – but not
civil – proceedings to speakers of all EU official languages.
Directive 2011/24/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 9 March 2011,
on the application of patients’ rights in cross-
border healthcare, acknowledges patients’
rights to information. However, each country has the responsibility (and freedom) to
issue its laws to regulate the application of these rules. Consequently, the adoption of
language rules that help manage PSI partly relies on each country individually: there is
a common EU-wide framework, but its implementation (or the lack of it) differs among
countries, as noted in a report by the European Commission (2018).
PSI on the path toward professionalisation

In an interview published some years ago (Valero-Garcés 2014), Corsellis explains that the
first step in advancing the professionalisation of PSI is to agree on a definition. Based on the
results of the EU project Qualitas, Corsellis claims that professions come into being when
trust is required, primarily because the clients are not able to judge for themselves the quality
of service offered as they do not speak both languages in question. To fulfil what is required
of them by their professional code, professions need to establish five principles: Selection cri-
teria (for entry to training and then the professional register); Initial and in-service training;
Recognised assessments at all levels; Guidelines and good practice; Disciplinary procedures.
These five principles were mentioned already in a preceding EU project –Aequitas – where
Corsellis and Félix Fernández (2001) emphasise the importance of being transparent, na-
tionally, and internationally recognised, consistent and accountable to the public and the
profession. A brief review of the five conditions about PSI shows that they are not met in
many countries today. In short, there is no consistency in the profession worldwide. In the
following, I will discuss some of the challenges that countries are facing and the solutions
they are adopting on the path toward the professionalisation of PSI.
The principle of consistency is worthwhile; however, implementing it in practice may
not be an easy task. Taking the literature and experience of PSI as a point of departure,
some of the many challenges and issues identified include the lack of recognition of PSI
as a profession; the non-availability of (adequate) training; and differences in language
24
resources and translation technologies for LLD (Giambruno 2014a; Balogh, Salaets and Van
Schoor 2016).
The lack of recognition of PSI as a profession implies a lack of professionalisation. To
achieve professionalisation, training is necessary, and the level and length of education no
doubt have an impact on professional status. Nevertheless, at the time of this writing, there
are still no clear directions about whether training should be offered by higher education
institutions or professional training institutions or whether it should be provided by NGOs
and other bodies involved in migration support (De Pedro Ricoy 2010). In practice, PSI is
still struggling with offering well-
trained translators and interpreters in the required (wide)
variety of languages and cultures, and debates are still ongoing about the formats to adopt,
from one-day instruction to periodical seminars or workshops to undergraduate and post-
graduate courses (Valero-Garcés 2019).
The present situation does not mean that PSI has not evolved. Despite the differences
between countries, PSI has gradually advanced towards professionalisation ever since it be-
came the focus of academic and research activity when the well- known 1995 Critical Link
conference was held in Canada. Seemingly, the boundaries between conference interpreting
and PSI are becoming blurred and the differences are starting to fade altogether. Some indi-
cations of this change are seen in the current debate over prestige and by increasing recog-
nition of PSI by other professionals and societies at large. Also, as Mikkelson (1996) argues,
some links between conference interpreting and PSI are quite evident. For instance, while
conference interpreting has contributed to shaping standards in PSI (sometimes a bit blindly
and because there was little else to serve as a model), it is becoming increasingly clear that
PSI can contribute to the development of conference interpreting by increasing practitioners’
perceived status of con-
sensitivity to various layers of contexts. In her analysis of the self-
ference and public service interpreters, Gentile (2014) found that a sense of lower status still
characterises PSI interpreters. At the same time, her data indicate an increasing awareness of
the social role carried out by the interpreting profession as a driving force that motivates PSI
interpreters to follow the path towards full professionalisation.
Searching for models of good practice based on the realisation that quality indeed impacts
equal access to justice and fair trials may also contribute to consolidating the profession-
alisation of PSI. For Corsellis (Valero-Garcés 2014: 10) this will include exploring non-
p rofessional interpreting both in research and training beyond mainstream institutions to
include groups of interpreting practitioners whose positions have been, or still are, rather
peripheral (be it professional, ad hoc, novice, volunteer and/or activist), but who play an
active part in society.
Merging different disciplinary and methodological approaches for the purpose of research
and training could also promote PSI professionalisation (see Krystallidou; Sagli and Skaaden,
this volume). Research indicates that the professionalisation process of PSI is linked also to
complex ideological and social factors. In some areas, the tendency is that PSI interpreting
generally is perceived as no less professionalised than conference interpreting or legal in-
terpreting and translation (LIT), which is recognised as a professional branch of its own in
some countries. No doubt, language service providers, practitioners and their clients must
continue striving for the common ground before PSI is broadly accepted as a profession
(Bancroft 2017).
However, some of the characteristics of PSI already mentioned, such as unstable working
conditions and poor remuneration, also contribute to the de-professionalisation of the trade,
thus compromising, for instance, individuals’ right to basic services or to fair trials. Gentile
(2017) shows how the implementation of nationalist ideologies, including aspects such as the
25
privatisation and outsourcing of PSI, have hindered the professionalisation of PSI and dam-
aged public perception of the profession.
Gentile (2017) further points out that to achieve full professionalisation and public rec-
ognition, PSI must gain and maintain the general public’s trust. However, the tendency to
outsource and/or cut interpreting services among some national governments in the EU,
particularly after the 2008 economic crisis, has not only transformed PSI into a commodity
but is creating a situation in which the winner is a cheap service rather than a quality one.
Cheaper services may become more widespread after the coronavirus pandemic, which has
boosted the need for interpreting services but created the conditions for a new economic
crisis.
In 2011, Sela-Sheffy and Shlesinger referred to translators and interpreters as ‘an extreme
example of an understudied semi-professional occupation’ (2011: 3). And indeed, it seems
like PSI continues to be a semi-profession, that is, an occupation that has achieved a few
characteristics of professions but does not possess sufficient autonomy to be sociologically
classified as such (Saha and Dworkin 2009).
Problems of professionalisation, financial cuts to translation and interpreting services,
privatisation and outsourcing to external agencies appear to be destroying systems where
service providers were once encouraged to use registered and state-certified interpreters (for
instance, in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands) (Gentile 2017). Gentile (2017) notes
that this illustrates the link between national policies and their impact on professionalisation
processes and interpreters’ perception of their status. In her research on the professional status
of PSI, Gentile provides insights into interpreters’ opinions and comments on three param-
eters: remuneration, perception of status and the social value of interpreting. In her own
words, ‘Despite the discouraging results, a positive aspect that emerges from the survey is
that many interpreters continue to work in this setting because they consider it to be a moral
imperative, a sign of justice towards the most vulnerable’ (Gentile 2014: 204).
This attitude suggests that interpreters include principles of social justice in their actions
to address the ‘democratic deficit’ (Gentile 2017: 83). Therefore, following Gentile, inter-
preters’ codes of ethics should arguably pay attention to the link between PSI and social
justice by specifying that interpreters are actively involved in addressing discrimination in
hospitals, courts, and all other settings where their services are required, an approach that has
proved useful in, for instance, enhancing the professionalisation of other professions, such as
nursing (Cohen and Ezer 2013).
Finally, dialogue between institutions and service providers could prove fruitful to raise
awareness of serious consequences, which may possibly result in the violation of language
rights, incorrect diagnoses and miscarriages of justice. In a world in which migrants are
ghettoised and discriminated against, interpreters are professionals who, ideally, work re-
sponsibly to make sure that human rights are respected. There may thus be a strong need to
listen to the opinions, fears and struggles of these professionals who sustain an ethical duty
that many national governments seem to have forgotten.
Conclusion and further developments

PSI has developed with uncertain force in the translation/interpreting professions, adding
new challenges and demands, but also new solutions. Some solutions to the challenges ex-
perienced during these years of evolution in PSI are already underway. Lessons can be learnt
from sharing experiences and common projects encompassing different settings. Despite
these difficulties, PSI is undoubtedly a growing market, although it may not be considered as
26
prestigious as other forms of interpreting, such as conference interpreting or interpreting for

international or commercial organisations (Gentile 2014: 195). Nonetheless, PSI has sparked
debate over important topics such as education, the interpreter’s role, and the recognition of
interpreting as a profession. It has also led to the inclusion of new forms of communication
(e.g. remote interpreting), and some concrete efforts have been made to develop standards
for the profession, including the emergence of associations like ENPSI (European Network
for Public Service Interpreting and Translation). This all serves to demonstrate that, at least
in Europe, PSI is moving toward (national) accreditation systems in compliance with rec-
ommendations made by the EU, the transposition of Directive 2010/64 on the right to
interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings and increasing awareness of the
need to cooperate with all the different actors involved in managing communication in
present-day public institutions. The consequences of the current pandemic and economic
crisis and the negative impact they will have on a financial level, as well as on a political
and social level, are not yet known (European Commission 2020, Meer and Villegas 2020;
United Nations 2020).
Further reading
Monzó-Nebot, Esther, and Melisa Wallace (2020) Ethics of Non-P rofessional Translation and Interpreting,
Special issue of Translation and Interpreting Studies 15 (1).
This special issue of Translation and Interpreting Studies explores the emergency of new societies, new
values, new demands when mapping non-
professional interpreting and translation, and pay special attention to
issues of justice, trust, accuracy, truth, virtue, and self-care.
Ng, Eva, and Ineke Creeze (2020) Interpreting in Legal and Healthcare Settings: Perspectives on Research and
Training. Amsterdam, John Benjamins.
The book addresses issues related to interpreting in legal and healthcare settings at large, but the variety of
innovative themes it addresses, based on empirical research and real-life experiences from different parts of the
world makes it suitable also for PSI researchers and trainers.
Phelan, Mary, Mette Rudvin, Hanne Skaaden, and Patrick Stefan Kermit (2020) Ethics in Public Service
Interpreting. London/New York, Routledge.
The book explores ethical dilemmas from different perspectives and explains the difference between personal
and professional principles; it also offers ample explanation and discussion of guidelines, clearly illustrated with
examples.
Valero-Garcés, Carmen (2019) “Training public service interpreters and translators: Facing chal-
lenges”, Revista de Llengua i Dret, Journal of Language and Law 71: 88–105. https://doi.org/10.2436/
rld.i71.2019.3262
The article calls attention to the need of education and training for raising the status of PSIT and provides
experiences of PSIT researchers, practitioners and trainers which help highlight challenges and advances in the
PSIT area.
Related chapters
Chapter 7, Public service translation: Critical issues and future directions by Mustafa Taibi
Chapter 16, ‘Interpreter’s mistake’ – Why should other professions care about the professionalization of interpret-
ers? by Hanne Skaaden
Note
1 ISO 13611:2014, Interpreting — Guidelines for community interpreting; ISO 18841:2018, Inter-
preting services — General requirements and recommendations; ISO 20228:2019, Interpret-
ing services — L egal i nterpreting — Requirements; ISO 21998:2020, Interpreting services —
Healthcare i nterpreting — Requirements and recommendations; ISO 20539:2019, Translation,
interpreting and related technology — Vocabulary.
27
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31
2
THE AMBIGUITY OF
INTERPRETING
Ethnographic interviews with public service
interpreters
Kristina Gustafsson
Introduction: public service interpreting and welfare service studies

It’s true, we [interpreters] experience and witness a lot of bad things in society. Not just
bad, both bad and good, to be honest. But basically, there’s a demand for public service
interpreting when people are in trouble. That’s a fact (25:2, p. 1).1
The public service interpreter quoted above describes his experiences of multilingual en-
counters between welfare professionals and clients in various service settings. In the same
interview, he discusses aspects of ethics, loyalties, power, and responsibilities associated with
interpreting in the public sector. The interpreter is one of 26 key participants interviewed
during two research projects about public service interpreting in Sweden with the joint title
The Interpreter Project (Gustafsson, Norström and Fioretos 2012, 2013; Norström, Fioretos and
Gustafsson 2012).2
For me, as a scholar in ethnology and social work, a starting point for The Interpreter
Project was the perception that although there are thousands of encounters every day in
different welfare service settings between welfare professionals and clients who do not
speak Swedish (the majority language), their knowledge of interpreting and the position
of the interpreter is far from comprehensive. Extensive research has been conducted that
explores issues of multilingualism and language competence in social work (Chand 2005;
Harrison 2006, 2007; Kriz and Skivenes 2010; Tipton 2016; Westlake and Jones 2017; Hall
and Valdiviezo 2018; Gustafsson, Norström and Höglund 2019), in legal and court settings
(Torstensson 2010; Elsrud 2014; Elsrud, Lalander and Staaf 2017; Staaf and Elsrud 2018), in
health and medical care (Gerrish et al. 2004; Kale and Syed 2010; Hadziabdic 2011; Plejert
et al. 2015; Haralambous et al. 2018; Granhagen et al. 2019), and in the area of migration
and asylum investigation (Herlihy and Turner 2007; Kjelsvik 2014; Akin 2017; Puumala,
Ylikomi and Ristimäki 2017). However, public service interpreting is not the main focus
of these studies.
Furthermore, when it is discussed, interpreting is primarily presented as an issue that
might have a negative impact on the work of welfare professionals and the legal rights of
the client. Chand (2005) and Kriz and Skivenes (2010) present several critical aspects of how
32 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-4

Ethnographic interviews with public service interpreters
neglect and lack of competence regarding language barriers in social work and in health and
medical care result in structural discrimination against clients who do not speak the majority
language in the United Kingdom and Norway. Both authors find that interpreting is often
perceived as a n on-functional tool among welfare professionals and that the use of inter-
preting might therefore actually exacerbate discrimination rather than promote integration
and social justice. Based on the body of previous research in various areas of welfare, three
challenges associated with public service interpreting appear to be particularly prominent.
One problem is that too many public-service interpreters lack training and competence and
this impacts the quality and legal security of the encounter. More strikingly though, most
welfare professionals lack training in how to interact with interpreters. In their research on
the topic, Westlake and Jones (2017) suggest that it is not fruitful to blame interpreters for
a lack of skills if welfare professionals fail to use them properly (see Skaaden this volume).
Thus, on the one hand, the welfare professionals’ lack of familiarity with interpreting may
affect the interpreters’ lack of competence and, on the other hand, explain why there is so lit-
tle demand for better interpreting services. A third problem is a lack of resources. Dominelli
(2018) discusses how the tight budgets of welfare services often become legitimate grounds
for not using interpreting and translation services at all.
The above description reveals a disturbing gap between societal needs and the demand
for highly skilled interpreting and translation services. Another obstacle against equity and
legal security is the low remuneration and low status of public service interpreters, who
often work under quite demanding conditions (Norström, Fioretos and Gustafsson 2012).
Although Sweden and other Nordic countries have extensive experience of migration, mul-
ticulturalism, and multilingualism, these features are treated as temporary situations that can
be met with short-term solutions rather than as inherent features of super-diverse societies
(Meissner and Vertovec 2015; Grzymala-Kazlowska and Phillimore 2018). This gap might
undermine the social rights of non-Swedish speakers in their interactions with the authori-
ties and welfare institutions and might lead to linguistic injustice (Piller 2016).
Although the literature referred to highlights problems and shortcomings, it also shows
the importance of awareness, knowledge, and skills in multilingual communication among
welfare professionals (Harrison 2006, 2007; Hall and Valdiviezo 2020). However, the per-
spectives of public service interpreters on these issues are missing from this body of literature.
Having performed fieldwork and multiple research studies among public service interpreters
for more than a decade, I found that they have gained unique insights into the contemporary
situation in Sweden and that these insights are of value for addressing the above-mentioned
gaps. The experiences of public service interpreters can offer instructive insights into how
the authorities work, about the responses of welfare institutions to global migration, and
the effects of a changing linguistic landscape (Blommaert 2013). Also, more can be learned
about the position of interpreters and how they take part in the negotiation of meaning in
multilingual encounters.
Thus, the aim of this chapter is to explore the potential of ethnographic interviews as a
method for documenting and exploring public service interpreters’ experiences of working
in various welfare settings. In order to present the method, I used my previous research,
including 72 lengthy interviews with 26 different interpreters, all working in the public ser-
vice sector. From this extensive material, two examples were selected, reflecting situations
that made the interpreters discuss in greater detail about what was going on, both in a wider
societal and welfare policy perspective and more narrowly regarding their own position.
This introduction is followed by a section on theories about multilingual encounters in
the context of postcolonial migration, with a special focus on the position of interpreters.
33
Kristina Gustafsson
The concepts of ambiguity and impartiality are presented. The next section includes a de-
scription of ethnographic interviews and methodological considerations. This is followed by
a section on critical issues and topics, in which two selected narratives are analysed. In the
conclusion, I discuss ethnographic interviews as a research method, its prospects, and conse-
quences and highlight some reflections on the idea of adding the interpreter’s perspective to
research in various welfare service areas, as well as in studies of public service interpreting.
Most sections, including this introduction, start with an interview extract. These quotes
demonstrate how theoretical concepts and methodological issues can be used in order to
analyse concrete contexts, namely, interpreters’ experiences and knowledge of multilingual
encounters.
Theory and concepts: the multilingual encounter in a postcolonial context

Sweden has enjoyed a good life for many years. Thus, we have not had to think about
our existence. We think about the next car we want to buy or which TV show we
would like to watch, while our clients often come from a completely different reality.
They often come from war zones, and their minds are scarred by trauma. They are still
thinking about ways of putting food on the table. Often, when they meet Swedish wel-
fare professionals, they have not yet landed mentally. Add to this a situation in which
you have perhaps been rejected by the migration authorities, have been in hiding and
all other kinds of troubles. I don’t know, it’s hard to imagine /---/ It rarely happens, but
sometimes I’m frustrated when I get back home and I have done my very best but the
client has not been heard or received help, because the staff did not listen or didn’t have
the strength to listen (8:2, p. 11).
This quote pinpoints the sometimes-overwhelming discrepancy between the different re-
alities that might be found in multilingual encounters. Such discrepancies go far beyond
language barriers and can play a crucial role in the communication and interaction between
clients and welfare professionals. Such diverging realities might constitute the core of a mul-
tilingual encounter in which an interpreter is positioned in the middle. In order to better
understand the constitution and meaning of the multilingual encounter and consequently
also the position of the interpreter, I will use theories of multilingual encounters drawing on
studies of postcolonial migration (Harrison 2006). Within the broad and multidisciplinary
field of migration studies, postcolonial theory and the study of migration and mobility are
increasingly combined (Mains et al. 2013). The addition of postcolonial theory to migration
studies means that contemporary migration and multilingual encounters can be analysed
in terms of the aspects that are significant for colonial encounters as such encounters have
taken place throughout history in different parts of the world, often facilitated by different
kinds of mediators or interpreters (Gustafsson, Norström and Fioretos 2013; de Jong 2015;
Gustafsson 2021).
It is noteworthy that participants in both historical and contemporary encounters some-
times have incompatible worldviews and that the settings are asymmetrical, unequal, and
multilingual (Fur 2017). Historically, these asymmetries were the result of the administra-
tive (a nd military) power of the colonisers. Power asymmetries are produced in a similar
way in contemporary welfare settings that are governed by law, administrative procedures,
authority, and the mandate of the welfare professionals to assess the private lives of their
clients, make decisions and treat them. Furthermore, requiring people to adjust to and use
34
the colonisers’ language while forbidding them to use an already existing language has been
one of the most powerful tools of oppression in colonial history (M ignolo and Walsh 2018).
Thus, language has been and still is a ‘war zone’ in many countries, including Sweden (A ngu
2018). Placing contemporary migration and language policies in Sweden within this context
highlights the hierarchies that exist between people speaking different languages. Using this
theoretical framework can potentially reveal how power relations are shaped between wel-
fare professionals and clients who do not speak the majority language and lack knowledge
about administrative procedures or regulatory laws.
Moreover, as stated above and highlighted in the quote, similarities between colonial
encounters in history and in contemporary settings can also be found in the position of me-
diators and interpreters (de Jong 2015, 2016). They operate in frontline encounters between
two participants who are rarely equal or on friendly terms. At the same time, these mediators
are positioned in the margin because they have no formal power to interfere. Nevertheless,
the mediators wield power because only they master both languages spoken and often un-
derstand the different realities and worldviews that participants represent. In this sense, the
mediators have great informal power, which puts them in a delicate position with a high
demand for trust (Gustafsson, Norström and Fioretos, 2013).
In order to build trust, it is considered fundamental that interpreters remain impartial
and keep all information confidential. Interpreters must not add their own opinions about
factual issues or about the other participants. Previous knowledge about the involved par-
ties, the case in question, or other significant information should not be mentioned by the
interpreter during the assignment in any way (K ammarkollegiet/The Legal, Financial and
Administrative Services Agency 2019). In her book Justice and the Politics of Differences, Young
(1990) explores the ideal of impartiality as guided by the ethics of rights and as defined in
relation to the public, the authorities, and welfare institutions. She defines impartiality as
being able to stay outside, detached and dispassionate, and to abstract from the particularities
of a situation and any associated feelings, affiliations or points of view (Young 1990: 97–98).
Young refers to feminist theorists who have criticised this definition and who suggest that
many decisions taken by the authorities demand engagement, empathy and nuanced under-
standings of the context and the particular needs that people have (Young 1990). Further-
more, this critique states that it is not possible for a welfare professional or an authority to
be truly impartial. One obvious reason is that people always speak and act from a position
that represents the sum of their life circumstances, background, and personal experiences,
as well as historical and societal events and situations. Another more prominent reason in
this context is that authorities and welfare professionals act on behalf of and at the discretion
of politically controlled organisations and legislation. If we return to the position of the in-
terpreter during a multilingual encounter, impartiality appears as an act of negotiating the
interpreter’s own, as well as other’s personal opinions and sentiments and participating, but
not siding with anyone in particular, or taking any decisions about the case at hand. In his
book Ambiguities of Witnessing: Law and Literature in the Time of the Truth Commission, Sanders
(2007) writes:
I take ambiguity in a literal sense. Etymologically the word derives from Latin and
combines amb –, meaning “both ways”, and agere, “to drive”. Agere is also the root of the
verb “to act” and the nouns “agent” and “agency”. “A mbiguity” may thus be taken to
mean an acting on both sides. Its implications would then be not purely semantic, but
also pragmatic (Sanders 2007: 5).
35
Kristina Gustafsson
Ambiguity in Sanders’s sense could be seen as embedded in the act of interpreting because
a public service interpreter is supposed to serve all participants in the encounter equally, in-
cluding both welfare professionals and clients. Defined as ‘acting on both sides’, the concept
of ambiguity may enhance our understanding of what is often both a privileged and a chal-
lenging middle position of the interpreter, handling ethical dilemmas, diverging realities,
power asymmetries, unequal relations, and different languages.
The ambiguous position of the interpreter and the function of impartiality is central in
the quote that opened this section. In the interview transcript, the public service interpreter
emotionally described the discrepancies in the interactions that she witnessed between the
welfare professionals and many of the migrant clients coming from war zones and traumatic
backgrounds. Her role is to act on behalf of both participants and facilitate their commu-
nication. But she is also a participant in the encounter and she should remain unbiased, not
interfere or make decisions concerning the case at hand. The ambiguity manifest when she
perceives that the participants misunderstand each other and that the welfare professionals
fail, or do not have sufficient strength to listen to their client; as she witnesses a clash be-
tween different worlds, life experiences, and power asymmetries. Her narrative instructs
our understanding of how unequal power relations and injustices might arise in seemingly
ordinary multilingual encounters in Sweden today, as similar narratives have through-
out colonial history. It also informs about interpreters’ ambiguous positions. Furthermore,
while there is sometimes little that interpreters can do in the hic et nunc of the situation,
apart from enabling participants’ communication, her narrative highlights the challenges
that are part and parcel of public services in a changing, multilingual, global society. In the
next section, I will focus on methodological issues involved when collecting empirical ma-
terial that can allow for investigation of public service interpreters’ experiences, attitudes,
and knowledge.
Ethnographic interviews – methodological considerations

It was really hard. In the early morning, the police broke into some apartments and
there were people sleeping. The officers were looking for one person but interrogated
everyone. It reminded me of my home country. When I was a student and lived in a
student dormitory, the police might enter in the middle of the night, looking for people
involved in the resistance or who were hostile to the regime, as well as politically active
people. It was a similar situation (25:2, p. 35).
The interpreter in the quote continued by describing how agonising it was to stand at the
doorstep alongside the police officers. It made him feel like an intruder. In contrast to the
quote in the previous section, this short narrative brings to mind the interpreter’s own back-
ground, from a country afflicted by conflict and war. By stating that he was standing next
to the police officers, the interpreter is pointing at himself in the narrative as it opens up for
further analysis of how he can handle his position.
The duality in being an outsider versus a co-participant on the inside was typical in
the interviews with the 26 key participants. On the one hand, the interpreters described
and reflected on the situation and the actions of the welfare professionals and their cli-
ents. In this respect, they positioned themselves as witnesses of the situations and com-
munication taking place in various welfare settings. On the other hand, the interpreters
also reflected on their own role in the same kinds of situations, as participants rather
than as observers.
36
The Interpreter Project mentioned above, from which the examples in this chapter are
drawn, included extensive ethnographic fieldwork in different areas of public service inter-
preting: training, authorisation, procurement, and working conditions. The selection of the
key participants and the design of the interviews were based on two main considerations.
First, inclusion criteria were formulated in order to achieve a broad representation rather
than a representative selection (Davies 2008). Second, the project used a longitudinal design
with the aim of interviewing the 26 interpreters three times over a four-year period in a
total of 78 interviews. In the end, 72 interviews were completed. The idea was that 50% of
the 26 interpreters should be authorised interpreters, 50% of them female and 50% of them
male, and that 50% should be working in the three main Swedish metropolitan areas and
50% should be working in rural areas from the north of Sweden to the south. The selection
should also include interpreters with extensive experience, as well as those who had only
recently started to work. There were no criteria concerning target languages besides the de-
sire to include native Swedes who interpreted in languages other than Swedish and to have a
broad representation of both common and rare migrant languages. During the recruitment
process special focus was given to the languages that were the most common during different
periods of migration to Sweden. It needs to be noted that most of the 5,0 00–6,000 public
service interpreters that are active in Sweden have a migration background.
The first interview comprised three questions: Tell us about how you became an inter-
preter. How would you describe your role as an interpreter? Tell us about when you came to
identify with the profession. In the second interview, the participants were asked to prepare
and describe five encounters when they acted as interpreters. These were then discussed in
detail in the interview. Some participants who had experience of union work and/or pro-
curement procedures as representatives of associations for interpreters in spoken languages
were asked to discuss this. In the third interview, the interpreters were asked to talk more
broadly about interpreting in the multilingual society and also to give their thoughts on
integration.
As noted, The Interpreter Project included extensive fieldwork and, for ethnographers, ob-
serving, interviewing, and listening is an ongoing process (O´Reilly 2012). However, the
interviews with the 26 interpreters were distinct from the rest of the fieldwork and were al-
ways carefully prepared. For example, the interpreters received the topics and the interview
questions in advance. Confidentiality was ensured and interview ethical guidelines were
followed both during the interviews and in the texts that were produced based on the inter-
views. All published examples (including this chapter) have been accurately reproduced and
coded so that no identifiable information can be linked to specific individuals or situations.
The interviews were o pen-ended and the style was collaborative rather than interrogative,
which is significant for ethnographic interviews. Davies (2008) defines ethnographic inter-
views as a method which, in line with ethnographic research, produces documentation of
interactions and contexts of an interview and uses reflexivity as a tool in the critical valida-
tion of the material. I would argue that interviews also may have an inherent ethnographic
quality, in our case, due to the interpreters’ detailed narratives, that is, their fi rst-hand ob-
servations of multilingual welfare service settings. The interviews drawn on in this chapter
included narratives of specific situations, relations, contexts, environments, and political
situations, which reminds of thick descriptions (Emerson, Fretz and Shaw 2011).
A critique of the ethnographic interview method would be that it is not optimal with re-
gard to drawing general conclusions, since people tend to describe situations that are unique
to them and therefore memorable (Holstein and Gubrium 2003). While this is also the
strength of the method (a s will be shown), I might add that the 26 key participants are all
37
Kristina Gustafsson
highly experienced ones so they, taken together, can provide information suitable to ob-
serve patterns of repeated and similar situations. Hence, the ethnographic interviews have a
certain quantitative quality. This suggests that they indisputably provide the opportunity to
identify and analyse conclusions that are more general.
The goal of the interviews was to capture how lived experiences are verbalised and or-
ganised into narratives. It is vital to recognise that such narratives are not simple reconstruc-
tions of personal experiences or past events, but are creative endeavours. Through narratives,
people present and maintain a certain self, make moral distinctions, or suggest and legiti-
mise specific courses of action. Moreover, people’s narratives are never merely personal, but
emanate from specific h istorical-societal contexts and relate to dominating narratives that
penetrate the social world of the individual (R iessman 2008). Thus, by analysing personal
narratives, it is possible to learn something about society, current norms, and specific histor-
ical events. The interpreters in our interviews, it turned out, were able to describe past times
and changes that had taken place in Swedish interpreting services, as well as in public service
in general, migration patterns, and policies over the years. The interpreters’ narratives high-
lighted demanding working conditions and challenges. Most of all, the interviews include
narratives about multilingual encounters and situations that took place in different welfare
service settings. In this way, the interviews became a keyhole through which the researchers
could peek into rooms that were otherwise closed.
Critical issues and topics: the ambiguity of the position of the interpreter
In this section, I will concentrate on narratives selected from interviews with two of the
26 key participants. The main reason for such a narrow selection is that they represent in-
structive examples of the ethnographic quality of the interviews in terms of a detailed and
reflexive thick description (Emerson, Fretz and Shaw 2011). Furthermore, the two narratives
exemplify different perspectives taken by the interpreters – as a witness and outside observer
on the one hand, and as an insider and participant in the encounter on the other.
Being a witness
One significant aspect of the encounters that take place in welfare settings is that they are
asymmetrical, with one party having the administrative power to make decisions about the
other. There is a risk that this asymmetry will be reinforced in multilingual encounters be-
cause of the unequal access to the majority language (Harrison 2006, 2007). In this section,
I analyse this asymmetry in a narrative by a female interpreter. Emigrated to Sweden in the
early 1970s, she was born and raised in a European country where she worked as a secretary
at an international company for most of her working life. At the age of 40, she decided to
retrain to become an interpreter, and when we met, she had completed the national train-
ing programme for interpreters and had more than ten years of experience in public service
interpreting. She describes how she regards assignments at one Swedish authority as particu-
larly challenging, namely, the Swedish Social Insurance Agency. ‘There, people can really be
treated badly, not myself as an interpreter, but the clients. And that also affects me, because
it is a situation that I cannot control’ (8:2, p. 1). Later in the interview, she describes in detail
a recent experience of one such encounter:
It was a small, narrow and asymmetrical room and there were six of us squeezed into it:
The case worker, a psychiatrist from the adult psychiatric rehab centre, a local medical
38
practitioner, a former employer, the client, and me. The room was narrow and the at-
mosphere was not much better and the case was awful (8:2, p. 14).
The case was awful in many ways, she states, most likely because the client was in a very dif-
ficult situation. He had been on sick leave for the first time in nine years when he was made
redundant due to lack of work. He now found himself in a vicious circle of contacts with the
health and medical services, the Swedish Social Insurance Agency, and the Swedish Public
Employment Service. Because of recent legislative changes, he was obliged to be actively
seeking work in order to be accepted as a client of the Swedish Social Insurance Agency.
However, he was too ill to work, according to documentation from the health and medical
services. Thus, he could not be accepted as a job seeker by the Swedish Public Employment
Service and had lost his right to receive sickness and unemployment benefits. He had had no
income for eight months, only being able to survive on loans from family and friends. Now
they wanted him to repay them.
The interpreter described how helpful the case worker was but how furious the other
parties became when they realised that the case worker had no authority to do anything
about the case. The client had to appeal to another unit outside the Swedish Social Insurance
Agency. The interpreter recalls the reactions of the other parties when they realised that
no one, neither the Swedish Social Insurance Agency nor the Swedish Public Employment
Service, was going to take responsibility and help the client.
We all stared at her; we didn’t understand. The w omen – there

were only women in the
room – except for the psychiatrist, who kept himself rather outside of the conversation,
all thought that the entire system was ridiculous. They wanted to complain to the Police.
The case worker defended herself and said: ‘I’m sorry, I can’t do anything about this case’
(8:2, p . 16).
The interpreter describes how it became very difficult to interpret when the local medical
practitioner, the former employer, and the psychiatrist started their own conversation about
how to proceed with the case.
In the end, the case worker listened to the critique and said: ‘Do you want me to call the
unit responsible for appeals and ask them to prioritise this case?’ She was really calm. I
translated. ‘Yes, please do anything you can’, the client replied (8:2, p. 18).
The interpreter explains that the term ‘prioritise’ was a relief because the procedure for ap-
pealing the case would take a long time with all the registration and diary entries ‘a nd, in
the end, maybe nothing would change’, she says (8:2, p . 19). She adds that despite this, the
client was even more upset afterwards and that it was such a comfort for her to know that
he was receiving support from his former employer, the local medical practitioner, and the
psychiatrist. The interpreter ends her story:
He was lucky. I really admired her, the former employer. Becoming involved with
someone who doesn’t work for you anymore. It was wonderful to witness, I really hope
they will sort it out (8:2, p. 19).
In the narrative, the interpreter positions herself as a witness to administrative system-

atic inconsistencies, which causes that a client in urgent need of help receives no help at
39
Kristina Gustafsson
all. She also witnesses a group of welfare professionals and one private actor (t he former
employer) who ultimately all try to operate within the rules of the different welfare au-
thorities. Hence, the power asymmetries of the encounter were negotiated and modified
during the meeting. From her position as an interpreter, she could observe how this was
happening, and she was the facilitator who listened to and assisted all participants in this
process.
This interpreter’s narrative and situation are unique, but her perception of what took
place is similar to the accounts of many of the 26 key participants. They reported witnessing
systematic problems in both welfare institutions and in the authorities, neither of which take
responsibility for their clients’ problems – the kind of systematic administrative problems
that leave the client with no opportunity to receive a rational explanation about how or why
decisions are taken. In the literature, this has been referred to as administrative or bureau-
cratic violence (Abdelhady, Gren and Joormann 2020). In this particular case, the interpreter
was able to manage her position and what she regarded as an unfair situation because other
people were involved in the case. She explains that every time an issue is understood and
resolved by a welfare professional, she feels that she can leave it behind and that the ambi-
guity of serving all participants without siding with any of them in particular becomes less
problematic.
In the next example, another interpreter describes and reflects in more detail on how she
perceived her own ambiguous position in a courtroom, and how she (a lmost) failed to re-
main impartial in relation to the participants she assisted, and how this made her reconsider
what her impartiality entailed in this particular case.
Negotiating impartiality
The interpreter underlines four words written on a piece of paper – ‘i nterpreting for a mur-
derer’ (26:2, p. 21). The interpreter is a m
iddle-aged female who had decided to learn and
study languages already in her youth. After completing university education in her home
country, she has worked as an interpreter and translator for more than twenty years, both in
her home country and in Sweden. In Sweden, she is an authorised interpreter with special
competence in legal interpreting and she often accepts assignments involving criminals.
She describes how courts provide a microphone and PA system in order to ensure good
sound quality. The equipment creates space between her and the parties for whom she is
interpreting. In this particular case, the defendant had been charged with murder and the
interpreter felt that it was good that she was at a distance from him. However, the defendant
did not want this equipment to be used and the interpreter ended up close to him, which
made chuchotage, or whispered interpreting, possible. From where she was sitting, she looked
straight at the plaintiffs, a family that was grieving and who also felt hatred towards the
defendant.
We were in a secure room because the court had decided that there was a high risk that
the family would attack the defendant. Oh, the hate, if you’d seen it. It was awful, you
could almost cut it with a knife. It was so heavy. And there I was, stuck in the middle.
During the break, I became aware that the family felt I was on the defendant’s side. I was
a sort of pariah in their eyes. /---/ I could see how everyone, the solicitors, prison staff
and other staff, kept a distance from the defendant. He was in kind of a bubble. After a
while, I realised that this was all affecting me (26:2, p. 22).
40
The interpreter realised that she was really trying to distance herself from the defendant.
Like the others, she detested him. She told herself that if she did not remain impartial, this
would impact his case, and that would be wrong. She recalls:
I thought, okay, nobody is showing him any respect or acknowledging him. I will break
the bubble and try to treat him like a human being. I started saying hello and goodbye
and kept thinking: ‘Yes, you still are a human being.’ This made him calmer. During the
hearings, I learned more about him. He was from another country and all he was facing
was loneliness and isolation. Nobody was allowed to talk to him and nobody wanted to
talk to him. /---/ When the hearings were over I recorded some music from his home
country and asked the solicitor to hand it over to him. The solicitor said: ‘He’s been
charged with murder’. I said: ‘He’s a human being’. The solicitor said: ‘You are strange’
(26:2, p. 23).
In this narrative, the interpreter reveals several layers of considerations, relationships, expec-
tations, and dilemmas. In the moment, she realises that others perceive her as a pariah and
associate her with someone charged with murder. She realises that she, like the plaintiffs, feels
disgust and hatred towards the person charged with murder, implying that she is biased rather
than impartial towards the defendant and the ongoing trial. She explains that in order to repre-
sent all parties equally, even those she might detest, she had to actively re-think her relationship
to the defendant and his situation. This might seem like she is taking sides, but in reality, it
worked the other way around – from being part of dehumanising the defendant to acknowl-
edging his humanity. This was not because she wanted to take a stand in favour of or against
any of the parties, but in order to promote equal participation. From the insider’s perspective,
she discussed her own position and feelings. This meant that the ethnographic interviews
turned out to be a situation in which she, like the other 25 key participants, started to process
her perceptions of interpreting and what it means to defend your integrity as an interpreter.
Moreover, the example shows how complicated it can be for an interpreter to favour
participation on equal grounds. It also illustrates how interpreters who exercise professional
discretion in public service meetings must be mentally prepared to deal with these kinds of
situations every now and then. In our interviews, it emerged that interpreters talk about the
dilemma of supporting equal participation in terms of being biased or remaining impartial.
In order to strive for impartiality, the interpreters meant that they constantly had to negotiate
and process multiple factors such as gender and race issues, expectations about loyalties of
fellow compatriots or, as in the example outlined above, feelings of hatred and detestation –
f rom the other participants towards her, as well as her own feelings about the person charged
with murder.
Conclusions and further reading

As noted in the introduction, public service interpreting takes place in a wide range of wel-
fare service settings. Consequently, public service interpreters work in multiple fields. Most
active interpreters in Sweden – between 5,000 and 6,000 individuals – interact with various
kinds of welfare professionals and clients every day (Fioretos, Gustafsson and Norström,
2020). A typical day might start at preschool, followed by a case at a police station, and end
with a medical consultation in a hospital. Thousands of interpreted encounters take place ev-
ery day. Each encounter can be regarded as the most important one, and also as the weakest
41
Kristina Gustafsson
link in the welfare state. It is in these encounters that democratic practices are supposed to
take place and where trust in society and its institutions is supposed to be built.
In this chapter, these encounters have been placed in a context of postcolonial migration
characterised by features that are typical of colonial encounters, that is, they are inflicted by
administrative power, they sometimes include different and incompatible worldviews and
they are asymmetrical, multilingual, and unequal. Moreover, an important consideration
is that interpreters have a unique position as both witnesses and participants in these multi-
lingual encounters and that ethnographic interviewing is a method that makes it possible to
document and analyse their experiences in both capacities.
A significant gain with ethnographic interviews is the detailed and reflexive narratives
of fi rst-hand observations and the way the interview itself creates an opportunity to take
a step back and articulate the lived experiences in the process of making them more com-
prehensive, open for interpretation, and abstract (Davies 2008). An o ften-reported problem
with this method is that collecting and analysing a rich and voluminous material is time
consuming and that it is at times difficult to classify information properly. Furthermore, to
present such a rich material in a fair way within the limits of a book chapter is challenging.
This question goes back to the careful and sometimes painful work of writing an accurate
ethnography based on only a few (in this chapter mainly two) selected examples that repre-
sent both the breadth and the depth of the material. This is often the most difficult task in
the entire research process.
Although it has not been possible to analyse all aspects of interpreters’ experiences and
knowledge of multilingual public service encounters within the limits of this chapter, some
layers of knowledge have been highlighted. First, as witnesses, interpreters get unique in-
sights into encounters that take place behind closed doors, and such encounters are reflected
in their narratives. These narratives could be useful for disciplines such as social work, health,
and medical care, and for continuing education of those who work in various welfare insti-
tutions. They provide for a better understanding of linguistic power asymmetries and may
help develop skills in how to use interpreting especially in asymmetric situations (Westlake
and Jones 2017) (see also Radanovic Felberg and Sagli, this volume).
Second, the ethnographic interviews include narratives about how impartiality and the
aim of favouring equal participation can be negotiated and processed during an encounter
depending on various factors that appear both inside and outside the encounter. Such factors
could include interpreters’ critical opinions about administrative procedures and welfare
policies, or their perceptions of the expectations of both welfare professionals and possibly
fellow-compatriot clients on a more personal level. Many interpreters have experiences that
are similar to those of their clients or have a working situation in which they meet the same
clients repeatedly. Another factor that might affect interpreters is prejudice and racist be-
haviour of welfare professionals towards their clients. Hence, it should be possible to learn
more about how impartiality and equal participation is negotiated in practice and in a way
that acknowledges that people always have a starting point and always have prior knowledge.
This is seen in the interpreters’ narratives and is something they addressed when interviewed.
Third, from a societal perspective, we can see how interpreters’ narratives provide us with
valuable insights and information about both positive and negative sides of society. They
give examples of encounters that work out to everyone’s satisfaction, and also accounts of
oppression, dominance, linguistic power asymmetries, and structural discrimination. Inter-
preters who have worked a long time in the public service sector have unique insights also
into the historical development of encounters between public institutions and minorities.
Thus, more robust analyses of the unique – but through ethnographic interviews, also more
42
g eneral – perspectives of public service interpreters might be fruitful to add to the otherwise
quite sparse literature on interpreters’ perceptions; of language competences, of their work
in various public institutions, of social work, health and medical care, education, the Police,
and the judiciary system.
Research on the perceptions of public service interpreters provides us with opportuni-
ties to investigate encounters between welfare professionals and clients in the context of
global migration. More specifically, this research allows us to explore the dilemmas that
interpreters face on duty. Both p erspectives – that is, the perspective of interpreters’ as
witnesses, on the one hand, and as participants in these asymmetrical encounters, on the
other – are crucial in understanding contemporary work in multilingual welfare set-
tings. Examples can demonstrate how linguistic asymmetries can be bridged, and how
this might promote linguistic and social justice. To my mind, research on interpreters’
perspectives needs to be further developed in the future, preferably in multidisciplinary
research environments.
Further reading
Davies, Charlotte, A. (2008). Reflexive Ethnography. A Guide to Researching Selves and Others. London,
Routledge.
This book provides the reader with extensive descriptions and examples of how to conduct ethnography,
including observations, ethnographic interviews, the use of visual methods and the internet, as well as ways of
structuring, analysing and writing up.
Hall, Jonathan and Sonia Valdiviezo (2020) “The social worker as a language worker in a multilingual
world. Educating for language competence”, Journal of Social Work Education 56 (1): 17–29.
In this paper the authors situate social work and other public welfare professions in multilingual contexts.
They explore linguistic competences that include using interpreters and ways towards achieving a more conscious
use of languages in welfare settings.
Piller, Ingrid ( 2016) Linguistic Diversity and Social Justice. An Introduction to Applied Sociolinguistics.
Oxford, Oxford University Press.
In this book, Piller explores and explains how linguistic justice can be used as a lens through which power
asymmetries in encounters between individuals, groups and societies might be understood and politically changed.
Young, Iris Marion ( 1997) “ A symmetrical reciprocity: On moral respect, wonder and enlarged
thought”, Constellations 3 (3): 340–63.
In this classical paper, Young critically discusses the ideal of understanding and imagining oneself in the situa-
tion of the other as a way of overcoming power asymmetries. She adds insights into how to address power asym-
metries, not by eliminating them, but by acknowledging them and showing respect to others by listening to them.
Related chapters
Chapter 3, Agency in and for mediating in public service interpreting by Claudio Baraldi
Chapter 11, Vulnerable encounters? Investigating vulnerability in interpreter-mediated services for victim survivors
of domestic violence and abuse by Rebecca Tipton
Chapter 16, “Interpreter’s mistake” – Why should other professions care about the professionalisation of interpret-
Notes
1 All quotes come from interviews collected within The Interpreter Project, described in this chapter.
They are all in Swedish (my translation here) and the codes show the number of the interviewee
(1–26), the number of the interview (1–3) and the page in the transcript.
2 The Interpreter Project [Swe: Tolkprojektet] included a series of studies on migration and foreign res-
idents’ integration starting in 2008–2011 and was developed through several follow-up studies.
43
Kristina Gustafsson
The researchers involved in the project were Dr Eva Norström, researcher and project leader,
Dr Kristina Gustafsson, researcher and assistant project leader, and Dr Ingrid Fioretos, researcher.
The team also included several administrators and interpreters as consultants at various times, for
example, in the design and distribution of an online survey about the experiences of interpreters.
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45
3
AGENCY IN AND FOR
MEDIATING IN PUBLIC SERVICE
INTERPRETING
Claudio Baraldi
Introduction
Studies of interaction have shown that interpreters’ activity definitely has an impact on com-
munication, not least to make the latter possible (e.g. Wadensjö 1998; Angelelli 2004; Gavi-
oli 2015b; Baraldi 2017). Interpreter’s agency is exercised in a number of ways and it is hardly
possible to provide a full account of the complexity of this notion. My focus here will be on
interpreters’ exercise of agency which leads to change in the structures of the interaction,
with a possible consequent impact also on the structure of the social system the interaction
is part of. In other words, interpreters acting in, for example the healthcare system can lead
to change the structure of interaction of the healthcare system with a possible impact on the
healthcare system as a whole. I will concentrate on this view, thus excluding those equally
legitimate conceptualizations which see agency as possibly including ‘agency for neutral-
ity’ (Tipton 2008b). This chapter focuses on a single contextualizing social system, that of
healthcare, which is used to exemplify the types of connections linking up the construction
of agency in the interpreter-mediated interaction and the comprehensive social system in
which such interaction is included. The chapter is not, however, on healthcare interpreting,
whose discussion is dealt with in Gavioli and Merlini, this volume.
In my literature overview, the idea of agency is discussed in reference to any (employed)
bilingual providing interpreting in healthcare interaction, without distinguishing between
those different types of professionalism that may be involved (e.g. interpreters or mediators).
The reason for this choice is that agency is here regarded as a combined product of a social
system and of interactions included in that system, not necessarily connected to the indi-
vidual professional status (see Baraldi and Gavioli 2012). The discussion of the interactional
conditions allowing for the exercise of agency by the participant providing interpreting may
instead have consequences for the development of interpreting skills.
Theoretical considerations concern the meaning of agency in coordinating interpreter-
mediated interaction with reference to the social systems in which individual interactions
are included: the complexity of the conditions in which interpreters’ agency is constructed
is then highlighted. The section on critical issues and topics includes some transcribed audio
recordings of interpreter-mediated interactions in the healthcare system, which are analysed
as examples of the specific conditions of interpreters’ agency within this system.
46 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-5

Agency in and for mediating in PSI
Literature overview
Several studies on Public Service Intepreting (PSI) show that interpreters do take autono-
mous initiatives in interpreter-mediated interactions, since they have access to and produce
knowledge in different languages. Their initiative in doing so may be labelled as agency.
As shown in the literature, interpreters’ agency is manifested through actions that affect
the process and outcome of interpreter-mediated interactions. The concept of coordination
(Wadensjö 1998) is a key one to understand the meaning of agency in interpreter-mediated
interactions. Wadensjö distinguishes between implicit coordination and explicit coordina-
tion. Implicit coordination shows interpreters’ agency in rendering, particularly through the
choices that are made in selecting among different types of renditions. Explicit coordination
shows interpreters’ agency through autonomous initiatives that are not renditions of utter-
ances. Such are requests for clarification, comments on translations, requests to comply with
the t urn-taking order, invitations to start or continue talking. The concept of explicit coor-
dination through the use of n on-renditions highlights interpreters’ agency as it shows that,
in the interaction, the involvement of participants in making meanings and purposes clear is
necessary to allow for rendering in the other language (see also Davidson 2002).
Inghilleri (2005) defines interpreting as a zone of uncertainty, in which interpreters can
either reproduce existing power relations, by acting in favour of the institution, or create
opportunities for improving understanding of migrants’ expressions. In her view, agency
highlights ‘the potential for interpreters to exert equal or greater control over interpreting ac-
tivity, even where this involves the disruption of p re-established power relations’ (Inghilleri
2005: 76). So, the latter type of interpreter agency has probably a stronger impact: disrupting
and bringing change to pre-established power relations means recognizing migrants as social
agents (Tipton 2008b) and empowering disadvantaged parties (Mason and Ren 2012).
There are studies (Van Langhenove and Harré 1999:24) that have defined agency as the
choice of a specific course of action among various possible ones. While this concept has been
introduced in sociology to show that society is not completely predefined by social structures
(Giddens 1984), it may apply to conditions of interpreter-mediated interaction as well. In
interpreter-mediated interaction, agency is visible through the interpreter’s positioning. The
concept of positioning represents what actually happens in the interaction (Van Langenhove
and Harré 1999). In Winslade and Monk’s view, positioning means that social roles adapt
‘to the subtleties and nuances of m oment-by-moment interaction’ (2008: 98). Positioning
represents the way in which participants’ actions show up as deliberate choice, intelligible
as such in the interaction. Interpreters can consequently exercise agency by positioning in
the interaction. Angelelli (2004), for instance, mentions different types of positioning in
healthcare interpreting which show interpreters’ agency; some are co-constructing mean-
ings, setting communication rules, controlling/fi ltering the information flow, paraphrasing
or explaining terms or concepts, sliding the message up and down the register scale, aligning
with or replacing one of the parties. Agency, however, cannot be considered as the product
of a single individual positioning since it is produced in social interactions. Mason (see 2009
and this volume) accounts for positioning as a structure of interaction in that (a ll) participants
‘position themselves and others and are, in turn, affected by each other’s positionings’ (2009:
59). Being based on such interplay of conversational moves, positioning displays interpreters’
agency in the interaction and impacts on the interaction structures.
Taking a different perspective, Gavioli (2015a) discusses the structure of positioning by
highlighting the ways in which healthcare providers ‘authorize’ interpreters to exercise
agency in exploring migrant patients’ needs and requests, as well as in explaining issues
47
Claudio Baraldi
related to medical consultation. In this case, interpreters’ agency is based on providers’ at-
tribution of epistemic authority to the interpreters, that is attribution of rights and respon-
sibility of access to and production of knowledge in the terms of Heritage and Raymond
(2005). Although attribution of epistemic authority leaves it up to the interpreters to choose
the best way to convey recommendation or reassurance in the patient’s language, in Gavioli’s
perspective, interpreters are not ‘co-diagnosticians’ (Hsieh 2007). Rather they are acknowl-
edged and recognized in their right and responsibility of dealing with bilingual communi-
cation, that is to act in the interaction, trusting that they know how to handle participants’
contents and purposes bilingually. This attribution of rights and responsibilities is not always
explicit, rather it may be the result of implicit attribution of trust in interpreters’ ability to
transfer information in the ways relevant to the purposes of the interaction (see Baraldi and
Gavioli 2007, 2021). In this perspective, in order to be exercised, interpreters’ agency needs
to be acknowledged and legitimized by institutional providers (Tipton 2008a) and also by
the laypeople participating in the interaction.
To sum up, according to the literature, interpreters’ agency is based on structures of posi-
tioning which guide the actions of interpreters, institutional providers and laypeople. These
structures may lead to the attribution (to the interpreters) of their rights of access to knowl-
edge and responsibilities for producing it and thus to the recognition (expectation) of the
interpreters’ possibility to choose ways of acting, that is to exercise agency in coordinating
interpreter-mediated interactions.
Theoretical considerations
a Agency as a form of active participation
Following Wadensjö (1998), the concept of agency highlights the importance of in-
terpreters’ choices for their renditions and non-renditions. By observing the structure of
positioning, however, agency is shown by intelligible choices of actions (Van Langenhove
and Harré 1999), that is actions which clearly manifest the speakers’ autonomous selec-
tion among a range of options. While in a bilingual type of interaction (l ike interpreter-
mediated interaction) not all actions are intelligible by all participants, some are. This is
for instance the case when interpreters shift immediately to the other language (or not)
or when they provide feedback channels positioning themselves as listeners, one inter-
locutor as teller and the other one as (temporary) by-stander. Since positioning involves
each participant, participants are likely to react to their (attributed) positioning, for
example accepting or rejecting it.
While Wadensjö’s concept of coordination first allowed for the possibility of observ-
ing interpreters’ agency in the interaction, it does not distinguish between what is active
participation and what is in fact agency in the terms adopted in this discussion. Active
participation is shown through any turn taken in talk by the interpreter, to take the view
of a w
ell-known interactional approach called Conversation Analysis (Gavioli 2015b).
Does this mean that any active participation of interpreters (a s well as of their interloc-
utors) can be considered as an expression of agency? To answer this question, a problem
needs to be solved that is the relationship between action, which makes participation
visible, and structural change. Although Giddens’ (1984) discussion of agency lends itself
to multiple interpretations (see e.g. Tipton 2008b or Inghilleri 2005), the view I am
maintaining here is that action can be considered as an expression of agency if it leads to
social change. Social change is particularly related to the structure of positioning in the
interaction and may have an impact on the structure of roles in the overarching social
48
system. Let us, for instance, take the medical system. Here, the positioning of the doctor
and the interpreter, collaborating (or non-collaborating) to make an explanation clear
may have an impact on the involvement (or non-involvement) of the patient and thus
lead to change in the hierarchy of roles. While the structure of positioning may be visi-
ble to participants in the interaction, social change produced through interpreters’ exer-
cise of agency becomes visible (and intelligible) only through the analysis of interaction.
A view of agency as leading to social change poses an interesting challenge. Agency,
in this view, is not necessarily a synonym of effective encouragement and support of ac-
tive participation. Indeed, agency may prevent patients’ participation and expression, as,
for example shown by Davidson (2000) about interpreters impeding doctors’ access to
patients’ untranslated narratives. Favouring participants’ access to services or allowing
for their expression of worry, however, involves interpreters’ exercise of agency, even
allowing for the possibility that they fail. While effective involvement in participation
may be achieved even without exercising agency, for example by automatically orient-
ing to normativity, effective interpreting and agency are associated when social change
is produced by encouraging and supporting (a ll) participants’ active involvement and
autonomous participation. Largely speaking, effective interpreting is produced when
interpreters’ selection of choice is exercised in a way as to produce a change of structure
of interactions that is beneficial to the accomplishment of the participants’ tasks and rap-
port, by preventing or reducing hierarchical structures of positioning, due to language
barriers and/or ways of communicating. This explains why, as mentioned in the first
section of this chapter, the interactional conditions allowing for the exercise of agency
necessitate development of interpreting skills so strongly.
So, while interpreters are active even in reproducing knowledge, they are agents when
they produce it, that is when they make their choices intelligible in the interaction, show-
ing their epistemic authority. Interpreters’ agency is thus based on the possibility of pro-
duction of ‘k nowledge in communication’ and is made intelligible through (1) modified
renditions, that is expanded, summarized, or reduced renditions (Wadensjö 1998), and
(2) non-renditions which show autonomous elaboration of other participants’ utter-
ances. In other words, interpreters’ agency is made intelligible through reflexive coordi-
nation that is when their actions focus on the ways in which the communication process
is produced (see Luhmann 1995 on the idea of reflexivity and Baraldi 2017, Baraldi and
Gavioli 2016 for its application to interpreter-mediated interaction).
Reflexive coordination means that interpreters’ actions focus on communication,
in whatever way it manifests itself. Reflexivity in interpreters’ renditions and non-
renditions are actions which clarify opportunities or stress problems/doubts concerning
information and actions in communication processes. This happens, in particular, when
interlocutors’ utterances need further investigation, because they include relevant infor-
mation or intentions, because they are complicated or unclear, because they are delicate.
For instance, interpreters may provide expanded renditions which clarify previous in-
formation (e.g. the meaning and purpose of a medical test) or the speaker’s intentions
(e.g. the reasons for the doctor’s prescription), which may sometimes create problems of
acceptance (e.g. the test is delicate or perceived as invasive). Reflexive coordination, as
well as agency, does not necessarily encourage and support the interlocutors’ active par-
ticipation (e.g. an interpreter may stress patients’ problems which are not relevant in the
context of the examination thus contrasting the health care provider’s work). So reflex-
ive coordination is not per se a synonym of good interpreting, but only a presupposition
for (possibly good) interpreters or mediators to exercise their agency.
49
Claudio Baraldi
While I have focused on the agency of interpreters, reflexive coordination is not

achieved by interpreter’s agency alone. Reflexive coordination is achieved in the inter-
action, through the structure of positioning. Interpreters’ agency both enhances and is
enhanced by the agency of institutional providers and migrant/foreign laypersons, so
that all participants contribute to reflexive coordination. Thus, agency is achieved in
the interaction, not as an individual interpreter’s action. This also implies that the in-
terpreters’ actions can only trigger change of positioning in the interaction, for example
healthcare providers’ attention for migrant patients’ concerns, and that the interaction
may not create the conditions of interpreters’ agency.
b Agency and mediation
When agency is intelligible in the interaction through production of social change,
PSI may be considered as a mediation system (Baraldi 2017). The notion of interpreting
as mediation is not new to interpreting studies and has been discussed, from different
perspectives, by for example Wadensjö (1998) or Pöchhacker (2008). The interpreter
as mediator exercises agency in enhancing equality, sensitivity, and empowerment for
what concerns the other participants’ actions (Baraldi 2017). Thus, the concept of me-
diation explains what ‘social change’ (change of structures of positioning) means when
interpreters exercise agency and what are the effects of this change in the interaction.
The concept of mediation comes from monolingual conflict management. In the
perspective of conflict management, mediation aims to empower both the conflicting
parties (e.g. Bush and Folger 1994). Heritage and Clayman (2010) analyse conflict me-
diation in the interaction, as based on transformative relaying, meaning ‘modifying and re-
p resenting one disputant’s concessionary position so as to invite a responsive concession
from the other disputant’ (Heritage and Clayman 2010: 209). This definition may also
be applied to language mediation, where transformative relaying means that interpret-
ers’ renditions modify and re-present (rather than represent) one position to invite response
from the other participant. Transformative relaying means that renditions are based on
interpreter’s agency triggering change of the structure of positioning by redistributing
epistemic authority in the interaction.
In this sense, interpreter-agents render by using formulations (Baraldi 2012, 2018a),
that is renditions of participants’ contents r e-presenting positions and showing transfor-
mative relaying. In Heritage’s definition, formulations
advance the prior report by finding a point in the prior utterance and thus shifting
its focus, redeveloping its gist, making something explicit that was previously im-
plicit in the prior utterance, or by making inferences about its presuppositions or
implications (1985: 104).
Renditions can be considered formulations when they summarize, explicate, develop,

or also make inferences about the gist of one interlocutor’s utterance, to invite the other
participant to understand and respond appropriately. In mediated bilingual talk, inter-
preters’ formulations are normally not addressed to the previous speaker (a s it frequently
happens in monolingual talk, to, e.g. show understanding); interpreters’ formulations
are instead in the other language and thus addressed to the other speaker – a definition
which follows Heritage (1985) about formulating for a radio audience. The relevance
of formulations in the latter sense concerns their conversational implication, which is
made visible in both mediated radio talk and in interpreter-mediated interaction, by, for
example making explicit something that was implicit.
50
As discussed above, rendering is, however, not the sole activity of interpreter agents.
Interpreters’ agency can also be exercised through non-relaying, through zero or non-
renditions. Let me focus on non-renditions which can effectively empower interlocu-
tors’ agency. N on-renditions are produced in interactions between the interpreter and
another participant thus producing monolingual sequences, which are known in inter-
preting interactional studies as ‘dyadic sequences’ (Davidson 2002). Dyadic sequences
allow for brief or longish talk about matters which concern the possibility of rendering
in one way or another, thus giving space to the interlocutors to negotiate what they want
to say (together with their right to say so). In studies on monolingual conflict manage-
ment, negotiation includes the ways in which the parties deal with their different or
opposite preferences (Carnevale and Pruitt 1992).
In interpreter-mediated interactions, negotiation applies when the interpreter and
another participant contribute to reach an agreement on shared objectives. Negotia-
tion involves the interpreter and another participant in dyadic sequences of interaction
where language is shared. Negotiation is particularly important when the interpreter
and another participant deal with what is to be rendered to the third participant (Gavioli
2015a). However, negotiation may also include production of small talk between the
interpreter and another participant (e.g. with the function of creating emotional ties and
possibly speak about ‘not-easy’ items more relaxedly, see Penn and Watermeyer 2012),
and organization of new doctor-patient encounters in which the interpreter should be
present to translate (Baraldi and Gavioli 2020). Negotiation has an important funcstion
in contributing to make rendition possible, thus when dyadic sequences involve negoti-
ation as for what needs to be rendered, they cannot be considered side sequences in the
term of Jefferson (1972) and are instead functional to the provision of rendition. Clearly,
such function is accomplished if renditions actually occur following dyadic sequences.
Summing up, PSI as a mediation system includes the combination of two distinc-
tive actions, bilingual transformative relaying (based on renditions) and monolingual
negotiation (based on n on-renditions), both of which require exercise of agency on the
part of interpreters. The combination of mediation and negotiation creates the complex
conditions for interpreters’ agency.
c Conditions for interpreters’ agency
Local dynamics of interpreter-mediated interactions manifest the ways in which the
mediation system is generated and thus highlight the conditions in which reflexive co-
ordination and interpreters’ agency are manifested. Such conditions are established by
the structures of the social systems in which interactions are included (Luhmann 1995).
These social structures are of key importance in establishing conditions of action and
they are based on social expectations. In particular, social roles are the predefined (in
each system) structures allowing for local structures of positioning. Positioning can r e-
d esign roles locally, but it cannot change their structural function in the social system.
The differences among the social systems determine different conditions of inter-
action, including interpreter-mediated interaction. It is not the aim of this chapter to
provide a comparative analysis between different social systems, rather the focus is on
the dynamics in which conditions are established for the production of a system of me-
diation. As mentioned above, here I will concentrate on a single social system, that of
healthcare. Although the healthcare system is not a simple one and it is thus impossible
to represent its internal differentiations in all their aspects, the variety represented shares
the function of providing care for illness (Luhmann 1990), and the same social roles, that
is healthcare providers and patients. Distribution of agency, in the healthcare system,
51
Claudio Baraldi
is based on the possibility of the social role of the healthcare providers to establish the
attribution of the rights of access to medical knowledge and the responsibilities for its
production.
The identification of social roles in medical (interpreter-mediated) interaction ex-
plains the conditions of interpreters’ exercise of agency. The healthcare provider has the
right and responsibility of managing the interaction with patients who are in need or
obligation to get access to the system. The role of patients makes sense of the function
of the system (that is in fact ‘used’ by the patients). Patients provide relevant information
about their health problems, their worries, and the obstacles they encounter in following
medical therapies or in planning future examinations or tests. Without patients produc-
ing knowledge during medical encounters, treatment of illness is impossible. Roles of
provider and patient condition the role of interpreter as the expert in bilingual commu-
nication, in particular interpreter’s rights and responsibility of getting access to and pro-
ducing knowledge bilingually. The interplay between roles of providers, patients, and
interpreters is visible through specific structures of positioning. Participants’ positioning
shows the different distributions of epistemic authority and thus the different conditions
of agency in specific interactions. Thus, the interplay between actions of providers,
patients, and interpreters and the structure of positioning can only be understood by
analysing specific interpreter-mediated events in the healthcare system.
Critical issues and topics

No specific analysis of interpreter-mediated interactions can reflect the full complexity of in-
terpreter’s agency, which may be exercised in a great variety of ways. This section analyses the
conditions of interpreter’s agency and reflexive coordination, focusing on the differentiation
and combination of mediation and negotiation in healthcare interpreter-mediated interac-
tion. For this purpose, the analysis focuses on three authentic occurrences of interpreter-
mediated interaction. The sequences were recorded in two Italian healthcare services and
then accurately transcribed according to the norms of Conversation Analysis (see Hepburn
and Bolden 2017). In these services, professionals who in Italian are called mediatori culturali
(intercultural mediators) are employed for providing interpreting. They have limited train-
ing (one to six months) but several years of experience in the field. The analysed sequences
are a very small part of a huge corpus of almost 600 audio-recorded medical encounters.
The selected sequences concern maternity c heck-ups and involve patients speaking Arabic
or English. Specifically, in what follows, consultations 2 and 3 take place with Moroccan
patients, while consultation 1 with a Nigerian patient. The A rabian-speaking patients are
sometimes accompanied by their husbands (a s in consultation 2), the latter being often very
active during the encounter.
The analysis allows for a distinction between two forms of negotiation in mediation:
preliminary or embedded.
Preliminary negotiation comes before mediation, that is before the mediator’s rendition.
Preliminary does not mean at the beginning of consultation, but introducing and producing
the conditions for rendering. The epistemic authority of the healthcare provider and the
patient is particularly evident during preliminary negotiation, since both take initiatives that
invite mediators to take responsibility for what is rendered and thus generate conditions for
the mediators’ agency.
Embedded negotiation is based on a form of reflexive coordination shown by non-renditions
preceding and following renditions. There are two types of embedded negotiation. One
52
type includes mediators’ autonomous initiatives exploring the meanings of information,

intentions, and acceptance with the migrant patient. This exploration is triggered by a pro-
vider’s question or explanation and allows for a comprehensive rendition of the patient’s
contribution back to the provider. The other type of embedded negotiation includes me-
diators’ explanations of what is not said explicitly, but meant or referred to in the patient’s
turn (Mason 2006) – such are for instance explanations of patients’ habits or of the patients’
previous experience. This negotiation facilitates the production of the provider’s further
questions or explanations. Embedded negotiation is based on a form of interaction allowing
for the attribution of epistemic authority to the mediator which makes the expression of me-
diator’s agency possible. In this case it is acknowledgment, rather than initiative of the other
two parties, which creates the conditions for mediators’ agency.
The analysis below shows the structure of positioning which creates the conditions for
mediators’ agency as well as for the impact of mediators’ agency on this structure.
Preliminary negotiation
The most frequent form of preliminary negotiation includes providers’ indications about
what should be rendered and mediators’ minimal responses which actively show understand-
ing and invite continuation. Gavioli (2012) shows the function of minimal responses in coor-
dinating participation. Mediator’s contribution to this preliminary negotiation is ‘m inimal’
allowing for both the clinician to provide a lengthy, complete explanation and the patient to
‘hold on’ for a lengthy rendition to come.
In extract 1, preliminary negotiation is shown in turns 1–23. The gynaecologist (GYNf, f
stands for female) in this case describes a diet for a waiting mother (PATf ), and the mediator
(M EDf ) provides minimal responses, including repetitions of the doctor’s utterances in turns
4 and 17. There are two long pauses occurring after turns 17 and 21 which are treated by the
mediator as suspensions of the clinician’s talk, a suspension which is made clear by both the
grammatical structures and the intonation used. The mediator then does not take the turn
until completion of the doctor’s long talk.
Extract 1 (consultation 1)
01 GYNf per la gravida:nza (.) è meglio mangiare: eh casomai
for the pregnancy (.) it’s better to eat eh possibly
02 MEDf mm
(0.6)
03 GYNf e non saltare i pasti (.) quindi è meglio far (0.3) cola[zio:ne]
and not to skip meals (.) so it’s better to have (.) bre[akfast
04 MEDf [colazione]
[breakfast]
05 GYNf e poi fare il pra: e poi casomai anche a metà mattina mangiare un frutto (.)
colazione come dicevamo può voler dire (.) una volta: non so
and then have lunch and then possibly also at m id-morning to eat some fruit (.) break-
fast as we were saying can mean (.) one time I don’t know
06 MEDf hm hm
07 GYNf posso prendere: il tè se ti pia:ce oppure un s[ucco opp]ure (.) il la:tte (.) okay? e
you can have some tea if you like it or a j[uice or] (.) some milk (.) okay? and
08 MEDf [hm hm]
09 MEDf hm
53
Claudio Baraldi
10 GYNf e: a metà mattina mangiare non so (.) un frutto (.) [ehm]

and at mid-morning eat I don’t know (.) some fruit (.) [ehm]
11 MEDf [mm]
12 GYNf a pranzo (.) mangiare (.) ehm
at lunch (.) eat (.) ehm
13 MEDf [some milk]
14 GYNf [può andare] bene la (.) uhm
[that could be] fine the (.) uhm
15 MEDf [la zuppa]
[the soup]
16 GYNf [la zuppa] con un po’ di:[ehm] di semolino hm? (.) ehm
[the soup] with a bit of [ehm] of semolina
17 MEDf [semolino]
[semolina]
(1.4)
18 GYNf alternarlo (.) oppure posso mangiare la zu:ppa con (0.3) le la (.) solo la: le
verdure (.) [per]
alternate it (.) or you can eat the soup with (.) the the (.) only vegetables (.) [so to]
19 MEDf [eh si]
[eh yes]
20 GYNf dire (.) e stessa cosa la sera (.) posso mangiare
say (.) and the same thing in the evening (.) you can eat
21 MEDf mm
(1.3)
22 GYNf la ca:rne (.) con (0.2) e o la tua zu:ppa con (.) le verdure (.) e casomai non
mangiare la pasta [anche la sera]
some meat (.) with (.) and or your soup with (.) vegetables (.) and possibly don’t eat
pasta [in the evening too]
23 MEDf [hm hm]
Rendition starts at turn 24 (below). Here we have an example of what I defined above as
a ‘formulation’. The mediator develops the provider’s advice (by giving examples, such as
that of breakfast), the types of fruit the patient can eat (pear or apple), and the correct way of
eating (slowly, often, and varying the food types), splitting her rendition so as to seek (a nd
allow for) the patient’s feedback (see, e.g. her use of ‘you know’ before pausing). The patient
provides continuing and acknowledging feedback several times (turns 25, 27) and finally
in turn 29 after a longish pause. The mediator’s minimal response in turn 30 functions as a
signal that translation has been accomplished and passes the turn back to the gynaecologist.
24 MEDf mm mm (0.4) that’s (0.3) you during pregnancy is better not to not to you
know (.) miss (.) eh meals (0.2) not to: leave off (0.2) some meals you know
(.) that’s (0.3) you:r you:r breakfast you have to (0.8) your breakfast you need
to have it even though you may not feel hungry but you can only drink
te:a (0.6) you kno:w o:r milk (0.5) or juice (0.6) uhm not (1.0) something
heavy if you are not feeling hungry (0.4) eh just liquid something like
that little then (0.7) later you can mm: (0.3) know take (0.6) a fruit like that
if it is apple: (0.3) o:r pear (0.3) hm hm take a fruit like that’s (0.4) then
54
in the afternoon (0.2) you can (0.4) eat (0.4) the: the: soup (0.2) mm: with
semolina (0.3) with semo (0.4) eat soup with semo then in the evening (0.1)
you may only eat (.) you know soup and meats (0.6) eh eh (0.5) without eat-
ing semo again (0.4) [o:r]
25 PATf [°okay]°
26 MEDf you know (0.4) uh uh i: vary: yo:ur your meals (0.3) and that you know
sma:ll (0.3) little little but often (0.3) eh little at tea time little at tea
time (0.5) [mm]
27 PATf [ok]
(0.4)
28 MEDf and vary it
(0.7)
29 PATf °okay°
30 MEDf mm
31 GYNf okay? pensi sia possibile?
do you think it’s possible?
Extract 1 shows a frequent type of occurrence in the analysed corpus, in which preliminary
negotiation, based on the mediator’s minimal feedback to the healthcare providers, is followed
by a (rendered) formulation for the patient, who eventually acknowledges the rendition.
Another form of preliminary negotiation is based on providers’ explicit authorization
to develop renditions (Gavioli 2015a). This case shows very clearly that the upgrading of
providers’ epistemic authority during preliminary negotiation conditions the following up-
grading of mediators’ epistemic authority, both enhancing reflexive coordination. Extract 2
is introduced by the provider’s authorization to the mediator’s exercise of agency (le spieghi-
amo means ‘let us explain’, you and I together). The gynaecologist invitation to collaborate
initiates a negotiation where a screening test, amniocentesis, is mentioned as a possibility the
patient might want to consider. This negotiation is managed in a way that is very similar to
the negotiation we saw in extract 1, with the doctor telling (more briefly in this case) and
the mediator acknowledging her talk. What is interesting to note here is that at the end of
her brief explanation, the gynaecologist encourages the mediator to try and explain herself
to the patient that amniocentesis is a possibly available screening (t urn 13). This encourage-
ment, together with the fi rst-person plural expressed by the verb le spieghiamo authorizes the
mediator to take charge of expressing the content of the doctor’s contribution in the way the
mediator deems appropriate for the patient and the situation. It thus creates the conditions
for the mediator’s exercise of agency. The mediator’s rendition to the patient (starting at turn
14) is a relevant development of the provider’s hasty summary. This development includes
repeated reassurances that what the doctor is saying (v ia the mediator) does not imply a
necessity to take the screening (an invasive one) nor to put any pressure on acting (see the
items in bold in the rendition). The rendition is concluded with a question about the pa-
tient’s interest in going on with such screening, which is followed by a declination voiced by
the patient’s husband (H USm, m stands for male) (turn 15). Note that the mediator designs
the final question as a yes/no alternative to accept the test, thus making declination equally
possible. The mediator then reports the conclusion about the assigned task to the provider,
including the report that she informed the patient, and the patient’s decision (what’s in God’s
mercy). This conclusion and the provider’s confirmation (turn 18) show the uptake of the
mediator’s right and responsibility for exercising agency.
55
Claudio Baraldi
12 GYNf allora adesso le spieghiamo che::
so now let’s explain her that
(t urns 2 -12 omitted)
13 GYNf prova mo’
go on try
14 MEDf w fih bitulik fahs ya’ni biyin’aml li lnisaa smiytu fahs amniocentesi (.) ana
ba’tiha kama’luma kawn ya’ni kul imraa lazim ta’raf hadi l ma’luma kawn
fi Italia biyin’amal w ba’dha al insane huwa hur yi’ml li huwa biyiqarar inu
biti’milih aw ma biti’milih hada lfahs huwa ‘ibara ‘a n fahs amniocentesi illi
huwa ‘ibara ‘an unbub daqiq bidakhluh biqarib min sirra biyakhdu maa min
sail li ‘and tifl w biya’malu ‘a lih analisi tahalil hatta yishufu ida kan tifl mzian
walla monghuli walla mush tabi’i (.) hada lfahs biya’maluh likul nisaa li fuq
khamsa wa talatin sana bidun ma yidfa’u ‘a lih fulus (.) nisaa li ‘amraha taht
khamsa wa talatin sana kama’luma bit’rf ha (.) w fih yalli mumkin bitfakar
innu ta’malu halla’ ta’tina khabar liannu nakhudlha maw’id ma’a tabibat aljinat
almas’ula bihadi lhaja fa antum kama’luma kafahs ya’ni ‘r ftu ‘anu (.) w
lakin habin in ta’mlu had l fahs walla [mtamainin w mtawklin ‘a la li Allah ba’t?]
and then she is saying that there is another c heck-up that they have for pregnant women
it’s called the amniocentesis (.) I give this to you as information because all pregnant
women should be informed about it, because in Italy they take it and then everybody is
free to take it or not, each person can decide if they want to have it, this amniocentesis
consists in a small tube that is introduced near the navel and is used to take some liquid
around the baby, with a diagnostic purpose to see if (the baby) is normal or handicapped
or retarded (.) this is a free test for women over thirty-five (.) to take it women under
thirty-five, just to inform you, have to pay (.) if you are interested in taking it, just tell
us soon so that we can make an appointment with the gynaecologist who is specialized
in this area (.) this is an information that you now have (.) so do you want to take
it [or do you put yourselves at the mercy of God?
15 HUSm [mntamainin ‘ala illi Allah ba’tlina iyah]
mntamainin ‘a la illi Allah ba’tlina iyah
[we put ourselves at the mercy of God] we put ourselves at the mercy of God
16 MEDf illi Allah ba’atu
at the mercy of God
17 MEDf a llora (.) come informazione l’abbiamo avuta poi:: (.) quello che
viene da dio::
okay (.) the information we had it then:: (.) what’s in God’s mercy::
18 GYNf o::kay
A couple of points may, thus, be made on preliminary negotiation and their creating condi-
tions for the mediators’ exercise of agency. First, extracts 1–2 show that preliminary negotia-
tion allows for reflexive coordination. Mediators actively participate in the negotiation with
providers showing both providers and patients that they are understanding and preparing for
the following rendition. Providers manifest their epistemic authority in giving advice mean-
while acknowledging mediators’ own epistemic authority in receiving the explanation and
then choosing how it can best be given in the other language. Second, extracts 1–2 show
that preliminary negotiation is followed by mediators’ renditions developing the providers’
talk by designing it for their patients. These renditions are formulations which function as
56
‘transformative relaying’ (Heritage and Clayman 2010), showing the mediators’ exercise of
agency and its impact on the distribution of epistemic authority in the interaction. This ren-
dition includes an option between taking or not taking the test, where the negative option is
rendered through a formulaic expression (‘at the mercy of God’). The formulation of the neg-
ative option is based on the mediator’s experience of possible negative cultural presuppositions
about abortion in Arab families. The mediator avoids the impression of advocating for a choice
evoking abortion. The mediator’s formulation is thus designed to encourage the migrants to
decide autonomously. In this case, the choice is expressed by the patient’s husband. It is rela-
tively frequent in my data that husbands participate in this type of consultation, for several pos-
sible reasons, including the fact that several wives arrive in Italy through family reunion when
they are already pregnant and do not feel like getting in touch with public services they are not
familiar with. Thus, husbands may replace wives in providing information and answers. While
the relationships between women and men are clearly a huge and highly debated problem go-
ing outside the purposes of this study, here suffice to note that (1) when (A rab) women in our
data want to have private information, they use the services alone, if a mediator is available;
(2) language mediation is not advocacy for social justice or women’s emancipation; mediators’
empowerment concerns migrants’ opportunities to s elf-express, as single individuals or couples.
Thus, extracts 1–2 show that reflexive coordination, achieved through mediator’s agency,
may need preliminary negotiations in which providers show primary rights and responsibili-
ties for producing knowledge, but still acknowledge (in the negotiation) the mediators’ rights
and responsibility in re-producing it in the other language. Preliminary negotiations are
rather frequent, but not found in all encounters and they definitely do not represent the only
way in which conditions are created for the exercise of interpreters’ agency. There are clearly
other practices creating conditions for expression of interpreters’ agency and acknowledging
their rights and responsibilities for r e-producing knowledge bilingually. Practices moreover
may be connected to the goals of the interaction. Preliminary negotiations however are one
way in which conditions for interpreters’ agency should thus not be censored a priori.
Embedded negotiation
While preliminary negotiations occur as basically long turns, pre-planning what needs to
be rendered to the other interlocutor, embedded negotiations are normally occasional oc-
currences arising from the interaction, showing, for example that something needs to be
(better) clarified or presented with particular care. Embedded negotiations are again dyadic
sequences occurring with the clinicians or the patient, but they typically occur when pa-
tients’ answers are provided which reveal complicated, unclear, or delicate contents. Let me
show one example.
In extract 3, turn 2, the mediator provides a rendition of the doctor’s question (DOCf
is the female doctor in the transcript) about the patient’s attempts to become pregnant. The
patient provides a partial and indirect answer in which she mentions she has taken the con-
traceptive pill. The mediator then treats the patient’s answer as n on-complete and initiates
an embedded negotiation with a continuer which invites the patient to add information.
Since the patient’s new answer is also indirect, the mediator provides two formulations of
what she understood to be the gist of the meaning of the patient’s answer (turns 6 and 8).
Both formulations are provided in interrogative form thus inviting the patient to possibly
confirm the correctness of the mediator’s understanding. The patient confirms and the me-
diator asks a new detail about how long the patient took the pill (turn 10), then she repeats
the patient’s answer to check understanding (turn 12; confirmed in turn 13) and provides a
57
Claudio Baraldi
third interrogative formulation for further confirmation (t urn 14). This insistence in looking
for confirmation is a consequence of the patient’s indirect and thus uninformative way of
answering the initial question. The mediator’s rendition is a formulation of the gist of the
whole exchange including the embedded negotiation and is composed of two parts: (a) a
summary of the patient’s indirect answers to the mediator’s requests (t urn 16), and (b) a con-
clusive answer to the doctor’s question (t urn 18).
01 DOCf da quanto tempo è che la cerca?
how long has she been looking for it?
02 MEDf sh’hal ‘ndk dyal l wqt w nti ka tqlbi thmli?
how long have you been looking for pregnancy?
(1.0)
03 PATf eh, eh knt drt l fanid f sh’har hdash
eh, eh I took the pill during the month of November
04 MEDf mhm
05 PATf w mn sh’har thnash w ana ma bqitsh drtu htta l daba
and since December I haven’t taken it until today
06 MEDf ya’ni mn sh’har hdash w nti bagha thmli?
so it is since November that you have been looking for pregnancy?
07 PATf ah
yes
08 MEDf ya’ni hyitti l fanid f sh’har hdash?
so you stopped the pill in November?
09 PATf ah
yes
10 MEDf w sh’hal w nti ka takhdi l fanid?
and how long had you been taking it?
11 PATf sh’har wahd
one month only
12 MEDf sh’har wahd
one month only
13 PATf ah
yes
14 MEDf hiya sh’har hdash?
so November?
15 PATf ah
yes
16 MEDf allora la signora aveva preso la pillola nel mese di novembre
so the lady took the pill during the month of November
17 DOCf =sì
=yes
18 MEDf =l’ha sospesa, e quindi è da dicembre che lo sta cercando.
=she stopped it, so it’s since December that she is looking for it
The analysis of extract 3 highlights that embedded negotiations like the one shown are based
on mediators’ exercise of agency clarifying communication, therefore achieving reflexive
coordination. First, the mediator treats the information provided in the patient’s answer
58
as the beginning of something more complex that is to come (since the detail is not per se
relevant to answer the doctor’s question). Second, the mediator investigates the gist of the
patient’s answer by way of minimal responses, autonomous questions, and interrogative for-
mulations of the patient’s utterances, thus encouraging her to go on and tell the whole story.
Such encouragement (and interactional support to go on) is shown by the mediator’s scru-
pulous checking of what the patient means in turns 3 and 5, which helps the patient respond
to doctor’s question. At the end of the negotiation, the mediator provides a rendition in the
form of a formulation for the provider, who shows trust in the mediators’ work, leaving her
and the patient time for talking and waiting for rendition allowing for the continuation of
the consultation.
Extract 3 shows successful mediation through reflexive coordination, since the mediator
takes the responsibility of exploring and eventually clarifying the meaning of the patient’s
answer and can thus suitably design her rendition for the doctor. This embedded negotiation
is important for coordinating the patient’s answer with the doctor’s question (see Davidson
2002). Mediators’ agency is thus achieved through reflexive coordination both inside the
embedded negotiation and as transformative relaying following such negotiation.
Conclusions
The analysis of extracts 1–3 shows forms of organization of interpreter-mediated interaction,
as an expression of a system of language mediation combining (1) negotiations of informa-
tion and intentions relevant to the context, and (2) mediation based on formulations in the
terms of Heritage (1985), but in the other language, re-presenting the gist of the previous
talk. This analysis is relevant to understand the conditions of mediators’ agency and reflexive
coordination and to show some ways in which mediators’ agency can trigger social change,
by both being given and taking the right and responsibility to deal with (sometimes com-
plex) communicative issues in the bilingual interaction.
Interpreter-mediated interactions may include different ways of distributing epistemic
authority and then agency among participants. In particular, reflexive coordination of em-
bedded negotiation with conclusive formulations in the other language shows mediators’
exercise of agency in interpreting the problems and nuances of communication. In prelim-
inary negotiation, agency is distributed among providers, patients, and mediators. The ac-
knowledgment of both the clinician and the patient of the mediator’s agency in interpreting
what needs to be rendered may lead to a collaborative achievement, possibly changing the
interlocutors’ positioning.
In the overall interaction then, reflexive coordination allows for equal distribution of
participation, mutual empowerment, and mutual sensitivity, showing the existence of a lan-
guage mediation system (Baraldi 2017) and a participants’ orientation to it. In this system,
interpreters’ agency is effective if it leads to the empowerment of all participants – which often
means supporting those who are disadvantaged (Baraldi 2019), thus changing the distribu-
tion of epistemic authority in the interaction and consequently the hierarchical structure of
positioning. This change can impact on the hierarchical structure of roles in the overarching
social system when the language mediation system is widespread in this system.
However, there are at least three factors conditioning the exercise of agency and achieve-
ment of reflexive coordination. First, reflexive coordination in a single i nterpreter-mediated
encounter may be strongly influenced by other dyadic or triadic encounters, mediated or not
mediated, involving the same migrant patient. Second, the way of experiencing agency and
achieving reflexive coordination may be conditioned by a shared spoken language between
59
Claudio Baraldi
the provider and the patient. Third, communication may be very confused, so that the me-
diator’s agency is exercised in difficult conditions.
Related topics
One topic that is clearly evoked in what I discussed above is intercultural mediation. The
meaning of intercultural mediation is ambivalent. First, language mediation may certainly
support mutual acceptance and intercultural adaptation between participants, but it may also
undermine them (Baraldi and Gavioli 2017) when interpreters become agents of essential-
ism. Essentialism presents ‘people’s individual behaviour as entirely defined and constrained
by the cultures in which they live so that the stereotype becomes the essence of who they
are’ (Holliday 2011: 4). Thus, an interpreter’s essentialist approach leads to ignore the im-
portance of language mediation in adjusting cultural assumptions in the interaction. Second,
the meaning of ‘intercultural’ in reference to mediation is at least t wo-faceted: mediation is
intercultural not only when it deals with cultural differences but also by narrowing the cul-
tural gap between migrants’ personal problems and social systems (Baraldi 2018b), e.g. that
between medical and n on-medical culture in the healthcare system.
Another interesting related topic, which was touched only partially in this chapter is
problematic exercise of interpreters’ agency, which can undermine effectiveness of PSI.
Problematic exercise of agency is visible through the anomalous positioning of interpreters
as institutional gatekeepers. In this chapter I mentioned the case in which interpreters select
information they believe to be diagnostically relevant, providing zero or reduced renditions
of some contents in laypeople’s talk (Davidson 2000; Hsieh 2007; see also Bolden 2000). In
this way, interpreters subtract epistemic authority to both providers and seekers (patients in
our case, but this problematic exercise of agency has been observed in other social systems,
see for example Angermeyer 2009; Davitti 2013; Maryns 2013). While this chapter has
maintained that exercise of agency in the (radical) terms I have illustrated here is essential
for the mediation system to trigger change towards more equality and inclusiveness, it needs
to be accompanied by strong interpreters’ expertise, e.g. to handle dyadic (negotiation) se-
quences in order to make relevant, rather than reduce, patients’ views.
Further reading
Angelelli, Claudia V. (2004) “Questioning invisibility” (pp. 7–14); “Finding visibility” (pp. 73–144),
in Medical Interpreting and Cross-cultural Communication, Claudia V. Angelelli (ed). Cambridge, Cam-
bridge University Press.
The two chapters, from a book presenting research on healthcare interpreting, highlight several ways in
which interpreters can exercise agency. Interpreters’ agency can have either positive or negative consequences on
interlocutors’ participation: it may produce co-participation and co-construction of meanings, control and filter
in communication and information flow, may be helpful in explaining terms or concepts, may lead to alignment
with or replacement of the parties.
Baraldi, Claudio (2019) “Pragmatics and agency in healthcare interpreting”, in The Routledge Handbook
of Translation and Pragmatics, Rebecca Tipton and Louisa Desilla (eds). London, Routledge: 319–35.
This chapter focuses on the use of the concept of agency to give meaning to interpreters’ activity, in particular
clarifying the ways in which interpreters’ agency affects interpreter-mediated interactions and is in turn affected
by interaction. It analyses the ways in which interpreters’ agency becomes relevant in interactions involving
healthcare professionals and patients, and the ways in which the recipients treat interpreters’ agency.
Inghilleri, Moira (2005) “Mediating zones of uncertainty. Interpreter agency, the interpreting habitus
and political asylums adjudication”, The Translator 11 (1): 69–85.
This article defines the concept of interpreting as a zone of uncertainty, in which interpreters can ex-
ercise agency either reproducing existing power relations, by acting in favour of the institution, or creating
60
opportunities for improving understanding of migrants’ expressions. The concept of agency highlights the poten-
tial for interpreters to exert control over interpreting activity.
Tipton, Rebecca (2008a) “Reflexivity and the social construction of identity in interpreter-mediated
asylum interviews”, The Translator 14 (1): 1–19.
This article draws on the sociological theory proposed by Anthony Giddens, exploring the consequences of the
distinction between agency and social structure for interpreting. In this view, interpreters are considered as social agents.
However, interpreters’ agency must be recognized by the institutional providers; this need of recognition gives relevance
to the social context of interpreting, which may establish the practices to which interpreters should commit.
Related chapters
Chapter 4, Cultural assumptions, positioning and power: Towards a social pragmatics of interpreting by Ian
Mason
Chapter 11, Vulnerable encounters? Investigating vulnerability in interpreter-mediated services for v ictim-survivors
Chapter 12, Public service interpreting in health care by Laura Gavioli and Raffaela Merlini
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Baraldi, Claudio ( 2012) “ Interpreting as dialogic mediation: The relevance of expansions”, in
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4
CULTURAL ASSUMPTIONS,
POSITIONING AND POWER
Towards a Social Pragmatics of Interpreting
Ian Mason
Introduction
During the G20 meeting in Osaka in June 2019, the BBC captured a photograph of Donald
Trump shaking hands with Xi Jinping. Trump offers a hearty handshake and a firm grip,
leaning in towards his counterpart and seeking eye contact, as is the American way. Xi
Jinping, on the other hand, offers little eye contact, it being the generally accepted Chinese
cultural assumption that to look someone straight in the eye shows a lack of respect. Here,
in microcosm, is the nub of the matter: the different cultural assumptions that interlocutors
bring to their meetings with others of different cultural backgrounds and the way in which
each party interprets the speech, body language and paralinguistics displayed by others ac-
cording to their own cultural assumptions. Almost automatically we position each other
according to our own cultural assumptions and, once a first impression is formed, we are
seemingly reluctant to shift our point of view. At the same time, we are largely unaware of
our own speech habits, body language and direction of gaze because they are instinctive and
spontaneous – indeed, we attach little importance to them.
The Trump/X i handshake is, however, merely the tip of an iceberg fraught with com-
plication. To begin with, we need to disabuse ourselves of the notion that nation-states are
coterminous with a given culture. Piller (2012, 2017) cogently argues the case for multiple
cultures existing in any society. It is here that the notion of communities of practice makes
sense; as people interact within communities, developing their own discourses and assump-
tions of what needs to be said and what does not, so expectations of common behaviour
begin to form. For example, there is the discourse of laissez-faire capitalism (or ‘neo-l iberal
economics’) or the discourse of Marxism. Or see below under the heading ‘Relevant the-
oretical considerations’, where I comment on the multiplicity of tasks that translators and
interpreters perform. At the m icro-linguistic level, transitivity, agency and cohesion are in-
volved. At a much higher level, discourses, genres and text forms emerge through a semiotic
process. In all of this, we send signs to each other which are either taken up or discarded.
Some voices, however, are stronger than others so that the ability to make oneself heard
varies greatly between the strong and the weak.
In all of these notions, it seems clear that the social context in which communication
takes place impacts the meaning of the language we use quite heavily. In what follows, I
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-6 63
Ian Mason
am striving to highlight how this communicative mechanism involves interpreting. Indeed,

what I am aiming for in the next pages is how a social pragmatics of interpreting may ac-
count for issues related to identity, position and power.
Relevant theoretical considerations

Let me first introduce the three main notions in this chapter: identity, position and power.
The concept of identity is related to the theory of communities of practice, developed
by Lave and Wenger (1991) and Wenger (1998). It acknowledges Bourdieu as a forebear but
diverges from Bourdieu’s theory of habitus, field and doxa in that an individual may belong
to many communities of practice simultaneously. Many scholars (e.g. Inghilleri 2005) have
spoken of a putative interpreter’s habitus. As Inghilleri (2005: 74) writes,
Interpreters can be placed in contradictory positions with respect to their initial and/or
acquired habitus and the norms of specific interpreting contexts and/or the norms of
interpreter training.
Thus, Inghilleri recognises ‘specific interpreting contexts’ and proposes that individual in-
terpreters’ habitus is formed partly in and by their personal background, partly in relation
to settings where they perform as interpreters and partly in their training to become in-
terpreters. (In line with Bourdieu’s theory she notes that individuals have varying habi-
tus). Interpreters may be involved in sign-language interpreting (shift of mode), chuchotage
(simultaneous but whispered), simultaneous conference interpreting (in a soundproof booth),
public service interpreting in a variety of institutional frameworks, each with its own com-
munity of practice. There is a world of difference between, for example, a given country’s
immigration services and its health service. Meanwhile conference interpreters, often mem-
bers of AIIC, have their own community of practice and engage, while interpreting, with
many others. Many would argue that public service interneters also have their own com-
munity of practice. That is definitely the case with those who are professionally trained and
certified, including spoken as well as signed language interpreters.
Translators may be sub-titlers, summarisers, be required to design an effective text to
match a promotional source text or required to adhere strictly to a legal text. It seems to me
that professional translators and interpreters become temporary members of several commu-
nities of practice, during which they either fully espouse the community’s practice or feel
themselves to be temporary and on the margins. Wenger’s theory involves identity, with its
sub-components of identities of participation and identities of non-participation. Broadly, the con-
cept is that we may feel fully aligned to a community of practice or only partly so, a feeling of
being an outsider as it were. For example, through membership of professional associations,
we may feel fully aligned with our profession and participate in discussion boards with other
interpreters. On the other hand, if we receive negative feedback on our interpretation or find
our suggestions rejected, we are bound to feel marginalised, at least to some extent. Positive
feedback, naturally, has the opposite effect. The same goes for interpreters at international
conferences and face-to-face interpreters. Many interpreters at international conferences
have experienced the feeling of being marginalised by conference delegates or treated as
non-insiders. On the other hand if, as a public service interpreter, the immigration or medi-
cal service adopts you as one of their own you rapidly become part of the institution – with,
occasionally, an interpreting stance to match, assuming the position of c o-interlocutor in
interviews (see, e.g. Bolden 2000, Mason and Stewart 2001).
64
Cultural assumptions, positioning and power
Less often, it seems, the interpreter will seek to give more ‘voice’ (Blommaert 2005: 68)
to the less powerful party in an exchange, an asylum seeker, for example, or a patient (Barsky
1996; Hale 1997; Angelelli 2004). And it is here that I come to my second key concept: po-
sitioning. By direction of gaze, body posture, pronominal use, facial expression, etc., we as
participants in interaction can position the less powerful party as included or excluded. We
can also position ourselves (‘reflexive positioning’), or position others (‘interactive position-
ing’, Davies and Harré 1990:48). An example from Wadensjö (1998: 179–86) will illustrate
this. The situation is a standard medical c heck-up.
The nurse, Nelly, meets a family, consisting of the seven-year-old child Clara, her new-
born sister, their mother, Marta, father, Felix, and a grandmother, Galia, all recently
arrived in Sweden from the USSR.
(Wadensjö 1998: 180)
The interpreter, Inna, relays a ‘gently-spoken proposal’ from the nurse, Nelly:
Nelly: då ska vi se. ska du få sitta här.
then let us see. you may sit here.
Inna: садись там. (.) и я с тобой сяду.
sit there. (.) and I will sit with you.
The child then silently starts to cry at the sight of a needle. Later on, the interpreter Inna,
again adopting a stance close to the child, says (t ranslating nurse Nelly):
Inna: и знаешь что. когда они тебе уже помазали этим кремом.
and you know what. when they have smeared you with this cream.
когда они будут тебе помазать. тогда совсем ничего не чувствуется.
when they smear you. Then you don’t feel anything at all.
(Adapted from Wadensjö (1998: 179–86)
Thus, the interpreter stays close to the child, sits beside her and adds ‘I will sit with you’ and
‘a nd you know what?’, seeking to create empathy with the child. It is a case of interactive
positioning.
Finally, I come to my third concept: power. Pragmatics-based accounts of interpreting
and conversation analysis accounts appear to assume that each participant in an encoun-
ter enjoys equal power in a speech exchange. Blommaert (2005) is highly critical of both
approaches and also of critical discourse analysis. All three approaches, in his view, fail to
acknowledge the vast inequalities of power among participants: from asylum seekers to
asylum adjudicators, from patients to doctors, from accused persons to judges, the disparity
is patent, but often overlooked. It is here that I would wish to make a distinction between
institutional power and interactive power. The public service interpreter, for example, enjoys
very little institutional power. Rates of pay are generally low, even when the interpreter is
qualified (e.g. the DPSI – Diploma of Public Service Interpreting – in the United King-
dom). Interpreters are often called upon without any prior knowledge of what or for whom
they will interpret. The coaching of users of interpreting services is still in its infancy.
Public services appear to assume that they know best and impose conditions on interpreters
that are far from ideal. Meanwhile, it is expected that court interpreters restrict themselves
to a close translation of what is said and there is little tolerance for interruption when an
interpreter perceives a misunderstanding. Also, asylum interviews are conducted at a brisk
pace with a focus on the end result, and interpreters are expected just to ‘t ranslate’, that is, a
shorthand request addressed to interpreters that assumes translation to be something simple
65
Ian Mason
and straightforward, ignoring the complex nature of spoken, interpreter-mediated interac-

tion (Pöllabauer, this volume).
However, as observed above, interpreters do enjoy a certain amount of interactional
power. In the example from Wadensjö (1998: 179–86) above, the interpreter has been able
to accommodate the patient in terms of the kind of discourse the child patient is likely to be
most comfortable with.
Bolden (2000, 2018) documents the opposite effect: the interpreter becomes a part of the
institution and feels able to ask questions of the patient in order to supplement the doctor’s
questions, and this without any kind of protest from the doctor. In effect, primary partici-
pants are totally dependent on the interpreter if they do not understand the other language
involved. This also holds true when interpreters are positioning themselves as independent
actors serving both parties.
Meanwhile, as regards institutional power, Blommaert (2005) proposes two key con-
cepts, voice and (re-)entextualisation. In the first case, voice is defined (Blommaert 2005:
68) as ‘a capacity to generate an uptake of one’s words as close as possible to one’s desired
contextualisation’. Here, the word ‘uptake’ is crucial. Used in conversation analysis, it refers
to evidence of words or simply notions or concepts used by one person being referred to in
subsequent speech by others. From an inequality of power perspective, it involves the ability
to make oneself heard in some particular context, given that there are vast inequalities in the
linguistic resources available to different users. It is here that Blommaert’s second concept,
(re-)entextualisation becomes relevant. In today’s world, texts (d iscourses, genres) travel.
Re-entextualisation refers to the use of a text in one context that is entirely different from
its context of origin. Sometimes, speech which enjoys high prestige in its context of origin
becomes downgraded and ignored in some new context for which it was not intended.
Blommaert documents many cases of this phenomenon in a transcontinental environment
(A frica/Europe), where the instruction to the interpreter is simply ‘Translate into Dutch’.
Interpreters are frequently involved in such exchanges: asylum hearings, doctor-patient in-
terviews, police interviews, and so on. As previously suggested, the point is that cultural
assumptions are such that we interpret what we hear according to our own cultural context
and then ascribe attitudes (e.g. ‘not frank, ‘shifty’, ‘doesn’t look you in the eye’) on the basis
of our own cultural prejudices. Thus, we position ourselves and others.
Literature overview
It will be apparent in what precedes that my analysis rests on the work of various theoreti-
cians from different fields of study. Wenger (1998) is persuasive on communities of practice
while Davies and Harré (1990) offer the notion of positioning which is entirely compatible
with communities of practice and which introduces a dynamic, interactive element into
talk exchanges. Barton and Tusting (2005) adjust Wenger’s theory by bringing the notion of
discourse to the fore (whereas, for Wenger, it had just been a ‘resource’ that ‘reflects’ a com-
munity). Meanwhile, Blommaert (2005) proposes a critique of many discoursal approaches
from the perspective of inequalities of power and the distribution of resources among users.
The notion of ‘voice’ (defined as ‘the way in which people manage to make themselves un-
derstood or fail to do so’, Blommaert 2005: 4) applies to PSI in a very real sense. It will be
central to the analyses that follow. At the same time, I am indebted to all those whose work
has analysed actual decisions made by interpreters, cumulatively offering an ample corpus of
interpreter behaviour with an eye not to criticism of interpreters but rather to a description
of their behaviour: B
erk-Seligson (1990), Hale (1997), Wadensjö (1998), Pym (1999), Bolden
66
(2000, 2018), Roy (2000), Davidson (2001), Angelelli (2004), Pöllabauer (2004), Bot (2005),
Gavioli and Baraldi (2011), Baraldi and Gavioli (2012), Pöchhacker (2012).
Critical issues
In what ways do cultural assumptions, positioning and power come together to form an inte-
grated theory? Let us start from the perspective of power. It is widely acknowledged that the
PSI interpreter is almost always involved in disparities of power, both institutional and in-
teractive. How is the interpreter to negotiate these d isparities – both in the interaction itself
and having regard for the availability of linguistic resources to each party to an exchange?
In Mason (2014), I detailed a case of an interpreter in an African context translating from a
formal European speech about a new savings bank for the benefit of African villagers who
might be interested in investing (based on Kouraogo 2001). This may well be about a savings
bank but I would argue that the interpreter was acting as a PSI interpreter. I claimed that
the interpreter had saved the European speech maker by adjusting his output to the villagers’
contextualisation (e.g. by adding interjections (‘ee’, ‘hey’), explaining to the villagers (‘you
need 1000 francs to open your account’, ‘that’s what he said’), encouraging the villagers to
subscribe (‘that’s a lot!’). The same is not very often true in reverse. Few concessions, I would
venture, are made to asylum seekers, whose experience of life is culturally entirely different
from that of well-to-do Europeans.
Examples from a corpus I analysed many years ago (Mason 2006a) suggest an inter-
preter fully aligned with the aims of the UK immigration authorities, whose immediate goal
was to deport illegal immigrants forthwith. The interpreter not only allows herself to ask
supplementary questions that incriminate immigrants but also completely suppresses their
discourse of seeking education in the United Kingdom (cf. also Keselman, Cederborg and
Linell 2010, where those acting as interpreters seem to be supporting what they believed was
the case workers’ aim but in effect are compromising the integrity of the caseworkers and
putting the young asylum seekers in a precarious position). It is important to note, however,
that the interpreters were lay persons, not professionally trained interpreters.
It is apparent that the PSI interpreter stands at the centre of all these issues. What is at
stake and what are the consequences of their actual decisions? From the perspective of cul-
tural assumptions, positioning and disparities of power, I aim to examine data samples that
illustrate the dilemmas involved.
Analysis
An example provided by Maryns (2006: 245) effectively brings together all these separate
strands. A judge, assisted by an interpreter, asks an asylum seeker a question to which he
presumably already knows the answer. This in itself illustrates a power imbalance: the judge
appears to be privy to knowledge that the asylum seeker may or may not know. The point of
the question, therefore, must simply be an attempt to catch the asylum seeker out. Moreover,
as Maryns points out, both the judge and the interpreter are non-native speakers of English.
Nevertheless ‘whereas the judges are highly literate people who developed their competence
at a European university, the interpreter also acquired his English through formal learning
but in a West African learning context’. The sequence I am referring to runs as follows:
01 J ja.. en wie was dan de de rector

(yes. and who was the vice-chancellor then)
67
Ian Mason
02 INT who was the urm director …..

03 AS ah at the time when I was
04 J the chancellor
05 INT or the chancellor
06 AS the chancellor at the time when I was in the university was professor Richard
Thomas
07 J Richard Thomas
08 AS yes.. Professor Thomas
09 J vice chancellor
10 INT and the vice chancellor.. who was the vice chancellor..
11 AS I don’t know where you talk but the vice chancellor is in the in the English section
12 J OK
(Adapted from Maryns 2006: 246)
I shall now analyse this sequence from the point of view of the context it enacts. The judge
(01) asks the name of the rector, that is the head of a Belgian university. The equivalent
English term (a s reflected in the literal translation) is v ice-chancellor. The interpreter relays
this into English as ‘the director’ and is immediately corrected by the judge, who says ‘the
chancellor’. Now, in English universities this is a largely ceremonial position (attending
graduation ceremonies, for example) and certainly not the chief executive (who is the v ice-
chancellor). The Judge can, of course, be forgiven for not being familiar with the idiosyncra-
sies of English universities but the point here is that he interrupts and corrects the interpreter
and is thus the primary cause of the confusion that ensues. The asylum seeker confidently
asserts that the chancellor ‘at the time when I was in the university’ (06) was professor Rich-
ard Thomas. The judge then self-corrects to ‘v ice-chancellor’ (09).1 The interpreter then
naturally assumes that ‘chancellor’ and ‘vice-chancellor’ are separate positions within the
university (10) and disconcerts the asylum seeker by asking for the name of v ice-chancellor.
This induces the asylum seeker to assert that the v ice-chancellor is in the English section (
11–12), something which cannot possibly be the case.
We can now review this example through the lens of ‘voice’. Having confidently asserted
that the chancellor was professor Richard Thomas, the asylum seeker is now totally confused
(‘I don’t know where you talk’, 11), loses his English and, in an attempt to make sense, utters
a total – and possibly incriminating – invention. The confusion then becomes worse, with
the asylum seeker wondering ‘do we have a vice chancellor in faculty itself. we don’t have’
(not in the transcript). He has lost his ability to make himself heard, his ‘voice’.
Meanwhile, the judge is highly unlikely to be challenged over his equivocation since he
enjoys total power within his own court. He can speak at any moment of his choosing, inter-
rupt or question the veracity of the asylum seeker. He is also the one who asks the questions.
It goes without saying that the asylum seeker can do none of these things.
The example also illustrates the different cultural assumptions made by the judge and the
interpreter. The judge assumes that he is sufficiently acquainted with the English language to
be confident in his nomenclature. The interpreter, on the other hand, has very little confi-
dence: having translated ‘rector’ as ‘d irector’, he is immediately corrected by the judge. Rec-
ognising his lack of familiarity with English cultural assumptions, he has to tread carefully.
Thus, his assumption that ‘chancellor’ and ‘vice-chancellor’ are different positions within a
university is both prudent and rational. He has been positioned as ‘not knowing’ while the
judge positions himself as ‘all-knowing’. In this respect, Blommaert’s notion of ‘language
ideology’ (Blommaert 2005: 171) rings true.
68
Cultural assumptions are also involved here. The judge positions the interpreter as a
competent translator but appears totally unaware of the misunderstanding that he personally
has introduced into the encounter, assuming that an interpreter (even one whose native
tongue is not English and who has learned English in an African context) is merely there
to ‘translate’. The interpreter, on the other hand, makes the cultural assumption that the
judge is an authoritative figure, who knows the difference between a chancellor and a v ice-
c hancellor and so translates accordingly. Errors on both sides in social role recognition (see
Vicker 2009) are clear. Thus the interpreter contributes to his own delegitimisation.
Cultural assumptions of a more explicit kind are involved in a study by S pencer-Oatey
and Xing (2008). Admittedly, this is taken from a business interpreting context (where
interpreters are expected to serve their employers), not PSI (where the expectation is that
the interpreter will serve both parties). But the example serves to encapsulate many of
the concepts introduced here. The article describes a Chinese delegation of businessmen
visiting the premises of a UK business. At the initial meeting, the head of the British
team made a speech of welcome to the Chinese guests and then each member of the team
introduced themselves. The head of the British team then invited the Chinese delegation
members to introduce themselves. The head of the Chinese delegation then assumed that
he should make a speech in return and ‘started to express the group’s appreciation to the
hosts.’ The interpreter immediately intervenes to say that the Chinese delegation had been
invited simply to introduce themselves, not to give a return speech. Here it is clear that the
Chinese interpreter, being Chinese himself, feels that he is sufficiently close to the Chinese
delegation (i.e. part of their community of practice) to be able to advise them on protocol
(a n identity of participation). This clearly was an error. S pencer-Oatey and Xing (2008:263)
relate that there followed ‘several minutes of uncomfortable discussion in Chinese by the
visitors’ before each then complied with the invitation to introduce themselves. In follow-
p interviews, the different cultural assumptions are stark. The head of the Chinese dele-
u
gation is reported as saying,
According to our home customs and protocol, speech is delivered on the basis of rec-
iprocity. He has made his speech and I am expected to say something (…) But he had
finished his speech, and he didn’t give me the opportunity, and they each introduced
themselves, wasn’t this clearly implied that they do look down upon us Chinese.
As suggested earlier, the danger with cultural assumptions is that, when we encounter unex-
pected behaviour, we read specific intentions into it (‘they do look down upon us Chinese’).
The British head, on the other hand, was wholly unaware of this, saying that
… they used to have return speeches, but that as the Chinese have become more familiar
with [us], ‘formalities have really eroded and drifted away’.
At stake here are unspoken assumptions. The Chinese delegation may have been trying to
look informal but, as is clear from the quote above, there are expectations of reciprocity and
business meetings in China are nearly always formal. The British head appears to assume
that, because strict formality has all but disappeared from UK business meetings, the Chinese
will be comfortable with this. In turn, the Chinese delegation arrive in the United Kingdom
with an expectation of formality and then feel cheated.
Even the seating arrangements are criticised. The Chinese delegation leader observes
(2008: 260)
69
Ian Mason
It shouldn’t have been that he was the chair and we were seated along the sides of the
table. With equal status, they should sit along this side and we should sit along that side.
The British leader had made the mistake of placing himself at the head of the (rectangular)
table. This is consequently liable to be interpreted within a formal Chinese context as some-
what arrogant and disrespectful. Clearly, business in China and business in the United King-
dom are totally different communities of practice, with different expectations as to what is
appropriate and what inappropriate. The Chinese leader felt that he had been deprived of
voice and therefore of status. The interpreter, meanwhile, had overstepped the mark with
catastrophic consequences, believing that he enjoyed status as a gatekeeper when in fact his
intervention was perceived as a gross intrusion. Thus, insensitivity to cultural assumptions
can be a huge problem for interpreters (see also Wadensjö 2001).
This is, of course, another illustration of the interactional power of the interpreter – in
this case, a negative one. Power, though, can also be exerted by means of gaze, facial ex-
pression or even body posture. The raising of eyebrows for example can, if directed at an
interlocutor, be a cooperative signal, inviting expansion, explication or simply lack com-
prehension. However, if the interpreter looks away from their interlocutor the raising of
eyebrows can cast doubt on what is being interpreted, especially if accompanied by frowning
or lowering the corners of the mouth (see Mason 2012). Meanwhile, a downward gaze can
communicate impartiality or even a refusal to be involved in what is being discussed while
leaning forward and giving eye contact to both other parties in turn can signal involvement
and a determination to assist. The role of gaze in face-to-face interpreting has perhaps not
yet been sufficiently explored (but see Davitti 2015; Davitti and Pasquandrea 2017).
All this, of course, is a matter of pragmatics. I am referring not to linguistic pragmatics
but to a kind of sociolinguistic – or social – pragmatics that has perhaps not yet been fully
explored.2 Part of this is accounted for by a lack of full data. That is, we would need to
be able to follow the speech, intonation and body posture of each individual participant
in exchange. Ideally, we would need cameras trained on each participant, recording their
facial gestures, gaze patterns and body posture. Transcripts would need to include markers
for intonation, emphasis, speech uttered very quietly, speech accompanied by frowns or
smiles and so on. The problem, of course, is that many exchanges where PSI takes place are
confidential. Very often only audio recordings are permitted. Output intended for televi-
sion audiences is just that, that is not intended as a study of interpreting behaviour. Thus, a
camera may cut away at a moment that may prove crucial to the understanding of posture
or gaze of an interpreter.
Social role recognition, turn allocation and conversational repair (Vicker n.d.) are all
pivotal to the work of the interpreter (see also Wadensjö (2015), as are the Gricean maxims
of quantity, quality, relation and manner (Grice 1975) or Sperber and Wilson’s (1995) rel-
evance theory – but here adjusted to take into consideration communication rights, access
to resources and other aspects of inequality of power and control. I would add a further
caveat: relevance theory is useful in its recognition of communicators’ ability to pick up cues
(‘ostension’) about what a speaker means and the further recognition that hearers then infer
on the basis of these cues what a working meaning is. Inference is thus key to understanding
and, for Sperber and Wilson, the hearer will always select the meaning that best matches
the principle of relevance (g reatest cognitive effect for least processing effort). Gutt (2000:
33) adds ‘… and there is never more than one interpretation that fulfils this condition’. This
however closes down the possibility of genuine ambiguity. Interpreters are frequently at a
loss to understand what someone has just said (especially if he or she is a n on-native speaker
70
of a particular language). Interpreters have access to contextualisation cues (ostension) but

not to whatever is going on in a speaker’s mind, with all their pre-textual baggage.
Cultural assumptions and positioning are a constant in interpreted encounters, as is ‘
pre-text’ (one’s cultural and social history, predispositions, personal narratives, etc. – see

Widdowson 2004). The interplay between all these factors is highly complex and, frankly,
indeterminate: we can never assert with certainty the meaning (or ‘message’) of what an-
other person says. We work on the basis of contextualisation cues (Gumperz 1992) in our
search for understanding. In other words, what people say will always be u nder-determinate
of what they actually mean. This is because we all make judgements about what needs to be
said and what does not (because it is taken to be understood).
Consequently, a social pragmatics of interpreting would include virtually all of the con-
cepts outlined above. Cultural assumptions come under the heading of p re-text while po-
sitioning is an interactive phenomenon. Power and control can be negotiable (interactive
power) or fixed (institutional power). In the case of interactive phenomena, we rely on
contextualisation cues and t ake-up to perceive what is going on. In the case of institutional
phenomena, there are clear demarcations: doctors are more powerful than patients, police
officers are more powerful than those they arrest, asylum adjudicators are more powerful
than asylum seekers, etc. I have suggested that voice and (re-)entextualisation (Blommaert
2005) are key tools for understanding these phenomena. Finally, a point mentioned early in
this article, Piller (2012, 2017) reminds us that cultural assumptions are local, not national.
My own view is that cultural assumptions are formed through the communities of practice
we come into contact with, either indirectly or directly, via membership. Thus, although
cultural assumptions are shared phenomena (excluding personal or ‘ontological’ narratives –
see Baker 2006: 28–32), as individuals we are influenced by the communities of practice
amongst which we move.
A final example, taken from Barsky (1994: 142), which I previously cited in Mason
(2006b), will suffice to illustrate these various notions. An asylum seeker, who had been
previously arrested and tortured in Ghana, is interrogated by an asylum adjudicator:
01 Q And during all the time of your detention, did you ask to see a lawyer?
02 A A lawyer.
03 Q Yes, to be assisted by a lawyer?
04 A I wasn’t given that chance.
05 Q But did you ask it?
06 A And I did not make such a request.
07 Q For what reason?
08 A Right from the (x xx) I was denying what they were trying to put on me so I did
not want to get the assistance of a lawyer to substantiate. To gain the requisition
of a lawyer to be personal means confirmation of their intention so I did not do
that to substantiate what they were thinking.
09 Q And did you have the right to be in communication with your family?
10 A In fact, my idea of joining this thing from the very beginning has not been in the
knowledge of my wife because she wouldn’t like it, so I kept all the activities that
I was doing with this movement quite secret from my wife.
The asylum adjudicator (in Canada) is clearly working on very western cultural assumptions:
that it is normal to ask for the assistance of a lawyer when being questioned by police and that
you would surely share your concerns with your nearest-and-dearest. In an African context,
71
Ian Mason
this might in some countries be very dangerous. You would not want your wife to know
about your activities because then she might be arrested and tortured in turn. Similarly,
you might not want to avail yourself of a lawyer employed by the government because the
government is your oppressor. The union movement in which the asylum seeker was active
no doubt conducted all its activities in secret. This, of course, is totally foreign to Europe,
the United States and Canada, where accused persons always ask for a lawyer so that this
dialogue works on diametrically opposed cultural assumptions. The dialogue itself did not
involve an interpreter but it is easy to see the problems that would have been involved if the
asylum seeker had demanded the services of an interpreter and expressed himself in his na-
tive language. In a dialogue where mutually opposing cultural assumptions are being made,
the interpreter would have to protect her/h imself from misunderstandings based on cultural
assumptions. Whether she/he would be given the opportunity to do so would depend on
circumstances. Under some jurisdictions, she/he might, under others – especially
in a legal
context – she/he might not. From the perspective of the interpreter, if you are prosecuted by
the legal system, you have no legal escape (like asking for a lawyer). Thus, interpreting can
contribute to social pragmatics by adding/suggesting new assumptions.
Related topics
One of the many issues raised here is social pragmatics. There are a host of web-based
sources for social pragmatics but they are largely confined to the field of language disorders
or impairments or of language learning. Beverley Vicker points the way with ‘Meeting the
challenge of social pragmatics with students on the autism spectrum’. For communication in
children’s development, see ‘W hat is social communication (Pragmatics)?’ (K idsense n.d.). A
search for ‘social pragmatics theory’ will reveal many more articles. A true social pragmatics
for interpreting however is yet to be written. Above, I have endeavoured to suggest what
such a pragmatics might include.
For Gricean pragmatics, see Grice (1975) and for its application to translation and inter-
preting see Hatim and Mason (1990) or Gutt (2000). Sperber and Wilson (1986) update and
correct Grice (1975), offering a plausible account of c ommunication – subject to the caveat
expressed above.
Another topic is indeterminacy (or under-determinacy) of meaning. On this see Robyn
Carston (2002) – from a linguistic pragmatics point of v iew – or Gumperz (1992) from a
more interactional sociolinguistics angle. For Carston,
Linguistic meaning underdetermines what is meant.

What is said underdetermines what is meant.
Linguistic meaning underdetermines what is said.
(2002: 19)
where ‘linguistic meaning’ is the lexical-syntactic form of the sentence and ‘what is said’ is
taken to be the ‘the thought or proposition which it is being used to express.’ This is to be
distinguished from ‘what is meant’ since, as previously suggested, speakers make judgements
about how much hearers already know and adjust their speech according to the principle of
relevance: greatest contextual effect for minimal processing effort. In other words, you don’t
need to say more than is necessary to ensure understanding – a principle we all adhere to.
Finally, I return to Piller’s observation that cultures are not coterminous with n ation-
states. A phrase that is frequently used, for example is ‘in Chinese culture’. Yet there are
72
so many different cultures in China. Sichuan is entirely different from Beijing and Shang-
hai (w ith a dialect to match), while Guangdong is entirely different from Northern China
(again, with a d ialect – some would say language – to match, Cantonese). Then, there are
the Muslim cultures of Xinzhang and the Uighur people, to say nothing of, for example
dissident cultures. There are as many cultures in China, in fact, as there are communities
of practice. On these notions, see Wenger (1998) and Piller (2012, 2017). Piller prefers to
describe ‘culture’ not as a noun but as a verb, ‘something people do’ (2017: 9) and asks ‘who
makes culture relevant to whom, in which context for which purposes’? (2017: 67). Such
notions are highly pertinent to the cultural turn in interpreting studies and assist in relating
cultural assumptions to communities of practice, positioning and power. In so doing, they
contribute to a social pragmatics of interpreting.
Further reading
Blommaert, Jan (2005) Discourse. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
The volume focuses on how language can offer a crucial understanding of often underestimated aspects of
power relations, maintaining that studies of discourse should highlight what power does to people, groups, and
societies, and how this impact comes about.
Carston, Robyn ( 2002) Thoughts and Utterances: The Pragmatics of Explicit Communication. Oxford,
Blackwell.
The volumes discusses the ‘underdeterminacy’ thesis and provides for reflection on a distinction between
what is explicitly and implicitly communicated.
Gumperz, John J. (1992) “Contextualisation and understanding”, in Re-thinking Context: Language as
an Interactive Phenomenon. Studies in the Social and Cultural Foundations of Language, vol. 11, Alessandro
Duranti and Charles Goodwin (eds). Cambridge, Cambridge University Press: 229–52.
This seminal paper discusses the relevance of context and the ways it is ‘talked about’ making, and referring
to, assumptions that impact heavily on the interlocutors understanding of meaning.
Piller, Ingrid (2017) Intercultural Communication: A Critical Introduction. 2nd ed. Edinburgh, Edinburgh
University Press.
The volume deals with intercultural communication as a discursive construction. It highlights the use and
prestige of different languages and language varieties as well as the varying access that speakers have to them,
moving debate on what the idea of ‘culture’ is all about.
Wenger, Etienne (1998) Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity. Cambridge, Cambridge
University Press.
The book presents a theory of learning based on the idea that engagement in social practice is the fundamen-
tal process by which we learn and so become who we are. The starting point of this process are the ‘communities
of practice’ that people form as they pursue shared enterprises over time. The theory explores the intersection of
issues of community, social practice, meaning, and identity
Related chapters
Chapter 3, Agency in and for mediating in public service interpreting by Claudio Baraldi.
Chapter 11, Vulnerable encounters? Investigating vulnerability in interpreter-mediated services for victim survivors
Notes
1 At least, we assume he self-corrects. One drawback of Maryns’s data is that we have no marking
for intonation. It could be simply a confirmation of the previous line, ‘yes, professor Thomas’ (08).
2 Social pragmatics has been applied to language learning and to language disorders but not, as far
as I am aware, to interpreting theory.
73
Ian Mason
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University Press.
Baker, Mona (2006) Translation and Conflict: A Narrative Account. London, Routledge.
Baraldi, Claudio and Laura Gavioli ( eds) ( 2012) Coordinating Participation in Dialogue Interpreting.
Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins.
Barsky, Robert F. (1994) Constructing a Productive Other. Discourse Theory and the Convention Refugee
Hearing. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins.
Barton, David and Karin Tusting (eds) (2005) Beyond Communities of Practice. Cambridge, Cambridge
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terpreting dialogues”, Taking Stock: Research and Methodology in Community Interpreting, Linguistica
Antverpiensia 5: 103–20.
——— (2012) “Gaze, positioning and identity in i nterpreter-mediated dialogues”, in Coordinating Par-
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Approach, Juliane House (ed). Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan: 36–55.
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5
CORPUS-BASED STUDIES
OF PUBLIC SERVICE
INTERPRETING1
Bernd Meyer
Introduction
As Kennedy (1998) states in his book An introduction to corpus linguistics, any systematic collec-
tion of language data is a corpus, that is ‘a body of written texts and/or transcribed speech
which can serve as a basis for linguistic analysis and description’ (ibid.: 1). Corpora may vary
in size and s cope – the amount of data in a collection depends on many factors and does not
necessarily say anything about the quality or the usability of a corpus. Rather, aspects such as
research questions and framework, the quality of data, or its rarity tell much more about the
significance of a corpus and its possible reuse.
Collections of linguistic data have always been part of methodologies in almost all sci-
entific fields in the humanities, and today’s digital technologies offer new possibilities for
data collection, storage, analysis, and presentation (Borgman 2010, 2015). The disruptive
character of digital technologies potentially changes the status of corpora in many fields,
and it does so also in public service interpreting (PSI)-related research. Nevertheless, the use
of digital technologies is a relatively new trend, gaining momentum in interpreting studies
only recently.
Today, corpora of spoken language in general and in PSI research specifically are still
rare. However, more and more research institutions host spoken language corpora because
of a growing interest in different aspects of language use (Caines, McCarthy, and O’Keeffe
2016) or in language documentation (Newman, Baayen and Rice 2011). Spoken language
corpora may vary in size and type of discourse they refer to, but usually they come enriched
with annotations and metadata on contextual aspects of discourse, such as information about
the time and place of the communicative event, or information about specific properties of
participants, like kinship relations, age, gender, professional status, and so forth.
Epistemological considerations: why work with corpora in PSI research?

For PSI research frameworks, the story of working with corpora begins in the 1960s with
an interest of social sciences and linguistics in studies on language use, or, more generally,
approaches that perceive language as a social phenomenon: the Ethnography of Speaking
(Hymes 1962), Ethnomethodology (Garfinkel 1967), Speech Act Theory (Austin 1962), or
76 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-7

Corpus-based studies of PSI
Goffman’s analyses of human interaction (Goffman 1967). These approaches led to numerous
theoretical and methodological innovations regarding the analysis of face-to-face encounters.
The pragmatic orientation towards the situatedness of linguistic action also inspired early
researchers working with audio recordings from interpreter-mediated interactions, such as
Lang (1978), Kaufert and Koolage (1984), or Knapp and K napp-Potthoff (1986). However,
the study of such interactions was based on analogue data (tape recordings and hand-or
type-written transcripts), simply because digitisation, storage and computer-assisted tran-
scription of oral data were not possible or far too difficult at that time.
The explicit call for corpus-linguistic methodologies in interpreting studies began with
Shlesinger (1998), who developed her argument against the background of corpus-based
translation studies, that is the investigation of structural properties of translated texts, and
with the intention of strengthening the methodological rigour in interpreting studies as an
emerging discipline. Thus, much of Shlesinger’s argument was about the possibilities that
may emerge from new technologies and, furthermore, text-analytical methodologies that
have proven to yield interesting insights in translation studies. While some of her proposals
and visions have already been put into practice (such as the design of corpora expressly for
the study of interpreting, or the creation of parallel corpora of interpreting data), others seem
to be far too optimistic (‘computerized comparisons between oral and written translations’,
Shlesinger 1998: 4, or ‘a controlled examination of the large number of variables involved in
interpreting’ 1998: 5). However, Shlesinger’s intention was obviously not to design a specific
research project in detail, but to highlight the potentials of using c orpus-linguistic methods
and technologies.
Making use of such approaches was hampered initially not only by technical limitations,
but also by a general tendency in translation studies towards idiosyncratic theory-building,
and limited exchange with theoretical and methodological frameworks of neighbouring sci-
ences (see, e.g. Reiß and Vermeer 1984/2014 on ‘skopos theory’). Furthermore, researchers
from interpreting studies are often working in translation and interpreting departments,
where academic training for conference interpreting is provided and other forms of inter-
preting are often considered to be peripheral or simply not part of the curriculum. Thus, PSI
researchers who feel comfortable with the theoretical and methodological frameworks from
pragmatics or sociolinguistics often come from neighbouring disciplines, such as sociology,
sociolinguistics, and pragmatics.
A typical feature of PSI corpora is the preference for authentic (i.e. non-experimental)
data and the small size of samples, due to remaining difficulties in data collection and field
access. Public service institutions, such as administrations, medical or educational institu-
tions and social services, usually have to comply with strict privacy regulations. Clients
and institutional agents are dealing with private matters and do not easily grant access to
researchers, or feel uncomfortable with the documentation of events by audio and video
recordings. Moreover, PSI research is usually carried out in qualitative research frameworks,
which primarily focus on understanding how people establish social order, or on their beliefs
and linguistic routines, rather than analysing large data collections quantitatively. While
corpus linguistics usually tries to describe patterns of language use in large data sets by using
quantitative methods, a considerable part of PSI research aims at understanding particular
or general aspects of interpreter-mediated interactions by looking at the use of language
and other communicative resources in detail. Instead of making normative judgments about
interpreter performance, the general aim of this body of PSI research is to investigate how
people in reality interact, using various communicative resources, and how their commu-
nicative practices shape the course and the outcome of interactions. Researchers therefore
77
Bernd Meyer
often draw their conclusions on the basis of single cases or examples that serve to illustrate
or highlight particular aspects of interpreter-mediated interactions. These qualitative ap-
proaches developed historically without intense contact to corpus linguistic approaches and
their focus on quantification.
However, with the rapid development of corpus technologies, working with corpora
is becoming part of the PSI toolkit. The interest in methodological reflection and digital
technologies has also reached the field of PSI studies, as Niemants (2012) shows. The combi-
nation of ethnographic or situational metadata, data from participant observation, together
with quantitative and qualitative analyses of interactions or texts raise the validity of con-
clusions and reveal communicative aspects that otherwise would not have come to the fore.
PSI research focuses on interactions between three or more participants using differ-
ent languages, mostly in institutional contexts. This places certain requirements on corpus
technologies that text-oriented corpus linguistics often does not have to meet (Schmidt and
Wörner 2009). This includes the focus on multi-party interactions, multi-modal analyses
considering non-verbal actions (smiling, laughing, gestures, and so on), or paralinguistic
phenomena such as pausing, prosody, and so forth. Thus, corpus technologies for the analysis
of interaction data need to allow for different layers of annotations and should provide mea-
sures for the collection, storage, and representation of metadata on social properties of partic-
ipants, and on the situational context in which the interaction takes place. Furthermore, such
data collections need to maintain the simultaneity and reciprocity of linguistic actions, that
is how discourse unfolds during the communicative event, taking into account the temporal
dimensions of speech. Another aspect is the use of special characters and signs to capture
phenomena of spoken language, such as false starts, prosodic patterns, pausing, hesitations,
and interjections. For multilingual data, the list of requirements is even longer because it
may be necessary to provide discourse data together with back translations of original ut-
terances (Rehbein et al. 2004; Belzyk-Kohl 2016), and to accommodate language-specific
features and scripts that differ from Latin, such as Arabic (Farag 2019).
Although such technologies are available in principle, only a small number of researchers
explore the whole spectrum of possible uses. Still, the combined representation of con-
textual information, images, videos, sound recordings, and transcripts is an expensive,
t ime-consuming, and challenging enterprise that often goes beyond the limits of individual
research projects. However, the influence of the observation also affects collections of au-
thentic discourse data and poses methodological questions. As Ochs puts it, data gathering
and transcription reflect ‘theoretical goals and definitions’ (Ochs 1979: 44). Transcription,
recording, and other steps of data collection and representation imply selective choices of
the researcher and, thus, influence the outcome in the sense of selective authenticity which
may even have political implications (Buchholtz 2000). Similarly, the presentation of data
from lesser used languages, minority languages, or n on-standard varieties poses challenges
for research communities (Egbert, Yufu and Hirataka 2016). Thus, making use of the full
range of advancements in corpus technologies may also be a way to partly bridge the gap
between the original communicative event and its digital representations in a corpus (sound
files, videos, images, transcripts).
The typical methodological approach in PSI research is the analysis of talk, more or
less explicitly transcribed on the basis of Jeffersonian transcription conventions (Hepburn
and Bolden 2013). Analytical categories are often taken from conversation analysis (turn,
turn-taking, sequence), and combined with Wadensjö’s concept of rendition types, or her
concept of different coordination moves. Although Setton (2011: 48) maintains that samples
used in such studies are generally ‘too small for normal science’, the impact of these studies
78
on scientific and professional communities is undeniable. Nevertheless, only some of these

studies combine qualitative and quantitative analyses and make use of corpus technologies
more systematically.
From the methodological standpoint of qualitative approaches, the validity of scientific
investigations is not automatically given if large data sets are explored but depends on the
coherence between research questions, data collection, and data interpretation (Meyer 2016).
Thus, the idea that variables of communicative events can be controlled and systematically
measured in the same way as is possible with bacteria cultures is misleading. Furthermore,
the relevance of qualitative investigations of interpreting is also mirrored by the fact that they
have changed normative concepts about this activity, with strong repercussions in the pro-
fessional and scientific communities. It is therefore not surprising that qualitative researchers
seemingly do not feel the need to explore the full range of existing corpus technologies be-
cause it does not seem necessary from a methodological perspective, in view of the fact that
it is indeed possible to generate new knowledge also with smaller corpora and case studies.
However, as will be shown in Section 3, the use of transcription editors, query tools, and
corpus management systems not only facilitates data analyses but also allows for sustainable
storage and reuse of data, retrieval and presentation of smaller sections of discourse, and
combined analysis of discourse data and metadata about participants and events. Thus, it
seems reasonable to claim that even scholars working in merely qualitative paradigms will
use (a nd will be expected to use) corpus technologies more intensively in the future.
Literature review: some examples of corpus-based PSI-studies

This section provides some examples of corpus-based PSI-studies. It is not intended as a
comprehensive overview. Rather, some studies will be resumed to show the breadth of
research in this field. Generally, studies of PSI have only begun to meet the challenges asso-
ciated with data collection, corpus compilation, and multi-modal data analysis. Most studies
refer to single cases, or small data samples, and ethnographic data are not always systemat-
ically integrated. Early examples of the combined use of ethnographic data and discourse
data are Berk-Seligson’s (1990) book The Bilingual Courtroom, and Angelelli’s (2004) study on
medical interpreting.
It is almost common sense nowadays that interpreters, independently of the interpreting
mode, their professional status, and their expertise, should be perceived as active participants
in an on-going interaction. They shape, and sometimes change, the course of the event by
assuming different roles. This phenomenon has already been observed in early studies on
dialogue interpreting, but it was Cecilia Wadensjö (1992, 1998) who first theorised this
observation, providing a conceptual framework to understand interpreter roles and forms of
participation in more detail. Wadensjö refers to Goffman’s analyses of verbal interaction to
show how interpreters participate by rendering talk of primary parties and, at the same time,
are coordinating the on-going communicative activity. Her research is based on a corpus
of tape-recorded interactions from public service settings in Sweden, and the analysis and
presentation of data is based on shorter or longer extracts from transcripts, provided with
glosses in English.
An important achievement of her study is that she shifted the focus away from a nor-
mative view of interpreting towards a descriptive perspective. The theoretical and meth-
odological framework of Wadensjö’s work inspired several similar studies, such as Bolden
(2000) on mediated question-answer sequences, B erk-Seligson (2009) on bilingual police
interrogations, who also provides longer sections of transcriptions in her book, or the various
79
Bernd Meyer
contributions in an edited volume by Baraldi and Gavioli (2012). Pasquandrea (2011) goes
beyond these analyses of the participation of interpreters by integrating multi-modal aspects
such as gaze and other body movements by which, for example, a participant may signal his
or her involvement in the o n-going interaction, which, in turn, may trigger or at least sup-
port certain types of participation by the interpreter.
As one of the precursors to Wadensjö’s analysis of the interpreters’ footing, Müller (1989)
uses a small corpus of ethnographic interviews with Italian migrants in Germany to dis-
cuss how the involved interpreters, being migrants themselves, shift their participation from
translating towards other forms of participation in these settings. He shows that the inter-
preting mode is constantly being negotiated and adapted to the needs of the interaction.
His claim is that this shifting between different modes of bilingual interaction and different
participation frameworks is at least partly due to the permeability of the language barrier
in communication with migrants. He describes talk in a foreign language as a scale with
opaque linguistic means, on the one hand, and transparent, that is intelligible, means on
the other. Bilingual constellations, thus, may be characterised by the mutual transparency
or opaqueness of linguistic means for interlocutors. This aspect has been taken up by Meyer
(2012), who perceives this as a systematic feature of ad hoc interpreting in hospitals and other
community settings, and Angermeyer (2015), who analyses legal settings and shows how
monolingual institutional norms stand in stark contrast to the multilingual competencies of
different types of participants.
Another line of research has been established by Sabine Braun, who conducted several
research projects on remote interpreting, and, more specifically, compares on-site and re-
mote video interpreting in legal settings and police interrogations. In a recent study, Braun
(2017) investigates the functions of additions and expansions of original utterances by in-
terpreters using a c onversation-analytic approach. One special feature of her corpus is that
it combines the advantages of simulations (controlled variables) and of authentic discourse
(fewer artefacts, natural behaviour) because role plays were not read out verbatim, based on
scripts, but rather acted out on the basis of transcripts taken from authentic interviews. An
interesting result of this study is that content-related deviations from the original (such as
additions or omissions) increased in remote interpreting and were even more frequent when
subjects became familiar with this interpreting mode. It may be seen as a shortcoming of the
analysis, however, that the transcripts presented in the article only vaguely account for the
simultaneity of discourse, and that the role of gaze and body movements is discussed without
presenting the respective data (Braun 2017: 171).
Angermeyer and Meyer (2021) investigate the potential of qualitative and quantitative
methods for the analysis of non-renditions (Wadensjö 1998:108; interpreters’ utterances
which do not translate source talk by other participants). The c orpus-based approach allows
for a comparison of interpreter performance across different settings, particularly medical
and court interpreting with ad hoc lay interpreters and experienced professional interpret-
ers, respectively. Non-renditions are found to be used at higher rates by ad hoc interpreters,
yet interpreters in all settings are more likely to produce them when speaking the language
of the institution than when speaking a minority language. The comparison also permits
the identification of exceptional cases in which the interpreter’s performance differs con-
siderably from other cases of the same context. These cases are then investigated further,
combining quantitative and qualitative approaches, showing that comparatively high rates of
non-renditions correlate with code-switching by other participants. In other words, when
flexible language strategies result in a convergence of language choice among the primary
interlocutors (w ith minority language speakers switching to the institutional language), this
80
temporary suspension of interpreting leads to interpreters participating in other ways. Or, to

put it the other way round, the more participants stick to a translation style that treats indi-
viduals as being monolingual, independently of their true linguistic repertoires (a s described
in Angermeyer 2009 for courtroom interpreting), the less the interpreters feel invited to act
as primary participants, or to perform ‘reflexive coordinative moves’, that is to act as media-
tors for the primary participants (to use Baraldi and Gavioli’s 2012: 3 term).

Critical for creating and working with spoken language corpora are the ways in which data
collection is carried out and how collected data are stored and accessed. Furthermore, the
collection and representation of information about the data (i.e. the metadata) is import-
ant because it may influence the analysis and reuse of data collections. Last but not least,
transcription systems and annotations of transcribed data have a considerable impact on the
quality of data. In this section, I will briefly outline these topics.
Corpus design and data curation

Data collections in all sciences represent assumptions about what matters in research: theo-
retical frameworks and models, research questions, methodologies. This is even more true
for research on spoken language. Although it is nowadays easy to record interactions (even
with smartphones), the recording procedure itself already influences the quality of data and
possible analyses that can be carried out on the basis of a particular data collection. In re-
search on spoken language or interaction, and more specifically in research on PSI, data
represent social events that are usually richer than the data itself. The social event is full
of sensory cues and information that cannot be fully transposed into the written medium
(Linell 2004). One obstacle is that the auditory or visual data have to be transposed to a
medium that is t wo-dimensional (script). Another problem is that scripts do not represent all
aspects of language.
Therefore, the collection of data usually places certain restrictions on possible uses. On
the other hand, the electronic format also facilitates accessibility and reuse of data. While
researchers in the past mostly collected, transcribed and analysed exclusively their own data,
nowadays corpus technologies allow for a wider distribution and use for different purposes.
Electronic corpora collected for a specific project may be used for other research projects or
student coursework, given that they are accurately stored, and web access is implemented.
This is even more important for PSI data, as they are usually difficult to obtain. In the fol-
lowing, I will outline some of the basic aspects of corpus design and data curation.
Metadata
Metadata are often the stepchild of data collection. Not all studies provide information about
the participants of the interpreter-mediated event, their age, gender, linguistic competen-
cies, relationships, professional roles, and so forth. The same is true for the event itself – the
date, time and place, type of discourse, the languages used, its duration, and so on. Research-
ers may think that detailed information is sometimes not necessary for specific research
purposes. However, for a follow-up study, it might be interesting. Thus, researchers should
be keen to collect metadata systematically in order to provide a basis for a sustainable data
collection.
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Bernd Meyer
In most cases, the collection of spoken language data requires research protocols which
account for the private character of such data. Therefore, researchers have to stick to data
protection laws and regulations, and usually ask participants to consent to the recording of
their voice and face. Thus, metadata usually entail anonymisation of proper names of per-
sons and places by using fictitious names, abbreviations, or numbers instead of the original
names. Details of anonymisation procedures depend on the research site and context. As a
rule of thumb, anonymisation should make it impossible for third parties to identify individ-
uals who have been recorded, including the exact time, place, and context of the recording.
Furthermore, procedures need to be documented to reveal their underlying systematics so
that other researchers can reconstruct general aspects of subjects in the corpus, such as their
professional role, their position in an institution, and so on. For the publication and reuse
of data, it is also necessary to document that consent has been granted. Furthermore, tran-
scripts need to be anonymised in the same way as metadata. This also refers to audio or video
recordings if there is an intention to publish them as well.
Transcription
An important feature of data curation is a transparent system of transcription conventions.
As previously mentioned, any transcription represents only certain aspects of interactions,
not the whole event as it happened in reality. Therefore, the use of transcription conventions
needs to be documented and explicitly mentioned in the metadata. Moreover, transcribing
according to certain conventions should be considered an integral part of the research process,
as the result strongly influences the analysis. Transcriber training and integration of tran-
scribers into team discussions are possible measures to achieve high quality for transcriptions.
Another aspect of transcriptions is their readability. While text corpora usually follow
standards of orthography, spoken language corpora try to grasp features of orality, such as
hearer signals or false starts, repetitions, aborted utterances, dialects, insecure transcriptions
and prosodic cues. Thus, transcription conventions need to account for phenomena that
are not part of standard orthography, such as hearer signals (‘a h!’), or indications of mental
planning (‘…ehm…’). Furthermore, transcriptions from PSI settings have to integrate dif-
ferent languages, potentially with different writing systems. Writing systems such as Arabic,
which goes from right to left, create temporal misalignment if used in combination with
Latin script. If Arabic is written with Roman characters, a systematic romanisation of spo-
ken Arabic is needed, that is a convention that allows transcribers to transcribe features of
spoken Arabic, including vernaculars and dialects, by using Roman characters. Otherwise,
temporal dimensions of speech would not be displayed in the transcription, due to different
directions of the flow of the scripts, and readability of the transcript will be hampered (Farag
2019).
Figure 5.1 gives an example of what the readability of a G erman-Arabic transcript could
look like. The format is that of a musical score in which reading is from left to right and
utterances of different speakers appear in their temporal order in separate tiers. The verbal
tiers [v] of the interpreter (T D2) and the client (K 3), a Syrian refugee, are complemented
by suprasegmental tiers [sup] and idiomatic back translations into English [en]. While the
suprasegmental tiers contain information about prosodic features, such as ‘soft’ and ‘a ngry’,
a commentary outside the score frame [k] provides transcribers’ comments about features of
discourse that are not attached to individual participants. This type of visualisation of tran-
scribed oral data (Schmidt and Wörner 2009, 2014) enables readers with different linguistic
competencies to use the transcript, albeit not to the same degree: a person with knowledge of
82
Figure 5.1 E xtract from a corpus of telephone interpreting (German-Arabic, Farag 2019: 21)
Arabic and German will be able to carry out analyses that are more sophisticated than those
of a person with English only.
Annotations
Annotations are a dd-on information in the transcript that serve to facilitate the analysis by
categorising, describing, or paraphrasing verbal or non-verbal activities. This may include
translations of single words or utterances, or glosses with information on grammatical fea-
tures, such as tagging parts of speech. In the following, I shall give examples of annotations by
referring to the Community Interpreting Database (ComInDat). ComInDat (A ngermeyer,
Meyer and Schmidt 2012) is designed to facilitate data sharing among researchers in inter-
preting studies and other disciplines. It combines data from three distinct previously existing
corpora. While these corpora represent data from PSI contexts, they differ with respect
to many parameters, including the type and setting of the interactions (e.g. hospitals or
courtrooms), the type of recording, the transcription and annotation conventions, and the
language dyads. At the same time, all interactions included in the corpus share annotations
of the translation status and language choice of individual utterances, which present oppor-
tunities for a comparative analysis.
The component data sets of ComInDat differ in their use of annotation and transcription
software (EXMARaLDA or ELAN) and of transcription systems (HIAT, or based on Chat).
Nonetheless, ComInDat presents these data in a common online platform that facilitates
the viewing and querying of data. T ime-aligned transcripts are displayed in a musical score
format, where users can select which annotation components they would like to see or query.
Two types of annotation are included for all three types of data, as each utterance is anno-
tated for language and translation status.
PSI-related annotations: language of utterance

Any analysis of interpreter-mediated interaction, whether focusing on translation or on
language contact, requires the labelling of words and utterances as belonging to one or
the other language involved in the interaction. However, languages in bilingual speech
are not discrete entities, as the boundaries between them are marked not only by lexical
and structural properties but also by speakers’ (and analysts’) language ideologies (Ajsic and
McGroarty 2015), making the unique attribution of each item to a specific language a com-
plex, and sometimes impossible task. However, in i nterpreter-mediated interaction, this task
83
Bernd Meyer
is facilitated, as the activity of translation represents a metalinguistic practice of language

attribution in that utterances are treated by the interpreter as input from one language that
is to be rendered in another language (A ngermeyer 2015). Similarly, because the interaction
is defined as involving a language barrier, other participants orient towards language choice
and may adapt their participation depending on which language is used.
Conference interpreters usually work with the hypothesis that all participants stay on
their side of the language barrier, so that almost everything said by a speaker is monolingual
source language material that is intended as input for translation. By contrast, communica-
tion in community settings is often based on heterogeneous linguistic repertoires which lead
to code-switching, code-mixing and ad hoc borrowing by primary participants, as well as
interpreters. Such mixed utterances may result from limited proficiency in an L2, from ha-
bitual community patterns of language mixing, or from an idiosyncratic choice.
While language tagging always implies interpretation, ComInDat sought to minimise
this interpretation by reducing it to a distinction between mixed and unmixed speech at
the utterance level. More precisely, the language of utterance (e.g. German, English, …) is
annotated for utterances that can be categorised as unmixed, and the label ‘m ixed’ is used
whenever some kind of mix of languages spoken by participants takes place.
Mixed utterances include insertions of single lexical items in the source speech. Alter-
natively, insertions can occur in the target speech of interpreters, where they often involve
retaining key lexical items from the source talk, resulting either from an inability to translate
or from an assumption that the recipient is familiar with the lexical item in the source lan-
guage (Meyer 2004: 128), or would appreciate learning about it.
Annotating the language of an utterance thus permits the quantitative analysis of vari-
ation in participants’ language choices in the course of an interaction. This is particularly
interesting for corpus-based studies on PSI, as measures such as the ratio between mixed and
non-mixed utterances or the types of sequences of utterances in different languages may give
quantitative insights into how participants handle language barriers and discrepant linguistic
repertoires in different language constellations and institutional contexts.
PSI-related annotations: translation status

The translation status of utterances is especially relevant for the analysis of n on-renditions.
By definition, interpreter-mediated interaction involves utterances by interpreters that func-
tion as renditions of prior utterances made by another speaker in another language. Wadensjö
(1998: 106–10) proposes a classification system of interpreter utterances that makes a primary
distinction between renditions’ and ‘non-renditions,’ that is distinguishing whether the in-
terpreter is engaged in the activity of translation or not. Renditions are then subdivided into
further categories on the basis of a textual comparison of source and target, distinguishing
first between ‘close’ and ‘d ivergent’ renditions, where close renditions are utterances that
closely match the propositional content and style of the corresponding source, which is often
immediately preceding. Divergent renditions fall again into several different types, depend-
ing on whether propositional content is added (‘expanded renditions’), left out (‘reduced
renditions’), or both (‘substituted renditions’), or whether source or target consist of more
than one utterance (‘t wo-part/multi-part renditions’, or ‘summarised renditions’).
The second part of Wadensjö’s model suggests classifying interpreter utterances also in
relation to their organisational f unction – as implicitly or explicitly coordinating utterances.
Utilising that categorisation allows the researcher to explore the interrelation between utter-
ances in longer discourse sequences, whereas using the various types of renditions restricts
84
the study to comparing interpreter utterances and preceding primary party utterance(s) (or
absence of utterance). Thus, this model opens up the possibility to explore talk as (t ranslated)
text, on the one hand, and talk as reciprocal activity of different participants, on the other.
The translation status, then, is seen as a text-related phenomenon.
To overcome the problem of annotator variation, utterances in the database are annotated
for translation status in a simple way that is not t heory-dependent and consider only a t op-level
categorisation (A ngermeyer, Meyer and Schmidt 2012). Utterances by interpreters are clas-
sified as renditions if they contain propositional elements that can be related to propositional
elements previously pronounced in the source language. Otherwise, they are categorised as
non-renditions. Similarly, utterances by other speakers are classified as source if they corre-
spond in one way or the other to an utterance by the interpreter, and as non-source if they
do not. This basic annotation of translation status enables researchers to quickly identify un-
translated talk as well as utterances in which interpreters do not engage in rendering talk but
interact with other participants in other ways. Moreover, it becomes possible to quantify the
rate of n on-renditions or non-sources for each speaker and each interaction, and thus to com-
pare types of interpreter-mediated interaction by this measurement. However, the annotation
for ‘non-rendition’ refers to utterances of interpreters that are formally and functionally quite
distinct: from subjective comments, side-talk, clarification sequences, and greetings to hearer
signals and minimal responses. Thus, any analysis has to consider that the categories ‘rendition’
and ‘non-rendition’ in this corpus are covering a whole range of different communicative acts.
Related topics and further reading

In this chapter, I shed light on some essential aspects of working with corpora in PSI re-
search. Outlining epistemological considerations, I highlighted the fact that many analyses
in this field already work with systematic data collections without, however, considering
these collections to be ‘corpora’, in the sense ordinarily associated with corpus-based trans-
lation studies. But, in fact, they are, and the advancement of corpus technologies does allow
for methodological innovations, such as complementing qualitative approaches with quan-
titative investigations. Examples of such ‘m ixed methods’ are given in the literature review
(Braun 2017; Angermeyer and Meyer 2021). Furthermore, corpus technologies may help to
create sustainable linguistic resources and to avoid ‘d ata graveyards’ (Schmidt et al. 2014: 1).
Sustainability means in this context that resources are accessible and usable for other re-
searchers and other research or teaching purposes outside the original context of data collec-
tion. Reuse of others’, and also one’s own data requires systematic and transparent protocols
for data collection and transcription, as well as the integration of technological k now-how
into the research process. This aspect may be the most important and the most difficult one
at the same time: researchers in the humanities often come from environments which show
a preference for qualitative methods and find it suspicious if a research question is tackled
solely on the basis of numbers and quantities. They are trained to work with texts and often
underestimate the effort of collecting and curating spoken language data. With this chapter,
I hope to contribute to a cultural shift in PSI research by highlighting that these method-
ological steps need to be taken seriously.
Further reading
Borgman, Christine L. (2010) “The digital future is now: A call to action for the humanities”, Digital
Humanities Quarterly 4 (3): 1–30.
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Bernd Meyer
This essay by Borgman elaborates on what the humanities need to do in order to catch up with other sciences
and outlines fields of action for digital humanities.
Schmidt, Thomas, Christian Chiarcos, Timm Lehmberg, Georg Rehm, Andreas Witt, and
Erhard Hinrichs (2 014) Avoiding Data Graveyards: From Heterogeneous Data Collected in Multi-
ple Research Projects to Sustainable Linguistic Resources. Institut für Deutsche Sprache, Bibliothek
(online).
In this online source, Schmidt and his colleagues discuss general aspects of storing and reusing spoken
language corpora. The article draws on experiences from three different research initiatives in Germany and
sketches areas of open questions with regard to sustainable data handling.
Ruhi, Şukriye, Michael Haugh, Thomas Schmidt and Kai Wörner (eds) (2014) Best Practices for Spoken
Corpora in Linguistic Research. Newcastle upon Tyne, Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
This edited volume provides corpus descriptions as well as corpus-based analyses using spoken language
corpora. It highlights best practices from both the perspective of assembling, annotating and linguistic analysis
of spoken language corpora, as well as from the perspective of processing, archiving and disseminating spoken
language.
The EXMARaLDA website (https://exmaralda.org/en/)
A practical introduction to using transcription software, including tutorials, is provided on the
EXMARaLDA website, managed by Thomas Schmidt (Institute for German Language) and Kai Wörner
(Hamburg University).
Related chapters
Chapter 6, Technology use in language-discordant interpersonal healthcare communication by Sabine Braun,
Khetam Al Sharou and Özlem Temizöz
Chapter 8, Public service interpreting in court – face-to-face interaction by Philipp Angermeyer
Chapter 10, Consecutive interpreting and multimodal sequences by Christian Licoppe
Chapter 21, The conversation analytic role-play method: how authentic data meet simulations for interpreter train-
ing by Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen and Elizabeth Stokoe
Note
1 This chapter is partly based on Meyer (2019) and Angermeyer and Meyer (2021). Remaining
shortcomings are mine.
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6
TECHNOLOGY USE IN
LANGUAGE-DISCORDANT
INTERPERSONAL HEALTHCARE
COMMUNICATION
Sabine Braun, Khetam Al Sharou and Özlem Temizöz
Introduction
The optimal approach to establishing communication between healthcare providers and
patients who do not share the same language has been discussed for quite some time; the
debates have ultimately served to highlight the crucial role that linguistically and culturally
competent human interpreters play in these instances of language-discordant interpersonal
healthcare communication.
However, there are many barriers to accessing human interpreters in healthcare settings,
including waiting times, lack of financial resources, restricted local availability of qualified/
trained interpreters in some languages and, at times, a lack of practicability (for instance,
spontaneous communication on a hospital ward). Alternative approaches to accessing hu-
man interpreters and approaches to providing language support without the need for an
interpreter have been developed, which involve drawing on and interacting with different
types of technology. They range from the use of audio and video communication tools en-
abling remote interpretation to volunteer language support through crowdsourcing via dig-
ital platforms, machine translation (MT) and bespoke translation tools/apps. Some of these
approaches were initially developed for situations of medical emergency and/or humanitar-
ian crisis but have subsequently been explored in other settings of interpersonal healthcare
communication, shifting the patterns of interaction in these settings from h uman-to-human
interaction towards increasing involvement of human-machine interaction.
This chapter will review technology-
assisted approaches to facilitating language-
d iscordant interpersonal healthcare communication and explore the extent to which they
are currently capable of meeting patients’ and healthcare providers’ communication needs.
The focus is on situations of dialogic communication and interaction normally involving an
interpreter, a patient and/or caregiver and one or more healthcare providers. Technology-
a ssisted methods of translating written texts are not included (on the latter, see Dew et al.
2018; Haddow, Birch and Heafield 2021; Vieira, O’Hagan and O’Sullivan 2021). Following
a brief epistemological consideration of technology use in interpersonal healthcare settings,
each approach will be considered in a separate section, beginning with a review of the rele-
vant scholarly literature and main practical developments, followed by a discussion of critical
issues and challenges arising.
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-8 89
Sabine Braun et al.
Technology use as h
uman-machine interaction:
epistemological considerations
Although interpreter-mediated interaction is different from direct interaction between in-
terlocutors who speak the same language, for example in terms of t urn-taking organisation
(Wadensjö 1998; Baraldi and Gavioli 2012; Davitti 2013), it has traditionally developed as
a form of human interaction, particularly in institutional settings. In the classic triangular
relationship of dialogue interpreting, the interaction takes place both between the primary
interlocutors and between each of them and the interpreter. Linguistic and cultural media-
tion is negotiated and established between all participants involved.
The use of various technologies to assist, complement and/or replace human interpreters
has begun to expand and reshape the interaction in different ways. Most notably perhaps,
technology-mediated interpreting has evolved using audio or video communication tech-
nology either to connect a professional interpreter who is offsite to a healthcare provider
and patient who are co-located in the same space (remote interpreting, see Niemants, Stokoe
and Hansen this volume) or to facilitate language-discordant healthcare consultations which
take place over the phone or by video link (interpreting in telehealth consultations). In these mo-
dalities of interpreting, the d ual – l inguistic-cultural and technological – mediation (Braun
and Taylor 2012) entails multiple layers of interaction: not only do the healthcare provider
and the patient (that is the primary interlocutors) interact with each other through an in-
terpreter, but all participants also interact with the relevant communication technology,
namely screens, cameras and/or microphones and potentially other devices, as well as with
each other through this technology. The section entitled Technology-mediated interpreting in
the present chapter will give an overview of technology-mediated healthcare interpreting
and review emerging issues with these modalities of interpreting, including the impact of
technological mediation on participant satisfaction, interpreting quality and interaction.
Similar communication technologies have also been used to provide a different type of
language support, especially in situations where professional interpreters are not available or
where their involvement is not practicable. In such cases, real-time crowdsourcing of non-
professional language mediators has been adopted to enable access to the language support
available. Digital platforms used for this purpose support audio or video connections, or in
some cases a text chat. Similar to technology-mediated interpreting, this requires partici-
pants to interact with each other at a distance, through communication technology. The
potential ‘conversion’ of a traditionally spoken-language interaction into written interaction
creates additional questions, especially with regard to the effectiveness and coordination of
the interaction. This type of technology-mediated language support will be reviewed in
Real-time crowdsourcing translation and interpreting below.
Still a different approach is provided with the use of MT, either by generic tools such as
Google Translate or bespoke solutions (Dew et al. 2018; Haddow, Birch and Heafield 2021;
Vieira, O’Hagan and O’Sullivan 2021). In this case, the translation is taken over by an MT
engine, and the patient and healthcare provider interact directly with each other, and also
with and through a device and an interface that gives access to the MT software. This occurs
either in situations where the patient and provider are c o-located, using a smartphone or
tablet to access the translation software, or where they are connected through communica-
tion technology; this is for instance the case of telehealth consultations using an integrated
translation tool (Skype Translator or the like). The section called Machine Translation will be
dedicated to the different dimensions of the largely unexplored, complex human-human and
human–machine interaction arising in these settings.
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Technology use in language-discordant communication
In addition to being underexplored in terms of the complex interactions taking place

when MT tools are used in interpersonal healthcare communication, one of the major con-
straints to their use in practice is quality. MT currently does not offer accurate mediation
for many language pairs and in many healthcare settings. In a bid to mitigate the current
problems with MT while benefitting from some degree of automation, several semi-
a utomated approaches, especially phrase-based translation apps, have been developed. The
apps are normally p re-populated with validated human translations of common phrases
and sentences to provide basic communication support in a specified healthcare setting.
The interaction with these apps can be as complex as the interaction with MT software.
A brief review of this dynamic field of development will be provided in the last section of
this chapter.
Technology-mediated interpreting
Technology-mediated modalities of interpreting have been utilised in healthcare commu-
nication for many years, initially in the form of telephone interpreting, but over the past
decade, video links have begun to replace telephone-based interpreting (see for instance
Marshall et al. 2019). Before the C ovid-19 pandemic, the most common use of both tele-
phone and video links in interpreter-assisted healthcare communication was to enable re-
mote interpreting, to connect an interpreter who is offsite to d octor-patient encounters in
which the doctor and the patient are c o-present in the same room (Rosenberg 2007; Lázaro
Gutiérrez 2019). With the rise of telehealth consultations by phone or video link during
the pandemic, it has also become more common to integrate interpreters in telehealth con-
sultations. In this configuration, the interpreter is either c o-located with one of the inter-
locutors or participates from a separate location, leading to a three-way communication
link (Rosenberg 2007; Schulz et al. 2015; Zhang, in preparation). While research on this
configuration is still scarce, the available evidence from research on remote interpreting can
provide transferable insights, given that all configurations share an element of remote work-
ing and remote interaction.
Literature overview
In relation to remote interpreting, the gradual replacement of the telephone with video links
has stimulated research comparing onsite interpreting with telephone and video remote in-
terpreting in terms of user preferences and user satisfaction with the communication and/or
care received ( Joseph, Garruba and Melder 2017). This research shows that patients or their
caregivers find all modalities of interpreting satisfactory (Locatis et al. 2010; Price et al. 2012;
Lion et al. 2015; Anttila et al. 2017), although there is some evidence that onsite interpreting
was preferred to the technology-mediated modalities, with video being preferred to tele-
phone interpreting (Lion et al. 2015; Anttila et al. 2017). Where healthcare providers and/or
interpreters were surveyed, they generally preferred onsite interpreting, and, among the
technology-mediated modalities, video to telephone (A zarmina and Wallace 2005; Locatis
et al. 2010; Price et al. 2012). Furthermore, in a study comparing different modalities of
delivery as well as different modes of interpreting, remote simultaneous interpreting via
telephone, which was a new service offered by some US hospitals at the time of the study,
yielded higher levels of patient satisfaction than onsite interpreting and remote consecu-
tive interpreting via telephone (Gany et al. 2007). Two surveys of telephone interpreters
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in Australia highlighted a wide range of likes and dislikes as well as c ommunication-and

interaction-related challenges and challenges linked to working conditions (Lee 2007; Wang
2018).
A small number of studies have explored the interpreting quality and/or quality of com-
munication in technology-mediated healthcare interpreting. An early study compared the
quality of onsite interpreting in consecutive mode with that of remote interpreting (v ia
audio link) in simultaneous mode, finding higher accuracy levels in the remote modality
(Hornberger et al. 1996). Notably, the interpreters preferred onsite consecutive interpret-
ing but thought that the remote simultaneous delivery would be beneficial for doctors and
patients. The healthcare providers and patients preferred the remote option. While the use
of a different mode of interpreting in each test condition may have skewed the results in
Hornberger et al.’s (1996) study, a more recent comparative analysis of interpreting quality
and interaction in onsite, telephone and v ideo-mediated interpreting in simulated healthcare
encounters (a ll in consecutive mode) also found evidence of a relationship between inter-
preting quality and modality (de Boe 2020). Two other recent studies compared the accuracy
of patient comprehension in onsite, telephone and video interpreting (consecutive mode) by
assessing the patients’ ability to explain the diagnosis they were given. These studies found
that onsite and video interpreting had led to a better understanding than telephone interpret-
ing (Lion et al. 2015; Anttila et al. 2017).
Some quality-related issues have also been identified in research exploring interactional
aspects of telephone and v ideo-mediated interpreting. Research on remote interpreting by
telephone suggests that the lack of visual cues in this modality has an impact on the coor-
dination of the interaction and, as a result, on the interpreters’ performance (Hsieh 2006;
Fernández Pérez 2017; Ruiz Mezcua 2018; Lázaro Gutiérrez and Cabrera Méndez 2019).
Other studies emphasise the need for developing the interpreter’s interaction management
skills (Fernández Pérez 2017) and show that telephone interpreters take a proactive role in
optimising communication, for example through intervention and clarification strategies
(Wang 2018; de Boe 2020), by switching to the third person with the aim of increasing
clarity for the recipients (Lee 2007), and through side conversations with the main interloc-
utors (Rosenberg 2007). Recent studies examining the interaction in remote interpreting
via video link in healthcare settings have focussed on the visual ecology and the use of
visual and embodied resources, suggesting that the complexity of the visual interaction in
this modality can put constraints on communication. For example, in situations of video
remote interpreting, the triangle position characteristic of onsite (d ialogue) interpreting is
more difficult to achieve, making it more difficult for the interpreter to perceive embodied
cues from, and build a rapport with, the co-present interlocutors and vice versa (Davitti and
Braun 2020; Hansen 2020; Klammer and Pöchhacker 2021). Furthermore, the participants
do not always seem to make effective use of the visual context available in video remote
interpreting (Davitti and Braun 2020; Hansen 2020).
Research on the interactional dimension in other configurations of telephone-based and
v ideo-mediated interpreting in healthcare settings is scarce. Rosenberg (2007) contended
that the interaction in three-way telephone links whereby the primary interlocutors and
the interpreter are each in a different location may be less problematic than in remote inter-
preting via telephone, as a three-way link may put the participants on a more equal footing.
However, analysing the quality of interpreting and interactional aspects in three-way video
links with interpreters (using simultaneous interpreting), Braun (2007) concluded that this
configuration creates its own interactional problems, especially a greater need for coordina-
tion on the part of the interpreter.
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Since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, new ways of communicating between
healthcare providers and patients have created new demands for interpreting and have accel-
erated the use of technology-mediated healthcare interpreting. Many emerging configura-
tions and practices, and their impact on the interpreter-mediated interaction have yet to be
investigated systematically, including, for example the increased use of three-way links to
facilitate interpreter-mediated telehealth consultations (see above) but also the use of mixed
media (audio and video links) and multiple devices (healthcare communication platform,
mobile phone) in interpreter-mediated healthcare encounters (Zhang, in preparation).
In addition, despite research into user satisfaction and experience with telephone and
v ideo-mediated interpreting in healthcare settings, especially remote interpreting, the ex-
tent to which technology-mediated modalities of interpreting can provide an effective alter-
native to onsite interpreting in healthcare workflows has not yet been fully established. The
findings of satisfaction-related studies referenced in the previous section appear to suggest
that patients are satisfied with all interpreting modalities. However, patients were normally
subjected only to one interpreting modality. Given the prevailing difficulties in accessing
healthcare interpreters (e.g. Whitaker et al. 2022), patients’ comparable levels of satisfaction
with each interpreting modality may, in part, stem from the comfort they derived from
being able to access an interpreter. Other research suggests that interpreters find all three
interpreting modalities (onsite, telephone, and video) satisfactory for conveying information
but prefer onsite interpreting for patient assessment, citing difficulties in establishing a rap-
port with remote participants as one of the main reasons (Price et al. 2012). Such studies are
particularly interesting as they uncover the factors that contribute to the variation in partic-
ipants’ satisfaction with different modalities, here interactional issues and their potentially
different implications in different modalities.
However, user satisfaction is only one dimension of technology-mediated interpret-
ing. A further issue is the current evidence gap with regard to the quality of technology-
mediated interpreting and its potential impact on patient outcomes. The small number of
studies exploring quality has mostly drawn on self-reported perceptions of quality by pa-
tients and/or providers. Interpreters’ perceptions of quality have not always been collected.
There also appears to be little awareness of the potential discrepancies between subjective
quality perceptions and objective quality, or of the challenges of assessing the quality of
interpreter-mediated communication, a trend which seemingly continues (see Fiedler et al.
2022). Studies that have systematically investigated patients’ or caregivers’ comprehension
of medical messages (Lion et al. 2015; Anttila et al. 2017) suggest a relationship between the
modality of interpreting and the patient/caregiver outcome, with onsite and v ideo-mediated
interpreting producing better results than telephone interpreting.
As was highlighted in the previous section, interactional issues have received more atten-
tion in the study of technology-mediated interpreting. In relation to telephone interpreting,
the most widely debated interactional issue is the lack of visual resources. Research shows that
the lack of visual cues is likely to have an impact on the coordination of the interaction and,
as a result, on the interpreters’ performance (Hsieh 2006; Lee 2007; Fernández Pérez 2017;
Lázaro Gutiérrez and Cabrera Mendez 2019). A question that has been discussed is, how-
ever, to what extent interpreters can adapt to the lack of visual cues, for example by making
greater use of paralanguage, tone of voice and other available resources (Wang 2018; Lázaro
Gutiérrez and Cabrera Mendez 2019). Research on interaction in v ideo-mediated interpret-
ing has also addressed the visual dimension, arguing that the greater visual complexity of this
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modality compared to both onsite and telephone interpreting requires greater awareness of
the importance of spatial arrangements (Davitti and Braun 2020; Klammer and Pöchhacker
2021). Although the relationship between the interactional dimension and other dimensions
of technology-mediated interpreting is under-explored, the detailed analyses of interactional
issues in remote interpreting partially call into question the findings from user satisfaction/
experience studies, which suggest that v ideo-mediated interpreting has more similarities
with onsite interpreting. The i nteraction-focussed studies thus highlight the need for further
in-depth investigations of technology-mediated interpreting as modalities in its own right.
One aspect that interaction- focused studies of technology-mediated interpreting in
healthcare (a nd other) settings have been able to highlight is the potential for adaptation to
the novel modalities. For instance, these studies have identified adapted interactional strat-
egies employed by interpreters (e.g. more explicit coordination; Braun 2007; Davitti and
Braun 2020) and by healthcare providers (e.g. chunking the source speech for better control
of the interaction; Klammer and Pöchhacker 2021). The C ovid-19 pandemic brought a
sudden shift to much more technology-mediated interpreting including a diversification in
the configurations and greater hybridity and complexity in the use of communication media
and devices. The potential for adaptation is therefore an area that needs to be pursued in re-
search and practice, including learning to adapt through education and training (see Amato,
Spinolo and Rodriguez 2018).
Real-time crowdsourcing translation and interpreting

In addition to expanding the reach and accessibility of human interpreters through com-
munication technologies, technological advances including web 2.0., social media, and the
development of platforms that can connect large numbers of users from anywhere in the
world have given the impetus to a new approach to facilitating multilingual communication,
namely real-time crowdsourcing translation. Crowdsourcing translation has been described
as the ‘human version of machine translation’, as both approaches can cope with high volume
and perform at high speed (A nastasiou and Gupta 2011). Research on this type of multilingual
communication has emerged from humanitarian crisis and medical emergency situations.
Literature overview
Crowdsourcing translation is a form of online collaboration established to respond to urgent
or otherwise unmet communication needs, fulfilled voluntarily by a network of people with
differing profiles and levels of language proficiency. It can be paid or unpaid, and has also
been described as ‘volunteer’, ‘collaborative,’ ‘social’, ‘non-professional’ and ‘community’
translation (O’Brien 2011; Jiménez-Crespo 2017). Crowdsourcing translation has become
an integral part of responding to natural or human-instigated disasters, violent political
upheaval, or health crises, especially when the need arises to carry out aid/rescue work in-
stantly due to the urgency of saving lives and when this need cannot be met by drawing on
professional interpreting services. In these situations, support for providing humanitarian aid
and healthcare often overlap, including emergency medical services, trauma counselling, and
rescue operations. Crowdsourcing platforms that connect volunteer translators/interpreters
and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have facilitated communication in various
settings. For example, during the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, Twitter and short message ser-
vice (SMS) communications were facilitated using a crowdsourcing platform with an inte-
grated map, which enabled “volunteers from within the Haitian Creole and F rench-speaking
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communities to translate, categorise and geolocate messages in real-time” (Munro 2013:

210). This information was then distributed to English-speaking information managers
based within and outside Haiti, who in turn communicated with those who were able to
provide aid or who monitored the situation. The communication was facilitated via an on-
line chat room, which served as a q uestion-answer medium. As Munro (2013) explains, the
members of the ‘crowd’ shared their knowledge of locations, regional slang, abbreviations
and spelling variants to process thousands of messages within the first weeks of the crises
from several countries, saving lives and helping to direct first food and aid deliveries to the
affected populations. Similar approaches were developed and used during the Ebola outbreak
in West Africa in 2 014–16 to cater for local language support (Tanner and Obrecht 2015), in
response to the Syrian refugee crisis (Balkul 2018) and, to some extent, during the C ovid-19
pandemic (K rystallidou and Braun 2022).
An example of the crowdsourcing platform addressing such situations is the Tarjimly
platform, which was founded in 2017 in response to the Syrian refugee crisis. As of 2021,
Tarjimly supports over 50 languages and is accessible through the Facebook Messenger app.
It has been used to support access to healthcare for refugees in Greece and to assist refugees
in the USA. It has more than 9,000 volunteers helping refugees and aid workers with medical
emergencies, asylum interviews, trauma counselling and rescue operations. Tarjimly volun-
teers have also translated for staff at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(U NHCR), the Syrian American Medical Society and the International Rescue Commu-
nity. The developers make it explicit on their website that the service they offer does not re-
place professional interpreting for medical appointments (or in legal communication), where
professional services are available (https://t arjimly.org/en).

Crowdsourcing translation in the context of a crisis comes with a great responsibility as any
translation errors could result in the loss of human life and as information translated through
crowdsourcing may become the basis for policy-making in relation to further crises (Sutherlin
2013). As Sutherlin (2013: 400) notes, “crowdsourcing relies on volunteers, frequently ama-
teurs, who are not bound by nor acquainted with a professional code of e thics” that is in place
for professional translators and interpreters. In addition, crowdsourcing approaches have often
been developed in response to a specific crisis, without undergoing quality assurance. Suther-
lin (2013: 397) highlights the importance of incorporating “the distinguishing features of the
crises, the real-life stakes for the individuals being translated and the expertise of translators.”
Apart from providing training to volunteer translators (crowd workers), one way of mitigat-
ing the challenges inherent in the crowdsourcing approach is to improve the process of match-
ing bilingual volunteers to refugees or aid workers who need translation/interpreting support,
that is, the identification of the best suited volunteer translator for a given request based on the
competence of the volunteer and the characteristics of request. The developers of the Tarjimly
platform, for example have developed an approach drawing on artificial intelligence and ma-
chine learning capabilities to address this problem at scale (Agarwal et al. 2020).
The actual interaction between the volunteer translators/ interpreters and those in
need of language mediation (in interpersonal healthcare communication) has, to the best
of our knowledge, not yet been investigated systematically. However, given the findings
from research on technology-mediated interpreting, which indicate that the interaction in
technology-mediated settings can be optimised through training and adjustments to system
design, research into interactional practices on crowdsourcing translation platforms and into
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their impact on the user experience and the translated outcome would be a useful step in
future research.
Machine translation
A different approach to meeting communication needs through technology has been to use
MT. This approach was triggered by the increasing availability of MT systems, including
both generic systems and customised systems. Generic MT tools such as Google Translate
offer free access to an increasing number of language pairs, but the translations they produce
are unreliable and raise issues about liability and data privacy. Customised MT systems focus
on increasing accuracy by training the MT engine for a specific domain. A growing body
of studies explores the use of MT tools for written communication in healthcare contexts
(Turner et al. 2015; Chen and Acosta 2019). However, the present overview focuses on the
use of MT tools in dialogic interpersonal communication. One aspect that is particularly im-
portant in this context is therefore the evolution and use of MT systems capable of processing
and/or generating speech output.
Literature overview
Speech-to-text and speech-to-speech MT solutions have a long history but have remained
experimental for a long time (Seligman, Waibel and Joscelyne 2017). MT systems that pro-
cess and/or generate spoken output are normally a concatenation of automatic speech recog-
nition (ASR) to process spoken source-language input, an MT engine to achieve the actual
language transfer and an optional speech synthesis system to create spoken target-language
output. The processing of spoken language brings additional challenges, because ASR is
at different stages of development for different languages and generally still has difficulty
coping with features that are characteristic of interpersonal communication (for instance,
overlap between speakers and background noise in the environment).
Publicly available generic MT tools have improved over the past decade, and translation
apps such as Google Translate and Microsoft Translator offer translation of written and
spoken input into speech or text output in n ear-real time in a growing number of language
pairs. Evidence of the use of generic MT tools in daily clinical practice emerged recently
as a by-product of a study examining attitudes to vaccination among Polish and Romanian
communities in England (Moberly 2018a). A large proportion of healthcare professionals
involved in delivering vaccines to these communities reported relying on free MT tools.
While official guidance in the UK does not endorse their use in medical consultations,
the healthcare workers believed that the tools were more accessible than professional inter-
preting services, particularly during t ime-pressured appointments. Reacting to this finding,
medical advisers pointed out that tools such as Google Translate should not be used in ev-
eryday clinical practice because of the risk of introducing communication errors and under-
mining patient safety, leaving doctors vulnerable to legal action (Moberly 2018b). However,
the advisers contended that MT tools may have a limited role in an emergency or in other
exceptional circumstances.
Research systematically trialling the use of generic MT tools as a potential alternative
to interpreting services in interpersonal healthcare communication started from a similar
premise and has explored the quality of MT in situations where time constraints make it
difficult to access interpreters, especially emergency situations, and/or where there is a lack
of interpreters for specific language pairs. For example, Nguyen-Lu, Reide and Yentis (2010)
96
evaluated the use of Google Translate for translating common anaesthetic questions in acute
emergencies, while Haith-Cooper (2014) tested its use in maternity services. Both studies
concluded that the support provided by Google Translate was limited. Turner et al. (2019)
simulated a medical emergency situation to compare the use of Google Translate with a
fi xed-sentence translation tool, finding, however, that the usefulness of Google Translate in
this situation was limited due to translation errors and difficulties responding to questions,
i.e. interactional issues (see also Bouillon et al. 2017).
In assessments of the use of Google Translate to translate emergency department dis-
charge instructions from English into Spanish and Chinese, Khoong et al. (2 019) found
that a high proportion of sentences were translated accurately (92% for Spanish and 81%
for Chinese) but that 2% of Spanish and 8% of Chinese sentence translations had potential
for significant/life threatening harm, for instance due to errors in word disambiguation
problems. In a similar study analysing further language pairs, Taira et al. (2 021) found
the performance of Google Translate to be inconsistent across seven language pairs, with
accuracy rates ranging from 55% to 94%. Testing the capability of another generic transla-
tion app, iTranslate, to translate questions that diabetes patients commonly ask clinicians,
Chen, Acosta and Barry (2 017) found the MT output to be comparable to human trans-
lation in terms of accuracy for simple sentences but e rror-prone for complex sentences.
None of the studies referenced here has addressed questions of how the users interact with
the apps.
As generic MT systems do not provide translation of good quality, a different approach
has been used to develop customised MT systems to cater for the needs in specific contexts/
domains. Several projects have focused on the development of customised one-way speech-
to-speech translation systems. Their primary interest has been the quality that can be
achieved with a customised MT system, although the findings are also interesting from an
interactional perspective. For example, SRI International developed MedSLT, a system that
translates doctor’s diagnostic questions to patients, who can answer with yes or no, or with
body language. While simulated doctor–patient encounters using this tool showed that this
approach is workable from an interactional point of view, despite the limitations it imposes
on the interaction, the system was found to produce translation errors that can cause diag-
nostic errors (Starlander and Estrella 2009). Another MT system, which was developed to
assist English-speaking patients in a South Korean hospital to describe their symptoms to
Korean healthcare professionals (Shin et al. 2015), was integrated into a humanoid robot
to improve the user’s interaction with it. In this case, the MT was evaluated on sentences
with limited vocabulary and structures and was found to be 84% accurate for native English
speech and 64% for non-native English speech. The robot was able to move around the hos-
pital to assist patients in need, and the interaction with it was deemed easy and not requiring
specific operating knowledge.
An example of a two-way speech-to-speech system is Converser for Healthcare, which
translates conversations between English-speaking healthcare professionals and Spanish-
speaking patients in hospital in-patient nursing situations (Seligman and Dillinger 2015).
This system applies interactive verification and other techniques such as backtranslation and
correction of the MT output to mitigate the issues arising in the process of speech recogni-
tion and/or in the MT component. The translation quality of the system was not evaluated.
In a user experience study, hospital staff perceived the MT quality as good enough, although
most patients reported that they prefer a human interpreter. In addition, the user interface of
the tool was deemed to be complex, and users found it hard to use the tablet on which the
tool was running in hospital (Seligman and Dillinger 2015).
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Among the critical issues relating to the use of MT as a potential alternative to interpret-
ing services in language-discordant interpersonal healthcare communication are the quality
achievable with current MT systems and the evaluation of quality in this context. None of
the MT tools trialled in interpersonal healthcare settings have reached the level of accuracy
and nuance in the transfer of meaning that professional interpreters generally achieve. More-
over, common ways of addressing MT problems, namely pre-editing the input to simplify
and adapt it to bring it in line with the content that the selected MT system is capable of
dealing with and post-editing the output to improve its accuracy, are of limited value in
situations of real-time interpersonal (healthcare) communication. However, the authors of
the above-referenced studies have come to different conclusions regarding the potential of
MT tools in the given context. While Turner et al. (2019) concluded that generic MT tools
were not ready for use in (emergency) medical settings, Khoong et al. (2019) suggested that
their findings could ‘cautiously support’ the use of such tools. Khoong et al.’s (2019) find-
ings, however, drew criticism from Downie and Dickson (2019), who took issue with the
study’s design and rigour. The need for rigour was also emphasised by Dew et al. (2018), who
highlighted the need for agreed evaluation criteria for the use of MT in healthcare settings,
although Downie and Dickson (2019) went further in their critique, by also pointing to
ethical problems with submitting personal or identifying information to Google Translate,
given that any information submitted to such services may be reused by the company run-
ning the service. Responding to these points, Khoong and Fernandez (2019) subsequently
urged caution with the use of Google Translate in clinical practice. While MT is developing
fast, the overall picture emerging from the recent debates is thus that the incorporation of
both generic and customised MT tools in a real-life clinical environment continues to be
problematic and that both the healthcare professional and the patient are currently better
served by a professional interpreter (Dew et al. 2018).
As pointed out above, pre-editing and post-editing are not helpful for improving MT quality
interpersonal, dialogic communication, but the research on MT use in such settings has identi-
fied opportunities for human intervention in, and interaction with, the MT output (Seligman
and Dillinger 2015; Seligman, Waibel and Joscelyne 2017). These include r eal-time error iden-
tification and correction, interactive disambiguation, backtranslation and confidence indica-
tion, but they are n on-trivial. For example, the real-time identification of speech recognition
errors either requires the display of a transcript of the ASR and skilled users to identify errors,
or it requires a voice playback of what the ASR system has understood, which slows down any
communicative interaction between users. The identification of MT errors is even more prob-
lematic. Equally important, in-depth studies of how users interact with and through MT tools
in this situation and how the interaction impacts on the outcome have not yet been conducted.
A further challenge is that the various approaches to using and improving MT output
require a level of awareness of common issues with MT. In situations with lay users such
as healthcare communication, the practicality of awareness-raising is challenging at least
on the part of the lay user (patient), while healthcare staff could be trained to increase their
MT literacy (Bowker and Ciro 2019). Moreover, the ethical issues that were highlighted in
response to Khoong et al.’s (2019) study show that decisions about the use of MT in interper-
sonal healthcare communication cannot be based solely on translation quality. MT literacy
plays an important part in ethical decision-making in relation to MT use.
Given the problems with current MT solutions, some of the studies reviewed in this sec-
tion have highlighted alternative approaches for situations where timely access to interpreters
98
is likely to remain problematic. For example, Haith-Cooper (2014), who concluded that the
use of Google Translate in maternity services is inadequate, recommended the development
of sets of midwifery terminology in different languages and their use in an app to facilitate
multilingual communication between midwives and those who receive maternity services.
This approach will be reviewed in the next section.
Fixed-sentence and phrase-based translation tools

A further approach to overcoming language barriers when professional interpreters are not
available has been the development of domain-specific, fi xed-sentence and/or phrase-based
translation tools, also known as phrasebook apps. These tools operate on the basis of mul-
tilingual sets of phrases and sentences, p re-translated by human translators. While such
systems cannot support free-flowing dialogic communication, they can produce accurate
results for highly formulaic dialogues.
Literature overview
Some phrasebook apps allow users to select only from the p re-loaded phrases in the app.
Other apps support f ree-text or speech input and use speech recognition and other language
technologies to match the phrase entered by the user to the pre-loaded phrases, enabling
healthcare professionals and patients to ask questions or describe symptoms in their own
words. An example of a text-based tool is Xprompt (A lbrecht et al. 2013), which draws on a
set of 800 phrases available in over 20 languages. Both patients and healthcare professionals
can search for relevant phrases in their respective source languages in text format. The target
language equivalents are available in text format, audio and as video clips with sign-language
versions. A speech-enabled tool is BabelDr (Bouillon et al. 2017), which ‘l istens’ to questions
asked by healthcare professionals and retrieves a p re-loaded canonical version of the same
questions in advance of retrieving the target language version, which can be shown as text
or played as an audio message. BabelDr uses closed questions to which patients are expected
to respond non-verbally, by nodding or pointing.
A recent study evaluated 15 apps with regard to the extent to which they support every-
day healthcare communication needs (Panayiotou et al. 2019). Only two (CALD Assist and
Talk To Me) were deemed suitable for everyday interpersonal healthcare communication.
At the time of the evaluation, both apps were limited to text input and mainly used closed
questions, that is operated at the most restrictive level of support that such apps provide,
while minimising risks from mismatching speech input and/or free-text input. They were
also the only apps that included an explicit disclaimer about their limitations and emphasised
the importance of using professional interpreters where possible.
In a further study, Turner et al. (2019) tested Google Translate and QuickSpeak, a
phrase-based translation tool, with providers of emergency medical services and Spanish and
Chinese-speaking patients, using simulations and post-session questionnaires. QuickSpeak
received higher usability scores than Google Translate, and patients preferred QuickSpeak
over Google Translate in terms of understanding the questions asked by the emergency
personnel. Both the emergency staff and the patients positively highlighted the flexibility of
Google Translate but emphasised that its usefulness was limited by multiple translation errors
and difficulty in responding to questions.
An approach that has similarities with the use of phrase-based translation tools is Aug-
mentative and Alternative Communication (A AC), which was originally developed to assist
99
Sabine Braun et al.
people with severe speech and language impairments to communicate their needs and feel-
ings (Enderby et al. 2013). Some AAC tools offer picture-based symbols matched with words
to support communication. While they were originally designed to support patients in inten-
sive care units, Somers and Lovel (2006) trialled their use with linguistic-minority patients.
Their findings suggest that AAC tools can improve the prospects of communication in the
absence of a professional interpreter. Similar tools have also been developed to provide basic
communication support in humanitarian crisis situations. For example, ICOON for refugees
(Lloyd 2019), which was developed in cooperation with aid organisations, includes 1,200
symbols and photos to help refugees overcome language barriers and make themselves under-
stood quickly in different situations. A multimodal open-source app called Translation Cards,
developed in a collaboration between UNHCR, Google, Mercy Corps, ThoughtWorks and
Translators Without Borders in response to the 2015 refugee crisis, offers audio-visual flash-
cards for communication. It allows refugees to read and listen to pre-translated phrases in
their own language. Aid organisation can create different sets of card decks to include, for
example translations of basic questions that can be answered with yes/no, non-verbally, or by
showing a document, as well as p re-translated answers to questions that refugees frequently
ask (Drew 2016).
Other tools that focus on healthcare needs have gone beyond translation functionality or
have complemented it. For example, HABABY, an app for prenatal and postnatal care for
refugee women provides country, symptom and medication information in multiple lan-
guages while also offering an anonymous message board and the option for live chat with a
healthcare professional and other features (Federici and O’Brien 2019).

In the limited body of research on the use of phrasebook apps in interpersonal healthcare
communication, two findings are particularly noteworthy. On the one hand, Panayiotou
et al. (2019) emphasised that all of the 15 phrasebook apps they evaluated require caution
when used in a r eal-life healthcare setting and that they should not be used to replace pro-
fessional interpreters. Notably, one of the apps they evaluated, Canopy Speak, offered the
users an opportunity to call a healthcare interpreter, thus enabling healthcare professionals to
intervene if the communication via the app becomes too complex to be handled by the app.
On the other hand, Turner et al.’s (2019) comparative study, which involved a phrasebook
app and Google Translate, suggests that the phrasebook app used in their study was seen as
preferable to an MT tool in terms of its reliability.
All authors who have explored the use of phrasebook apps for interpersonal healthcare com-
munication agree that these tools attempt to strike a balance between flexibility and accuracy
and that their use in real-life settings is currently limited. At the same time, continuous ad-
vances in speech recognition and MT for many languages, including low-resource languages,
could enable a combination of content pre-translated by a human translator with automatically
translated content and options for user intervention (for instance, error correction). This could
increase the flexibility of such tools while reducing the risk of compromising quality.
Conclusion
The need to reduce language barriers in interpersonal healthcare communication is grow-
ing in many countries due to global migration. Professional interpreting services, as the
gold standard, can be extended through the use of communication technology, especially
100
v ideo-mediated communication, but access to professional healthcare interpreters continues

to be problematic in emergency settings and for ‘small’ language pairs. In such situations,
alternative ways of reducing language barriers through crowdsourced translations, MT or
phrasebook apps have been explored, although most researchers concur in their assessment
that these tools currently do not provide a f ully-fledged alternative to professional interpreting.
Where the involvement of professional interpreters is impossible or impractical and where
the risk is low, technology-supported approaches such as MT and phrasebook apps may in
the future become a viable alternative to professional interpreting services. However, their
use needs to be complemented by further research, training (Dew et al. 2018) and further
customisation, for example by training of translators on using open-source MT toolkits to
build MT engines (Federici and Al Sharou 2018).
Khoong and Rodriguez (2022) propose to focus further research into MT use in health-
care communication on exploring the risks of MT use in different healthcare settings and
improving the MT algorithms through increased diversity. Dew et al. (2018) have further-
more highlighted the importance of consistent evaluation criteria for MT outputs; the same
can be said for the outputs of phrasebook application. Equally important is greater emphasis
on the study of how users interact with different types of tools, how this may contribute to
shaping the outcome of the language mediation process and what can be learnt from inter-
actional analyses for the design of the tools and their user interfaces.
Migrant and refugee populations ultimately need access to a wide range of healthcare
information and other critical public information. There is therefore also a broader need for
‘multilingualising’ access to information, that is making information available in different
languages as a default, even if this information changes frequently/dynamically, as we have
seen during the C ovid-19 pandemic and in recent humanitarian crises situations. Such infor-
mation can be updated by professional translators and appropriate MT tools.
Further reading
Dew, Kristin N., Anne M. Turner, Yong K. Choi, Alyssa Bosold, and Katrin Kirchhoff (2018)
“Development of machine translation technology for assisting health communication: A system-
atic review”, Journal of Biomedical Informatics 85 (September): 56–67. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
jbi.2018.07.018.
This systematic review explores the extent to which machine translation can be used in language-discordant
healthcare communication and the steps that need to be taken to facilitate its adoption and improve its
effectiveness.
Joseph, Corey, Marie Garruba, and Angela Melder (2017) “Patient satisfaction of telephone or video
interpreter services compared with In-person services: A systematic review”, Australian Health
Review 42 (2): 168–77. https://doi.org/10.1071/A H16195.
This review article synthesises previous findings regarding patient satisfaction with the three modalities of
interpreting service delivery: telephone, video-mediated and in-person interpreting.
Klammer, Martina, and Franz Pöchhacker (2021) “Video remote interpreting in clinical communi-
cation: A multimodal analysis”, Patient Education and Counselling 104 (12): 2867–76. https://doi.
org/10.1016/J.PEC.2021.08.024.
The article provides an in-depth analysis of remote interpreting via video link in a doctor-patient encoun-
ter, illustrating the challenges and affordances of this modality of interpreting for the interpreter and the main
interlocutors.
Panayiotou, Anita, Anastasia Gardner, Sue Williams, Emiliano Zucchi, Monita Mascitti-Meuter, Anita
M.Y. Goh, Emily You, Terence W.H. Chong, Dina Logiudice, Xiaoping Lin, Betty Haralambous,
and Frances Batchelor (2019) “Language translation apps in health care settings: Expert opinion”,
JMIR MHealth and UHealth 7 (4): e11316. https://doi.org/10.2196/11316.
This article evaluates several phrasebook apps to assess their suitability for facilitating everyday conversations
in healthcare settings. It includes an analysis of the apps’ features and a set of evaluation criteria.
101
Sabine Braun et al.
Vieira, Lucas Nunes, Minako O’Hagan, and Carol O’Sullivan (2 021) “Understanding the socie-
tal impacts of machine translation: A critical review of the literature on medical and legal use
case”, Information, Communication and Society 24 (11): 1515–32. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.
2020.1776370.
Based on a critical review of official documents and published research, this article reflects on the consequences
of uninformed uses of machine translation in high-risk domains including healthcare settings.
Related chapters
Chapter 5, Corpus-based studies of public service interpreting by Bernd Meyer
Chapter 20, Blended learning is here to stay! Combining on-line and on-campus learning in the education of public
service interpreters by Gry Sagli and Hanne Skaaden
ing by Natacha Niemants, Jessica P. B. Hansen and Elizabeth Stokoe
Chapter 22, Training interpreters in asylum settings: the REMILAS project by Anna Claudia Ticca, Véro-
nique Traverso and Emilie Jouin
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7
PUBLIC SERVICE TRANSLATION
Critical issues and future directions
Mustapha Taibi
Introduction
Public service translation (PST) plays a key role in facilitating communication between
public services and the general public, particularly in situations where the two sides do not
share the same language. On the one hand, PST allows government departments, agencies
and services (a s well as the non-government sector) to reach out to all members of a society.
On the other, it allows speakers of minority or minoritised languages access to public texts
that would normally be inaccessible due to language barriers.
PST has attracted some research attention in the last two decades. The International Com-
munity Translation Research Group was founded towards the end of 2013. A year later, the
First International Conference on Community Translation was organised at Western Sydney
University. In 2019 the second conference was organised at RMIT University, Melbourne.
A few publications have come out (e.g. Taibi 2011; Lesch 2012; Córdoba Serrano 2016; Taibi
and Ozolins 2016; Tomozeiu 2016; García 2018; Kelly 2018; Määttä 2020). However, PST is
still a developing area of Translation Studies. An indication of its early developmental stage
is the conceptual and terminological variation surrounding it. PST is also known as Com-
munity Translation. Community Translation, in turn, is used to refer to different types of
translation: professional PST (e.g. Taibi and Ozolins 2016; Taibi 2018) or volunteer (crowd-
sourced) translation for online communities (O’Hagan 2011; García 2018). This variation
does not only indicate the terminological diversity that characterises language and communi-
cation disciplines but also denotes different assumptions about professional standards. García
(2018) suggests that the two notions and practices of Community Translation can work hand
in hand, in such a way that h igh-stake translation materials are assigned to professional trans-
lators, and non-critical ones are undertaken by bilingual volunteers or amateurs.
In this chapter, the focus is on PST or Community Translation as a professional service
consisting of written translation intended to bridge the communication gap between public
services and relevant organisations on the one hand and speakers of minority or minoritised
languages on the other. ‘Professional service’ is understood as ‘a paid occupation which requires
a formal qualification’ (Schäffner 2020: 64; see also Skaaden, this volume). Formal qualification
can consist of a relevant education degree, professional certification or any other adequate form
of credentialing. In this sense, it contrasts with non-professional translation, which is offered by
106 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-9

Public service translation
‘individuals not only without formal training in linguistic mediation but also working for free’
(Pérez González and Susam-Sarayeva 2012: 151). However, while the focus is on PST as a pro-
fessional activity, reference is occasionally made to non-professional translation where relevant.
The chapter starts with theoretical considerations and a literature review covering recent
contributions, then discusses some of the most prominent issues in PST (quality assurance,
translation accessibility, and dissemination methods), and finally looks at future directions,
with a focus on multimodal dissemination methods and potential interdisciplinary collabo-
ration with scholarly areas such as social marketing.
Theoretical considerations and existing literature
The social role of PST

In previous work (Taibi 2011; Taibi and Ozolins 2016), PST was defined as an area of trans-
lation with a social mission, that is as a language service that empowers linguistically and
socio-economically disempowered communities. It has also been established that the work
of public service translators is constrained by power asymmetry between text producers
and readers, imparity between source and target languages, and sociolinguistic and educa-
tional diversity among audiences. Lesch (2018) agrees that PST aims to enable and empower
(m inoritised) community members. He, therefore, argues that the social and linguistic needs
of these people need to be prioritised.
Understandably, all translation is a social activity to some extent, and all translators have
a social role and impact. As Wolf (2007: 1) puts it, ‘A ny translation, as both an enactment
and a product, is necessarily embedded within social contexts’. Translators do their work
having in mind benefits to humanity and a positive impact on society – or readership, at least
(Tymoczko 2000: 26). This applies to news translation (Bielsa 2016), audio-visual translation
(Diaz-Cintas, Orero and Remael 2007: 13) and even to literary translation (Cronin 2003:
142), to cite just a few examples.
What distinguishes PST is that its social role is generally local and focused on minority
or minoritised language communities within the same country or region. It usually covers
texts about essential public services (healthcare, education, social services, environment, and so
forth), and it caters for indigenous or migrant language groups in a particular country, state or
municipality. Corsellis (2008: 32) notes that ‘[t]ranslation in the public service sector can also
include an international dimension’, as in the case of medical or social service reports travelling
internationally. Ko (2018: 143, 145) also agrees that PST can sometimes extend beyond na-
tional boundaries, but acknowledges that it is usually ‘localised, context-specific and culture-
specific’, which requires translators to develop knowledge of the relevant local culture and
institutions. In the case of general awareness campaigns such as those relating to human rights,
the environment or preventive healthcare, for instance, PST can clearly become an interna-
tional exercise. Especially with the help of the Internet, resources translated locally can be used
and have an impact internationally. However, PST is generally guided by national or local pol-
icies and initiatives, and it aims to serve and empower national, regional or local communities.
Translator agency
Given the social mission of PST and the social contexts where it is usually offered (or
needed), translator agency is central to this area of translation practice. Translation in general
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is a social activity performed by social actors to fulfil certain social needs (Tyulenev 2014:
126). As Way (2016: 1018) affirms, ‘translators are social agents who participate not only in
the communication process but in society as a whole’. Among other senses, the notion of
‘agency’ is understood as ‘human action… which makes a difference to a human relationship
or behaviour’ ( Jary and Jary 2000), and as such it applies more specifically to PS translators.
To empower communities, PS translators, as a first step, take into consideration the socio-
linguistic situation of their community, the o ften-asymmetrical relationships between social
groups and between these and institutions, and particularly the relative social status of public
service staff and the target readers of PST. As a second step, they are expected to assume an
active role in enabling access to information, literacy and, ultimately, societal and economic
change (Taibi and Ozolins 2016: 70–71).
In the last two decades or so, translator agency has been a major question in Translation
Studies, probably ‘a s a reaction to a more established tradition of studying norms and systems
in translation’ (Paloposki 2007: 336) but, most importantly, as part of growing interest in the
social role of translators, and the political, ideological and intercultural consequences of their
work. Translator agency is the translator’s ability and power to produce change in societies
through the texts they choose to translate and how they translate them (Tymoczko 2007:
200–16). It can also be associated with activism when it relates to international conflicts and
ideological struggles (see e.g. Baker 2006; Fernández and Evans 2018). In the case of PST,
translator agency is not about activism, but rather about taking a translation approach that
enhances the social role of PST. PS translators, as discussed here, are not activists in the
sense outlined, for instance, by Baker (2013): a group of (volunteer) translators who put their
language and translation skills at the service of social or political movements. Instead, PS
translators are (ideally) adequately trained professionals who offer a language service for a fee
or a salary and, while doing so, exercise agency by taking an active, functional and culturally
sensitive approach to translation, which aims to inform, educate and empower linguistically
disempowered communities. Their agency does not consist of direct advocacy, lobbying or
resistance, but manifests itself in the impact of their translations and translation approach on
society or certain groups within it (See below).
Translator agency implies translator power: that translators have the necessary power and
influence to trigger or contribute to change (Paloposki 2007: 337; Marais 2011: 192). Marais
(2011: 198) notes that the debate on translator agency and power has focused mostly on lit-
erary translation, which raises questions about the applicability of statements about agency
and power to the translation of pragmatic texts. In the case of PS translators, one can hardly
speak of power as it is generally understood: the capacity to influence individuals or groups
and affect their behaviours by actually or potentially offering them or depriving them from
desiderata (D ye 1990: 4). First, PS translators (a s well as interpreters) do not generally enjoy
a high status in society. Second, they do not choose what texts to translate or what languages
to translate them into. This is usually the decision of authorities, public services and, in some
cases, non-government organisations. The decision is political and is often in line with im-
migration policies, language policies, and attitudes towards multilingualism and minority
languages (Córdoba Serrano 2016). However, PS translators do have a role and a degree of
power in terms of the approach they take when translating for local communities. Their
power lies in the extent to which they, consciously or unconsciously, enable access to infor-
mation and education, not through tokenistic language transfer, but through effective com-
munication of contents and mediation between public services and community members.
Thus, PS translators may not have a say in relation to translation policy, funding available for
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PST, or production and selection of PS texts, but they can exercise agency in their translation
choices by making them consistent with the needs of disempowered audiences.
Translation approach
The above sense of agency goes hand in hand with a full understanding of the role of PST
in society and of the type of translation approach required in each social and translational
context. Referring to the translation of administrative documents, Way (2006: 581) stresses
the role of PS translators as intercultural mediators, and advocates for ‘a more active role for
the translator’, a translator who actively strives to mediate between cultures and overcome the
issues surrounding this mediation. PST is offered (or needed) in local contexts that are char-
acterised by linguistic and cultural diversity, not only in terms of different ethnic, religious
or cultural groups but also in the sense of differences between the cultural assumptions and
(specialist) discourse practices of institutions on the one hand and those of (lay) PST users on
the other. In line with the active mediation required of the PS translator in such diversity,
Lesch (2018) conceives of quality in PST as a matter of adaptation, appropriateness and acces-
sibility for the target readership. Taking as a starting point the work of generalist translation
scholars such as Chesterman and Toury, he suggests a set of functional translation principles,
which revolve round the idea that effective communication through PST requires plain or
simplified language, explication strategies when necessary, and accessible text organisation
(see ‘Accessibility’ below). Taibi and Ozolins (2016: 70) also suggest that ‘functionalist ap-
proaches to translation would be the most attractively suitable for community [PS] transla-
tors in their capacity as active social agents’. Framed within a sociological understanding of
the PS translator’s work, a functionalist approach (1) empowers translators by bringing their
status closer to that of authors (in terms of text production, not socio-economic standing);
(2) places the intended function of the text/translation as the paramount criterion to guide
the translator’s decisions; (3) acknowledges differences between text types and the translation
strategies appropriate for each; and (4) allows ‘for a wide range of renderings and translato-
rial actions’, such as adaptations, transcreations and summary translations, depending on the
translation context and needs (Taibi and Ozolins 2016: 70).
Tomozeiu (2 016) draws on Suojanen, Koskinen and Tuominen’s (2 015) User-Centered
Translation to propose three methods to assist PS translators in visualising the target audi-
ence needs and making informed decisions in the translation process. These are ‘personas’,
‘implied readers’ and ‘audience design’. ‘Personas’ are typical user profiles within the
target community which a PS translator can outline based on their knowledge of and
experience with the community (Tomozeiu 2016: 197, 202). One risk in the creation of
personas, Tomozeiu (2 016: 198) points out, is that they may be centred on some stereo-
typical elements and features of the target community and leave out others, thus under-
mining the inclusiveness aim of PST. ‘I mplied readers’ refers to ‘t he audience based on the
analysis of the text’ (Tomozeiu 2016: 199) rather than previous knowledge of the target
group. In other words, while reading the source text, the translator infers the character-
istics of its target audience, which they can subsequently compare and contrast with those
of PST personas. Finally, ‘audience design’ serves to identify not only primary readers
(addressees), but also secondary ones (auditors, overhearers, eavesdroppers and referees).
Once identified, the PS translator will be in a position to make translation choices that
address these different audiences and, where necessary, prioritise the needs of some of
them ( Tomozeiu 2016: 2 00–1).
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PS Translator’s training and socialisation

The social role of PST, translator agency, and a r eader-oriented mediational translation out-
lined above require that PS translators are adequately trained for the task and are socialised
in the values associated with PST as an empowering language service. In some cases, PST
knowledge, skills and role awareness may develop through apprenticeship opportunities in
some public services and n on-governmental organisations. However, like any other profes-
sional language service, PST requires adequate training and socialisation, which can then be
complemented by a supervised internship or practicum. Kelly (2018) argues that it is possible
to cater for PST education within generalist translation programs. Generalist courses would
need to be accompanied with specialised PST modules. Curricular design would need to
be based on rigorous analysis and alignment of societal needs, professional expectations and
the socio-economic and institutional context of the planned translation program. In line
with Kelly’s (2018: 39) ‘meaningful curricular design’, R ueda-Acedo (2018) shows how col-
laboration between universities and other relevant societal stakeholders like public services
and NGOs can contribute to meaningful, c ontext-sensitive and effective PST training. She
stresses the benefits of s ervice-learning partnerships for both trainee translators and members
of the community.
However, as Kelly (2018) acknowledges, PST is not highly recognised or catered for in
terms of education initiatives (See also Taibi 2011; Taibi and Ozolins 2016). This, together
with PS policies and inexistent or inadequate funding, often leaves PST in the hands of
volunteers or bilingual staff with no demonstrated translation qualifications. Some authors
(e.g. Susam-Sarayeva and Pérez González 2012; Antonini et al., 2017) acknowledge the role
of non-professional translators (a nd interpreters) as actors in society and the complexity of
their role. As an existing phenomenon, n on-professional translation for public services is
worth investigating and acknowledging. However, the phenomenon raises two concerns at
least (1) about the extent to which non-professional translators (w ithout adequate language
skills and translation training) are able to translate competently and effectively for public
services and minoritised communities, and (2) about the political and ethical position of
governments and public instrumentalities who leave PST (a nd interpreting) at the mercy of
ad hoc solutions.
Professional-non-professional complementarity?
Within the context of what is desirable vs. what is available, García (2018) identifies areas
where non-professional, crowd-sourced translation can co-exist with and complement pro-
fessional PST. His argument is as follows: (1) both PST and g rass-root volunteer translation,
available mainly on Internet platforms, share the social inclusion ethos; (2) not all con-
tent that needs translation has the same value: some texts are ‘critical and enduring’, while
others are ‘inconsequential and ephemeral’ (2018: 105); (3) therefore, in critical situations
(t ranslations involving high risk) PST needs to be assigned to professional translators, while
low-risk translations can be done by n on-professionals. An example of n
on-critical task is the
translation of ‘peer-to-peer support pages’ for newly arrived migrants (2018: 103). H igh-r isk
translations would include instances such as official information about social security, health-
care, or administrative procedures. Pym (2021: 26) takes up this argument with reference to
both translation and interpreting: ‘The basic argument […] is that, when and where mistakes
can be costly, it is worth paying for highly trained professional translators and interpreters
so that error can be avoided’. Pym (2021: 26) cites findings such as Canfora and Ottmann’s
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(2018) on damages (partly) attributable to translation errors and concludes: ‘From one or two
disasters, it certainly does not follow that all mistranslations are costly. Some are h igh-stakes,
most are low-stakes, and the difference is important’.
While it is evident that in translation, as in life, there are h igh-stakes and low-stakes sit-
uations, García’s and Pym’s points above raise several questions:
1 Given that ‘high-stakes’ and ‘low-stakes’ are relative and blurry, who would be enti-
tled to make decisions in relation to the classification of translation needs, areas and
situations?
2 What types of ‘cost’ or ‘d amage’ will be quantified and how? There are translation
production and dissemination costs and social costs arising as a result of inexistent or
inadequate PST; there are risks relating to the reputation and legal responsibilities of
public service organisations and risks relating to the lives, livelihoods and welfare of
PST users; there is individual damage and collective damage, and there are quantifiable
and unquantifiable costs and damages.
3 Inadequate PST is not only about translation errors, which may lead to physical dam-
age or safety incidents; it is also about inadequacies such as complete lack of PST in
all or some local languages, insufficient PST in some key sectors such as healthcare or
employment, or less effective PST as a result of inappropriate translation approaches or
dissemination strategies.
While notions of ‘non-critical’, ‘low-stakes’ or ‘low-r isk’ may be operationally useful to

reduce costs or prioritise certain needs in a PS context of limited resources, the notions
themselves are controversial and fraught with risks, given the potential impact their opera-
tionalisation may have on the interests and welfare of minoritised groups.

As has been pointed out above, PST stands out as a translation activity with a social mission
and impact. It ‘is a means to an end, namely, to equip the community with the necessary
information and other means to develop skills for themselves’ (Lesch 1999: 93). Given the
pragmatic, functional and impact-driven nature of PST, this section focuses on three inter-
related critical issues: quality, accessibility, and dissemination media. PST can only achieve
its intended impact on society if it complies with quality standards, is accessible to its target
users, and is made available through appropriate and effective media.
Quality
For PST to achieve its social aims, it needs to meet quality requirements. The first require-
ment is professional qualifications; however, in the case of PST (a nd translation in general),
translator qualifications are only one step towards ensuring quality; others rely on the role of
other stakeholders. Taibi (2018) outlines a m ulti-layered quality assurance framework with
four main levels: (1) societal obligations (what the society in question needs to do to ensure
quality in multilingual public messaging), (2) inter-professional collaboration (how profes-
sionals from different relevant fields can contribute to translation quality before translation
takes place), (3) the translation stage and translator’s role (what the translator needs to do and
how they need to do it to ensure their translations are appropriate and effective), and (4) p ost-
translation quality assurance (what needs to happen after a translation has been submitted:
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Mustapha Taibi
rigorous checking and e nd-user feedback). The levels or steps below (d iscussed in Taibi 2018)
are to be taken as conditions for PST to be at optimal quality standards. Naturally, only the
translation stage below applies to translators. The other levels show where other stakeholders
or actors can make a contribution.
Level 1 – Societal level

This level of quality assurance relates to the responsibility of the society (or rather, nation-
state and regional authorities) to recognise the need and lay the groundwork for quality
communication for all. It has two complementary aspects:
i Policymaking: developing and implementing favourable policies in relation to human

rights, language rights, social justice and equal access to public services, including access
to information;
ii Training: providing adequate education opportunities for future translators, preferably
language-specific and PST-specific, or generalist translation training where the former
is not possible.
Level 2 – Inter-professional level

This level refers to collaboration between translators and other professionals involved in the
production of public service texts, such as public servants, language service managers and
translation agencies. This level includes three steps:
i Selection of translators: recruitment of trained and/or certified translators, where avail-

able, and establishing clear alternative selection criteria in other cases;
ii Preparation of source texts: careful preparation and editing of original texts, with a
linguistically and culturally diverse readership in mind;
iii Briefing translators: Informing translators about the purpose of the translation, the ex-
pectations of the key stakeholders, especially in relation to accuracy and effective com-
munication of messages.
Level 3 – Translation stage

i The translator’s awareness of the overarching mission of PST (empowerment): An es-
sential and distinctive aspect of quality in PST is the extent to which a translation serves
the purpose of target community empowerment. This criterion relates to the nature of
PST and to the translator’s role as a social agent. As Tyulenev (2014: 126) points out,
‘understanding translation as an activity meeting certain social needs underlies all theo-
risation of translation. No discussion of translation would be possible if translation were
not (seen) as a social activity playing its distinct role in society’. However, what is special
about the role PST plays in society is that it contributes to social equity by giving certain
groups access to essential information. A translator within this context will be guided by
the commissioner’s specifications, text type, target language textual norms and conven-
tions, and so on, but most importantly by their role as a social agent whose professional
activity impacts people’s access to information and participation in society. Arguably, in
PST more than any other field of translation, the translator would (be expected to) ask
Tyulenev’s question (2014: 127) ‘W hat does translation do for society?’
112
ii Taking a functionalist approach to PST: Functionalist approaches to translation are now

widely accepted all over the world and in different text genres (Nord, 2014: 120, 124).
They treat texts and translations ‘a s communicative occurrences whose form is deter-
mined by the situation in which they occur and by the persons who use them as well
as by cultural norms and conventions’ (Nord 2014: 127). Skopos theory, a functionalist
approach par excellence, considers translation as a new culturally situated ‘offer of infor-
mation’ based on another ‘offer of information’ (Reiss and Vermeer 1984) in the source
text. Thus, a key criterion of translation quality is the extent to which the translation is
fit for purpose and suitable for the target readership. In the case of PST, in particular, a
functionalist understanding of translation allows translators to make informed decisions
about the form of translation and level of register to use, as well as about the level of
intervention on the original text.
iii Language appropriateness: This criterion is closely related to functionalism in trans-
lation and to empowerment and accessibility in PST specifically. Language appropri-
ateness in the case of PST may, of course, be guided by text type and institutional
requirements, but will often consist of catering for the target reader as the main
stakeholder: determining and using the language variant, register and lexical choices
that are most appropriate for the specific target community, in light of available infor-
mation on the average literacy level, age group, national and cultural background and
so on.
iv Consultation with the community: To ensure suitable translations, PS translators some-
times need to check with members of the target community before or while under-
taking the translation assignment. Consultation may relate to any relevant issue, but
particularly cultural sensitivities, appropriate language varieties and lexical choices.
Naturally, this process is essential at other stages of content development as well (for
instance drafting original texts, or post-translation feedback, as is shown below).
v Translation checking: At this stage translation checking consists of the translator’s own
revision, editing and proofreading to ensure content accuracy, textual coherence, lan-
guage consistency and stylistic appropriateness.
Level 4 – Post-translation stage

i Translation checking: At the post-translation stage, checking consists of external revi-
sion (for instance, peer revision within the same translation team, or external revision
arranged by translation agencies or public services). This step provides a safety net to
detect oversights that might have slipped through the cracks during the translation and
typesetting phases.
ii Seeking community feedback: PST has a r eal-life impact on people’s lives – either pos-
itive or negative. It is therefore important to seek the feedback of target communities
on the quality and suitability of translated resources and to determine the extent to
which these translations serve their purpose and make a difference in society. Under-
standably, this will only be possible in some cases, such as large translation projects and
awareness campaigns run by government agencies. For these translation commissioners,
regular quality checks and impact assessments, for instance, through surveys or focus
groups, are not only important in terms of communication strategy, but also in terms
of cost-effectiveness. Cost is often used as an argument against providing language ser-
vices (Taibi and Ozolins 2016: 19; Pym 2021). So, by checking impact and seeking
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Mustapha Taibi
community feedback, commissioners (and funders) can find out which translation ef-
forts and approaches reduce cost (by effectively addressing social, educational, environ-
mental or health issues), and those that only end up producing ineffective parallel texts
in minority languages.
Accessibility
PST cannot achieve its social mission unless it is accessible. Accessibility is a general term
used in different fields to refer to easy access, ability to function in a given environment, and
ability to use a product, process or system. Suojanen, Koskinen and Tuominen (2015: 49) de-
fine ‘accessibility’ as ‘efforts making products and services available to all people, regardless
of their individual abilities or backgrounds’. In the context of communication, accessibility
includes ‘intralingual subtitles for the hard of hearing, Braille translations, simplified texts
and the use of plain language for those with cognitive challenges or limited language skills,
and so on’ (I bid: 57). In the particular context of PST, it refers to translation strategies and
adaptations intended to make multilingual resources readable, comprehensible and effective.
These often consist of accommodation shifts such as simplification of specialised terms, usage
of verbs instead of nominalisations, active constructions rather than passive voice, breaking
down complex sentences, and avoidance of archaic language and constructions (Cornelius
2010; Määttä 2020).
Accessibility is crucial for translations, ‘particularly user-centred translation where the
central purpose is to direct texts to their specified user groups and the needs of these groups’
(Suojanen, Koskinen and Tuominen 2015: 57). At the same time, making texts accessible de-
pends on a number of variables, including the norms and conventions of the source and target
languages, literacy levels in the target community of readers, and the extent to which institu-
tional discourse in a given country or organisation favours clarity and access to information
or institutional power and prestige (K atan and Taibi, 2021: 296–324). Translators with the
mindset of ‘translation as a public service’, ‘translation as a social mission’ or ‘translation as
empowerment’ work within the possibilities and constraints of their working languages, the
socio-educational levels of their readerships, and the requirements or expectations of the
institutions and organisations generating content and commissioning translations.
First, in terms of language, while certain textual features may enhance readability and
accessibility across languages (absence of specialised terms, shorter sentences, clear links be-
tween ideas and so forth), languages also vary in their tolerance for complex structures (for
instance, embedded and conjoined clauses) and in their internal hierarchy of formality. A
good example is diglossic languages such as Arabic (Taibi and Ozolins 2016: 48–49), where
the gap between spoken (colloquial) and written language (Modern Standard Arabic) is far
greater than in n on-diglossic languages. The implication is that as soon as the mode of com-
munication changes from spoken to written, the accessibility of the information is reduced
significantly. This applies to other languages as well, but the case of diglossic languages is a
pretty clear one.
Some languages also have additional sources of complexity and may, therefore, require ad-
justable readability metrics. To take Arabic as an example again, there are types of ‘l inguistic
complexity that would not be captured by currently available automated readability analysis’
(Malik, El-Haj and Paasche-Orlow 2019: 171). One such source of complexity is the absence
of diacritics (El-Haj and Rayson 2016; Malik, El-Haj and Paasche-Orlow 2019). Although
diacritics are not usually used in texts for highly literate adults, they can improve readability
114
significantly, especially in the case of homographs and potential ambiguity (Malik, El-Haj
and Paasche-Orlow 2019).
In terms of literacy level, it is well known that literacy rates vary internationally and
that lower socio-economic groups tend to have lower literacy (Reardon et. al. 2013; Lesch
2018). Minoritised language groups have historically had less access to education than
dominant groups (e.g. Lesch 2012, 2018). Migrants and refugees may come from different
socio-economic backgrounds, but at least some of them face literacy challenges in their own
mother tongue (or official language of their home country). Syrian nationals, for example
have traditionally had high literacy levels (at least prior to the 2011 civil war). Still, although
Syrian refugee statistics in Europe confirm this in comparison with some other nationalities,
they also show that approximately a third of these Syrian refugees arrive with a low literacy
level. German data, for example show that ‘24% attended only primary school and 11% had
not attended school at all’ (OECD 2015: 8). What this shows is that, while aiming for com-
prehensible translation, PS translators need to have updated knowledge of the sociolinguistic
and literacy backgrounds of their readers. It also means that alternative dissemination media,
such as video in colloquial language, could be considered (see next section).
As for the relation between institutional discourse and public service users, the function
of institutional language and discourse may vary: texts are sometimes used to communicate
and other times to regulate and maintain institutional status and control. Accessibility of
information is not always the focus of institutional communication. An organisation may
produce texts to inform the public, to comply with legal requirements or, as Barron (2012:
50) notes, ‘to increase the status of this organisation’. Public messaging usually consists of
one-way communication from more powerful institutional agents to less powerful masses
(Barron 2012: 66–67), and the power differential is often reflected in language. The infor-
mation in public messages is usually based on legal or institutional regulations.
Accessibility, then, needs to be addressed at the source (when drafting public service texts
intended for the general public). This was recognised as early as the 1970s, and especially in
the 1990s, with the Plain Language Movement in countries such as Australia, New Zealand,
the United States (Adler 2012: 69), South Africa (Cornelius 2010) and the European Union
(Fight the Fog). This movement has later spread to other countries as well, including Japan
and China (Adler 2012: 69). The movement advocates the presentation of public information
in a plain and precise language and accessible design to minimise the receiver’s effort and
maximise their understanding (Adler 2012: 68). In healthcare, for instance, Schipper et al.’s
(2016) systematic review shows that the preparation of a lay version of healthcare information
enables patients to understand it better. When such lay versions are unavailable, PS transla-
tors have a major role in providing accessible multilingual information. The extent to which
this is possible will naturally depend not only on their agency and knowledge but also on
institutional practices and expectations.
Dissemination media
Dissemination methods are closely linked to accessibility. As Burke (2018) points out, so-
ciolinguistic variation in situations where PST is needed poses serious challenges for both
translation commissioners and translators. As mentioned above, PST is a written translation.
Writing in many language communities is inseparably linked to the standard variety of the
language, which is only accessible to certain socio-educational layers. This calls for PST
hand in hand with an effective communication strategy. Public services, translators and re-
searchers need to determine the dissemination media that are most appropriate and effective
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Mustapha Taibi
for each audience (age group, regional language varieties, literacy level and so forth). Taibi,
Liamputtong and Polonsky (2019: 147), for example found that older Arabic speakers in Aus-
tralia had different preferences: some preferred reading health awareness materials because
they can be referred back to whenever needed, while others preferred audio-visual media,
due to literacy and eyesight challenges, among other reasons.
Suojanen, Koskinen and Tuominen’s (2015: 9 3–110) ‘user-centred translation’ calls for
empirical studies with real translation users to determine their preferences. This, the au-
thors note, can be done through usability testing by means of questionnaires, focus group
discussions, interviews, think-aloud protocols or eye tracking. Usability testing can generate
a wealth of data that would assist in better catering for the needs of real users. However,
while usability testing can be applied to study the usability of different dissemination media
separately (print translation, video, website, and so forth), proactive research needs to be
undertaken to determine user preferences before actual production of (translated) dissemi-
nation material. Here, questionnaires, focus groups and interviews can also be useful. This,
naturally, is the remit of public services and researchers, not translators.
Public services have a lot to learn from healthcare dissemination research and practice.
The (Australian) National Health and Medical Research Council’s (2019) Guidelines for
guidelines: Dissemination and communication, for example, include advice on communication
needs assessment among the target audience or segment of society, message design, dissem-
ination methods, as well as assessment of effectiveness. The Guidelines also cite literature
pointing out that leaflet or brochure campaigns are less effective than active dissemination
methods such as face-to-face education campaigns and workshops. However, the fact that
one dissemination medium is found to be more preferred or impactful than others does not
mean that it should be used exclusively. As Schipper et al.’s (2016) systematic review shows,
a combination of different approaches can enhance the effectiveness of messaging among
target audiences.
Related topics and research areas
Crisis translation
The International Network on Crisis Translation (see also Federici and O’Brien 2020)
defines ‘crisis translation’
‘as the translation of written information from one linguistic and cultural system to
another in the context of a crisis scenario, with a view to enabling affected communities
and responders to be prepared for crises, improve resilience and reduce the loss of lives’
(INTERACT 2019)
Although crisis translation focuses on emergency situations such as natural disasters and
wars, much of its scope can be subsumed under PST, more specifically under ‘translation
for temporary communities’ (Taibi and Ozolins 2016: 95–102). What Taibi and Ozolins
(2016: 95) mean by ‘temporary communities’ are ‘various types of conglomerations that may
occupy a local space and form a multilingual microcosm during a limited time’ (d isplaced
populations in a bilingual or multilingual space, seasonal migrants and pilgrims).
A crisis, however, can affect both established communities and emerging/temporary
ones, as has been demonstrated recently during the C OVID-19 pandemic. This crisis has
brought the notions of PST and crisis translation closer to each other, as health authorities in
116
each country have had to use the existing translation services or enact makeshift solutions to
address awareness needs during the pandemic.
Much of crisis translation is provided by volunteers collaborating with NGOs (see Elrha,
n.d. on translation in health crises in Africa; Munro 2013 on the 2010 Haiti earthquake).
The situation of PST in many countries is not much better. As is shown in Gigliotti’s (2017)
study of a small corpus of translations between Spanish, Italian and English, translations pro-
vided by non-qualified volunteers raise a number of quality concerns. While crisis situations
are difficult to anticipate and plan for, more stable sociolinguistic situations requiring PST
(a nd interpreting) allow for ample planning, including planning for professional language
services. It is just a matter of political will and resources.
Social marketing
The point was made above that PST would be more impactful if combined with an effective
communication strategy through appropriate and r esearch-supported dissemination methods.
PST is part of public service communication campaigns, which, as Barron (2012: 55) states,
‘are concerned with knowledge transfer and attitude and behaviour change’. Influencing
attitudes and behaviours is an intersection point for PST and social marketing, which ‘seeks
to develop and integrate marketing concepts with other approaches to influence behaviours
that benefit individuals and communities for the greater social good’ (International Social
Marketing Association 2017). Like P ST – but
from a completely different p erspective – social

marketing seeks to guide social transformation through an effective and equitable application
of marketing principles (Saunders, Barrington and Sridharan 2015: 165; International Social
Marketing Association 2017). What social marketing has in common with PST are as follows:
• ‘the overarching goal of greater social good’ (Saunders, Barrington and Sridharan 2015:
164);
• Concern with both impact (effectiveness) and process (e.g. equity, participation of dif-
ferent stakeholders and fairness);
• Recognition of the right of communities and community members to act, decide and
contribute to change (Saunders, Barrington and Sridharan 2015: 165);
• A need for collaboration among different stakeholders, and a recognition of audiences
as ‘active participants and collaborators that ultimately transform and shape their own
lives’ (Saunders, Barrington and Sridharan 2015: 164; See also Blocker et al., 2013)).
Social marketing also has a community-based strand, which has significant insights to offer
PST. McKenzie-Mohr (2011: 3 –5), for instance, cites several studies in countries such as
the United States, the Netherlands and Switzerland showing that most programs aiming
to change behaviours rely on mass information campaigns (for instance leaflets, newsletters
and TV ads). Community-based social marketing offers alternatives including careful iden-
tification of the behaviour to be promoted, identification of barriers and benefits, design of
behaviour-changing strategies, piloting the strategies with a population sample and evalua-
tion of impact (McKenzie-Mohr 2011: 8 –10).
As in information-intensive social marketing, the assumption in PST has been that ac-
cess to information will lead to social change and community empowerment. While this
assumption appears reasonable at face value, it still needs to be supported through research,
especially with interdisciplinary insights and contributions from areas such as c ommunity-
b ased social marketing,
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Mustapha Taibi
Future directions1
The nature and social role of PST call for interdisciplinary research into a number of areas.
Four key investigation areas can be identified: (1) training and socialisation, (2) quality
and professional standards, (3) dissemination media and (4) the impact of PST on different
aspects of society, including healthcare literacy and other literacies, and the social and po-
litical participation of migrants, refugees and indigenous minorities. While some research
has been undertaken in countries such as Australia, South Africa, Spain and the United
Kingdom, further research is needed, particularly in other multilingual national and local
contexts.
To speak of a translation activity with a positive social impact, first we need to investigate
the extent to which adequate training is available, the types of training and socialisation
to which PS translators have access, as well as the correlation between type and amount of
training on one hand and PS translator performance on the other. Where training is unavail-
able, it needs to be ascertained what alternative induction and socialisation processes are in
place and how effective they are.
PST training is a worthwhile research focus, not only in terms of translator skill devel-
opment but also in relation to the socialisation of future translators as engaged citizens and
active agents for social change. Washbourne (2019: 601) notes, ‘Translator and interpreter
training and education has been slow to engage with educational philosophies such as social
reconstructionism – the prioritising of social betterment as an aim of education’. In transla-
tion and interpreting pedagogy, there is probably no more suitable domain than PST (a nd
interpreting) for a social reconstructionist approach. Curriculum components that involve
engaging with PS texts, translating for local communities, and service-learning placements
offer students opportunities to develop translation and intercultural skills as well as civic
responsibility (Rueda-Acedo 2018: 62–63) and commitment to social advancement.
Whether existent or not, PST training needs to be studied in conjunction with quality
and professional standards. This is a broad and rich area of enquiry which covers, among
other research interests, quality assurance arrangements and practices; collaboration between
PS translators and other stakeholders to ensure quality; assessment of PST quality in different
countries, institutions and language combinations; correlation between translation quality
and end-user trust and perception (of the content, the public service providing it, and trans-
lators). As would be expected in research into a community-based activity, the views of end
users are an essential part of PST quality assessment.
In line with a social reconstructionist approach to education and community-based
quality assessment, a key future direction in PST research is interdisciplinary collaboration
with scholarly areas such as social marketing, mass communication, and healthcare to study
the opportunities that multimodal messaging offers and the impact of each dissemination
method on PST audiences. One main challenge in PST is the linguistic, sociolinguistic
and cultural diversity of audiences. This diversity can be addressed to some extent through
translator expertise, discernment and translation strategies, but much of the challenge is
related to the dissemination medium and the overall communication strategy of the public
service in question. PS translators may produce appropriate or acceptable translations, but if
these are not disseminated through an effective channel (for the relevant community), the
social impact of PST cannot be guaranteed. In this regard, social marketing, mass commu-
nication and healthcare communication in particular have a lot to offer. PST researchers can
also contribute with intercultural, language-specific and t ranslation-related insights in such
interdisciplinary research.
118
Conclusion
PST is socially oriented translatorial action that aims to serve minority and minoritised
language groups by enabling them to access public service contents. As such, this area of
translation practice offers an interesting field for researchers and other social actors, not only
those interested in mediation between languages and cultural systems, but also those con-
cerned with language policies, social equity, democracy and community participation, mass
communication, and public service messaging. In this translation context, ‘t ranslation as em-
powerment’, ‘t ranslator agency’, ‘accessibility’, ‘t ranslation quality’, ‘effective dissemination’
and ‘social impact’ emerge as central notions.
Translation, by nature, requires the collaboration of different stakeholders: authors, com-
missioners, translators, translation checkers/copyeditors and publishers. PST, because of its
social mission and the pragmatic nature of its texts, requires interventions by various social
agents, from the government level (language policy, access to information and funding) to the
level of the translation team (translator, checker and team/service manager), going through
other professionals, professional bodies and public services (translator certification, selection of
translators, briefing translators, writing for multilingual and multicultural audiences).
Given the nature of PST, translation practices and products within it cannot be studied
in terms of language transfer and c ross-linguistic text analysis alone, but they also need to
be researched in terms of their relevance to the lives and interests of PST audiences, and the
social impact they have on them. In other words, both production and reception studies
are needed. PST practices and products also need to be studied and understood as part of a
broader public service communication strategy, rather than isolated instances of communi-
cation between author and reader through a translator. For the above reasons, collaboration
between researchers in PST and relevant areas such as social marketing and mass communi-
cation is likely to be mutually beneficial and productive.
Further reading
Córdoba Serrano, María Sierra (2016) “Translation policies and community translation: The U.S., a
case study”, New Voices in Translation Studies 14: 122–63.
This paper addresses the connection between translation policies and PST, taking the situation in the USA
as an illustrative case. The paper shows how language and translation policies lead to different levels and stan-
dards of PST provision.
Taibi, Mustapha, and Ozolins, Uldis (2016) Community Translation. London, Bloomsbury.
This book introduces PST as a socially oriented translation activity. It discusses different aspects of this
niche area, including its empowering role, the socio-cultural issues facing translators, translation approaches
and quality assurance.
Taibi, Mustapha (ed) (2018) Translating for the Community. Bristol, Multilingual Matters.
This edited volume includes contributions from different countries on the social role and challenges of PST.
Among other topics, it covers PST training, quality assurance and the relationship between PST as a profes-
sional activity and crowd-sourced translation.
Related chapters
Chapter 1, General issues of PSI: Institutions, codes and norms, professionalisation by Carmen Valero-Garcés
Mason
hapter 16, “Interpreter’s mistake” – Why should other professions care about the professionalisation of interpret-
C
119
Mustapha Taibi
Note
1 I would like to thank Anne Beinchet (University of Moncton, Canada) for her input into this
section.
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PART 2
Exploring PSI settings

8
IN COURT
F
ace-to-face interaction
Introduction
Court interpreting, also called judicial or judiciary interpreting, is a form of public service
interpreting that takes place in courts as part of the judicial process to mediate interaction
between legal professionals and lay participants who speak a language other than the court’s
procedural language. Court interpreting differs from other forms of public service interpret-
ing in various ways. Most notably it tends to have a high degree of professionalization, with
specialized processes of training, certification, and employment for interpreters, as well as
dedicated professional organizations. It is generally subject to legal regulations with regard
to the rights of participants to interpreting, and also to the obligations of interpreters, often
with explicit guidelines that address the ethics of interpreting as well as specific translational
norms (e.g. mandating the use of first person to refer to the source speaker). Court interpret-
ing involves routinized genres of legal-lay interaction, such as the questioning of witnesses or
the announcement of a verdict by a judge, and these pose specific interactional challenges for
interpreters, as does the use of specialized professional registers of legal language. Like other
forms of public service interpreting, court interpreting is generally bidirectional, but court
interpreters are also expected to perform different modes of interpreting, typically both short
consecutive interpreting and simultaneous interpreting, as well as sight translation. Court
interpreting is also increasingly done remotely, via video link, which is addressed in Licoppe,
this volume. Due to its ubiquity as well as its importance in the legal process, court inter-
preting is among the most widely researched areas of public service interpreting, with con-
tributions from scholars in translation studies (including practitioners of court interpreting
and scholars involved in interpreter training), but also from legal scholars and from linguists,
anthropologists or sociologists interested in the relationship between multilingualism, social
power and human rights.
Relevant epistemological/theoretical considerations

Court interpreting is conducted in specific jurisdictional contexts, shaped by the respective
legal systems and their laws and institutions. Most jurisdictions recognize a right to court
interpreting in order to preserve an accused person’s right to due process, that is, their right
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-11 125

to understand the charges and to participate in their defense. This is stated, for example in
the European Convention on Human Rights (A rticle 6.3e) and the Court Interpreters Act
of 1978 in the United States (Pousada 1979). Many jurisdictions have extended the use of
court interpreters to other participants, whether in practice or by right, particularly courts
in societies with multiple official languages, or with high degrees of linguistic diversity.
Nonetheless, the existence of formalized rights does not guarantee the consistent provision
of effective interpreting services, as noted by Morris (1999), Ozolins (2016) and others. As
a consequence, scholars have often felt the need to advocate for higher and more consistent
standards of interpreting, as have professional organizations of court interpreters, partic-
ularly in the face of budget cuts (Schweda-Nicholson 1994; Fowler 2016). Despite such
efforts, court interpreting practices often vary significantly by language, partly because of
differences in demand and interpreter availability, but also because of legal differences, such
as in cases of languages with a special legal status. For example, in some jurisdictions, the
use of signed languages is mandated by a nti-discrimination laws, and so sign language in-
terpreting may be offered to categories of court users who would otherwise not have a right
to interpreting, such as jurors (Hale et al. 2017). Standards of interpreting may also become
the subject of legal disputes, such as when judicial decisions are appealed on the claim that
a person’s due process rights were infringed. Such disputes often involve assessments of the
accused’s proficiency in the institutional language, most commonly concerning p re-trial
phases of the process, such as police interrogations (see especially Berk-Seligson 2000; Eades
and Pavlenko 2016).
The conditions for court interpreting in a particular jurisdiction are thus shaped by the
sociolinguistic context and history of a given society. While public service interpreting
in court is often conducted to enable the participation of speakers of minority languages
who are not fluent in the majority language, it is also used in other situations. For example,
countries with multiple official languages may grant special rights of access to interpreting
for speakers of c o-official languages that are independent of a person’s proficiency in the
procedural language (see, e.g. Morris 2008 on interpreting in Canada and Israel). In p ost-
colonial countries, the former colonial language may be the primary institutional language
in court even if it is not spoken natively by most (or even any) of the participants, so that
interpreting is done for the majority of lay court users (see, e.g. Ng 2009, 2018 on Hong
Kong; and Moeketsi 1999 on South Africa). In such settings, the interpreter’s performance
may be scrutinized by other bilingual speakers in the courtroom, in contrast to settings of
interpreting for minority language speakers, when the interpreter may be the only bilingual
participant.
The judicial settings that court interpreters work in can be divided into two major types,
adversarial and inquisitorial. In adversarial proceedings, such as most trials in the common
law system that is prevalent throughout the English-speaking world and in former British
colonies, prosecution and defense present conflicting theories to the court and take turns
questioning witnesses, while the role of judges is limited to that of an impartial procedural
referee. Interpreters in adversarial proceedings are thus regularly required to interpret in
highly confrontational situations, mediating between participants who have contradictory
goals. For example, in cross-examination, attorneys ask questions that are designed to coerce
witnesses into making responses that support the opposing side’s theory. This requires inter-
preters to pay close attention to the pragmatic force of questions, as attorneys design ques-
tions to control and restrict the range of possible answers that a witness may give (Hale 1999;
2004; Rigney 1999). Similarly, court interpreters also need to attend to nuanced meaning
differences in a series of near-repetitive questions (P ym 1999).
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Public service interpreting in court: face-to-face interaction
By contrast, in inquisitorial (a lso called n

on-adversarial) proceedings, judges play a domi-
nant role, as they investigate to determine the facts of the case and conduct most questioning
of witnesses. Inquisitorial proceedings are characteristic in the Civil Law (Roman Law)
systems prevalent in continental Europe, Latin America and East Asia, as well as in legal
systems based on Islamic Law, but they may also exist in common law legal systems, for ex-
ample in US small claims courts. In inquisitorial proceedings, court interpreters may align
more closely with the court and may be at less of a risk of appearing to take sides for a party
(A ngermeyer 2016).
In many jurisdictions, court interpreting is subject to specific codified regulations whether
mandated by courts or by professional organizations ( Nicholson 1994).1 Such
Schweda-
regulations generally conceptualize the role of court interpreters as almost m achine-like,
requiring interpreters to produce accurate and complete translations that are referentially
equivalent to their respective source talk, while at the same time refraining from any other
activity, such as commenting or explaining (Morris 1995; Mikkelson 1998). This includes
calling for interpreters to be neutral and impartial, that is, to not take sides in legal disputes.
However, where interpreters are employees of the court, they may align with the interests of
the institution versus those of lay participants (A ngermeyer 2016) and may be asked to take
on institutional tasks that exceed interpreting, such as explaining administrative procedures
(see Ng 2018: 31–32). Such regulations and practices are based on ideologies of language
that are prevalent in the respective judicial system and the society at large (Haviland 2003;
Nakane and Mizuno 2019). They often run counter to the pragmatic realities of i nterpreter-
mediated interaction, resulting in moral dilemmas for court interpreters who find themselves
constrained in their ability to resolve resulting communication problems (Morris 1995).
Regulations for court interpreters may also include explicit translational norms, such as
the common directive to maintain the person deixis of the source, that is, using first person
singular reference for the source speaker rather than for the interpreter themselves. This
practice is tied to the notion of the interpreter as invisible, whose voice represents that of
the source speaker. At the same time, this practice can lead to misunderstandings, and court
interpreters may at times use indirect translation or reported speech instead.
Interpreters in court are also required to work in different interpreting modes, which
are used for different phases of a trial or hearing. When the non-official language-speaking
individual is involved in a dialogue with a legal professional (such as during the questioning
of a witness, or the taking of a plea by the accused), short consecutive mode is used, as the
other participants have to wait for the interpreter in order to be able to respond to their in-
terlocutor’s turn. This mode is also referred to as witness interpretation. This differs from s o-
c alled proceedings interpretation, when interaction between several speakers of the official
language is translated for the benefit of a hearer who does not understand them, such as, for
example in the case of a suspect needing to understand a discussion between a judge and an
attorney. In such situations, interpreters typically need to engage in simultaneous interpret-
ing, as the primary participants do not require the interpreter to understand one another, and
therefore don’t pause to facilitate interpreting. In the absence of equipment for simultaneous
interpreting, such as a sound-proof booth for the interpreter and headphones for listeners,
simultaneous interpreting in court is typically done in whispered form, called chuchotage, and
audible only by the recipient, such as a defendant.2 During whispered proceedings interpre-
tation, the court functions otherwise as if the interpreter were not there, and speakers do
not orient towards the fact that their speech is being interpreted. A particular challenge of
proceedings interpretation lies in the fact that it often involves the interpretation of dialogue
between two speakers. If they take quick or overlapping turns, it may become difficult for
127
the interpreter to keep up with individual turns, and for the recipient to distinguish who said
what. Alternatively, interpreters may use reported speech or summarize question and answer
sequences into single renditions (see Angermeyer 2015: 132–35).
This distribution of interpreting modes is common in most jurisdictions and is often
taken for granted without questioning its impact on courtroom discourse, interpreter perfor-
mance, or the fairness and efficiency of proceedings. For example, simultaneous interpret-
ing (w ithout the use of equipment) is more likely to lead to omissions, thus disadvantaging
listeners who depend on it for information about the proceedings ( Jacobsen 2012; Anger-
meyer 2015). Furthermore, Ng (2018: 43) points out that chuchotage is not suitable for p ost-
c olonial settings such as in Hong Kong, where jurors or audience members also need to be
able to hear the interpreter because they are not sufficiently proficient in the language of the
court (in this case English).
In contrast to these common courtroom contexts, simultaneous interpreting with tech-
nological aids is common in international courts and tribunals, such as, famously the Nurem-
berg trials and subsequent trials of war criminals (Morris 1990; Takeda 2008; Elias-Bursać
2012). These will not be addressed further in this chapter as the situation is perhaps more
akin to conference-interpreting than public-service interpreting.
Literature overview
As noted above, court interpreting (or more widely defined legal interpreting) has been a topic
of research in a number of different disciplines besides translation studies, including linguis-
tics, anthropology, sociology, and law. Besides being the subject of many journal articles, it
has been examined in monographs, textbooks and special issues of journals in translation
studies (Shlesinger and Pöchhacker 2008) as well as language and law (Eades, Hale and
Cooke 1999; Coulthard and Hale 2016). Research in translation studies has focused espe-
cially on aspects of the interpreters’ performance, investigating the role interpreters play in
mediating courtroom interaction, while also comparing source and target speech to identify
differences in meaning and assess translation quality in a broad sense. Scholars have also
explored ways in which structural differences between specific languages impact interpreta-
tion, as well as how i nterpreter-mediated talk differs pragmatically from s ame-language talk.
Such empirical studies of court interpreting depend on access to data in the form of audio-
recorded courtroom interaction, yet jurisdictions vary greatly in the extent to which they
grant researchers access. Some courts do not permit any recordings at all (for instance, most
courts in the United Kingdom or in Canada), thus effectively preventing empirical research
on courtroom interaction and restricting researchers to working with data from observations
or interviews with interpreters and legal professionals (Fowler 2016), or to analyses of writ-
ten court records or legal opinions (Morris 2008). Other jurisdictions do allow researchers
access, or even go so far as to permit the broadcasting of h igh-profile trials, as some courts
in the United States have done, which greatly facilitates access for researchers interested in
courtroom discourse (see, e.g. Pym 1999; Rigney 1999; for an overview of issues relating to
data collection, see Angermeyer 2013).
In a g round-breaking early b ook-length study, B erk-Seligson (1990) analyzed more
than one hundred hours of audio-recorded data from Spanish-English court interpreting
in different courts in the United States. In addition to providing a survey of the legal and
institutional context and an ethnographic description of interpreters’ working conditions,
Berk-Seligson investigated various ways in which the interpreter’s speech affected the inter-
action. Specifically, her linguistic analysis focused on comparing interpreters’ renditions to
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their corresponding source utterances with regard to their pragmatic force and their speech
style. For example, she found that interpreters could downplay speaker agency and blame
attribution by using agentless passives or other impersonal constructions where the source
speaker had used an active form. To assess the impact of such and other practices on the le-
gal process, Berk Seligson also conducted experiments with mock jurors and found that the
speech style of interpreters (for instance whether they used markers of hesitation and hedg-
ing) could influence the perception of a witness’s credibility.
The effect of interpreters’ choices on the interaction is also investigated by Hale (2004),
drawing on data from Spanish-English court interpreting in Australia. She finds that in-
terpreters may alter the pragmatic force of lawyer’s questions during cross-examination,
by omitting discourse markers or altering the question type. For example, she argues that
interpreters may make cross-examination less coercive and confrontational when attorney’s
declarative statements like ‘I put it to you that…’ are rendered as interrogatives. When in-
terpreting witnesses’ responses from Spanish to English, interpreters are also found to make
omissions, for example of markers of so-called ‘powerless’ speech (O’Barr 1982), but also of
parts of utterances that don’t directly respond to or even challenge the preceding questions.
Based on her findings, Hale argues for enhanced training for court interpreters that in-
cludes attention to pragmatics and that encourages interpreters to mimic the source speakers’
speech style, that is ‘faithfulness of content and manner of speech’ (Hale 2004: 239). Inter-
preting in Australian courts has also been examined by Lee (2009a, 2009b), focusing on the
impact of structural, pragmatic and cultural differences on interpreting between English
and Korean, and Cooke (1996) on a case study of stand-by interpreting for an Aboriginal
Australian defendant.
Another post-colonial common law context that has seen multiple studies of court inter-
preting is the Chinese-English bilingual court system of Hong Kong. In an ethnographic
monograph, Kwai Hang Ng (2009) examines the pragmatic and legal consequences of lan-
guage choice, finding that adherence to the juridical formalism of the British common law
system is reduced when trials are conducted in Cantonese rather than English. When trials
are conducted in English, use of court interpreters is widespread, though many of the legal
professionals may, in fact, be bilingual. Kwai Hang Ng (2009: 161) documents that litigants
in English trials are frustrated with the interruptions caused by consecutive interpreting and
this may prompt them to opt for C hinese-language trials instead. In another recent mono-
graph, Eva Ng (2018) focuses more specifically on court interpreting practices and explores
the ways in which they are influenced by other participants’ proficiency in the two languages
(or lack thereof ). She examines particularly trials that are conducted in English, where jurors
may not be able to understand English-language testimony because chuchotage interpreting
is not audible to them, while on the other hand, bilingual attorneys may conduct examina-
tions in Cantonese without waiting for interpretation. Court interpreting in Hong Kong has
also been examined by Cheung (2012, 2014, 2017), focusing in particular on interpreters’
non-adherence to guidelines (e.g. using reported speech or producing non-renditions), and
Leung and Gibbons (2008, 2009), focusing on interpreters’ marking of the participation
status and their translation of Cantonese u tterance-final particles into English. Interpreting
between English and local languages in p ost-colonial common law contexts has also been
investigated in Ghana (A muzu, Campbell and Ofori 2020), Malaysia (Powell and Hashim
2011) and South Africa (Moeketsi 1999; Thetela 2003), among others. However, as shown by
Powell (2008), interpreters are not always available in such jurisdictions, disadvantaging lay
participants with limited understanding of English, while their testimony in a local language
is understood by legal professionals.
129
Most research on court interpreting – and on courtroom interaction more generally –

has been conducted in common law settings, especially research published in English.
Book-length studies in civil law contexts include Kadric’s study of interpreting in Aus-
trian courts (2001) and D’hondt’s study of intercultural communication in Belgian courts
(2004). English-language studies in civil law contexts include studies of court interpreting
in Belgium (Gallez and Maryns 2014; Gallez and Reynders 2015; Defrancq and Verliefde
2017), Denmark (Christensen 2008; Martinsen and Dubslaff 2010; Jacobsen 2012; Karrebæk
and Sørensen 2021), Japan (Marszalenko 2014; Nakane and Mizuno 2019), Spain (Pérez
González 2006; Arumí and Vargas-Urpi 2018; Vargas-Urpi 2019) and Sweden (Carstensen
and Dahlberg 2017), among others. As mentioned above, courtroom interaction in these
settings can generally be characterized as inquisitorial, with the judge taking a more central
and active role in fact-finding. This has implications for the role of interpreters as well, who
may find themselves aligned more closely with the judge than interpreters in the adversarial
system (see, e.g. Licoppe and Verdier 2013 for an analysis of this dynamic in French courts
with video conferencing). An inquisitorial style is also found in small claims courts in the
United States, as shown in Angermeyer (2015). However, while these courts are intended as
informal venues for civil litigation where litigants can bring lawsuits at low cost and without
having to hire an attorney, the professional court interpreters follow the norms established
for formal courts with regard to language choice and interpreting style.
Researchers who have studied interpreter-mediated courtroom interaction in detail have
often sought to apply their findings by giving recommendations for best practices (see, e.g.
Hale 2004: 242–44; Ng 2018: 171–90). Other publications have aimed primarily at giving
guidance to interpreting trainees or to legal professionals working with interpreters. Such
books are typically written by experienced interpreters or educators and are geared towards a
specific linguistic and jurisdictional context, for example by including glossaries of legal ter-
minology for languages used in a specific jurisdiction (De Jongh 1992; Edwards 1995; Colin
and Morris 1996; Moeketsi 1999; Mikkelson 2000; De Jongh 2012). This has also led to a
growth in academic training opportunities for court interpreters (Matthews and Ardemagni
2013). Increasingly, guidelines are not only for interpreters but also for legal professionals
who work with them (Hale 2015; Ng 2018: 1 81–84).
Language boundaries and permeability

The practice of court interpreting presupposes the existence of discrete and recognized (that
is named) languages for which qualified interpreters can be assigned, and this in turn de-
pends strongly on language ideologies about multilingualism and about perceived bound-
aries between languages. Interpreting is often not available to (or desired by) speakers of
languages or dialects that are perceived as varieties of the institutional language, even if mu-
tual intelligibility is limited, as in the case between English and Jamaican Patois in Jamaica
(Brown-Blake 2008: 46) or A frican-American English in the United States (R ickford and
King 2016: 955). In other contexts, a lack of awareness of linguistic diversity may lead to
situations in which lay participants are assumed to speak a language that they have only lim-
ited proficiency in, such as, for example the official colonial language of a state with many
indigenous languages. Haviland (2003) discusses a murder trial in the United States in which
a speaker of Mixtec, an indigenous language spoken in Mexico, was provided with a Spanish
interpreter. As Haviland shows, the interpreter’s complaints about persistent communication
130
problems were not taken seriously by the judge who appeared to assume that all Mexican
citizens speak Spanish. The accused, later found to be innocent, was convicted and spent
several years in prison before the verdict was overturned.
In addition to requiring the recognition of named languages, court interpreting presupposes
that utterances can be translated without loss or change of meaning. Haviland (2003: 772)
refers to this as the ideology of referential transparency, in which ‘substituting one language’s
words for another’s’ can be done ‘as though the word, or code, is merely an exotic costume
for a shared meaning.’ Researchers have increasingly challenged this assumption, either by
pointing out that interpreter-mediated interaction is inherently different from same-language
interaction or by investigating structural differences between languages. For example, lan-
guages differ with regard to the marking of agency, and so speakers of one language may be
able to avoid an attribution of blame in ways that speakers of another cannot (see Lee 2009a
on the use of subject ellipsis in Korean; or B erk-Seligson 1990 on the use of reflexive passives
and datives of interest in Spanish; also Mason 2015). D iscourse-specific features of languages,
such as u tterance-final particles in Cantonese, or discourse markers in other languages, are
notoriously difficult to translate and often end up being omitted by interpreters, in ways that
may not change the propositional content of testimony, but affect its overall coherence (Hale
1999, 2004; Leung and Gibbons 2009). Coherence is also affected by consistency in lexical
choice (Pym 1999), and by the pauses required for consecutive interpreting, which cause frag-
mentation of extended turns (D’hondt 2004; Ng 2009; Angermeyer 2015). As noted above,
scholars have also examined ways in which interpreters may change the register or speech style
of testimony, with potential consequences for how credible or likeable they are perceived to be
by legal decision-makers (Berk-Seligson 1990; Hale 2004; Lee 2011). For example, Gallez and
Maryns (2014: 7 4–75) show how an interpreter renders a defendant’s informal and affective,
‘a lmost childish’ vernacular speech into a more formal and institutionally appropriate register,
thereby giving a different impression of the defendant’s character and preparedness, with po-
tential consequences for the evaluation of ‘his moral and legal responsibility.’
Compared to other institutions, courts have been shown to be less flexible about the lan-
guage choice of multilingual speakers. In particular, lay participants who have an interpreter
available to them may be discouraged or even forbidden from using their second language
proficiency in the institutional language (A ngermeyer 2008, 2015). Such a ll-or-nothing pol-
icies ignore the fact that second language acquisition is dynamic and not uniform, so that a
person may be able to narrate their recollection of an event in a second language, but may
not be able to understand legal arguments or the nuances of complex questions in cross-
examination. Stand-by interpreting, which is common with non-professional interpreters
in other contexts, would be an option for lay participants with some proficiency in the
official language, and its use has been observed in some jurisdictions (see e.g. Kadric 2001:
218). Cooke (1996) reports on the trial of an Aboriginal Australian defendant who spoke
English but also received assistance from an interpreter. Focusing on the defendant’s testi-
mony, Cooke notes,
access to an interpreter at the trial was a significant aid in her narration … The fact
that she spoke mainly English does not detract from the linguistic empowerment that
interpreting assistance gave her at those points when deficiency in her second language
blocked her expressive capacity (Cooke 1996: 286).
The practice of stand-by interpreting points to the fact that the linguistic boundaries be-
tween the participants in the courtroom are not always as impermeable as is often assumed.
131
Even lay participants with low proficiency in the court’s language may actively code-switch
into this language rather than rely exclusively on the interpreter, for example to respond to
a yes/no interrogative (A ngermeyer 2015). Alternatively, they may understand a question
in the original and respond in their preferred language before it has been translated. Such
practices can be understood as cases of translanguaging, a concept that has gained currency
in bilingualism and second language acquisition studies in recent years (Li Wei 2011; Oth-
eguy, García and Reid 2019). The term translanguaging describes language practices in
which speakers make use of the full repertoire of their linguistic knowledge, rather than
treating languages as separate and using only one language at a time, as if knowledge of the
other could be turned off (Rock 2017). Legal professionals may similarly make use of their
proficiency in a n on-official language. This is especially common in p ost-colonial contexts,
such as Hong Kong, where Ng (2018) argues that bilingual counsels have an advantage over
monolingual participants because they assume a role of ‘non-ratified overhearer of the ver-
sion of the talk not originally intended for them’ (2018: 70). However, translanguaging prac-
tices are also found in the global north when lay participants use a language that is widely
known (for instance English in continental Europe, or Spanish in certain parts of the United
States), or when attorneys speak their client’s language.
Participant roles and person deixis

Whether in stand-by mode, or in a consistent use of consecutive or simultaneous interpret-
ing, interpreters take part in coordinating the interaction between the other participants,
that is organizing t urn-taking and identifying participant roles. Following Wadensjö (1998),
scholars of court interpreting have drawn on Goffman’s (1981) notions of footing and the
participation framework, especially in describing the interpreter’s alignment to their speech
as animator of another person’s words and beliefs, as author of the spoken words, or as principal,
speaking for themselves and expressing their own beliefs (see e.g. Leung and Gibbons 2008).
Professional norms and legal guidelines strongly discourage interpreters from speaking for
themselves and instead often require them to speak in the voice of the source speaker whose
speech they are animating (Edwards 1995; Colin and Morris 1996). However, empirical
studies have shown consistently that interpreters stray from this norm. For one, interpreters
do at times make contributions that do not have a corresponding counterpart in the source,
so-called non-renditions (Wadensjö 1998; Cheung 2017; Vargas-Urpi 2019). In addition,
studies have found court interpreters to sometimes frame their renditions as reported speech,
and thereby distancing themselves from what is said, rather than by translating in the voice
of the source speaker, as they would typically be required.
When it comes to the interpretation of witness testimony, the mandatory use of first per-
son has a legal rationalization in many jurisdictions in that the interpreter’s rendition enters
the court record as the speech of the witness (and thereby exempting interpretation from
the hearsay rule in common law that prohibits testimony consisting of reported speech, see
Berk-Seligson 2000: 225). By contrast, when translating the speech of legal professionals into
the language of the witness or defendant, the practice of fi rst-person usage brings with it the
possibility for miscommunication when recipients falsely interpret first person pronouns as
erk-Seligson 1990: 116 notes, ‘the pronoun yo (I) can be a dan-
referring to the interpreter (as B
gerous word’). Similarly, in Angermeyer (2005) I show that address forms can cause confusion
during proceedings interpreting, when a you that the source speaker addresses to another par-
ticipant is taken by the target recipient as addressing them. By contrast, when interpreters use
a form of reported speech or indirect translation, such miscommunication is avoided. When
132
Source-centered interpreting Target-centered interpreting (reported

Participant (direct translation) speech or indirect translation)
Source speaker 1st person 3rd person

Interpreter 3rd person 1st person
Target recipient
• if addressed by source talk 2nd person 2nd person
• if not addressed by source talk 3rd person 2nd person
Other participant
• if addressed by source talk 2nd person 3rd person
• if not addressed by source-talk 3rd person 3rd person
Figure 8.1 Grammatical person used for participants in source-and target-centered interpreting re-
spectively (i.e. direct translation vs. reported speech; Angermeyer 2015: 85)
translating into languages that grammatically mark the gender or social status of the speaker
or addressee, misunderstandings may also be avoided in direct translation, such as if first
person forms are marked for the gender of the source speaker rather than the interpreter, or
if informal second person forms are used instead of polite address forms (A ngermeyer 2005).
Building on earlier analyses of the use of fi rst-and second-person reference (A ngermeyer
2005; Angermeyer 2009), I have argued in Angermeyer (2015) that interpreter styles in court
interpreting can be understood as source-centered or target-centered (see Figure 8.1). In
source-centered interpreting, interpreters maintain the person deixis of the source speech,
including the use of first person to refer to the source speaker and second person to refer to
the addressee of the source. By contrast, t arget-centered interpreting shifts the deictic center
so that the recipient is treated as addressee (referred to by second person) and first person is
reserved for the interpreter. This distinction between interpreter styles is inspired by Waden-
sjö’s (1998: 246–47) distinction between ‘relaying by replaying’ and ‘relaying by displaying’
as two endpoints on a continuum of interpreting styles, based on how interpreters constantly
and variously mark (limited) responsibility for what they utter, not only by means of choice
of personal deixis but by a range of communicative resources such as changes in vocal pitch,
gaze direction, gestures and so forth.
The choice between source-centered and target-centered interpreting styles may be due
to the interpreter’s preferences, their training and professional affiliation or identity, as well
as a result of accommodating to the preferences or usage of recipients. For example, some
legal professionals may ask the interpreter to ask a witness, rather than asking the witness
themselves directly (see Berk-Seligson 1990: 61; Fowler 1997; Christensen 2008). At the
same time, it may be conditioned by a number of contextual factors, such as the need to
disambiguate between competing source speakers, or the identification of an interactional
trouble source (A ngermeyer 2009). While court interpreting norms are posited as applying
independently of the direction of interpreting, several studies show an asymmetrical distri-
bution of these styles, in that the interpretation of witness testimony into the institutional
language is done consistently in source-centered interpreting style, but interpretation in
the other direction varies between the two styles, with some interpreters favoring a target-
c entered approach throughout and others using it for specific pragmatic reasons. For ex-
ample, Berk-Seligson (1990: 115) notes that many interpreters ‘systematically avoid these
pronouns when the judge is declaring the sentence’ such as by using passive forms (see also
133
Angermeyer 2009). Similarly, Ng (2018: 168) finds that in Hong Kong courtrooms, court
interpreters consistently use first person for interpreting from Cantonese into English, but
third person when translating from English into Cantonese, and she observes that this prac-
tice appears to be encouraged by their supervisors. Drawing on a survey answered by inter-
preters, she attributes this practice to a reluctance of interpreters to assume the voice of legal
professionals (whose speech they are translating when interpreting from English). Cheung
(2012) has similar findings and argues that the use of reported speech when translating into
Cantonese can facilitate communication and prevent misunderstandings.
While the use of first person and a source-centered interpreting style is often described
as a practice that distinguishes professional interpreters in courts, its comprehension by lis-
teners is also a marker of professionalism among the other participants in court. Legal pro-
fessionals may expect and understand that first person pronouns refer to the source speaker
rather than to the interpreter, but, as mentioned above, lay participants may find this practice
confusing, and this may induce interpreters to avoid it when they are interpreting for them.
In fact, scholars have increasingly argued that t arget-centered deictic adaptations of the par-
ticipant framework, but also of references to space and time, may enhance lay participants’
ability to understand the interpreter’s renditions (Cheung 2012; Gallez and Maryns 2014).
Defrancq and Verliefde (2017) describe a particularly striking contrast between the partici-
pation frameworks of professional courtroom discourse and the interpreter’s rendition style.
In the inquisitorial system of the Belgian Correctional Court from which they draw their
data, legal professionals employ a ‘paternalistic’ (2017: 210) style where the defendant is the
main topic of conversation but is not being addressed directly. Defranq and Verliefde show
that the court interpreter consistently transforms this paternalistic style in her interpretation
by ‘converting all third person references to the defendant into second person form’ (2017:
221), thus treating the defendant as the addressee rather than as an overhearer. At the same
time, she maintains the paternalistic style when interpreting the defendant’s speech for the
judge (2017: 223–24).
While such deictic shifts may thus play a role in coordinating the interaction and fa-
cilitating understanding, they have perhaps more often been analyzed in relation to the
interpreters’ pursuit of remaining neutral, their identity and ideology (Berk-Seligson 1990;
Shlesinger 1991; Morris 1995; Hale 2004). For example, Leung and Gibbons (2008) show
in their analysis of data from two trials in Hong Kong how the court interpreters’ shifts in
person deixis coincides with other ways in which they mark their own stances v is-à-vis other
participants, such as, for example modifying the pragmatic force of hostile questions posed
by a defense lawyer in a rape trial. However, while deictic shifts permit interpreters to speak
for themselves, they do not automatically mean that the interpreter is perceived as taking
side. In an experimental study, Cheung (2014) found that lay participants did not perceive
the use of reported speech per se as a sign of the interpreter’s lack of neutrality. However, if
reported speech was introduced with a title (‘the judge said…’), interpreters were more likely
to be perceived as aligned with the legal professional, whereas use of a pronoun (‘he said…’)
led to the perception of an alignment with the lay recipient.
Related topics
In recent years, scholars in the field of language and law have increasingly treated court-
room interaction as part of an intertextual chain in the judicial process, investigating
in particular how police records and other documents are recontextualized in criminal
trials (Heffer, Rock and Conley 2013; D’hondt 2014). The impact of intertextuality on
134
court interpreting has not yet been examined to the same extent, however. While it has
often been noted that court interpreters may need to engage in sight translation or may
need to interpret complex written texts that are read out loud to them, less attention has
been paid to how those written documents may themselves be the product of processes of
translation, for example in the case of a suspect’s written statement to the police that may
have been produced with or without the aid of an interpreter. As shown by B erk-Seligson
(2 000, 2009) and Morris (2 008), among others, interpreting in police interviews is often
conducted in a more informal and a d-hoc manner than interpreting in court, and this pro-
cess may itself become the subject of a legal argument in trial or on appeal. B erk-Seligson
(2 009) conducts detailed analyses of recordings of police interviews with S panish-speaking
suspects in the United States, showing how bilingual police officers may blur the roles
of interpreter and interrogator. She also shows how suspects’ statements are drafted in
English by police officers, and then given to suspects to sign, often without providing an
accurate backtranslation. When such statements are presented in court, court interpreters
may have to translate them back into the defendant’s language, presenting them as the
defendant’s own words, only for the defendant to deny having said them. Marszalenko
(2 014) compares the working conditions of legal interpreters at three stages of the judicial
process in Japan, that is, during police interrogation, interviews by a public prosecutor and
testimony at trial. Drawing on personal experience as interpreter rather than data from
recorded interaction, Marszalenko notes that it is more difficult for interpreters to remain
neutral during the police interview than at the trial, and argues, like B erk-Seligson, that
the production of the suspect’s written statement by police is problematic. As interpreting
for police becomes a more widely researched topic, the importance of intertextuality for
court interpreting is likely to be explored further in future studies.
Intertextuality also represents a challenge for the translation of legal terms. As noted
above, court interpreting requires interpreters to be familiar with specific legal registers,
which are tied to the distinct legal traditions of their respective jurisdictions. Specialized
legal terminology refers to concepts that have developed highly specific meanings through
legal statutes and traditions of precedent. As a result, such legal terms of art generally do not
have translation equivalents in languages that do not share a similar legal tradition. In such
cases, interpreters may be found to produce lay reformulations of legal concepts that reduce
the institutional character of their rendition. Such challenges point to the limitations of legal
translation, and ultimately to the fact that languages are not neutral vehicles of communi-
cation (Duranti 2011). Even in bilingual legal systems, where participants have the choice
between languages, scholars have shown that this choice may have legal implications. For
example, in his analysis of trials in Hopi Tribal Court, Richland (2008) shows that appeals
to traditional Hopi concepts of justice are more likely to be successful if they are made in
Hopi rather than in English. Similarly, Ng (2009) shows how in Hong Kong, common law
trials become less formal and bound by tradition when trials are conducted in Cantonese
rather than English. In a broader sense, this points to what linguistic anthropologists and
sociolinguists call the social indexicality of language, namely that linguistic forms and codes
are socially meaningful in that they shape how participants perceive each other. A request for
a court interpreter or the act of speaking a non-official language may by itself be evaluated
negatively by other participants and evoke negative social stereotypes, or what Haviland
(2003: 771) calls ‘l inguistic paranoia’, that is a belief that speakers use an unfamiliar language
to hide information from others (see also Fowler 1997; Angermeyer 2015: 10). Court in-
terpreting is thus an area of public service interpreting where the participants’ beliefs about
language and translation may have a considerable impact on the rights of individuals. In this,
135
court interpreting is shaped as much by societal ideologies about multilingualism as it is by

ideologies and practices that are specific to the legal sphere.
Further reading
Haviland, John B. (2003) “Ideologies of language: Reflections on language and U.S. law”, American
Anthropologist 105: 764–74.
Drawing on court records from two controversial legal decisions in the United States, the author insightfully
examines the language ideologies that underlie judicial attitudes towards translation and constrain how court
interpreting is provided.
Karrebæk, Martha Sif and Solvej Sørensen (2021) “Interpreting as creating a potential for understand-
ing: Insights from a Danish courtroom”, International Journal of Speech, Language and the Law 28 (1):
59–97.
Examining a corpus of audio-recorded court proceedings in Denmark, the authors explore how interpreters
work to facilitate lay participants’ understanding of institutional processes when the corresponding source talk
by legal professionals is implicit and abbreviated.
Ng, Eva N.S. (2018) Common Law in an Uncommon Courtroom: Judicial Interpreting in Hong Kong.
The author provides a highly detailed linguistic analysis of E nglish-Cantonese interpreting in the bi-
lingual context of Hong Kong, where some courtroom participants have bilingual proficiency while others
do not.
Related chapters
Chapter 9, Research on interpreter-mediated asylum interviews by Sonja Pöllabauer
Notes
1 See for example the Code of Ethics of the National Association of Judicial Interpreters and Translators
in the United States: https://najit.org/w p-content/uploads/2016/09/NAJITCodeof EthicsFINAL.
pdf
2 As noted by Gallez and Maryns (2014), court interpreters may also whisper during witness inter-
pretation, when interpreting into the witness’s language.
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9
RESEARCH ON INTERPRETER-
MEDIATED ASYLUM
INTERVIEWS
Sonja Pöllabauer
Introduction
This contribution outlines epistemological, theoretical and methodological considerations,
and strands of topics in research on interpreter-
mediated communication in asylum contexts.
The focus lies primarily on research that uses and explores authentic communication data,
that is instances of naturally occurring talk, taking place in different administrative stages
of the asylum adjudication procedure, recorded and subsequently transcribed. Research that
predominantly addresses users’ or interpreters’ perspectives is not included in this review
(see Gustafsson, this volume, for a discussion of such work). All of the studies under review
present some form of ‘interactional data’ (Vuori and Hokkanen 2020: 110). The studies un-
der review present data on spoken-language interpreting only; at present, no studies report
on corpora of naturally occurring sign language interpreting (SLI) in an asylum context
(but see Slettebakk Berge and Stone et al., this volume, on problems related to sign language
interpreting).
The thematic focus of this chapter lies on communication in asylum proceedings, which
often requires interpreters to assist in the process of determining whether individuals in fear
of persecution are to be granted refugee status (asylum). In most industrialised countries, the
asylum adjudication system is governed by international humanitarian law, with the 1951
Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees being one of the key instruments,
together with national asylum-
specific legislation. While the structure of the proceedings
may vary nationally, most countries provide several levels of adjudication, often with an
appeal instance. The number of refugees worldwide and dominant source and host countries
are influenced by current geopolitical developments and subject to rapid change (relevant
statistics are available from key players in refugee protection such as the UN International
Organisation for Migration (IOM) or the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR)). Due to lack
of documentary evidence, most countries rely on in-person oral interviews to establish the
validity of applicants’ claims. These interviews generally have a prototypical structure and
format, with the burden of proof lying on the applicants who are required to disclose rel-
evant facts and present their claims in the best possible way, and where contradictions may
harm their credibility. The applicants’ oral accounts of events are then remoulded and pre-
served in written records (transcripts) of the interviews which are the basis for the asylum
140 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-12

Research on interpreter-mediated asylum interviews
officials’ decisions. Interpreters play a crucial role in this system as both sides need to rely on
the interpreter and trust in him or her to render what is said fully and correctly.
The literature review presents a chronological outline of the development of this field,
which is followed by a discussion of central epistemological, theoretical and methodological
considerations. A discussion of salient strands of topics follows, and an outline of work in
related fields concludes the chapter.
Literature overview
Among the first publications on interpreter-mediated interaction in an asylum context, dat-
ing back to the late 1980s and early 1990s, are contributions that are not data-
driven. Kälin’s
(1986) and Monnier’s (1995) study of the structure of asylum interviews and cross-cultural
misunderstandings in (Swiss) asylum proceedings are among the most influential of those
early conceptual-theoretical publications.
One of the pioneering authors of the 1990s is Barsky (1993, 1994, 1996) who, based
on official transcripts of Canadian Refugee Convention hearings, provides a profound and
critical discussion of the routines and the intrinsic bias inherent to such encounters. With a
focus on the US, Anker (1991) also zooms in on data from the 1980s. Though Anker’s study
does not strictly meet the criteria for inclusion in the body of literature under review, as
her corpus does not include recordings of authentic interviews, it is still worth mentioning
as this two-year observational study reports on one of the largest corpora in the pertinent
literature with a sample of 193 hearings that were observed. Like other authors who first
drew attention to this then marginal field of research, Anker points to ‘major problems in
foreign language interpretation’ (1991: 272) such as faulty renditions, no training and no
standardised selection criteria for interpreters. Following and in part inspired by these first
t hought-provoking forays into this field, the 2000s saw a surge in more d ata-d riven research
(see Pöllabauer 2006b: 235), a trend that may be explained not only by broader geopolitical
developments which sparked greater interest in migration-
related topics but also by the fact
that with the new millennium, PSI research had gained momentum. It seems neither feasible
nor useful, however, to present a full chronological timeline of more recent research in this
section; publications that have proven particularly fruitful are discussed in more detail under
the sections below.
Epistemological and theoretical considerations and methodology

The process of granting international protection to applicants in need is ‘one of the most
complex adjudication procedures in contemporary Western bureaucracies’ ( Jacquemet 2011:
479). Autocratic systems do not have comparable asylum adjudication procedures that com-
ply with international human rights standards. It is thus not surprising that the body of
research under review only includes studies on countries with democratic government sys-
tems. It spans almost two decades and three continents:1 North America, Europe and Asia.
More specifically, Barsky (1994) and Rousseau et al. (2002) explore the situation in Canada,
and Anker (1991) in the US. The greatest number of studies are on European countries:
Jacquemet (2010) on Albania (as well as Kosovo and Italy); Pöllabauer (2004), Kolb and
Pöchhacker (2008), Rienzner (2011) and Dahlvik (2018) on Austria; Maryns (2006) on Bel-
gium; Licoppe and Veyrier (2020) on France; Scheffer (2001) on Germany; Doornbos (2005)
and van der Kleij (2015) on the Netherlands; Gómez Díez (2010) on Spain; Keselman et al.
141
Sonja Pöllabauer
(2008) on Sweden and finally, Lee (2014) analyses the situation in South Korea. Interestingly,
Australia 2 does not appear on this map, though it has been pinpointed as one of the pioneer-
ing countries as regards PSI practice standards and training. One explanation might be Aus-
tralia’s restrictive offshore asylum policy which might impede researchers’ access to the field
to an even greater degree than in other countries. What is also apparent is the lack of data
on central European countries that have been under former Communist rule (exceptions
are Tryuk’s (2017) survey on Polish interpreters’ views, and recent ethnographic work by
Tužinská (2019) on the Slovak asylum context.
Some model-based studies

While this chapter will mainly focus on data-driven research, there are a number of works
discussing a sylum-seeking in reference to socio-cultural models. Inghilleri (2003, 2005), as
a case in point, uses Toury’s (1980) model of translational norms, combined with Bourdieu’s
(1977) constructs of field and habitus and Bernstein’s (1990) theory of pedagogic discourse, to
theorise the principles that govern the communicative practices in asylum interviews, both
on a m acro- and a m icro-level. Inghilleri concludes that interactants in interpreter-mediated
asylum interviews show conflicting and contradictory habitus. Participants read situations
variously, despite the same macro-context, which is why Inghilleri argues ‘for an alternative
to viewing interpreters as forever trapped inside their socially constituted selves’ (2003: 261).
With a focus on ethics and interpreting justice, Inghilleri (2012) concludes that ‘interpreters
frequently abandon unproductive norms’ (2012: 98) because existing codes steering norms
on interpreting practice ‘do not sufficiently acknowledge the decisions and actions interpret-
ers take as normal part of their task’ (ibid.). In 2005, she expands on her use of the habitus
concept (Inghilleri 2003) to conclude that interpreters’ habitus is often geared towards ‘the
maintenance of control of the social/interactive space by the dominant legal and political
institutions involved in the political asylum process’ (2005: 1) and that conflicting habitus
may weaken or strengthen interpreters’ position within this interactional space, which, with
reference to Bourdieu, she compares to ‘zones of uncertainty’. With a focus on identity con-
struction, Tipton (2008) introduces another sociological construct into the array of theoret-
ical constructs: she uses Giddens’ (1984) notion of reflexivity to discuss the reflexive practices
of the different parties in an asylum encounter and how these ‘impact on the applicant’s abil-
ity to assert his or her status as a “knowledgeable agent” and promote his or her “authentic
voice” in the telling process’ (2008: 1). As one with several other agents in this system, an
interpreter has to tread a fragile line in this process of identity construction and ‘“fight” to
promote his or her status as the knowledgeable (cultural) agent’ (2008: 12).
Data-driven research
Most of the studies under review adopt a qualitative design and a phenomenological or
constructivist approach, though elements of quantitative methods are occasionally used to
describe specific data (sub)sets (Keselman et al. 2008, 2010b; van der Kleij 2015). The tag-
ging of research designs is not clear-
cut, yet most of the studies in the literature under review
can broadly be described as case studies, in that they combine different methods to explore
a communicative phenomenon and interactants’ perspectives within its context. Some can
be classified as typical examples of ethnographic research, and also use this descriptor, while
others do not use this label yet adopt an ethnographic multi-
data design. Almost all use
some form of discourse analysis, which is a blurry concept per se in that it is sometimes used
142
broadly and unsystematically to describe the analysis of language in use, and sometimes is
associated with a particular methodological-theoretical framework (Hale and Napier 2013:
119). Many underline the problems in getting access to the data, given the sensibility of the
situations involved.
Ethnographic research and fieldwork

Examples of ethnographic research that have explicitly been labelled as such by the au-
thors are, for instance, Scheffer (2001), Doornbos (2005), Maryns (2006), Jacquemet (2009,
2010, 2011) and Dahlvik (2018) (see Gibb and Good [2014] for an ethnographic study us-
ing interviews, observation and document analysis). In his study of the German asylum
determination system, Scheffer (2001) combines participant observation with interviews,
recordings and document analysis. As an outsider to the discipline and with little reference to
translation-specific literature, he provides a broad sociological analysis and pinpoints pitfalls
of communication that are also addressed later by other authors. With reference to Goffman,
Foucault and Clifford, he not only addresses the structure and turn-taking patterns in asy-
lum interviews, and the role of interpreters and their influence on the (co)construction of
formal records, but also discusses the challenges of data collection in a field that is difficult to
access. While his data provide a good glimpse into communication routines, his transcripts
do not include original-
language sequences and their translation and he does not address the
quality of the renditions, nor does he reflect on the process of transcribing and translating
foreign-language utterances. As his publications are in German only, they are also not widely
accessible.
A more recent example of a sociological stance on interpreter-mediated hearings is Dahl-
vik’s use of ‘institutional ethnography’ (2018: 14) to study social processes at fi rst-instance
interviews in Austria. Rooted in grounded theory (Strauss and Corbin 1991), she uses obser-
vation, interviews and artefacts analysis to discuss the role of interpreters in such a system.
Dahlvik’s study is an example of the use of second-
hand data: she uses her observation notes
to discuss fragments of interpreted talk that were translated into English for her 2018 mono-
graph; the foreign-
language original sequences are not included in the excerpts. A similar
approach, which is mostly necessitated by the lack of permission to record hearings or the
reluctance of speakers to be recorded, is adopted by Doornbos (2005) and Rienzner (2011).
The latter is a monograph written in German based on the author’s MA thesis. Rienzner’s
data are interesting insofar as they are drawn from a substantial corpus of ethnographic data
that were collected within a larger project on communication with African migrants in Aus-
trian administrative procedures. In her study, Rienzner critically points out that the use of
fragments of talk, which were recorded only through observational notes, should be viewed
with caution as they are not a ‘direct reflection of the hearings but “only” a result of the pro-
cesses of observation and documentation’ (2011: 39, my translation); and while note-based
observation is a valid method and may help to shed light on interactional circumstances, ex-
amples of authentic talk that are based on personal notes only (and not recordings) should be
interpreted cautiously as the combination of observation and literal note-taking is a complex
process in which details and words may easily get lost.
Jacquemet (2009, 2010, 2011), whose work on transidiomacity (2009) seems to have
found a particular echo in the work by some researchers (see, e.g. Maryns and Blommaert
2001 and below), only tags his approach as ethnographic in a footnote and presents data from
fieldwork in Italy (2009), Albania and Kosovo (2010), which he combines with data from
other sources (Inghilleri 2003; Maryns 2006), to feed his arguments. His broad background
143
Sonja Pöllabauer
in communication studies, linguistic anthropology and linguistics shows in his choice of a

panoply of different theoretical notions that are skilfully used to analyse and discuss specific
language practices and ‘entextualisation’ (Bauman and Briggs 1990) processes in the asylum
context (see below), while the description of the overall corpus and his general approach,
however, remain rather eclectic.
Other studies anchor their approach under the broader concept of discourse analysis or
use descriptors such as case study or fieldwork. Barsky’s pioneering work (1993, 1994, 1996)
on Canadian asylum determination hearings, for instance, is an example of qualitative doc-
ument analysis. He uses official English transcripts of two Canadian Convention refugee
hearings of the 1980s. These transcripts, which are a particular set of second-hand data, were
prepared by an external company and used as a basis for the decision of Convention refugee
cases. Based on his critical review of both the transcription process and the adjudication
system itself, in a later publication (Barsky 2000), he also analyses a set of simulated data
(simulations of interviews with claimants).
Discourse-analytical studies of natural talk

Maryns’ (2006) study of the Belgium asylum system is one of the first to analyse a corpus of
authentic hearings. It consists of ten recordings involving speakers who use different reper-
toires of African English. Maryns combines an ‘assemblage’ (2006: 9) of different theoretical
discourse-analytical approaches for analysing her data. She is also one of the few to address
research theoretical issues such as access to the field and gatekeeping processes inherent to
this process in more detail (see Maryns 2004 and also Barsky 1996: 4; Doornbos 2005).
Pöllabauer (2004, 2005, 2006a) combines observation and an analysis of 20 authentic
audio recordings. Her d iscourse-a nalytical approach to the analysis of Austrian fi rst-instance
hearings is inspired by Fairclough and Wodak’s (1997) approach to critical discourse analysis
(CDA), with a theoretical framework that is rooted in translation studies (Toury’s (1980)
norm model), and merged with Goffman’s (1967) notion of image, face and participation
status and Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory. Brown and Levinson’s notion of
face threats and repair strategies and Goffman’s construct of participation status are also used
by Gómez Díez (2010) who combines her analysis of a 60- minute admissibility hearing in
Spain with the typology of ‘renditions’ that was developed by Wadensjö (1998). Similar to
Pöllabauer, Gómez Díez’ study also presents data where English is used as a lingua franca
(also see Pöchhacker and Kolb 2009; Maryns 2013). Wadensjö’s approach to discourse anal-
ysis is also used by Keselman et al. (2008, 2010b) who combine it with Goffman’s construct
of participation status to study the rendition of different question types in interviews with
unaccompanied minors seeking asylum in Sweden. Goffman’s notion of participation frame-
work and a c onversation-a nalytic approach to t urn-t aking, namely Jefferson’s classification
of side-sequences (1972) is used on the same data set to focus on instances of non-renditions
(Keselman, Cederborg and Linell 2010a). The work of Keselman et al. is a good example of
a design that combines a qualitative approach with elements of a more quantitative approach,
including the use of descriptive statistical tests. It is also a sound example of a particularly
transparent description of methodological design, in that the authors are among the few to
address not only issues such as processes of data coding and inter-rater-reliability but also
access to the field, ethical approval, transcription and translation of the recorded or tran-
scribed data.
Kolb and Pöchhacker’s (2008) and Pöchhacker and Kolb’s (2009) studies of second-
instance interviews in Austria do not only rely on first-
hand authentic audio recordings but
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also combine those with a document analysis of the official records that were taken during
these interviews. Like Lee’s (2014) ‘case study’ of ad-hoc-interpreting by untrained lay in-
terpreters in South Korean asylum appeal hearings, they do not narrow down their approach
to a specific school of discourse analysis but conduct a broad analysis that combines different
elements of the studies mentioned above.
Van der Kleij’s (2015) study on i nterpreter-mediated asylum interviews in the Netherlands
is fittingly labelled a ‘corpus analysis’ as it is the only study in the literature under review that
presents a predominantly quantitative analysis of shifts and modifications in the interpreters’
renditions. The author combines different theoretical constructs, such as Wadensjö’s (1998)
model of renditions and Goffman’s ( 1981) participation framework, with Chesterman’s
(1993) translational norms and van Leuven-Zwart’s (1989, 1990) notion of translation shifts.
Multimodal data
A very specific set of multimodal data is used by Mason and Stewart (2001), Tillman (2009)
and Mason (2012), who explore fragments of TV documentaries on asylum interviews that
feature instances of authentic hearings. While Mason and Stewart (2001), who focus on face,
and Tillman (2009), who conducts a quantitative analysis of modal particles, do not compre-
hensively describe their corpus and its limitations, Mason (2012) discusses the usability and
limitations of such multimodal data in more depth. His fine-grained analysis of gaze patterns
shows that the interplay of gaze and nonverbal signals is closely linked to issues of status and
role. While the data used by Mason and Stewart and Tillman are rather small fragments of
video-recorded data that were recorded and preprocessed for a different purpose (use in TV
documentaries), Licoppe and Veyrier’s (2020) work on asylum appeal hearings in France is
currently the only large-scale a sylum-specific study that is based on a corpus of 150 hours
of multimodal courtroom data (see also Licoppe and Verdier 2013, and Licoppe and Veyrier
2017, and Licoppe this volume, on aspects of courtroom interpreting that also bear relevance
to asylum interpreting). Licoppe and Veyrier (2020) adopt an explicit ethnographic approach
by combining video recordings with observation and interviews, and specifically focus on
chunking and turn management in stretches of extended answers in remote consecutive.
Their theoretical framework is drawn from the literature on institutional talk and power and
identity, and Wadensjö’s (1998) notion of explicit or implicit coordination.
Limitations of research and methodology

As mentioned above, one limitation of research in this field generally is that migration au-
thorities are increasingly reluctant to provide access to data (Nikolaidou, Rehnberg and
Wadensjö 2019). Asylum determination procedures can be counted among those fields that
due to their intimate and delicate nature are difficult to access and are thus often ‘blackboxed’
(Blommaert 2001: 414).
The blackboxing of information in this closed system sometimes also makes it necessary
to use ‘“second best” data’ (Blommaert 2001: 414). This assumption is borne out by the data
sets used in the studies under review: we find both first-
hand data (examples of natural talk,
collected in situ, often by the researchers themselves), and second-hand data (t aken from
other sources). Some of these data are authentic (recordings of naturally occurring talk),
while others can be described as semi-authentic in that they are not based on recordings
but have been (pre)processed in some ways (official transcripts of hearings; memory notes
of sequences of hearings). The size of the corpora used in the different studies also differs
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Sonja Pöllabauer
considerably and is not comparable. Some provide information on the number of cases, rang-
ing between one (Gómez Díez 2010) and 390 (Gill et al. 2016), while others measure their
corpus in minutes or hours, ranging between a few minutes (Tillman 2009; Mason 2012)
and 150 hours (Licoppe and Veyrier 2020).

Elements of one strand of discussion are problems in interpretation, incomplete or faulty
renderings and misunderstandings (see, e.g. Pöllabauer 2004; Maryns 2006; Keselman et al.
2008; Jacquemet 2009, 2011; Gómez Díez 2010; Lee 2014). Interestingly, only one of the
studies in the literature under review concludes that smaller ‘shifts’ (i.e. conscious or un-
conscious changes leading to dissimilarities between source and target text material, such
as additions, omissions, change of word order or forms of address) that were detected in the
analysed corpus did not ‘seem to jeopardise a reliable account of the asylum seekers’ narra-
tive’ (van der Kleij 2015: 161). Doornbos (2005), in contrast, concludes that in more than half
of the interviews of her corpus of 90 interviews, serious obstacles impeded communication.
Jacquemet (2011) uses Gumperz’ notion of ‘contextualisation cues’ (Gumperz, Jupp and Celia
Roberts 1979), that is to say, culture-specific verbal and non-verbal signals that are used by
interlocutors to indicate the meaning of utterances, to outline instances of ‘communicative
breakdown’. Such obstacles in communication may be caused by ‘unexpected cultural as-
sumptions’, ‘unexpected semantic clusters’ and ‘unexpected ways of speaking’ ( Jacquemet
2011: 483–85), and interpreters can influence these breakdowns. The overall nature of the
interviews per se, which often follows a specific ‘script’ (2011: 480), the complex entextual-
isation processes that are involved in the drafting of an official written record of the hearing
that needs to comply with official standards and expectations, and metapragmatic statements,
which are used by officials to ‘impose dominant norms and forms of their institutional cul-
ture on people [who are] barely able to understand the nation’s local language’ (2011: 480),
make it difficult for applicants to present their claims. Jacquemet considers interpreters as an
obstacle in this process, as they not always are in a position to adequately render these spe-
cific narratives and discursive structures. Officials themselves, however, as is also shown by
Scheffer (2001: 40–43), have very few ways of evaluating the degree of completeness and the
quality of interpreters’ renditions of original contributions.
Communication breakdowns hamper the determination of the credibility of applicants’
claims, which is another line of argumentation that spans much of the literature under re-
view: ‘[…] the performances of asylum seekers are routinely framed by officials as “difficult”
and “problematic” and are handled with suspicion’ ( Jacquemet 2011: 482). Reliance on
‘denotational signs’ ( Jacquemet 2014), such as proper and personal names, is one of the
means available to officials for assessing the credibility of applicants’ claims. Jacquemet crit-
ically outlines the negative consequences which such a search for denotational accuracy
and common-sense assumptions may have for applicants, whose transnational ‘superdiverse’
(Vertovec 2007) language practices often conflict with official language ideologies. Jacque-
met (2014: 75) finds that those acting as interpreters in his data often were actively involved
in these ‘examinations’. Moreover, by providing their own choices, which need not neces-
sarily be based on attested expertise, they could undermine the credibility of an applicant’s
claim. Gómez Díez (2010) study of an admissibility hearing, involving an untrained ad-hoc
interpreter, also serves as a rich example of how interpreters may negatively influence the
determination of credibility. In this case study, an Urdu-speaking interpreter, who is called
in to interpret for an English-
speaking African applicant, blatantly fails to let the applicant
146
be heard, partially also due to his lack of knowledge about the applicants’ multilingual and
multicultural background. Much of the applicant’s narrative does not ‘survive the interpret-
er’s filter’ (2010: 353), who assumes tasks that would in fact be the official’s duty. This is also
an example of how unawareness or ignorance on the part of the authorities as regards the
selection and recruitment of suitable interpreters may exacerbate the intrinsic bias inherent
to the system. In a different geographical context, though similar as regards the degree (or
lack) of awareness by official stakeholders and interpreters, Lee (2010) shows in a case study
of South Korean appeal hearings how untrained interpreters assume discrepant roles that
may also be detrimental to the applicants’ claims. Her examples also provide ample evidence
of how content may be mistranslated. Lee’s (2014: 66) is also one of the few studies in the
literature under review where the complexities of relay interpreting in such a context are
addressed (see also Maryns 2006: 238–39 on a case of multilanguage translation).
Narrative inequalities that are intrinsic to the system and may hamper applicants’ chances
of being heard (Barsky 1994; see also Doornbos 2005 on evidentiary assessment) are dis-
cussed extensively by Blommaert (for instance 2001) and Maryns and Blommaert (2002).
The complex entextualisation process that is inherent to the process of drafting a formal
record (Blommaert 2001) and applicants’ dense and complex ‘home narratives’ that are used
to narrate and contextualise ‘displaced lives’ (2001: 63), as well as ‘deterritorialised’ (Maryns
and Blommaert 2001: 63) and ‘transidiomatic’ (ibid.) language practices and forms of shifting
and mixing different codes which are part of applicants’ language repertoire, make interpret-
ing in such a context a difficult task. Deterritorialised and transidiomatic language practices,
terms that were coined by Jacquemet (2000), describe linguistic resources and language use
that are ‘out of place’ (Maryns and Blommaert 2001: 63) in that they are not usually associ-
ated with the context (space) in which they are used, and, in the case of transidiomacy, re-
sources that are ‘not associated with a (perceived) linguistic community’ (ibid.: 64). Maryns
(2006, 2013), for instance, presents a wealth of examples of interpreters’ influence on such
complex discursive processes and shows how interpreters’ and officials’ lack of awareness of
these processes may result in misunderstandings and faulty renderings that can affect the de-
termination of credibility. Doornbos (2005) also draws attention to the fact that interpreters
are not always impartial, as stipulated by codes of ethics, and sometimes assume an expert
role by providing background information that may be used by officials to contest claimants’
arguments and credibility (see also Scheffer 2001: 139–87 on interpreters’ role in ‘credibility
testing’ routines; my translation).
The role of interpreters is also a transversal topic straddling most of the studies under
review, as almost all, in one way or the other, discuss interpreters’ agency and positioning
within that complex discursive system as outlined above. Barsky, for instance, pleads for a
distinctively active role of interpreters as ‘intercultural agents’ (1996), who in his view should
be allowed to articulate and even embellish applicants’ claims to counterbalance the intrinsic
bias that is inherent to the asylum determination system. Justified as such a claim may be,
examples of more recent data-based studies suggest that in the face of a lack of trained inter-
preters and little awareness among principal stakeholders of the complexity of the tasks to be
assumed by interpreters, such a claim may remain an ideal. With reference to Prunč’s (1997)
notion of ‘translation culture’ as the variable set of norm, conventions and expectations fram-
ing interactants’ behaviour in a given field, Pöllabauer (2006a), for instance, shows that along
a continuum of different forms of agency, interpreters often assume discrepant roles that
hold a potential for manipulation. Prunč’s construct of translation culture is influenced by
issues such as loyalty, cooperation and transparency, which were used by Pöllabauer (2006a)
to analyse the positioning of the interpreters in her corpus. Her data suggest that there is a
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Sonja Pöllabauer
considerable degree of cooperation between officers and interpreters, and shifting degrees
of loyalty towards the asylum applicants, for whom the entire system is not very transparent.
Pöllabauer’s data suggest that interpreters try to coordinate talk to produce translations that
comply with official language ideologies, and in such a role position themselves as allies and
helpers of the administrative officials. They seek to solve obstacles to communication in a
cooperative way, while at the same time, though not always, they try to uphold rapport with
applicants. In such a function, they also provide meta-
comments and, in a role as ‘auxiliary
police officers’ (2004: 157), may even conduct their own subhearings in ‘internal rounds of
talk’ (2004: 160). Pöllabauer’s (2004) examples also support the assumption that the linguistic
diversity and the specific languages repertoires that are used in this context (an issue also
raised by Maryns and Blommaert 2001), including also the use of a lingua franca, a topic
explored by Maryns (2006) and Gómez Díez (2010), cannot always be rendered adequately
by interpreters who sometimes have limited linguistic skills (Gómez Díez 2010; Lee 2014) or
little awareness of the (super)diverse backgrounds of applicants ( Jacquemet 2011). Similarly,
Maryns (2013) suggests that there is a serious discrepancy between what interpreters should
and can do. Her specific case study of an appeal case involving a Krio-speaking applicant and
an English (not Dutch) interpreter, with the asylum official himself translating the English
utterances and re-entextualising them in the Dutch record, shows that interpreters may also
tend to make utterances more ‘palatable’ (2013: 681) by ‘flagging the inexpressible’ (2013:
682). Her study is also one of the few examples among those studies under review which
discusses interpreters’ influence on the disclosure and ‘re-performance’ (2013: 661) of gender
issues and gender-based evidence.
The negotiation of the participation status of unaccompanied children, as a specifically
vulnerable group, is addressed by Keselman et al. (2008; Keselman, Cederborg and Linell
2010a; Keselman et al. 2010b) who show that interpreters’ involvement may challenge mi-
nors’ participation status and their rights to be heard and that interpreters may even ‘exclude,
distort, discredit and guide the voices of children’ (2010a: 83). Their data also suggest that
interpreters, often unknowingly, change the question format (2010b) and change open ques-
tions that are aimed at enabling applicants to disclose information and are an important
element of the free narrative phase of interviews, into more focused question types (2008).
In her pragmatic microanalysis of modal particles, Tillman (2009) arrives at a similar conclu-
sion: while modal particles may be used to reduce distance and establish rapport, a change of
such particles through interpreters may turn questioning strategies into less open and more
forceful formats, which ultimately may have an influence on power relations and rapport.
Power within the asymmetrical system of asylum hearings is also the focus of Mason’s
(2012) study of gaze patterns. He shows that gaze is not only used to regulate participation
frames but is also ‘closely bound up with role and status’ (2012: 177). Interpreters also use
gaze to coordinate turn-management, and he also concludes that ‘different gaze behaviour’
(2012: 197) may be considered inconsistent with the dominant ‘norm in this community of
practice’ (2012: 197). Issues of power are also linked to facework. The idea that interpreters
are aware of their own face is discussed by Pöllabauer (2004, 2005) who analyses interpreters’
strategies for saving their own but also the other interactants’ face and shows that interpreters
may sometimes challenge applicants’ face (see also Dahlvik 2018 on examples of disrespectful
and biased behaviour on the part of interpreters and officials). While interpreters generally
opt for direct forms of address, they sometimes indicate the authorship of a statement if the
officers’ or applicants’ face is in danger by, for instance, transforming the deictic structure of
utterances (‘He said that…’), or they omit the face-threatening comment (Pöllabauer 2004:
163). If their own face is endangered by an applicant’s statement, they may also opt for a
148
comment, which, however, need not necessarily be made transparent to the applicant (ibid:
167). In a similar vein, Gómez Díez also studies applicants’ reactions to face-threatening acts
and argues ‘[…] that the interpreter makes some alterations that weaken the defensive force
of the applicant’s arguments’ (2010: 351).
Interpreter education is another of the (sub)strands that can be inferred from a closer
reading. The studies under review show that non-t rained ( L ee 2014) and ad-hoc interpret-
ers (Gómez Díez 2010) are still assigned to work as interpreters. And while training may not
be top on the asylum authorities’ list of priorities, data in the studies under review suggest
that specific training is much needed (Keselman et al. 2008; Lee 2014). Even if trained
interpreters are used (see Pöllabauer 2005; Kolb and Pöchhacker 2008), and these are often
simply not available for specific language combinations (see Maryns 2013; van der Kleij
2015; Dahlvik 2018), the outcome might not necessarily be much better, which would be
an extra argument for more specific training. While interpreters’ qualifications and (lack
of ) training are often mentioned, sometimes only in passing as often little is known on the
interpreters’ backgrounds, only few authors focus specifically on training interpreters for
an asylum context (see Bergunde and Pöllabauer 2019; also, see Ticca, Traverso and Jouin,
this volume).
A specific strand of focus, first taken up by Scheffer (2001) and also discussed by Pölla-
bauer (2004, 2005), is that interpreters serve as co-producers of the official written record
and as such try to ‘interpret for the record’ (Pöchhacker and Kolb 2009: 26) by reformulating
content and adapting it to the conventions of interview records. They play a considerable
role in the trajectory and reformulation of narratives into a written record that complies
with the official expectations of this specific text genre (Blommaert 2001). This topic is
dealt with by Kolb and Pöchhacker (2008) and Pöchhacker and Kolb (2009) who show that
‘interpreters tend to adjust to a striking degree to the needs of the record’ and in doing so
assume considerable responsibility for ‘the legally relevant manifestations of the interview’
(2009: 119). Like Pöllabauer (2005: 281–83), they present instances of talk where interpreters
seem to feel responsible for cooperatively and jointly solving problems such as a lack of co-
herence (Pöchhacker and Kolb 2009: 1 29–31).
One last strand of topics, which has not been discussed in much detail above, is found
in Licoppe and Veyrier (2020)3. In a recent large-
scale study on remote interpreting in a
‘distributed’ (Licoppe and Verdiere 2013: 247) spatial arrangement, they examine the man-
agement of extended answers, which are a typical element of the free narrative phase of
in-depth hearings (also see Keselman et al. 2008 on question types that are prone to elicit
more productive answers in the free narrative phase). They discuss chunking and turn-
t aking as well as the use of implicit (body signals, gaze) and explicit coordination techniques.
Their data, which include examples of two forms of site organisation (applicant and inter-
preter in one site, or interpreter and judge in one site) clearly show that problems in turn-
m anagement, in other words, who speaks when and who allocates and controls turns, may
be detrimental to communication.
Research on related fields

This concluding section draws attention to research that stricto sensu does not address inter-
preting within the official administrative procedure but straddles related fields. One case in
point is Delgado Luchner and Kherbiche’s (2018) study of interpreting in African refugee
camps in a larger transnational migratory context, which is labelled as ‘humanitarian inter-
preting’ by the authors (2018: 415). Founded in Bourdieu’s field theory and with a specific
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Sonja Pöllabauer
focus on his notion of doxa, the authors analyse Red Cross and UNHCR interpreters’ po-
sitionality in such a field, drawing up a ‘paradigmatic interpreter profile’ (ibid.), based on
training notes and interpreters’ written personal résumés. They suggest that interpreters
working for the Red Cross and UNHCR view themselves first and foremost as humanitar-
ian actors.
In a local context, applicants also need to communicate in medical, police or court set-
tings. Interpreter-
mediated communication in such fields has drawn ample attention in re-
search (see chapters by Angermeyer, Licoppe and Pöllabauer, this volume). Less information,
however, is available on how applicants communicate in refugee reception facilities or at
non-governmental and municipal institutions which provide advice on a sylum-related mat-
ters. One case in point is Merlini’s (2009) study of interpreting at a ‘foreigners’ advice bu-
reau’ in Italy. Based on transcripts of such encounters, Merlini shows that interpreters act
as ‘cultural mediators’ and ‘co-providers’ of service, trying to help turn ‘narrative chaos in
linear form’ (2009: 85).
Killman (2019), in a non-empirically based contribution, also addresses interpreters’
agency and positioning and the specific dynamics and rapport-building in meetings between
applicants, their US attorneys and interpreters. This specific context, which is also largely
under-researched, entails a power structure that differs considerably from that of official
hearings: applicants are given more voice, and interpreters may have to provide services
different from those in strictly legal encounters.
Another under-researched topic is the communication needs of specifically vulnera-
ble groups of applicants such as those with physical or cognitive disabilities or the elderly.
Sivunen (2019), for instance, addresses the communication needs of Deaf refugees. In an
ethnographic study of communication in a Finnish reception centre, she reveals the range
of social and linguistic challenges which hamper Deaf applicants’ access to information and
social participation. Sign language interpreting, including the use of Deaf interpreters, may
also be required in asylum hearings, though no authentic data on such encounters have been
explored so far to the author’s knowledge.
One last strand of publications to be mentioned under this section are studies which focus
on encounters where no interpreters are involved, even in cases where one could have ex-
pected one. Maryns and Blommaert (2002) and Maryns (2005), for instance, show that the
imposition of a monolingual code in asylum interviews, for example the use of English as a
lingua franca, may serve as a filter and have detrimental effects on the ‘entextualisation of
the case’ (Maryns 2005: 299) and ultimately the credibility of applicants’ claims (Maryns and
Blommaert 2002: 18–19). This is part of a monolingual language ideology, based on the idea
that one dominant (national) language should be used in institutional (and other encoun-
ters), and where the ideal model of society should be ‘as uniform and homogenous as possible’
(Blommaert and Verschueren 1998: 117; italics in original).
Further reading
Barsky, Robert F. (1994) Constructing a Productive Other. Discourse Theory and the Convention Refugee
Hearing. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, John Benjamins.
This monograph is one of the pioneering publications on interpreting in an asylum context and offers a rich
and theoretically inspiring insight into the subject.
This article uses a Bourdieusian approach to discuss the agency and positionality of interpreters in an asylum
context.
150
Jacquemet, Marco (2011) “Crosstalk 2.0: Asylum and communicative breakdowns”, Text & Talk 31
(4): 475–97.
Based on Gumperz’ construct of contextualisation cues, this article outlines the communicative and social
complexity of asylum interviews as well as challenges and pitfalls of interpreter-
mediated communication in
this context.
Maryns, Katrijn (2006) The Asylum Speaker. Manchester, St. Jerome.
This monograph draws on a wealth of ethnographic data to examine the discursive processes in asylum
proceedings and how the work of interpreters may impact the outcome of these processes and the assessment of
asylum claims.
Related chapters
Chapter 2, The ambiguity of interpreting: Ethnographic interviews with public service interpreters by Kristina
Gustafsson
Chapter 8, Public service interpreting in court – face-to-face interaction by Philipp S. Angermeyer
Chapter 11, Vulnerable encounters? Investigating vulnerability in i nterpreter-mediated services for victim-survivors
Notes
1 The list is ordered, first, alphabetically by countries, and second, chronologically by authors. It is
not exhaustive and includes only one study with authors with more than one relevant publication;
for more references, see the references section in this chapter.
2 New Zealand practices and interpreters’ perspectives are tackled in a survey by Fenton (2001).
3 Remote interpreting in an asylum context has been discussed in other studies (for instance Ellis
2004; Federman 2006; Mollo 2006), but not based on authentic discourse data. For an example
of phone interpreting, which shows how communication problems may be amplified by technical
problems, see Gibb (2019).
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——— (1996) “The interpreter as intercultural agent in convention refugee hearings”, The Translator
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10
CONSECUTIVE INTERPRETING
AND MULTIMODAL SEQUENCES
Christian Licoppe
Interpreting in legal settings: pragmatics-oriented,

interaction-focused approaches
Research on interpreting in legal settings has mostly focused on three main empirical set-
tings: police interviews, courtrooms and asylum proceedings (which, depending on the
particulars of national legal systems may or may not occur in courts). Though I will not
discuss this point of note here, it is important to underline that different norms may bear on
the way interpreting is expected to be done and is actually done across settings (for a com-
parison of medical and judicial settings, see Gavioli and Baraldi 2011). For instance, while in
criminal proceedings interpreters are usually asked to provide a faithful and exact rendition
of previous talk, there is usually more leeway for interpreters in asylum proceedings. They
are often given a measure of discretion to engage in clarification work (Pöllabauer 2004)
and to elicit storytelling (Pöchhacker 2012: 63–66) when needed (see also Pöllabauer this
volume).
Though an exhaustive review of interpreting in legal settings would lie beyond the scope
of this empirical chapter (but see Inghilleri 2012; Lee 2015), one can distinguish three broad
lines of empirical research investigating the details of interpreted interaction in legal set-
tings. The first focuses on comparing the source talk and its rendition from a pragmatic
perspective, that is to consider both turns as doing something, and to try to unveil that
they might be actually doing something different, which was usually previously not no-
ticed, such as variations in displays of politeness (Berk-Seligson 1990), changes in pragmatic
force (K rouglov 1999), shifts in the use of ‘powerless’ and ‘powerful’ registers (Conley and
O’Barr 1998) in multi-lingual settings (Berk-Seligson 1990; Hale 2004; Gallez and Maryns
2014), the mimicking of target audiences (Hale 1997; Jakobsen 2007) and aligning with in-
stitutional representatives (Berk-Seligson 1990; Ng 2013), and shifts in the coerciveness of
interactional moves (Hale 2001; Berk-Seligson 2009). The second stream of research, often
relying on Erving Goffman’s analysis of ‘footing’ and interaction analysis, tries to analyse the
dynamics of participation frames and the interpreters’ evolving stances regarding the current
talk and its coordination (Wadensjö 1998; Merlini 2009; Baraldi and Gavioli 2012). Finally,
more specifically inspired by Conversation Analysis and/or ethnomethodology (hereafter
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-13 155

Christian Licoppe
EM/CA; see Schegloff 2007; Sidnell and Stivers 2014), the last stream of research looks at
the organization of multilingual talk in legal settings as a sequential phenomenon, with an
interest in phenomena such as the management of turn-taking (Wadensjö 1998) and pauses
(Nakane 2011, 2014), various forms of repair, repetition and recycling (Wadensjö 1997),
code-switching (A ngermeyer 2015) and so on. Recent research focusing on interaction has
started to highlight the importance of gaze (Mason 2012; Davitti 2015) and more generally
the role of multimodal resources in the sequential coordination of interpreted talk (see for
instance Pasquandrea 2011; Davitti and Pasquandrea 2017; Vranjes et al. 2019), a point I will
elaborate later.
One important aspect of this last direction of research is the way in which it allows a radical
respecification of the notion of ‘modes of interpreting’, and in particular ‘consecutive inter-
preting’, which is the most common mode of interpreting in legal settings. In the more tra-
ditional (i.e. not EM/CA-inspired) interpreting literature, consecutive interpreting is usually
defined as “the process of interpreting after the speaker or signer has completed one or more
ideas in the source language and then pauses while the interpreter transmits that information”
(Russell and Takeda 2015). By considering turn-taking as an emergent phenomenon and a
locally managed ‘members’ issue’, CA invites us to consider consecutive interpreting not just
as an abstract definition or as a prescription for the interpreter to speak and provide a rendition
‘after’ the previous speaker, but as a practical accomplishment in which such successiveness
(‘after’), has to be collaboratively achieved. For instance, transition-relevant places (TRP) in
ongoing, consecutively interpreted courtroom talk must be constantly scrutinized by partici-
pants for their relevance to the start of an interpreted rendition. The actual start of a rendition
is locally managed and collectively negotiated. The idea that the interpreter starts ‘after’ a
previous speaker has completed a turn in the target language and offered a pause becomes a
problem for participants and analysts alike. When one respecifies consecutive interpreting as a
conversational process and accomplishment, the interpreter’s competence and agency regard-
ing sequential concerns emerge as a crucial aspect of interpreting as an activity in legal settings
(and more generally in any setting), as I will try to show in the next section.
Consecutive interpreting in the courtroom as a member’s practical issue

To show how sequential concerns must be taken into account if we want to understand
courtroom interpreting, I will consider consecutively interpreted interrogation sequences. In
such sequences, which are crucial to legal encounters, a representative of a legal institution
interrogates a lay participant. To get a sense of what the CA perspective on consecutive inter-
preting as a sequential accomplishment means, I will start with questions and their rendition.
Providing the rendition of a question ‘after’ the question

Regarding questions, the standard view of consecutive interpreting would consider that the
speaker formulates a question, pauses and the interpreter provides a rendition of the question,
‘a fter’ the question. However, this simple description is deceptive, for TRPs are oriented to
as such, and managed so that ‘questions’ and the start of their rendition are a collaborative
accomplishment.
For instance, if a ‘question’ projects a TRP, it is possible for the interpreter not to take the
turn and for the judge (if in a courtroom) to go on to elaborate or transform his/her own
‘question’, as in Extract 1 (see end of article for transcription key).
156
Consecutive interpreting and multimodal sequences
Extract 1. J. is the judge, I. is the interpreter.

1. J. d’accord (0.5) et il s’est passé quoi madame pendant cette a nnée-là/
okay and what happened madam during that year
2. (.) il a il a arrêté de vous menacer/
he he stopped threatening you
3. (1.5)
4. I. durante ese tiempo (.) durante ese tiempo él-qué hacía é:l
during that time during that time he-what did he do
5. todavía la seguía amenazando/ o ( )
he was still threatening you or ( )
The micropause after “cette année-là” in Lines 1 –2 marks such a moment. What comes before
could be understood as a grammatically complete wh-question. In the ‘mechanistic’, third-
party view of consecutive interpreting, the interpreter should thus start there and interpret the
previous ‘question’. From a CA perspective, however, this constitutes a TRP. The institutional
character of a setting usually manifests itself through constraints on turn type and t urn-taking
(Drew and Heritage 1992). At the kind of sequential juncture we have here, only two op-
tions are oriented to t urn-taking by the interpreter (to provide a rendition), and self-selection
by current speaker (the judge going on). In Extract 1, option 2 is made operative: the judge
self-selects to transform the initial open w
h-question into a Y/N question with a candidate
answer.
Extract 2 shows how both judges and interpreters can simultaneously orient to turn-
t aking as relevant in such a sequential environment.
Extract 2.
1. J. la première question à: à madame/ combien de personnes
the first question for madam how many persons
2. de sa famille: euh sont en Guyane (.)
from her family are in (French) Guiana
3. et à [quel titre-
and for which reason
4. I. [.h cuántas personas de su familia están en Guyana/
How many persons from your family are in Guiana
Here, the pause at the end of Line 2 marks a grammatically completed question and a potential
TRP. Both parties orient towards its relevance to t urn-taking, as shown by the occurrence of
an overlap. The judge self-selects to elaborate the question (a nd eventually relinquishes the
floor), while the interpreter starts her rendition. The fact that it is eventually that question
which is asked and interpreted appears clearly as a collaborative accomplishment in which
the judge and the interpreter have both been agentive.
Such TRPs may be treated explicitly as equivocal, as in Extract 3 below.
Extract 3.
1. J2. merci madame la présidente (.) madame est-ce que: votre compagnon
thank you madam president madam had your partner
2. avait été violent également euh à l’égard des enfants/
also been violent towards the children?
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Christian Licoppe
3. I. mh ella quiere saber si tú–

she wants to know whether you-
4.
excusez- moi je: (.) la question est finie/ je suis désolé

excuse me I is the question over? I am sorry
5. J2. ((
smiling)) oui oui (.) pour le moment oui
yes yes for now yes
6. I. la señora quiere saber si mh (.) tu marido también fue violento/
the lady wants to know whether your husband was also violent
7. eh:: a-a con tus hijos
with your children
Here, the interpreter starts her rendition at the first opportunity, after the grammatical com-
pletion of the question. However, she breaks her rendition to inquire whether the question
was actually finished (w ith an initial-positioned apology), thus initiating a potential repair
sequence. She thus makes explicit the relevance of such sequential configurations for both
judges and interpreters, and their equivocality.
All this shows how (a) ‘questions’ are emergent phenomena in the course of the court-
room interaction; (b) ‘questions’ are collaborative accomplishments whose outcome depends
on the way participants orient to t urn-taking concerns at TRPs; (c) through such a ‘purely’
sequential involvement, for which there is no time out, the interpreter bears directly on what
is said and interpreted in the courtroom. Beyond the example of the judge’s questions, all this
remains true at any point of the multilingual courtroom interaction. The EM/CA perspec-
tive allows us to unpack the deceptive simplicity of the traditional perspective on consecu-
tive interpreting which requires that the interpreter start her rendition ‘a fter’ a turn in the
source language. It allows us to show the agency of the interpreter in courtroom talk as a co-
ordinated activity, and to move away from a s emantics-centred view of ‘interpreting-a s-text’
to the action-centred perspective of ‘interpreting-a s-activity’ (Wadensjö 1998). Consecutive
interpreting has to be understood as a joint practical accomplishment.
Consecutive interpreting in institutional settings

and the problem of chunking
It is important to note that according to the type of speech event and activity under way,
different orientations to TRPs may be observed. For example, in religious settings, when a
sermon has to be consecutively interpreted, the preacher and the interpreter seem to collab-
orate so that the rendition starts at the first opportunity, that is at the first TRP (Ostos 2019).
This is made possible by the way in which religious preaching searches to produce emotional
effects through its scansion in brief performative utterances. Legal settings (and probably
other institutional settings as well) work very differently. It is often the case that questions
and answers are oriented towards the elicitation and production of complex arguments and
stories. It would not make sense for participants to take the floor at the first opportunity
before the thrust of the utterance becomes perceptible. Elaborate questions, for instance, to
produce ‘contrasts’ (Drew 1992) and elaborate answers such as narrative expansions (Galatolo
and Drew 2006) are common, and consecutive interpreting must allow for their emergence.
In the CA perspective, the actual production of elaborate questions and answers can only be
understood as the outcome of an orientation of participants to let the current speaker self-
select at TRPs, at least to some extent. If the interpreter were to speak at the first available
opportunity it would often prevent the emergence of complex questions and answers. But
158
this raises a new issue for the courtroom interpreter-as-a-member, which is to determine at
which TRP it would be proper for him/her to start his/her rendition.
The expansive character of the source talk in legal settings thus raises specific issues for
interpreters (Wadensjö 2010; Licoppe 2020). Their dilemma concerns when exactly to begin
their rendition when interpreting consecutively: they should start their rendition after some
bit of talk has been elaborated ‘enough’ for local practical purposes, but if they let the source
speaker go on for too long, the kind of work they will have to do may change from con-
secutive interpreting to ‘long consecutive interpreting’, and all the way down to ‘summary
interpreting’, with its implied loss of accuracy in the rendition. One way out of this is for the
source speaker and the interpreter to collaborate in avoiding an utterance extending beyond
too many minutes of talk and to ‘chunk’ long expansions into smaller utterances which
can be interpreted successively in a more manageable way. The phenomenon of ‘chunking’
has also been observed in therapeutic talk, but it is particularly relevant to interpreted legal
settings. It happens in police interventions for instance, when the police read their rights
to people about to be arrested (Russell 2000; Nakane 2007), but also in court proceedings
(Licoppe and Verdier 2013) and in asylum proceedings (Licoppe and Veyrier 2020).
Chunking is a sequential and collaborative phenomenon, characteristic of consecutive
interpreting, where the agency of the interpreter plays an important part. It involves two
sequential issues. One is its initiation: collaboration is necessary to allow the interpreter to
launch his/her rendition in such a way that it can be understood that the source utterance
has not yet come to an end. Multimodality is a crucial resource there. Gaze, but also body
reorientations, interruptive gestures, controlling touch, inbreaths and vocalizations, all the
way up to explicit verbal requests and apologies, are commonly used resources for managing
t urn-taking and potentially initiating chunking (Licoppe and Veyrier 2020; Vranjes and Bot
2021). In legal settings, there is an expectation on the part of the judges that the interpreter
should manage chunking on his/her own, which may be made explicit by judges in instances
of trouble (Licoppe and Veyrier 2020). The second significant issue regarding sequential
juncture concerns what may happen at potential ‘endings’ of the interpreter’s rendition after
the initiation of chunking.
Turn-taking, chunking and the production of narrative expansions in the

consecutively interpreted courtroom
Because chunking has enacted a normative expectation that the source turn is not yet over
and, therefore, that the current speaker should self-select to go on with her story, the way
in which turn-taking is actually managed at turn-relevant transitions in the interpreter’s
rendition may articulate sequential matters and (m icro)power concerns. I will illustrate this
from an example taken from asylum court proceedings in France. An asylum seeker and an
interpreter are appearing in court through a video link. Since the interpreter is sitting next to
the asylum seeker (they are co-present), one can disregard the video link for the time being:
the analysis I will present is more general and valid for the case in which everybody is sitting
in the same (court)room. Here, in this present scene, the judge has just asked a question re-
garding how the asylum seeker’s husband died, that is the kind of question which projects an
extensive narrative as an answer. There is no room for a full analysis here (see Licoppe, Verd-
ier and Veyrier 2018), but to summarize, before the extract which is presented below, the
interpreter initiated chunking, that is she managed to start a rendition in a way that showed
the story was not over, and at the end of her first rendition, as it could be heard to come to
a close, she turned her gaze away from the judge (on screen in front of her) and towards the
159
Christian Licoppe
asylum seeker, while verbally instructing her to go on with her story. Gaze is a powerful
multimodal resource to manage recipiency in conversation in general and in a consecutively
interpreted talk in particular (Mason 2012; Vranjes et al. 2019). Moreover, and in this ex-
ample, the verbal instruction made clear what the gaze shifts meant. The story was chunked
several times in this way with the interpreter looking back to the asylum seeker after each
rendition, thus providing her with a strong opportunity to go on with her story (w ith the
judge displaying his alignment with such management of recipiency by not talking). Even-
tually, the asylum seeker, who spoke Haitian Creole, came to the point in her story in which
she told the circumstances of her husband’s death (Extract 4 below).
Extract 4.: AS. is the asylum seeker. I. is the interpreter. J. is the judge.
01. AS. lè mwen rive bò stad sylvio katò
when I arrived near the stadium Sylvio Cator
02. mwen jwenn yo bat li yo tiye l atè a
I found him beaten up he had been killed on the ground
03. (.)
04. AS. [li benyen nan san atè a
he was lying in his blood on the ground
05. I. [ehh
06. AS. (
0.5) ((
cries and sneezes))
07. I. hmm (0.2)
¤et donc heu:: il nous avait dit qu'il revenait and
so er he had told us he would be back
¤Image 2.3
08. qu'il arrivait quand j'ai vu qu'il ne qu'il ne rentrait pas

that he was coming back when I saw he was not coming back
09. (
0.3) je suis partie avec heu mon cousin
I left er with my cousin
10. I. kouzen avèk kouzen w
cousin with your cousin
11. AS. neuveu m wi
my nephew yes
12. I. avec mon neveu (0.4) et heu::: donc nous sommes partis
with my nephew and er so we left
13. comme il n'y avait pas d'électricité nous sommes partis
as there was no electricity we left
160
14. avec des torches (0.4) et heu et je et je l'ai vu:

with torches and er and I and I saw him
15. je l'ai trouvé derrière ce stade (0.3) et heu::: mort
16. I found him behind this stadium and er dead
17. on l'avait battu (
0.8) on l’avait: euh:: ¤maltraité¤
18. he had been beaten one had er mistreated him
19.
¤Image 2.4
20. (1.4)
21. J. d'accord donc heu: ( 0.5) ensuite heu les les personnes
22. okay so er then er the the persons
23. qui ont menacé ( 0.4) madame après le décès de son:: mari
24. who threatened Madam after the death of her husband
25. (
0.4) ce sont les mêmes que celles qui:::: ont fait des
26. are the same persons who made
27. menaces avant/
28. threats before
The asylum seeker’s story comes to a dramatic culmination in which she tells of the death of
her husband (Line 2). The interpreter orients to the TRP projected by this announcement
as an opportunity to interpret and starts to speak then; however, the asylum seeker goes on
with a reformulation of her sad discovery. There is therefore an overlap, and the interpreter
relinquishes the turn (Lines 4 –5). At the next TRP, the asylum seeker breaks down, cries and
sneezes (Image 2.3). The interpreter treats the sequential juncture and the emotional display as
a cue for her to start interpreting. Of particular interest here, is the way the interpreter actively
designs the end of her rendition. After the end of the second clause in Line 16 (which provides
a possible TRP), she stops talking, thus conveying a sense that she has possibly finished her
interpreting. However, during the lengthy pause that ensues, and contrary to what she previ-
ously did at several successive and similar sequential junctures, instead of looking at the asylum
seeker, she keeps her gaze fixed on the screen and therefore on the presiding judge (Image 2.4).
Through such an embodied conduct, she appears to orient toward the judge as the potential
next speaker. In so doing, she also displays her understanding that this particular juncture is a
possible completion point for the s tory-so-far (indeed the death of the husband is recognizable
as a kind of dramatic culmination, and therefore as a possibly adequate ending to the story),
and that the story-so-far can now be treated as a response to the initial question. The judge
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Christian Licoppe
seems to align with the sequential opportunity the interpreter’s embodied actions project for
him, for he starts a new question, on a different topic (Line 23–29). Through her behaviour
at such sequential positions, the interpreter is therefore active in the production of the story as
such, both in conveying a sense that it is not over yet and allowing it to flow or in conveying
that a story or a turn has reached a potential ending, thus providing a slot for a new question.
These are not ‘just’ sequential concerns, for this connects to issues of power in the asylum
court in two different ways. First, because there are inequalities in the resources participants
may deploy there. In particular, unlike the judge, the asylum seeker usually does not under-
stand the rendition and cannot anticipate its ending, which makes it very difficult for her to
claim the turn, should the interpreter elicit to look at the judge at the end of her rendition
(thus giving her the opportunity to ask a new question). Second, our analysis points towards
two distinct potential trajectories for consecutively interpreted narratives in courtroom in-
terrogations. Should the judge emerge as the next speaker (generally to ask a new question
within that institutional organization of talk), then the asylum seeker’s answer/story-in-
progress runs the risk of remaining truncated (for its progression has been recognizably
interrupted earlier). This is a scenario which is often preferred by judges, who usually like
to control the proceedings through successive questions rather than leave witnesses with
the liberty to talk at length. On the other hand, should the turn be made available to the
asylum seeker at this point, then he/she may get a chance to complete his/her answer/story.
So, in the case of expansive answers that are produced in successive interpretable chunks,
the management of t urn-taking after the interpreter’s rendition of one of these chunks may
either lean toward ‘control’ (by the judge) or ‘voice’ (when the asylum seeker is allowed to
continue his/her tale). Sequential concerns and power effects are tightly interwoven in the
management of consecutively interpreted courtroom interaction.
Multilingual courtroom interaction with video links

and remote participants
The last ten years have seen the introduction of video links in many legal settings to allow
the remote participation of various actors, witnesses, defendants, asylum seekers, interpret-
ers, counsels, often within a managerial, cost-centred rationale. Such an evolution opened
new sets of options for the interpreter (such as being present in the institutional site or ap-
pearing remotely, whether alone or with others) and raised concerns regarding the potential
impact of various audio-visual interactional configurations on the interpreters’ production
quite early on (Braun 2007; Braun and Taylor 2012; Fowler 2013). It also led to several
large-scale research initiatives, such as the successive AVIDICUS projects (see http://w ww.
videoconference-interpreting.net/), and to an accumulation of research (for a current view
of the field, see Napier Skinner and Braun 2018; Salaets and Brône 2020).
The fact that a majority of studies have involved experimental settings (Balogh and Sala-
ets 2018), and that there have been few attempts at recording v ideo-mediated, naturally
occurring courtroom proceedings (for exceptions see Fowler 2013; Balogh and Salaets 2019)
may be explained by the difficulties to get permission to record in legal settings. Both this
practical constraint and the semantic bias in interpreting studies which favours a focus on
the comparison of the accuracy of rendition in variously mediated settings have impeded the
development of an EM/CA perspective in which the focus would be (a) on sequential con-
cerns (rather than the accuracy of renditions) and in particular on consecutive interpreting
as an accomplishment (how does consecutive interpreting get recognizably done in a v ideo-
mediated configuration); and (b) on v ideo-mediated consecutively interpreted courtroom
162
proceedings investigated for themselves, rather than engaging from the start in a comparison
with face-to-face settings.
I will use the extensive recordings my colleagues and I made of courtroom asylum
proceedings in France to illustrate this point by investigating the way a purely sequential
achievement (the chunking of long answers for the sake of consecutive interpreting) may
be affected by video link configurations. Video links open up new possibilities of spatial
distribution for participants, and particularly for interpreters. In our case, the interpreter
would appear either sitting beside the asylum seeker and away from the court (this was the
case in Section 2, and it is the institutionally preferred configuration), or, in the case of rare
languages where no interpreter is available in the remote site, in court and away from the
asylum seeker. In the latter case, as happens in the coordination of talk in telephone inter-
preting (Wadensjö 1999), one would expect that the interpreter would have less embodied
resources available to coordinate the flow of the asylum seeker’s talk. How is the chunking
of expansions and narrative actually done in v ideo-mediated settings?
In the following extract, where the asylum seeker speaks Mandinka, the judge has just
asked about the circumstances of the death of the (m ale) asylum seeker’s father. Such a ques-
tion projects a narrative as an answer, and indeed, the asylum seeker has started relating the
events that led up to this fateful incident. As he describes his father’s arrest, the interpreter
initiates a clarification sequence about the place where the father was taken (which breaks
the flow of the narrative) and starts to interpret immediately afterwards what appears then as
the ‘beginning’ of the story. It is important also to note that the video frames the interpreter
and the judge, with the interpreter on the far left of the field and appearing relatively small
on the image. Extract 5 begins as the interpreter is interpreting this particular sequence into
French.
Extract 5. The asylum seeker (AS.) speaks Mandinka

01. I. et donc ils lui ont:: signifié qu'il allait répondre
and so they told him that he would answer
02. à ma place ils l'ont arrêté et amené heu (0.8) heu au
instead of me they arrested him and they brought him er
03. commissariat de police ¤de Camp Alaadji
to the police station of Camp Alaadji
¤ ¤Image 3.1

04. *¤(
0.8)
05. *¤((
looks up at the screen))
163
Christian Licoppe
¤ Image 3.2

06. I. [apéré
après
and then ?
07. AS. [kàn-laaji komisariya polisi
Camp Laadji a police station
08. I. *donc c’est à la police [qu’ils l’ont ( mis)
so they brought him to the police
09. *¤((
looks at the judge))- -
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-

10. J. [d’accord
okay
¤ Image 3.3

11. I. *¤ (
0.5) then/
*¤((
looks up at the screen))
¤ Image 3.4
164
12. AS.
ìyoo k
àn-
laaji (.)
kábiriŋ à bé jée ì kà’à bùutee jée kà
Yes in Camp Laadji. During his imprisonment there they beat him

repeatedly
At the end of his rendition, the interpreter is looking down at his notes. The judge is tak-
ing notes and not looking at him (Image 3.1). The interpreter then looks up at the screen.
There is a micropause, and the interpreter and the asylum speaker start to speak in overlap.
The interpreter provides an invitation for the asylum seeker to go on (Line 6, Image 3.2),
thus showing both that his earlier gaze was projecting the asylum seeker as the next speaker,
and that he treats the lack of immediate response as a potential problem. In the overlap, the
asylum seeker speaks (thus showing that he has understood the sequential meaning of the
interpreter’s gaze shift) but only to provide a correction to his previous utterances (the name
of the camp, Line 7). The interpreter provides a rendition of that correction (Line 8) and
looks at the judge (Line 9, Image 3.3). The judge treats the gaze as offering a slot for him to
talk, and he provides an agreement token (Line 10). By passing such an opportunity to ask a
new question he orients to the asylum seeker’s narrative-so-far as unfinished. The interpreter
then looks at the screen. There is again a silence, and the interpreter provides verbal instruc-
tion for the asylum seeker to go on (“then/”, Line 11). Such an upgrade again orients to the
possibility that his looking up at the screen may not have been understood as a floor-giving
move. Only then does the asylum speaker resume his narrative.
This short sequence allows me to make several analytic points. First, it shows that when
the interpreter is away from the asylum seeker, his range of resources for managing the lat-
ter’s talk, and in particular for giving the floor back to him, is reduced. He cannot rely on
embodied cues such as body reorientations or touch, nor on audible ones that might not be
heard, such as inbreaths. The interpreter must rely mostly on gaze shifts and explicit verbal
and non-verbal instructions. Thus, the interpreter’s range of resources for managing the
sequential flow of t alk-in-interaction appears reduced when compared to co-present config-
urations. Second, through his verbal upgrades, the interpreter seems to internalize the frailty
of the v ideo-mediated interactional frame and to display a particular sensitivity to the fact
that his gaze shift may not have been noticed or recognized as providing an opportunity for
the asylum seeker to talk next, and therefore to the fact that more work may have to be done
by him with respect to next speaker selection. In other words, it shows an orientation on the
part of the interpreter towards the possibility that the gaze may lose its force as a resource to
select the next speaker, in line with early studies of video communication which showed that
the gaze may lose its performative power in interaction in v ideo-mediated settings (Heath
and Luff 1992).
The video medium may have only indirect effects on the semantic work involved in the
interpreting. It is only through problems in quality of audio and video or delays, and the po-
tential fatigue associated with screen-based activities that renditions may be affected. How-
ever, regarding the sequential management of courtroom interaction, even when technical
conditions are good and fatigue has not settled in, the v ideo-mediated courtroom ecologies
may affect the sequential management of the proceedings. This has direct implications on
the m icro-politics of narrative production in asylum proceedings. By making it slightly more
difficult for the courtroom-located interpreter to give the floor back to the remote asylum
seeker, asylum proceedings in distributed courtrooms are more prone to support ‘control’
rather than to allow the unimpeded flow of ‘voice’, that is for the asylum seeker to tell his/her
story rather than answering a volley of questions by the judges. It also shows the importance
of strictly enforcing the prescription that requires interpreters to sit next to the person who
165
Christian Licoppe
does not speak the language of the court and, whenever that is not possible, for them to be
visible on screen when they talk (on this latter point, see Licoppe and Veyrier 2017).
Consecutive interpreting and the showing of documents at a distance

With the role of the interpreter in the coordination of talk being increasingly explored
(Baraldi and Gavioli 2012), as we have seen in the previous sections, current research has
started to highlight the importance of multimodal resources in the management of turn-
taking in interpreted talk. On the one hand, this calls for new forms of qualitative explo-
ration based on video recordings (Davitti 2018) or other innovative technologies such as
eye-tracking (Vranjes and Brône 2020), this trend being reinforced with the growing interest
in video links, which especially affect the multimodal organization of the interaction frame
(Pöchhacker 2020). On the other hand, this also calls for a closer look at traditional notions
regarding interpreting, in which interpreting is supposed to operate on ‘t alk’, understood as
self-contained verbal utterances, intelligible on the basis of what one hears. However, there
are other ways in which the intelligibility of utterances may be elaborated. Some utter-
ances are ‘coupled to the environment’ (Goodwin 2007), and built from multiple semiotic
resources which are ‘co-operating’ (Goodwin 2013; Mondada 2016), so that they are only
intelligible if one considers their indexical ties with embodied conduct and local material
ecologies. Some activities are even so multimodal as to involve distinctive sequences in
which talk becomes sequentially and topically constrained, and its production conditional to
what happens in the environment, as with ‘object-centred sequences’, in which someone is
given something to taste or inspect, or shown something (Tuncer, Licoppe, and Haddington
2019). How do such sequences put our understandings of ‘consecutive interpreting’ to the
test? How can they be accomplished through video links?
Multimodality is an integral part of courtroom interaction (Matoesian and Gilbert 2018),
and a typical o bject-centred sequence in the courtroom would be the showing and trans-
ferring of a piece of evidence for consideration. In the co-present courtroom, this is often
done by moving and transferring the artefact to a witness about to be questioned about it. In
a courtroom with video links, such transfers may be impossible and the evidence has to be
shown and viewed on screen. To the best of my knowledge, there is no study of this kind of
phenomenon in c o-present courtrooms with interpreters, but I will present here an instance
of such a showing through a video link, to argue that this presents the interpreter with com-
plex options regarding participation frameworks, and that the requirements for consecutive
interpreting may break down or be suspended as a result.
In the following extract, a contested piece of evidence (a professional card with a mis-
spelling, ‘polpular’ instead of ‘popular’, which makes its authenticity questionable) is evoked
in the hearing sequence. With the asylum seeker claiming ignorance of the misspelling, it is
decided that it is important enough to be shown to him on screen.
Extract 6
DJ. is the (m ale) questioning (Deputy) judge, I. is the (female) interpreter, AS. is the (m ale)
asylum seeker.
#
01. DJ. vous voyez/ £(
0.5)#ce qu'y a écrit (.) sur la carte#
you see what is written on the card
£ad £points
#camC #-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
zoom
in-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-#
166
# Image 1
#Image 4.1
02. #(0.8) #
#camC #zoom out#
#
03. I. #uhh #
#camC #zoom in #
#
04. (0.4)µ (1.7) µ (0.3)
µgre µ sits straighterµ
05. I. $pol-[pulaire ]
polpular
06. AS. [popilè] (
0.6)# $là sè $ popilè (.)&
popular there it is popular
$req $points $points $hand gesture-
>
#Image 4.2
07. & Sé sa ki ékri $( 0.6) [sé po-pilè]

it is what is written it is popular
08. I. [gen on l ] aprè
o-
a
there is a l after the o
$
req -
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
| $ turns head
09. (0.4)
10. DJ. °d'accord°
11. (0.6)
12. I. li ekri polpulaire
it’s written polpular
167
Christian Licoppe
13. (0.9)
14. AS. ah bon $#l’la
ah well there
$req $points with left hand
15. I. $voilà c'est ça
right it’s that
$req $points
16. $µ (1.4)$
$req $home position
µgre µ sits
17. AS. ¤ ( ) ¤
¤int ¤leans backward
18. (0.7)
19. DJ. c'est étonnant (
0.5) qu'ils se soient
It is surprising that they made
20. £#trompés en imprimant les cartes
a mistake when printing the cards
£ad £turns head towards Pr
#Image 4.3

21. (1.8)
22. AS. ba:h euh: bon m’pa (.) m’pa: janm gadé sa
kom-
I didn’t I didn’t ever look at that
like-
23. sa nan bon kondisyon,
it’s in good condition
After manipulating the card for a while, the deputy judge (DJ), who is leading the inter-
rogation in this sequence, eventually asks the asylum seeker if he can see what is written
on the card (Line 1), while pointing at the screen (I mage 4.1), thus displaying his under-
standing that it is currently visible enough for the purpose at hand. In view of the initial
discussion, this can be heard as a request for the asylum seeker to recognize the misspelling
(he initially denied noticing it) and to discuss it. The interpreter (who is experienced and
works in this court on a regular basis) does not provide a rendition of this turn. After a
significant silence, she provides an identification of the misspelling as something she can
see on screen (Line 5), thus enacting herself as a recipient of the showing. This is uttered
168
in overlap with a contradictory statement by the asylum seeker asserting that it is written
“popular” instead (Lines 6–7 ), while pointing at the screen (I mage 4.2). Then, the inter-
preter initiates a sequence that aims at the clarification of this discrepancy. She reaffirms
her point in third position (her assertion Line 12 that it is written “polpular”), thus pro-
viding for the emergence of a potential argument (A ntaki 1994). It is defused by the next
turn of the asylum seeker who agrees with her, as if it were news to him (the “ah bon” in
initial position, Line 14), so that he seems to orient to what she said rather than to what
he claimed to see. Eventually, the interpreter provides an argument closing confirmation
turn ( Line 15).
In her use of verbal (speaking Haitian creole, referring to what is visible on screen) and
non-verbal communication (looking alternately at the screen and at the asylum seeker), the
interpreter does two things. First, she constitutes herself as a joint recipient of the showing
by displaying in her embodied conduct that she is trying to see what is shown on screen
( Line 5). Such a stance is allowed by the grammatical design of the showing initiation by
the judge, and by the local ecology in which the interpreter and the asylum seeker are fac-
ing the screen side by side. Second, she engages in a collaboration with the asylum seeker
to produce a joint visual recognition of what has been framed as viewable, that is that the
card contains a misspelling. Since the asylum seeker had hitherto contested this, she can be
seen to remain within the provisions of her institutional mandate, which requires her to
provide accurate consecutive interpreting but also allows her some discretion in engaging in
clarification sequences when needed. This is achieved in her reasserting what she has seen
in Line 12, which initiates an argumentative sequence, and a particular kind of ‘schisming’
( Egbert 1997), in which interpreter and asylum seeker are engaged together in a separate
conversation.
The questioning deputy judge seems sensitive to that participation framework, for, turn-
ing towards the judge sitting next to him (Image 4.3), he addresses a comment to the latter,
designed as an expression of surprise regarding the misspelling (Lines 19–20). In the context
of asylum proceedings where judges are focused on and usually suspicious of the credibility
of asylum seekers, such a publicly available comment (it is hearable by all) on the current case
can be heard as highly detrimental to the case. Judges are not supposed to do that, and they
generally refrain from doing so in co-present settings. What makes it possible here? First, the
kind of schisming enacted by the sequence between the interpreter and the asylum seeker
regarding what they can jointly see opens up the possibility of further schisming through
the initiation of a conversational thread between the judges. Second, not only does the t wo-
sited, v ideo-mediated ecology reinforce that possibility, but, as is common for participants
in v ideo-mediated communication, it can lead the judges to assume that since the remote
others are ‘not there’, they won’t hear any asides. This is probably what has happened here
and explains why the judge made a publicly available comment on the case under way, some-
thing which he certainly would have avoided in a co-present hearing (whenever asides occur
there, it is usually in the form of whispers). In line with the idea that expectations regarding
consecutive interpreting are suspended here, the interpreter does not provide a rendition
of this assessment, even though it is highly relevant and detrimental to the case. She is still
oriented towards the asylum seeker who is initiating an account for his being unaware of the
misspelling (Lines 22–23).
In this multimodal showing-oriented sequence we see how v ideo-mediated courtroom
environments may be conducive to situations in which the interpreter may engage in a dif-
ferent participation framework (here, the interpreter is a recipient of the showing herself,
striving to ‘see-together’ with the asylum seeker) and in which the orientation to consecutive
169
Christian Licoppe
interpreting may be suspended in an emergent fashion. Not only may this have significant
consequences regarding the judicial activity underway (here, allowing for both the produc-
tion of a publicly audible negative assessment done as an aside between judges and the lack
of any rendition of it to the asylum seeker), but such a troubled multimodal sequence also
reveals how much our usual view of consecutive interpreting and its very possibility rely on a
monomodal view of t alk-in-interaction where utterances can be understood and interpreted
on the basis of how they can be heard. However, highly multimodal sequences put such
a presupposition to the test by making the achievement of consecutive interpreting more
difficult to accomplish, with v ideo-mediated configurations amplifying potential problems.
Conclusion
I have first used the perspective of EM and CA to provide a respecification of consecutive
interpreting in legal settings (and also in general), then as a framework to understand the way
in which video links may affect consecutively interpreted courtroom interaction. Rather
than a mode or a process which could be described from a third-party perspective (a s in ‘the
interpreter starts to interpret after the question or a previous turn’), consecutive interpret-
ing appears as an unfolding and joint accomplishment. Questions (a nd answers) emerge as
collaborative achievements. They are the outcomes of the way turn-taking is managed by
participants. Besides any consideration of content and semantic accuracy, interpreters are
therefore unavoidably agentive in the sequential organization of consecutively interpreted
interaction. I have discussed how such a ‘sequential’ agency is consequential in courtroom
interaction, first by showing how ‘questions’ are c o-produced, and second, by identifying a
sequential phenomenon which is characteristic of the kind of sequential work done to sup-
port consecutive interpreting, that is the ‘chunking’ of narratives and expansive turns. I have
also shown how the management of long turns by chunking is not simply a practical inter-
actional matter but involves issues of power and control in courtroom interaction in the way
it opens the latter to different trajectories for interpreted narratives. According to the way
t urn-taking is managed as the rendition of chunked narrative proceeds, the floor can either
be given back to the speaker to continue telling his/her story or to the judge to ask further
questions, even though the answer may have been marked as incomplete.
Regarding the analysis of the elusive effects of the introduction of video links and re-
mote participants in the courtroom, an understanding of these sequential issues is critical,
because they are affected by technological mediations and the transformations these bring
to courtroom ecologies. For instance, the presence of video links opens up two possibilities
for the interpreter where remote witnesses are involved: to sit next to the remote witness in
the remote site or to sit away from the witness and in court. In the latter case, the embodied
resources available to the interpreter to manage the flow of talk are more limited and con-
strained than in c o-present configurations with respect to a previous speaker who is only
perceptible on screen. For example, I have shown how an interpreter in court has to work
harder to initiate the chunking of a narrative produced by a remote asylum seeker because
touch could not be used and the latter was much less aware of the embodied behaviour of
the interpreter. This can also make it more difficult for the interpreter to give the asylum
seeker the floor back. Such constraints on interactional resources when interpreter and asy-
lum seeker are talking through a video link may allow greater control of courtroom inter-
action by judges, thus bearing on issues of power in consecutively interpreted courtroom
proceedings.
170
Finally, I have shown how video links may occasion the development of complex mul-
timodal sequences, such as showing a document to a remote witness (a nd interpreter). In
the case here demonstrated, this led to a suspension of consecutive interpreting, with the
development of a participation framework in which the interpreter was jointly engaged with
the asylum seeker in scrutinizing the document. I have also shown how this may be conse-
quential to the proceedings themselves through the possibility of schisming, how the pro-
duction of case-relevant comments is made possible and how they may be left uninterpreted.
Not only are multimodal sequences particularly complex achievements when done through
video links (something which definitely merits more research), but in breaking the organiza-
tion of consecutive interpreting, such object-centred sequences also demonstrate how much
the traditional view of consecutive interpreting relies on the assumption that it operates on
‘monomodal’ talk, intelligible simply on the basis of the way utterances can be heard.
Further reading
Braun, Sabine (2017) “W hat a m icro-analytical investigation of additions and expansions in remote
interpreting can tell us about interpreters’ participation in a shared virtual space”, Journal of Prag-
matics 107(2017): 165–77.
This article discusses the issues expansions and additions in answers may raise for interpreters, and which
constitute the background for the ‘chunking’ phenomenon.
Gallez, Emmanuelle, and Katrijn Maryns (2014) “Orality and authenticity in an interpreter-mediated
defendant’s examination”, Interpreting 16(1): 49–80.
This article provides an analysis of interpreted asylum court proceedings from an interactional perspective.
Licoppe, Christian (2017) “Showing objects in Skype v ideo-mediated conversations. From showing
gestures to showing sequences”, Journal of Pragmatics 110 (2017): 63–82.
This article introduces readers to the sequential organization of the showing of objects, with a focus on
showing sequences.
Napier, Jemina, Robert Skinner, and Sabine Braun (2018) Here or There. Research on Interpreting via
Video Link. Washington, DC, Gallaudet University Press.
This book gathers state-of-the-art research on remote interpreting and interpreting through video-links from
a practice-based perspective.
Vranjes Jelena, and Hanneke Bot (2021) “A multimodal analysis of t urn-taking in i nterpreter-mediated
psychotherapy”, Translation & Interpreting 13 (1): 101–17.
This article discusses the phenomenon of chunking in a different (medical) institutional setting.
Related chapters
Chapter 6, Technology use in language-discordant interpersonal healthcare communication by Sabine Braun,
Khetam Al Sharou and Özlem Temizöz
nique Traverso, and Emilie Jouin
Transcription key
°yes° segment produced very softly
YES segment produced more loudly
: sound elongation;
:::: longer sound elongation
- sound cut-off
(1.4) silence expressed in seconds
171
Christian Licoppe
(.) micropause of less than 1 second

[yes] square brackets mark overlaps in adjacent turns.
() uncertain transcription of poorly audible talk
µ, $, ¤ are diacritical signs used to position embodied actions made by the relevant participants with
respect to the talk in progress. They also reference to their descriptions below the turn at talk in
which they occur (unnumbered lines in lighter color)
# is the diacritical sign used to refer to camera actions with the camera, and to the positioning of im-
ages with respect to the talk in the transcript.
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11
VULNERABLE ENCOUNTERS?
Investigating vulnerability in interpreter-mediated
services for victim-survivors of domestic violence
and abuse
Rebecca Tipton
Introduction and epistemological considerations

This chapter revisits findings and data collected over a fi ve-year period (2015–20) on inter-
preter services in statutory and non-statutory or charity service settings for v ictim-survivors
of domestic abuse and violence in England. A principal goal of this work is to investigate
conceptualisations of vulnerability in the context of interpreter-mediated service interac-
tions, their representation in institutional guidance on working with interpreters, and in
interpreter talk about occupational experiences in these settings.
The concept of vulnerability has long been contested, eluding clear definition in the hu-
manities. As Peroni and Timmer (2013: 1058–59) assert, ‘a central paradox of vulnerability is
that it is both universal and particular’, and something that ‘each of us experiences uniquely’
by virtue of our embodiment. At first sight, this appears of little relevance to studies on pub-
lic service interpreting; however, our ability to empathise with others derives directly from
this shared experience of corporeal vulnerability and, in domestic violence encounters, in
particular, the threat to life facing some individuals generates orientations to interaction by
all parties, both verbal and non-verbal, that can impact on service user decision-making for
good or ill, and are therefore worthy of investigation.
A second complicating factor in conceptualising vulnerability concerns the fact that it can
be experienced directly by an individual as a result of a specific set of circumstances (social,
political, economic, physical, environmental), which may or may not endure over time to
the same extent or to the same degree, or it can be ascribed on the basis of perception. Of
particular interest to studies of interpreting in domestic violence service encounters is pre-
cisely what happens in interaction when individuals ascribe a status of vulnerability to others
that these individuals do not recognise in themselves and may even reject. ‘Others’ in this
case relates to all parties in an encounter and is not limited to unidirectional ascriptions of
vulnerability by principal service providers or interpreters to v ictim-survivors: each agent in
the interaction has the capacity to ascribe, whether consciously or not.
The discussion that follows has spoken language interpreting as its focus and reflects a
growing interest in public service interpreting studies in social phenomena labelled, among
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-14 175

Rebecca Tipton
others, as family-based violence, gender-based violence and intimate partner-v iolence, re-
flecting the many social and relational dynamics of situations in which individuals are subject
to forms of abuse and/or violence in the domestic setting. Responding to Brown, Ecclestone
and Emmel’s (2017: 506) criticism of the emphasis in ‘v ulnerability studies’ on theoretical
debates and policy critiques to the neglect of empirical investigation, this chapter makes a
modest contribution to knowledge on how vulnerability and related phenomena of risk and
autonomy operate in particularised service settings.
Despite growing interest, the number of studies addressing language and communi-
cation in these settings remains small and largely limited to preliminary investigations of
courts and specialist perpetrator programmes (Abraham 1998; Abraham and Oda 2000;
Oda and Joyette 2003). More systematic approaches have emerged in the past decade, par-
ticularly in Spain, oriented towards improvements in interpreter education and training,
and knowledge exchange between statutory support services in legal, social service and
healthcare settings (for instance Toledano Buendía and Del Pozo Triviño 2014; Valero-
G arcés 2015). However, the emphasis on structural and perceptual phenomena, which is a
necessary stage in mapping practice in settings and identifying research agendas, leaves am-
ple scope for investigation of matters concerning vulnerability autonomy and risk, among
many others.
Through ethnographic work (observations and interviews) and close analysis of au-
thentic interpreter-mediated police interviews with v ictim-survivors, my research has
sought to broaden the scope of investigation. In particular, I draw attention to charity
sector victim support services which take place in complex, m ulti-sited research settings
where professional and n on-professional interpreting commonly intersect. To date my
research has explored themes relating to social contracts in interpreter mediation for
v ictim-survivors (Tipton 2017a), the concepts of accountability and responsibility in a
third sector setting (Tipton 2017b), the social trajectories of v ictim-survivors through
a third sector organisation and variability in English language proficiency (Tipton
2018), question forming and code-switching in police interviews with v ictim-survivors
(Tipton 2019a), and interpreting as a biopolitical endeavour that supports the achieve-
ment of political community in these settings (Tipton 2021). The work has also sup-
ported practitioner workshops, leading to the development of guidelines for interpreters
and staff working in a charity organisation in the city of Manchester (Tipton 2020a,
2020b).
This chapter revisits findings from this extended period of inquiry to develop a more
critically-informed perspective regarding the forms of vulnerability that are present in
interpreter-mediated encounters, and how they are perceived and attended to by the various
parties involved in different service settings. In the first part of this chapter, I examine the-
orisations of vulnerability before exploring forms of vulnerability in interpreter-mediated
encounters specifically. The second section revisits examples from police interview data
reported in Tipton (2019a) to illustrate ways in which v ictim-survivors and interpreters
generate layers of situational and linguistic vulnerability which can impact on epistemic
vulnerability. In the final section, I present new findings from re-coded interview data with
interpreters working in both statutory and charity settings to evaluate discursive construc-
tions of what I term ‘professional vulnerability’. The following main questions underpin
what follows:
1 how might vulnerability be theorised in service encounters involving service users with
limited or no majority language proficiency?
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Investigating vulnerability in interpreter-mediated services
2 what relationship between vulnerability and autonomy can be discerned through anal-
ysis of authentic interpreter-mediated encounters?
3 how do interpreters discursively construct vulnerability and what is the significance of
such constructions for our understanding of the interpreter as a professionally vulnerable
subject?
Literature review: theorising vulnerability
Normative and situational vulnerability

The concept of vulnerability has attracted diverse disciplinary interest in the first two de-
cades of the t wenty-first century, among others by scholars working in sociology, moral phi-
losophy, healthcare, social policy, feminist and critical legal studies. More recently, research
in critical legal studies (Fineman 2008, 2010) has invigorated debates around what it is to
be vulnerable and how society should respond; at its core, theorising vulnerability entails
an attempt to balance an individual’s right to and capacity for self-determination and socie-
tal obligations to protect disadvantaged individuals (Mackenzie, Catriona and Dodds 2014;
Brown, Ecclestone and Emmel 2017). In the discussion that follows, attention moves away
from r ights-based issues to consider the balance between service user desire and capacity for
self-determination in interpreter-mediated encounters, and the ways in which individual
agents within organisations (interpreters and principal service providers) manage their re-
spective obligations to protect.
Normative and situational accounts of vulnerability are common frames through which
to examine the concept of agency, where agency is understood as a temporally embedded
social process and a capacity to change a state of affairs either through exercising choice or
an act of resistance (Emirbayer and Mische 1998; cf. Matras, Tipton and Gaiser 2023). Nor-
mative accounts tend to assume vulnerability in difference, ‘i mplying deviation from usually
undefined standards of life or behaviour’ (Brown, Ecclestone and Emmel 2017: 498) and are
typically underpinned by perceived vulnerability, for example in relation to gender, race
and disability. As many have argued, normative approaches do not give sufficient attention
to the subjective realities of individual experience, its ambiguities and multifaceted nature
(Gilson 2014), and have historically been used to justify policies and institutional practices
that are coercive and paternalistic (Mackenzie 2013: 2). This can lead to resentment by those
whose vulnerability is deemed ‘non-negligible and dictated by government protocols and
bureaucracy’ (A squith, Bartkowiak-Théron and Roberts 2017: 9) as their agential capacity
is diminished.
Situational accounts of vulnerability, by contrast, capture variability in individual ex-
perience and emphasise factors that impact this experience, whether they be social, eco-
nomic, environmental or political, as well as their duration (Goodin 1985). An individual
may become vulnerable, for example by virtue of a change in circumstances (for instance
physical health), which may later be resolved. Describing an example of a woman experienc-
ing domestic violence, Mackenzie (2013) argues that the source of vulnerability is not the
woman’s inherent corporeal vulnerability but rather her relationship with an abusive partner.
Drawing on Goodin (1985), she asserts that the extent of this woman’s vulnerability ‘w ill
be determined by the social supports and legal protections available to her’ (2013: 6). In this
respect, interpreting provisions constitute one of the social supports that can impact on the
extent of a v ictim-survivor’s vulnerability and are therefore an important factor in investi-
gating situational vulnerability in these settings.
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Rebecca Tipton
Relational approaches to vulnerability

Writing about the interrelatedness of autonomy and vulnerability, Mackenzie (2013: 8) ar-
gues that a theory of vulnerability needs to ‘identify the obligations involved’ in responding
to it, but that the goal should – wherever possible – be guided ‘by the overall aim of fostering
autonomy and promoting capabilities’. Failure to do so, she argues, risks any interventions
designed to protect being inadequate at best, and compounding vulnerability at worst (ibid.).
Mackenzie’s words have implications for the way in which obligations are understood in
interpreter-mediated interaction and, in particular, their compatibility with provisions com-
mon to codes of ethics which can ‘sometimes move some distance from the concerns of pri-
vate or ordinary morality’ (Postema 1980: 65). In fact, the moral obligations of interpreters
qua social individuals in relation to the care of others have often been the source of tension
in research and practice in public service interpreting (cf. Barsky (1994) on interpreting
in convention refugee hearings), but their investigation often privileges normative ethical
frameworks over matters of relationality, limiting the scope of debate. Facilitating autonomy
in interpreter-mediated encounters can be viewed as an obligation that is not necessarily in
opposition to the principle of interpreter impartiality (see Skaaden, this volume). Its achieve-
ment requires what I term a future-oriented approach to interpreting that acknowledges
the service user as a capable and knowledgeable agent; however, such an approach is not
without risk.
In translation and interpreting studies, the concept of risk has been explored from several
vantage points, primarily in relation to written translation. As Pym (2015: 70, 72) observes,
certain orientations to risk in translation treat it ‘a s a correlative of uncertainty’, which he
contends is limiting and assumes that risk can only be conceived in negative terms. Pym’s
critique seeks to broaden the debate to take account of risks that are socially structured exter-
nally to the translation process, advocating the potential for ‘enhanced social rewards’ (ibid.)
by incorporating a more positive view of risk in the analysis.
Määttä, Puumala and Ylikomi’s (2021: 61) example of an interpreter who mitigates the
risk of using an incorrect descriptor of an asylum applicant’s sexual orientation by c o-opting
the applicant into the interpreting process echoes a strategy mentioned by Pym (2015) in
relation to written translation. Co-option could therefore be seen as an example of a f uture-
riented approach to interpreting and one that facilitates service user autonomy. Whether
o
the interpreter’s action in Määttä, Puumala and Ylikomi’s study was prompted by the reali-
sation of the potential impact of an incorrect translation on the asylum application – thereby
constituting a deliberate r isk-mitigation strategy to achieve an enhanced social reward – is
impossible to say from the data extract alone. However, the possibility that perceived vul-
nerability acts as a trigger for the interpreter’s approach to risk management merits greater
attention in interpreting studies than it has received to date.
Epistemic vulnerability
The example from an interpreter-mediated asylum interview given in the previous section
is a reminder that, as Johnson (2020: 684) writes, ‘[w]hen we need other people to help us
meet our epistemic need, we are vulnerable to them’. Määttä, Puumala and Ylikomi’s study
shows how linguistic vulnerability (i.e. vulnerability that arises as a consequence of language
interpretation and ideologies about language) in conjunction with psychological vulnerabil-
ity, can lead to epistemic vulnerability and therefore be highly consequential in institutional
178
processes that are anchored around truth and credibility, such as an asylum procedure. How-
ever, as Määttä, Puumala and Ylikomi assert, epistemic vulnerability can also be generated
by particular institutional dispositions to knowledge which ‘[affect] what kind of informa-
tion becomes valued as knowledge’ (2021: 48).
For v ictim-survivors of domestic violence and abuse, linguistic and psychological forms
of vulnerability are present in encounters with police and charity support services for the
reasons outlined in Määttä, Puumala and Ylikomi’s work. In police settings, epistemic
vulnerability is an inherent quality of evidential account taking and is influenced by the
disposition of the interviewing officer to knowledge of evidential value and, in court set-
tings, from the verifiability of the victim account. In charity settings, by contrast, although
some account-taking does take place, much of the interactional work centres around an
individual coming to terms with a situation and taking action to move forward and self-
determine. In this sense, knowing the self becomes a priority, which means that the organ-
isation’s disposition to knowledge is chiefly concerned with how it is validated rather than
how it is valued.
In other words, the truth-value of v ictim-survivor discourse is not in question in such
circumstances; epistemic interdependence in c harity-led encounters is often shaped by the
belief shown in a victim’s story, which places the interpreter in a different set of interac-
tional parameters to other institutional interactions with v ictim-survivors. This setting-
specific distinction is therefore salient and has implications for interpreter practice, and the
way such practice and its outcomes are evaluated. Displaying believability towards victims,
however, requires careful management. In my study, charity support workers stressed that
(interpreters’) efforts to be empathic, for example through verbalisations such as ‘I cannot be-
lieve you put up with that’ or ‘that he did that to you’ (Tipton 2020b: 14), can be interpreted
by v ictim-survivors as though they are being blamed for creating the situation themselves,
potentially impacting on the decision taken whether or not to return to the family home.
An interpreter’s disposition to knowledge in such settings therefore requires specific training
interventions to prevent such inadvertent v ictim-blaming.
Victim-survivors with limited majority language proficiency in the

criminal justice system
This section explores facets of vulnerability in relation to data collected on LEP v ictim-
survivor police interviews. The account first examines (pre-Brexit) structural responses to
vulnerability manifest in legal provisions and interview guidelines, before exploring ex-
amples of authentic interpreter-mediated interviews to illustrate the types and degree of
vulnerability present, how these intersect with issues of autonomy and risk and are attended
to by all parties to the interaction.
In England and Wales, provisions for translation and interpreting in the criminal justice
system are made through the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) (1984) and, since
2010, through Directive 2010/64/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20
October 2010 on the right to interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings. Direc-
tive 2012/29/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 October 2012 estab-
lishing minimum standards on the rights, support and protection of victims of crime (section
34) ensures victims are able to exercise their rights through appropriate language support
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Rebecca Tipton
provisions. The Code of Practice for Victims of Crime in England and Wales (revised 2015),
sets out various entitlements to interpreting and translation provisions, but these are strictly
limited to procedural matters (evidence-gathering, court attendance), and do not extend, for
example to other police victim support services that may be provided through victim hubs1.
Under the current Section 16 definition 2, people with limited English language profi-
ciency are not characterised as vulnerable witnesses in England and Wales; however, this is
not the case in all jurisdictions where English is the majority language of the criminal justice
system as highlighted by Asquith, Bartkowiak-Théron and Roberts (2017). These authors
cite The New South Wales Law Enforcement (Powers and Responsibilities) Act (2002) and
the 2005 Regulation, which lists five categories of vulnerability and includes individuals
from non-English speaking backgrounds. Interestingly, these provisions strictly apply to of-
fending only and are not operationalised to account for victim or witness vulnerability. The
question as to whether a n on-English speaking background should be considered as a named
characteristic of vulnerable witnesses and victims in England and Wales is beyond the scope
of this chapter to address. However, based on earlier discussions, it may be argued that a per-
son is not inherently vulnerable due to language proficiency or background though they may
experience situational vulnerabilities, thereby justifying its exclusion from the normative list
of what constitutes a vulnerable witness.
In England and Wales, police guidance at the time of writing offers LEP individuals
(whether suspects, victims or witnesses) the opportunity to select their preferred or ‘best
language’ for interview purposes (A ssociation of Chief Police Officers 2012: 227). The
guidance is underpinned by several key assumptions that arguably underplay the nature of
vulnerability and its subsequent handling in the interview: (1) that a single language will
be selected, one in which the individual is fully proficient; and (2) that ‘monolingualising
practice’ (A ngermeyer 2015: 8), characteristic of many bureaucracies, will prevail, according
to which an individual either only speaks in the majority language or not at all, leading to a
participation framework in which the interpreter takes every other turn. Individual reper-
toire development (Blommaert, Collins and Slembrouck 2005) and emerging competence in
the majority language which an individual may or may not seek to employ in the interaction
are not factored into the guidance, and yet it is increasingly being recognised in research
on public service interpreting (A ngermeyer 2008; Tipton 2019b; Monteoliva-García 2020).
As Angermeyer (2015) observes in relation to non-English speaking litigants in a small
claims court in New York City, many individuals try to resist monolingualising practices
that foreclose their attempts to draw on their repertoire but are often challenged in so doing.
In Monteoliva-García’s (2020) study on police interpreting in Scotland, by contrast, the
interviewing officers do not follow the anticipated monolingualising approach and actively
encourage two S panish-speaking suspects to use their limited English language repertoires,
thereby relegating the interpreter to a ‘stand by’ position. This places pressure on the inter-
preter to know how, when and to what extent to intervene in the police interview, with
many interventions appearing to hinge on the interpreter’s perceived vulnerability of the
suspects in light of their lack of institutional expertise. The officers’ decision in this case
generates a different type of situated vulnerability for the interpreter and the suspects to that
evidenced in my research, highlighting variability in current interpreter-mediated police
interview practices in the United Kingdom.
Resistance to institutional monolingualising practice is, however, evidenced in one of the
interviews that formed part of my study. In this case, a Russian-speaking victim makes sev-
eral attempts to bypass the interpreter and speak in English over the course of the evidential
interview. The vast majority of such attempts were curtailed by the interviewing officers as
180
Extract 1 (opening sequence of the interview)
00:06:13 PO1 1 so what I’d like you to do:: {name} if you could just go ba:ck
[to that day]
00:06:15 V 2 [uh hu]
00:06:15 PO1 3 to all the events till before you left the house
00:06:17 INT 4 [хочу вернуться чтоб вы] вернулись в тот день нанана прежде
этих событий перед тем как вы ушли из дома
[I want to come back that you] come back to that day nanana before the
events before that when you left the house
00:06:27 PO1 5 but please remember if you ca:n’t {name}
V 6 я могу сейчас объяснить что случилось
I can explain now what happened
00:06:40 INT 7 I can tell you now what has happened
00:06:42 V 8 I remember this I remember
00:06:47 V 9 {name} come from jail he was arrested
00:06:50 PO1 10 stop stop stop
00:06:52 INT 11 по-русски говорите speak in Russian
speak in Russian
Key to speaker roles: PO1: Interviewing officer 1; V: Victim; INT: Interpreter
Transcription key: [ ] overlapping talk; o:: long vowel; italics back translation from Russian; this
stress; {name} redacted information
the victim’s level of proficiency falls way short of what is needed in an evidential interview,
as observed in Extract 1 above. The interviewing officers’ decision in this case can be seen as
oriented to their understanding rather than as normative or ideological, and as performing
two key functions: maximising the quality and detail of the evidence and safeguarding the
victim.
Research also shows that the concept of ‘best language’ can and does vary, both in
terms of the choice made ahead of the police interview and in terms of the language(s) em-
ployed in the interview itself, sometimes with procedural consequences (for instance Gallai
2013). In short, if an individual selects a language for interview in which they have limited
proficiency – whether for political, ideological or other reasons – they are in effect making
all parties present in the encounter vulnerable to some extent. This raises important ques-
tions as to the nature and level of interpreter intervention in negotiating and/or making vis-
ible issues arising from limited language proficiency. A second interpreter-mediated police
interview (Tipton 2019a) discussed below helps to illustrate this situation.
The extracts are taken from an interview involving a female police interviewer, an ex-
perienced female interpreter and native speaker of Italian, and a female v ictim-survivor of
domestic abuse who chooses to be interviewed in Italian, which is not her first language.
The reason for this decision and details of the victim’s first language were not made available
to the researcher, although there are several indications that it may be Arabic. The extracts
are taken from an account-giving sequence lasting t wenty-two minutes in which the victim
and interpreter take turns, punctuated by several response tokens ‘uh hu’ on the part of the
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Rebecca Tipton
interviewing officer. The sequence is prompted by the initial question: ‘Okay. So, if you can
then, in as much detail, tell me what happened on Sunday the 6th of November from about
2 o’clock onwards?’.
Extract 2, taken from just after four minutes into the interview, shows the interpreter
seeking clarification with regard to the victim’s use of possessive pronouns in Italian. The
interpreter’s interjection in line 4 is reported to the interviewing officer as a request for a
‘repetition’, which does not clearly signal an issue of language proficiency that may require
negotiation as part of the interview process. Although this is followed up in lines 13–14 with
confirmation that the discussion was not about substantive issues, the interpreter does not
make the reason for the clarification explicit.
The extract draws attention to the situational vulnerability generated through the vic-
tim’s choice of interview language and raises the question as to what benefits accrue (to all
Extract 2
00:04:37 V 1 E: non lo so cosa (.) ch-(.) cosa hanno detto perché io: io non ho chie-
2 sto lui cosa ha detto, lui mi ha detto che: mi ha chiesto solo pe:r (.) per
3 la sua salute e basta.
A:nd I don’t know what (.) wh-(.) what they said because I: I didn’t ask him
what he has said, he told me tha:t he asked me only abou:t (.) about his/her
health and that’s it.
00:04:50 INT 4 Erm, the interpreter is gonna ask for=a=repetition (.) Chiedo scusa
5 signora, (.) l’ultima cosa che ha detto:? Erm… Mi ha chiesto per la
sua: …?=
I’m sorry Madam, (.) the last thing you said:? Erm… He asked me about
his/her…?
00:04:57 V 6 =Per sua salute.
For his/her health.
00:04:58 INT 7 Lei [s-?=
You s -?
00:05:00 V 8 =[No no io. La sua fi:glia [ ] gli ha chiesto a lu:i: per la sua salute.
No not me. His daug:hter asked him about his /her health.
00:05:01 INT 9 [Ah… ]
00:05:04 INT 10 La salute di lei signora..?=
The health of you madam…?
00:05:05 V 11 =No no la salute [suo]
No no the health of his…
00:05:06 INT 12 [Ok].
00:05:07 INT 13 Erm... I didn’t ask any details erm… erm... of the conversation (.) what
14 it was about mh… I just know that: at one point she a:s-((throat clear-
15 ing)) asked my husband about his health.
Key to speaker roles: V = Victim; INT = Interpreter
Transcription key: (.) micro pause; italics back translation from Italian; [ ] overlapping talk; =
no gap between the two lines; (( )) non-verbal feature; a: long vowel.
182
Extract 3
00:12:03 V 1 E poi ha cominciato a strangolarmi… con (.) mi ha detto io vado

2 comunque, io sto andando in galera (.) è meglio vado… vado in
3 galera… e tu… muoi… è meglio morire.
And then he started strangling me… with (.) he told me I go anyway, I am going
to jail (.) it is better I go… I go to jail… and you… dies… it is better to die.
00:12:18 INT 4 Erm… and then he started strangling me. He said: well, I’m al:ready
5 erm … bound for prison so I m is-… I might as well… erm… that
6 you… erm… it might as well be that you die.
Key to speaker roles: V = Victim; INT = Interpreter
Transcription key: (.) micro pause; italics back translation from Italian; you stress
parties) from an interpreter making the issue explicit to the interviewing officer. Specifically,
the exchange raises questions as to the impact, if any, such information could have on the
officer’s disposition to knowledge in the a ccount-giving process. It also raises questions as
to the potential implications of the negotiation of meaning at this early point in the inter-
view for the way in which the interpreter subsequently handles the linguistic and epistemic
vulnerability arising from the selected interview language. Extracts 3 and 4 provide some
insight into both issues.
Extract 3 is taken from a short time later in the interview in which the victim experi-
ences difficulties in conjugating the verb ‘to die’ in line 3 (i.e. ‘muoi’ rather than ‘muori’).
The victim opts for a different construction, ‘it is better to die’, which the interpreter clearly
understands and, in seeking an idiomatic rendering (‘it might as well be …’), mitigates the
illocutionary force of the utterance. The fact that the threat was not taken up again later in
the account-probing phases of the interview raises questions as to whether the overall level
of risk facing the v ictim-survivor was fully assessed and whether the officer’s disposition to
knowledge was impacted by the mitigation.
Extract 4 shows the interpreter generating an instance of linguistic vulnerability. In line
4, the interpreter initiates an intervention to alert the interviewing officer to the need for
clarification and follows up after the short monolingual exchange (lines 4 –5) in line 7 with
an explanation that signals the v ictim-survivor’s linguistic vulnerability to the interviewing
officer, 52 minutes into the interview. The lack of m eta-commentary by the interpreter at
other points in the interview for the benefit of the interviewing officer suggests that the in-
terpreter does not pay attention to the fact that lack of mutual understanding may jeopardise
the v ictim-survivor’s trust in the police officer and consequently in the public institution.
The two interviews show respectively an example of a v ictim-survivor using a limited
repertoire in English and a second who uses a language in which proficiency was limited.
These decisions to speak in a language of limited proficiency were ostensibly designed to
enable these individuals to maintain some autonomy over the situation and alleviate personal
suffering, but the risk of inflicting harm on the self and increasing situational vulnerability
is evident. The extracts also show how the interviewing officers’ disposition to knowledge
can be impacted and the extent to which their (lack) of understanding leads to action in
mitigation. In the first interview, the frequent (re-)a ssertion of the anticipated participation
framework was to protect the victim from herself, for the PO to protect himself from the
183
Rebecca Tipton
Extract 4
00:51:45 P 1 and, can you describe how he.. he got hold of your hair?
00:51:51 INT 2 può descrivere come le ha afferrato i capelli?
can you describe how he grabbed your hair?
00:51:55 V 3 come afferrato? aperto? afferrato?
what do you mean by grabbed? opened? grabbed?
00:52:00 INT 4 erm (.) the interpreter needs to (.) n o-non sa cosa significa afferrato in
italiano?
5 don’t you know what ‘afferrato’ means
in Italian?
00:52:05 V 6 no.
00:52:07 INT 7 Erm.. {name} is not sure what the word (.) the Italian word for ‘d rag’
8 means. ‘a fferrare:’ e’… prendere con la mano cosi’…
dra:g is…take with your hand like this… ‘to drag’ is to do like that with
9 the hand like this.
10 quindi, come-come le ha preso i capelli?
then, how-how did he take hold of your hair?
00:52:26 V 11 con.. con.. tutte e due le mani.
with..with.. all and both of the hands
Key to speaker roles: P = Police officer; INT = Interpreter; V = Victim
Transcription key: (.) micro pause; {name} redacted information; italics back translation from
Italian
effects of misunderstanding and maximise the clarity and detail of the evidence provided.
In the second, the interpretation and lack of transparency over language choice contributed
to shaping the interviewing officer’s positive impression of the v ictim-survivor’s ability to
provide a detailed account in Italian.
It is important to stress that the observations regarding the lack of m eta-commentary in
the second interview are not intended as a criticism of the interpreter’s approach. However,
the selected extracts do raise important questions about the m ulti-layered nature of vul-
nerability in interpreter-mediated victim interviews and its impact on officers’ disposition
to knowledge. At the time of the research, anecdotal evidence suggested that interpreter-
mediated police interviews were less likely to be categorised as high risk, resulting in some
individuals not being monitored as a priority. The small sample of interviews made available
for my study did not allow for corroboration of this point, nor was I given access to the in-
terviewing officer and interpreter as originally planned in the research design to talk through
the decision-making processes. However, the interviews do highlight different ways that
vulnerability manifests in interpreter-mediated victim interviews, providing scope for their
systematic analysis across a much larger sample, opening up questions with regard to the
nature and importance of interpreter meta-commentary within a future-oriented approach
to the interview process.
Discursive (re-)construction of vulnerability

This final section revisits interview data from my above-mentioned study (Tipton 2017a,
2017b) to explore the discursive construction of vulnerability in interpreters’ talk about their
184
experience within and across domestic abuse service settings. It draws on 15 s emi-structured
interviews with spoken language interpreters: eight from a police constabulary in the East of
England and seven from a city council service in the North West of England, two males and
13 females, with experience ranging between 5 and 27 years. Each interview lasted between
one and one and a half hours. Thirteen interviewees gave permission for the interview to be
recorded and transcribed, and in the other two, the author took notes. Interviewees from the
police constabulary were recruited through a survey, and the city council interpreters were
recruited through recommendation by the service manager, all following ethical approval
for the study from the University of Manchester.
The interviews covered topics such as the extent of domestic abuse-related interpret-
ing experience, interpreting in risk assessments, rapport and trust building, assignments at
refuges, emotional impact of domestic v iolence-related work, domestic v iolence-specific
interpreter training (availability/impact on practice), service user repertoire use in English
during encounters, language challenges around domestic abuse, pre- interview briefing
(police), understanding of victim interview process (police), experience of working with the
same v ictim-survivor across services (in statutory and charity sectors) and available support
for interpreters. Although the concept of vulnerability was not a focus of the interviews
and a keyword search of the data confirms that it was not mentioned by the interviewer
or respondents directly, using a thematic approach to re-analyse the d ata – as suggested by
Braun and Clarke (2006) working with qualitative research in psychology – the theme of
‘professional vulnerability’ emerges as salient through indirect references identified through
the sub-themes of disclosure, challenges to interpreter impartiality, personal safety, service
user desire for autonomy and freelancer precarity.
In agential terms, ‘professional vulnerability’ denotes actions taken that result in increased
vulnerability for the interpreter and/or for his/her interlocutors, and actions taken by others
that impact on the level of interpreters’ perceived and actual vulnerability. The examples dis-
cussed in the previous section of the different kinds of vulnerability in interpreter-mediated
interaction are thus complemented in this section through a focus on the broader contextual
factors shaping the interpreter’s experience of vulnerability, opening up critical points for
commissioners of interpreting services and interpreter educators.
Extract 5 is one of several from the data that draw attention to interpreters being viewed
as knowledge holders who may be relied upon for information to support continuity of ser-
vice within a single service or across services. The interpreter in this extract does not appear
to perceive the self as vulnerable when such requests arise, nor does s/he suggest that such
requests are resisted. The account, nevertheless, highlights several situational vulnerabilities
Extract 5
The victim needs to be taken into some home, obviously if they’re not going back to their
house, and then it’s handed from one service to the other service. Within that hand [over],
although I follow it all the way through, the same officer doesn’t follow it all the way
through…these new people, I would say, don’t have much about the case. And if there is
not a decent brief being given to these people, they ask the interpreter because I’ve been
there all the way though (Police Interpreter Interview 1).
185
Rebecca Tipton
that may be of some consequence. These include the potential for increased epistemic vul-
nerability (of primary service provider and v ictim-survivor) due to incomplete or inaccurate
information relayed by the interpreter, and a diminished sense of control (a nd, hence, in-
creased ‘psychological vulnerability’ (Määttä, Puumala and Ylikomi 2021)) for the v ictim-
survivor in being excluded from discussions.
A second interview with a city council interpreter also on the theme of handovers (this
time within the same service) highlights an agential response that shows sensitivity to the
v ictim-survivor’s psychological vulnerability and awareness of the potential for the institu-
tion to generate linguistic vulnerability. In this case, the interview notes show the interpreter
recognised the risk of re-traumatisation posed by a new case worker by asking the service
user to talk about experiences that had been recounted several times before. The interpreter
reported asking the new case worker to start from the most recent section of the notes to
avoid emphasising issues not relevant to that day’s service encounter. This draws attention
to the impact of the interpreter’s familiarity with a service user’s institutional trajectory on
her/h is disposition to knowledge and moral sensitivity to the v ictim-survivor’s experience
and vulnerability to distress being triggered. The interpreter’s actions can be described as
future-oriented and motivated by professional interest in the outcome of that day’s interac-
tion for the service user.
It is not the goal of the analysis to evaluate the rights or wrongs of such intervention by
the interpreter. However, it is important to note that approaches inevitably vary among in-
terpreters, and for those who adopt a minimal interventionist approach to interpreting, such
future orientation will be precluded. In this case, the avoidance of harm (t riggering distress)
seems to have been a motivating factor for the interviewed interpreter. However, it may be
argued that the interpreter’s decision to act as reported above was based on her own perceived
vulnerability only and not on professional expertise and, hence, that the intervention is risky
and needed to have been negotiated with the primary service provider.
Extract 6 shows the interpreter experiencing professional vulnerability within a single
encounter due to issues of perceived physical and financial risk. Faced with an uncertain
situation, alone with two v ictim-survivors who are apparently in touch with the alleged
perpetrator, the interpreter has to wait for a manager to sign the job card in order to receive
payment. The lack of autonomy to physically leave the situation brought about by the ad-
ministrative needs associated with freelancer status highlights the diminished agency of the
Extract 6
Three victims, and I, being left at this house’s living room. Two hours waiting for this
manager to turn up. So, we were alone for two hours. I had no professional next to me.
What we’re doing in two hours? We’re talking. I’m not talking, they are talking. Because
they are so worried, “a re we staying here? Is there food? I don’t have money, what are
we going to do? Is he going to find me? What’s happening?”. And for some reason, the
victims’ phones were with them, the same numbers and everything else. So, I don’t know
if perhaps it’s their choice, I don’t know. But so, it kept ringing. I can hear the suspect
calling them. What do you do? You walk out? I could’ve walked out. And also, I need to
get signed to get paid. There is no one to sign me (Police Interpreter Interview 1).
186
Extract 7
…a sexual assault happened, and the person left on bail. It was chucking it down, I didn’t
realise the person was hanging around, the suspect was hanging around. I went into my
car and then he just appeared next to me saying “can you give me a lift to town?” (Police
Interpreter Interview 8).
interpreter, especially in assignments that stretch beyond the usual working day in which in-
terpreters are left with no back-office support. Extract 7 is a further articulation of perceived
physical risk; this interpreter account (and others in the data set) was set against a backdrop
of government funding cuts to police services and the lack of funding to pay for taxis or
accommodation if a police interview finished late at night.
These situations, along with the example above of the interpreter providing continuity of
service between institutional handovers are, at this time of writing, seldom highlighted in
academic research on public service interpreting. Yet these interstitial experiences (i.e. non-
interpreter mediated encounters in between interpreter-mediated encounters) are clearly
a source of professional vulnerability that interpreters appear to have little control over. It
raises the question of institutional accountability to interpreters in such moments and the
extent to which this accountability is foregrounded in commissioning interpreting services.
Another category of professional vulnerability in the data concerns what I term challenges
to interpreter impartiality where impartiality is understood primarily as non-involvement
in matters of substance in an encounter rather than non-involvement tout court. At stake is
the porousness of social interaction and the over-estimation on the part of many interpreters
that others automatically share a consensus as to where the interpreter’s boundaries of in-
volvement lie as a professional. The experience of boundary encroachment can be a source
of professional discomfort and perceived vulnerability for interpreters.
The data contains several examples of such encroachments. Two city council interpret-
ers report side conversations initiated by v ictim-survivors prior to the interpreter-mediated
encounter or during the encounter. The first involved disclosure of a level of violence perpe-
trated against the victim that the interpreter found very difficult to handle; she subsequently
struggled to maintain her composure during the main encounter. The second concerns ap-
parently regular requests from v ictim-survivors for the interpreter to embellish their stories.
The interpreter in question had no difficulty in asserting her professional boundaries and
deny such requests, but the unexpected infringement on her professional role boundaries
was striking and highlights the challenges of interpreters being coerced into conversations
against their professional will: ‘Many times, say 85% of my clients say ‘what’s your personal
view?’. I keep saying ‘I can’t’’ (City Council Interpreter Interview 7).
Extract 8 contains another example of boundary encroachment. Here the interpreter re-
ports refusing to take sole responsibility for taking a victim personal s tatement – a document
that informs a court of the harm suffered by a victim of crime and that may be regarded
when a sentence is decided – out of concern that her status as interpreter would impact on
the document’s admissibility in court and on the victim’s ability to fully exercise her/h is
rights. The interpreter asserts her professional vulnerability on the basis that going along
with the officer’s w ish – that
she takes a statement on her own, outside of her usual profes-
sional m andate – would lead to an inappropriate public record and potentially impact on the
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Rebecca Tipton
Extract 8
…here is a victim, and the written statement needs to be taken… there is something called
VPS “v ictim’s personal statement”, and I get this [question] “can you take a statement?”,
and [the police officer] tries to walk out. So many times. And then I go “well, no I can’t”,
and then [he says] “well the other interpreter did it” (Police Interpreter Interview 8).
outcome of the case for the v ictim-survivor. The officer’s reported response suggests that
the level of epistemic vulnerability is not fully acknowledged or downplayed for reasons of
procedural expediency or his own convenience; yet, it is not an unusual occurrence in police
settings. Mayfield’s (2016) research reveals that interpreters who are anxious about maintain-
ing good links with the service and mitigate precarity of their freelancer status will often go
along with an officer’s wishes without taking full account of the epistemic vulnerability that
may ensue for the limited (English) language proficient speaker.
Conclusion
This chapter draws on research conducted over a five-year period (2015–20), revisiting find-
ings and presenting new ones in the context of an investigation of vulnerability in settings
involving v ictim-survivors requiring spoken language interpreting. The discussion high-
lights that what is understood by the ‘v ulnerable subject’ by parties to encounters varies,
generating dispositions to both knowledge and interaction that are often neglected in pub-
lic service interpreting research. There is clearly scope to further investigate the extent to
which some interpreter decision-making is triggered by perceptions of vulnerability relat-
ing to encounter-specific and wider social factors and its impact on service user outcomes
to deepen understanding of the relationship between interpreter agency and risk, and the
nature of epistemic interdependence in interpreter-mediated encounters. The proposed
‘future-oriented’ approach to interpreting offers a useful analytical category for the pursuit
of such questions in ways that foreground relational approaches to vulnerability and the im-
portance of fostering service user autonomy.
While the category of professional vulnerability emerges as salient in the re-analysis of in-
terviews with interpreters, caution is needed against viewing interpreters as inherently more
vulnerable than other professionals. Nevertheless, the contextual lens of domestic abuse ser-
vices, both statutory and non-statutory, has made it possible to identify a range of situational
vulnerabilities that merit further attention from commissioners of services and interpreter
educators, to enhance protection and support for interpreters where it is needed, and to de-
velop the foundations for interpreter strategy development.
Further reading
del Pozo Trivino, Maribel (2018) “Immigrant women in situations of gender violence: Towards im-
proving communication with public providers through interpreters”, in Galician Migrations: A Case
Study of Emerging Super-D iversity, Renée DePalma, Antía Pérez-Caramés (eds). Cham, Switzerland,
Springer: 265–78.
188
This chapter describes findings from a questionnaire conducted under the SOS-VICS study among agents with
experience of assisting foreign female victims of gender-based violence and how these supported the development
of training resources for key service providers.
Schröttle, Monika, Ravi K. Thiara, and Stephanie A Condon (2011) Violence Against Women and
Ethnicity: Commonalities and Differences across Europe. Leverkusen-Opladen, Verlag Barbara Budrich.
This book addresses issues of ethnicity and violence against women within and across national contexts and pro-
vides an excellent background resource for interpreting studies scholars interested in understanding how women
from different ethnic, racial and linguistic minorities are confronted with different legal, cultural and economic
challenges depending on which (European) country they live in.
Related chapters
Chapter 14, Public service interpreting in social care by Dorien Van De Mieroop, Antoon Cox, and Koen
Kerremans
Chapter 16, ‘Interpreter’s mistake’ – Why should other professions care about the professionalization of interpret-
Notes
1 The author’s correspondence with the head of a victim hub described how in the local area bilin-
gual volunteers had been recruited to support service users to mitigate language issues.
2 Section 16 of the Ministry of Justice Guide (2011) https://lemosandcrane.co.uk/resources/Vulnerable
%20and%20intimidated%20witnesses.pdf
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12
IN HEALTHCARE
Laura Gavioli a nd Raffaela Merlini
Introduction
Together with legal services, healthcare is one of the traditional areas in which the need for
interpreting services is more than obvious. Providing adequate assistance in the absence of a
shared language has been a chief preoccupation on two grounds: the need for hospitals and
clinics to guarantee a basic human right, such as that of access to healthcare; and the high
costs incurred by services when this access is not provided (Ingleby et al. 2012; Hsieh 2015;
Hohenstein and L évy-Tödter 2020). The challenge has acquired new urgency as migration
flows, along with massive c ross-border movements of people travelling abroad for business or
tourism, have heavily changed the patients’ panorama in most of the world.
For a number of reasons, including funding, service organisation, language availability,
and the need to cope with emergencies, healthcare interpreting has historically been provided
by a variety of bilinguals ranging from qualified interpreters to experienced practitioners, to
quickly trained mediators, and to family members or healthcare personnel performing for
the occasion. As a consequence, possibly more than other settings, healthcare interpreting
seems characterised by a considerable diversity in types of abilities and experience of the bi-
lingual participants performing as interpreters. Since the beginning of the new century, this
much diversity has prompted increased interest in research and education.
Relevant epistemological considerations

Two are the main epistemological assumptions to be considered when addressing healthcare
interpreting studies. The first is a theoretical shift in dialogue interpreting analyses spurred by
work based on empirical methods; the second concerns what may be broadly called the cul-
tural gap. Though both assumptions are central to PSI as a whole, they seem to acquire specific
relevance when providing healthcare to speakers of other languages who are mainly migrants.
Observing interpreting through the lenses of empirical approaches:

facilitating patients’ participation
Analyses of recorded interactions involving clinicians and patients in monolingual en-
counters have highlighted that patients’ active participation is of the utmost importance for
192 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-15

Public service interpreting in health care
doctors to deliver correct diagnoses and treatment (Heritage and Maynard 2006; Gill Teas,
Pomerantz and Denvir 2009). Yet, this participation is not easily accomplished even when
language obstacles are not there (Ruusuvuori 2007; Heritage and Lindström 2012). From the
1990s onwards, dialogue interpreting studies of empirical data (y ielded by both interviews/
focus groups and recorded/transcribed interpreted interactions) have exposed the problem
of involving patients and enabling them to contribute, in relevant ways, to their interaction
with clinicians (see Angelelli 2004). Interpreting means helping others to communicate
across language barriers, and this requires profound social and linguistic competencies which
are often overlooked or neglected, especially by service providers or naive commentators.
Eliciting patients’ talk, showing sympathy, asking for or giving clarifications was sometimes
necessary to put the interlocutors in touch (Metzger 1999). Moreover, negotiation of the
interlocutors’ intended meaning seemed often necessary to make sense of the participants’
utterances (Davidson 2002).
Wadensjö’s seminal work (1998) was probably the first to extensively clarify the new
approach. At the beginning of the 1990s, many aspects of interpreting in face-to-face inter-
action were new because the traditional way of looking at interpreting was from a monologic
rather than a dialogic perspective (ibid.: 43–44). The latter view uncovered a full range of
actions which were not normally expected to be performed (and not even considered as
acceptable) in court and conference interpreting – such as coping with features of extempo-
rary talk, repair moves, para-and non-verbal items, implicit requests or unclear statements.
Thus, interpreting was seen to involve two different and yet intersecting activities, namely
translating and coordinating (ibid.: ch.6).
For the healthcare setting, this may mean that interpreters supply additional items to
put the patients at their ease (ibid.: 179–84) or talk briefly to the patients, in their language,
to help them say what they are trying to say (Englund Dimitrova 1997). Simplification of
technical jargon is often involved in rendering clinicians’ talk, and clinicians sometimes ask
interpreters how something may be said or explained in the other language (Gavioli 2015a).
Patients are guided by interpreters to provide details which are likely to be found relevant by
the clinicians, and interpreters take up an active listening role to help patients produce their
stories of illness (see Angelelli 2014; Merlini 2015, and our discussion below). While this be-
haviour may be debatable given the risk of excluding one participant from the conversation
(Valero-Garcés 2007), it highlights a central issue in interpreter-mediated healthcare talk,
namely the need to provide interactional space in particular for the patients to express their
emotions and concerns.
Mediating the cultural gap: cultures versus people

Healthcare interpreting takes place mostly with migrants. For this reason, one of the main
concerns of healthcare institutions is to ensure that they can understand the system’s work-
ings and be compliant. Research has shown that when patients are not (fully) familiar with
the healthcare system in which they are being treated, understanding the healthcare provid-
ers’ suggestions and offering them appropriate medical history details may not be taken for
granted, as suggested by Meeuwesen et al. (2007). It follows that the problem of bridging
different expectations has become an important one in healthcare interpreting, to the extent
that in some countries – particularly those with a recent immigration history and embryonic
interpreting services – healthcare institutions have relied on ‘cultural mediators’ accompany-
ing and assisting interpreters, for instance in Belgium (Cox 2015), or working as interpreters,
for example in Italy (Pittarello 2009; Falbo 2013).
193
While mediation is clearly a necessary component of interpreting (Wadensjö 1998: 6 –7;

Pöchhacker 2008) and may involve bridging different views and types of knowledge, the
cultural component is a less easily definable and far more debatable one. Research carried
out by Felberg and Skaaden (2012) has shown that using culture as an explanatory tool for
perceived interactional obstacles may result in ‘othering’ minority patients, thus concealing
rather than revealing communication problems. Along the same line, Barbieri (2009) has
noted that interpreters’ attempts to explain cultural differences in d octor-patient talk with
a view to possibly clarifying different perspectives result, in fact, in cultural stereotypes.
Research by Baraldi (2012, 2019) too suggests that the concept of ‘cultural’ or ‘intercultural’
mediation has significant limitations. Interpreters working from a p atient-centred angle,
he argues, may promote patients’ self-disclosure and narratives. While such narratives may
evoke different worlds and cultural views, it is the individual patients’ stories, their personal
intimacy told by themselves that is offered as a contribution in the interaction. Thus, speak-
ing through an interpreter provides participants with the opportunity to acknowledge per-
sonal agency, rather than cultural group features, and show concern ‘for the person’ (Baraldi
2012: 323).
To sum up, healthcare interpreting is concerned both with a knowledge gap and with
presuppositions about health and illness that become evident through features of talk. How
to tackle these features and the context they reveal (Mason 2006) thus becomes a central
epistemological issue.
Literature overview
The literature on public service interpreting in healthcare is by now bulky; the more recent
studies can however be broadly divided into those using data derived from interviews or
focus groups with interpreters, clinicians, and to a much lesser extent m inority-language
patients, and those using recordings of naturally occurring interpreter-mediated encounters.
While the former look into how interpreting is perceived by those who work in/w ith it,
the latter sheds light on the actual practices adopted in communicating via interpreters, al-
though the two approaches can be and often are combined (see e.g. Hsieh 2010; Krystallidou
2013). For the sake of epistemological clarity however, we deal with them separately in our
discussion below.
Healthcare interpreting as perceived by participants

Possibly, the main concern emerging from analyses of interpreters’ perception of their work
has to do with what has been called their role in the c linician-patient encounter. The debate,
which was initiated in research within sign language interpreting (Roy 1993/2002) and then
expanded to spoken language settings by Leanza (2005), Martin and Martí (2008), Hsieh
(2008) and others, has centred on the multiplicity of often contrasting activities.
Studies in interaction and discourse have clarified that participation in talk is dynamic
and largely the result of contributions by all participants (Merlini 2009b: 111). Mason (2009),
in particular, has suggested replacing the concept of role with that of positioning; in a dialogic
perspective, what we say positions both ourselves and the others in particular capacities
which are relevant and meaningful in the hic et nunc of interaction. From its distinctly di-
alogic perspective, work on positioning (see also Merlini 2009a; Delizée 2018; Mason this
volume) has thus contributed to dismantling the monologic idea of separate roles for separate
actions and/or separate contexts. This notwithstanding, interviews and focus groups with
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both interpreting professionals and healthcare providers still reveal concern for perceived
clashes between what interpreters do and precisely the roles they feel they are expected to
adhere to. Critical issues fall into two categories: (a) conflicting feelings between acting
‘like conduits’ (cf. Roy 1993/2002) versus showing empathy and involvement and (b) the
management of issues related to the medical world versus issues related to the world of the
patients (M ishler 1984). It is worth noting that by far the largest amount of research on per-
ceived contrasting expectations comes from nursing and healthcare journals, possibly show-
ing that such clashes are of particular concern to healthcare organisations.
Conduits versus humans

One of the main problems highlighted in the literature has to do with perceived reduction-
ism in considering the activity of interpreters as that of a conduit. This is mainly explained
in terms of a struggle between delivering accurate rendition on the one hand, and showing
concern and empathy on the other (Hsieh and Kramer 2012), with little possibility of rec-
onciling the two. Hsieh (2008) reports of interviews and focus groups with interpreters who
observe that if they want to keep their job, they need to act as neutrally as possible, just like
‘robots’ (ibid.: 1371), thus ignoring patients’ need for attention or reassurance.
The clash between a m achine-like versus a humane attitude has been attributed to two
main factors. The first is a perceived inadequacy of guidelines of conduct. Here, the scope
ranges from discussing the challenges healthcare interpreters face in complying with profes-
sional standards (A ngelelli 2006) to a search for more adaptable guidelines which may meet
the interpreters’ expectations and acknowledge their professionalism (A ngelelli et al. 2007;
Butow et al. 2010; Tebble 2012; see also Skaaden this volume).
The second factor consists in the clinicians’ expectations, which often suggest that higher
professionalism in interpreting equals (to them) lower interpreters’ agency (Li, Pearson and
Sarah Escott 2018, Sturman et al. 2018). In particular, the clinicians’ perception is that me-
chanical interpreting reinforces their relationship with patients (Hsieh 2008: 1371) and that
expressions of emotions (e.g. angry tone and agitated movement) do not require interpreters’
relaying them because they are directly accessible and thought to be universally understood
(Hsieh and Nicodemus 2015: 1475). An interesting study by Leanza et al. (2017) has shown
that young doctors, newly trained in patient-centred approaches, tend to value interpreters’
activities aimed at showing attention for the patients more than experienced senior prac-
titioners do. This suggests not only that clinicians’ lower self-confidence due to limited
experience may result in higher appreciation of interpreters’ contribution, but more impor-
tantly that training in communication is relevant and beneficial for healthcare practitioners
working with interpreters.
Finally, the idea of the interpreter as an invisible n
on-agent may also stem from the inter-
preters’ own interpretation of guidelines (Ozolins 2016), with professionalism probably need-
ing to be developed in the direction of exercise of discretion (Merlini 2019; Skaaden 2019).
Medicine and the lifeworld

One of the key problems in medical communication is that of dealing with potentially
complex medical issues in terms that the patients can understand and appreciate. In this re-
spect, Mishler (1984) has often been cited in healthcare interpreting studies for his g round-
breaking distinction between two voices; the ‘voice of medicine’ (VoM) and ‘the voice of
the lifeworld’ (VoL). In interpreter-mediated medical talk, the problem of dealing with
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these two ‘voices’ is not the doctor’s alone, and clearly involves interpreters’ contribution
in making medicine clear for the patients (A mato 2012: 43). Doctors and interpreters are
thus inevitably called upon to cooperate, and this has been one further object of inquiry in
interviews and focus groups.
One of the earliest accounts of interpreters’ perceptions is found in Angelelli (2004: ch.7).
Her interviews with interpreters highlight a perceived need to both simplify the doctors’
language and their ‘rushed’ instructions (ibid.: 111), and mitigate the impact of patients’
storytelling (ibid.: 109). Interpreters believe that both institutional awareness and medical
knowledge need to be rearranged for the patients to get equal care. For instance, they find
that it may be relevant to inform patients about services available in the hospital, or suggest
that they ask questions since they are often unaware they can (Hsieh 2008). Interpreters may
also support healthcare services by explaining what is involved in prevention or other med-
ical protocols; Madlon-Kay and Smith (2019), for example show that interpreters of Somali
communities in the US often go through the benefits of vaccination to contrast the idea that
it provokes autism.
These findings highlight the participants’ perception that interpreters’ knowledge of
medicine and of the medical system is an important factor, often determining the accuracy
and effectiveness of diagnostic assessment (see also Haralambous et al. 2018). At the same
time, doubts have been raised as to what may be considered distinctive of the clinician’s and
the interpreter’s contributions respectively, thus stirring debate on the extent and scope of
collaboration between the two (Hsieh 2010).
Healthcare interpreting as practised in interaction

Discoursal and interactional approaches have focused on practices and mechanisms of in-
terpreted talk as revealed through the analysis of transcripts of authentic recordings. These
practices often display participants’ perceptions, as well as the ways in which conversations
are constructed, highlighting how actions are accomplished and different assumptions ex-
posed or dealt with (Mason 2006). In the two sub-sections that follow, for the sake of epis-
temological clarity our discussion of the literature is organised first around investigations of
coordination as a means of brokering between medical and laypeople knowledge, followed
by studies dealing with the interactional treatment of feelings and emotions.
Coordinating medical talk

Analyses of monolingual doctor-patient interaction have shown that effective diagnosis
and treatment are based on careful consideration of patients’ histories and lifestyles. Thus,
roughly speaking, medical interaction revolves around negotiation of those details provided
by the patients which are treated as medically relevant by the doctors, and those doctors’ sug-
gestions which are found helpful by the patients (see Heritage and Maynard 2006). Work on
interpreted interaction at the beginning of the 2000s found that interpreters may negatively
interfere in such dynamics by, for instance, cutting short of and even cancelling patients’ tell-
ing about their lifeworld (Davidson 2000, 2001), or by rendering lay concepts into medical
ones (Bolden 2000: 414).
Later work on meaning negotiation has shown that interpreters’ engagement in talk with
one of the interlocutors is functional to supplying useful details for diagnosis and therapy
(Pasquandrea 2011), as well as co-constructing question-answer sequences (Baraldi 2015),
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history taking ( Gavioli 2015b; Gavioli and Wadensjö 2021), and doctors’ explanations
(A ngelelli 2018; Baraldi and Gavioli 2021a, 2021b).
Gavioli and Wadensjö (2021) have shown that when very precise details are sought, cli-
nicians may repeat the same question several times in slightly different ways so as to help
the interpreter find the most effective formulation in the other language. In these triadic
sequences, patients sometimes show they can understand the doctors’ (repeated) question
directly, and interpreters are seen to just support direct understanding by confirming or
repairing occasional troubles. Patients’ ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers, or simple answers accompanied
by gestures, can similarly be understood by doctors directly, thus only requiring interpreters’
monitoring the achievement of understanding.
Other studies have instead analysed monolingual dyadic sequences where one partici-
pant produces an extended turn. Here, data have shown that these sequences need expert
handling to ensure that all participants are kept on track (Baraldi and Gavioli 2007). While
a doctor may not (and most likely does not) understand the content of the patient’s story
in another language, s/he can probably understand that it is a story told to an interlocutor,
the interpreter, who displays that s/he is listening, by either keeping eye-contact, nodding
or producing continuers. The interpreter’s feedback may thus be considered to perform a
double function: eliciting the patient’s story, and putting the doctor ‘on hold’ waiting for
a rendition of the story to come immediately afterwards (Gavioli 2012: 213). The coordi-
nating and monitoring function of paralinguistic features, including gaze and gestures, in
the management of monolingual sequences, may assume high relevance (Pasquandrea 2011;
Gerwing and Li 2019) and suggest further means of effective coordination.
In parallel with interpreters’ perception that medical language needs simplifying, some
most recent studies focus on the treatment of specialised terminology. Watermeyer, Thwala
and Beukes (2021) observe that some frequently used practices include naming illnesses in
one and then the other language, and providing a lay explanation (e.g. ‘contractions is when
your belly becomes hard’, ibid.: 7). Bolden (2018) analyses two cases. In the first one, the
interpreter displays that she does not know how to translate a technical item and negotiates
the solution with the patient who supplies the item using the medical term in Latin. In the
second case, the interpreter helps the doctor position the patient’s head correctly in the
course of an ophthalmologic test and does so by synchronising her rendition with the doc-
tor’s actions. The collaboration between doctor and interpreter thus succeeds in making the
doctor’s handling of the diagnostic instrument meaningful for the patient.
Rapport as an interactional construct

A feature that has been consistently observed in the literature on medical interpreting is that
patients tend not to talk easily and smoothly: they may hesitate because they are worried or
ashamed, may find it difficult to describe their symptoms, or may tell lengthy stories filled
with data that may not be clinically relevant.
Emphasis on the transmission of information has traditionally been seen as possibly clash-
ing with emotional attention in monolingual interaction too (Ruusuvuori 2007). However,
testifying to the inherent connection between the informative and relational aspects of talk,
clinical information-seeking has been shown to serve a number of crucial rapport-building
purposes: from making patients feel they are being taken care of, to helping them express
doubts or worries, and reveal uncomfortable conditions that can only then be dealt with
(Penn and Watermeyer 2012).
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As mentioned in the section above, the interpreter’s management of dyadic sequences

may contribute to the success or failure of a medical encounter, given that patients are com-
monly seen to express themselves more comfortably and openly with the interlocutor who
speaks their own language. In Baraldi and Gavioli (2007), a t wo-fold interactional pattern is
revealed. In some cases, the patient’s affective content is cut out of the subsequent rendition
into the doctor’s language, and the latter is thereby prevented from participating in its eval-
uation and eventual elaboration. In other cases, interpreters convey their understanding of
the emotional stances being expressed, which enables their topicalisation by the healthcare
professional, and the latter’s inclusion in the triadic r apport-building process.
Tuning in with Ochs’ (1989: 1) definition of ‘affect’ as the ‘expressive and experien-
tial part of emotion’ encoded through linguistic means, a number of early studies (Baraldi
and Gavioli 2007; Zorzi and Gavioli 2009, to name but two) attempted to investigate the
extent to which interpreters manage (verbally, nonverbally or through feedback tokens)
the primary speakers’ affective m oves – either by making them relevant in interactional
sequences, by responding to them directly, by mimicking them or conversely by ignoring
them altogether.
Two interesting examples of how the psycho-sociological concept of emotion can be
explored through a variety of methodological lenses are Farini (2013) and Leanza, Boivin
and Rosenberg (2013). The former study operationalises the concept in terms of affective
formulations as derived from Conversation Analysis. The latter codes occurrences of exclu-
sion and inclusion respectively, of affective elements in the interpreters’ renditions on the
basis of Communicative Action Theory, and more specifically of Mishler’s (1984) distinc-
tion b etween VoM and VoL. Revolving around the same notion of voice, an earlier study
of speech-therapy sessions (Merlini and Favaron 2005) drew on a combination of analytical
t ools – t urn-t aking, footing alignments, expanded renditions, and prosodic f eatures – t o
outline the contours of a third voice, the ‘voice of interpreting’, which was revealed not just
to echo but to amplify the healthcare practitioners’ empathic orientation.
Seminal as they are, virtually all of the above-mentioned studies make only cursory
mention of empathy as a specific case of emotional responsivity. One of the first enqui-
ries to use empathy as the core theoretical construct is found in an article by Merlini and
Gatti (2015). Their discussion of mediated encounters in a family planning clinic com-
bines a c lose-up view at interactionally produced empathic moves (identified in attentive
listening, perspective-taking, and body language cues), an intermediate view of the medi-
ators’ responses to situational questionnaires, and a distance view of their psychologically
tested empathic disposition. In line with the prevailing dialogical epistemology of current
interpreting research paradigms (Merlini 2020), the findings of the study provide further
evidence that although the empathic process can be initiated by the move(s) of any one par-
ticipant (including the interpreter), its development and outcome are necessarily the result
of the deliberate c o-construction of rapport by all participants – what
Tipton and Furmanek
(2016: 6) identify as ‘a n openness to the other in order to understand oneself ’.
Systematic exploration – both quantitative and q ualitative – of interpreter-induced shifts
in the levels of patient-and doctor-expressed empathy is found in the most recent work
of Krystallidou et al. (2018a, 2020). Empathic opportunities were coded in two corpora
of simulated and authentic interpreter-mediated medical consultations using the Empathic
Communication Coding System (Bylund and Makoul 2005), where degrees of empathy
range from 0 (denial of the other’s perspective) right through to level 6 (sharing of feelings
or experience). The authors demonstrate that interpreters’ prevalent focus on processing
meaning combined with their inability to correctly assess the communicative functions of
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patients’ statements of emotion might lead to the patients’ lifeworld being muted, and to
empathic communication being severely compromised.

As will be clear from the discussion above, the difficulty of interpreting in medical settings
largely stems from a complex interplay of needs and perspectives, with on the one hand
attention to the patient’s conditions informing decisions on remedies, and with appropriate
medical advice and treatment allowing for trust and gratitude on the other. In what follows,
we analyse these two sides and their intersections.
Negotiating territories of knowledge: issues of epistemic accessibility

Observing that much of the complexity in clinical interactions derives from matching two
different ‘territories of knowledge’ (Heritage 2012), that of doctors’ scientific culture and
that of patients’ experience of illness, Raymond (2014a, 2014b) looks at practices by which
interpreters ensure that possibly discordant doctor’s and patient’s contributions are accessi-
ble to each other. He calls such practices ‘epistemic brokering’ (2014a: 426). In particular,
epistemic brokering orients to monitoring the knowledge of the two primary parties by
addressing the risk of under-or over-supposing that information is clear or known. In Ray-
mond’s data, for instance, dieticians use expressions which imply that particular food types
exist and that patients know what they are. In these cases, interpreters are seen to modify
the dieticians’ assumptions by making them explicit. In other words, they act on their per-
ception of a mismatched alignment between the dietician’s and the patient’s knowledge, and
treat the piece of information as new, thus allowing for (a nd legitimising) the patient’s lack
of knowledge.
Epistemic brokering is observed not only in interpreters’ renditions for the patient but
also in those addressed to the provider. In one of Raymond’s extracts (2014a: 438–39), for
instance, the patient mentions ‘m ixed fruit’; following the dietician’s request for a more
precise description, the interpreter offers the patient an example: ‘like a Dole cup’. The ex-
ample comes from a shared experience of people living in the US, as both the dietician and
the patient are, and is thus recognisable by both. Raymond’s analyses (2014a, 2014b) show
how interpreters redesign knowledge for the benefit of primary interlocutors by mobilising
resources both from the interaction (assuming that the patient does not know about the
availability of special dietetic food) and from the outside context (a ssuming that a Dole cup
is a familiar concept to both Spanish and English speakers living in the US). An interesting
consequence of Raymond’s work is that although the notion of epistemic brokering refers
primarily to patients’ and healthcare providers’ knowledge, interpreters do display their ac-
cess to knowledge too, by both identifying instances of under-or over-assuming knowledge,
and supplying the relevant (m issing) details.
In mediated interaction, interpreters are called upon and legitimately expected to con-
tribute their specific interlinguistic and intercultural knowledge. One way of treating inter-
preters’ (interlinguistic) knowledge as interactionally relevant is simply by allowing them to
take the floor and provide a rendition of the original u tterance – or else not allowing them
when direct understanding occurs. There are, however, other ways to make knowledgeable
contributions by the interpreters relevant in talk. Gavioli (2015a) shows that Italian medical
providers sometimes explicitly ask the interpreters to relay what they say to the patients.
While there is clearly no need to do so, reporting verbs are frequently used – as in statements
199
like ‘tell him/her’ or ‘let us explain to him/her’. These devices are seen to recurrently in-
troduce complex or delicate clinicians’ explanations or requests, and seem to acknowledge
the interpreters’ competence in redesigning the service provider’s contribution in ways they
deem appropriate. This provides further evidence that interpreters’ supplementary contri-
butions are often not the result of autonomous choice, and may well be triggered by other
participants’ conversational actions.
These findings suggest that clinicians and patients do not simply offer their contributions
for interpreters’ rendering, they can also elicit particular types of renditions by display-
ing that something is difficult to explain and may be easily misunderstood. In this sense,
interpreters are given and take up responsibility for interpreting by exercising (a nd being
expected to exercise) professional discretion. The rights and onus of such discretion become
part of the activity of talk, as they are negotiated and acknowledged by all participants in
interaction (see also Gavioli and Wadensjö 2021).
Providing humane care: educational and professionalisation issues

Interpreters’ discretion includes insightful treatment of emotional expression. Attempts at
equipping healthcare interpreting students with empathic communication skills are, if any-
thing, very much in their infancy. As D ysart-Gale (2 005: 401) observes, it is not surprising
that many professional interpreters manifest distress and ethical dilemmas with regard to
the expression of affect, given that ‘[they] are not trained to establish therapeutical rapport
with the patient’. On the same note, Fernández (2 010) argues that student interpreters
should be taught both verbal and n on-verbal strategies to handle rapport, as well as cul-
turally different ways to relay emotional involvement. She also notes that more informed
decisions could be made by students if they were ‘aware of the risks posed by seeking for the
medical (objective medical information) at the cost of the emotional (subjective personal
accounts)’ (ibid.: 223).
Only very recently have teams of researchers in the US and Belgium proposed medical
interpreting courses featuring empathic skills acquisition as a major learning outcome. Tar-
geting specifically medical students, from 2015 to 2017 the Penn State College of Medicine
offered regular whole-day interpreting workshops, with the declared aim of enhancing their
empathic sensitivity to vulnerable limited English proficiency patients. Reporting on the
program results, Vargas Pelaez et al. (2018) observed that all participants’ self-reported mea-
sures of empathy had increased on completion of the course and that all of them had also
developed proficiency in interpreting skills. The findings of Krystallidou et al.’s (2018b) in-
novative joint training project for Master’s level interpreting students and 3 rd-and 4th-year
medical ones at Ghent point in the same direction; namely, the successful development of a
more insightful, resourceful and reflective approach to contextually dependent communica-
tion and relational needs.
Located at the intersection between empathic communication, healthcare interpreter ed-
ucation, and interpreting ethics, Merlini’s (2019) research protocol and experimental study
yielded some t hought-provoking considerations. First, since no systematic correlation could
be established between student interpreters’ empathic dispositions and their interactional be-
haviours in classroom practice, empathic communication was found to be a highly c ontext-
d ependent and collectively achievable outcome. Second, the empathy-inhibiting effect of
the simulated environment was shown to be of only limited relevance, especially if stu-
dents’ emotional awareness is promoted through the combined use of a variety of didactic
activities – with post-simulation individual feedback reports and group discussion sessions
200
being the most fundamental to unravel the complex interplay between r apport-building and
other motives for action. Indeed, the most interesting finding was that students learnt to
identify where and how empathy works may run counter to the principle of i mpartiality – as
in those cases in which student interpreters empathised with one party while openly d is-
a ligning with the other for (covert) ideological reasons.
In light of the above, it has been argued that developing healthcare student interpreters’
understanding of their own and others’ feelings may push professionalisation a step further.
In an inspiring paper, Niemants (2013) applied the theoretical distinction between an ‘ethics
of conviction’ and an ‘ethics of responsibility’ to the analysis of simulated and authentic
medical interactions. Whereas in class students tend to adhere to an idealised model of in-
terpreting conduct, in real life professional interpreters are seen to take responsibility for
the outcome of the interaction, departing from theoretical guidelines when this is deemed
necessary to achieve overarching communication goals. Hence, the question raised by Nie-
mants is how students can be helped bridge the gap between ‘playing’ roles in the classroom
and ‘taking’ roles in the real world. One answer may be found in the social constructivist
concept of ‘situated learning’ (K iraly 2000; González-Davies and Enríquez-Raído 2016);
by observing, reflecting, and providing feedback on their own and others’ performances,
students will actively contribute to shaping (and transforming) the competencies of their
communities of practice.
Situated learning theories show evident connections with the conceptual transition from
‘interpreter training’ to ‘interpreter education’, as spearheaded by Angelelli (2008), and
expanded upon in Tipton and Furmanek (2016) and Cirillo and Niemants (2017). Once
the narrow confines of instrumentally conceived practical-only training are overcome, the
wider educational goal may realistically become what Skaaden (2019) calls ‘the exercise of
discretion’, and Danou (2007: 56) ‘the art of improvisation’ as reasoned opposition to the
linearity of habit through a long and arduous reflection on one’s professional practice.
Conclusions
While effective medical treatment and humane care clearly go hand in hand, achieving a
successful balance between the two components requires complex communication compe-
tencies. In interpreter-mediated interaction, this complexity is even more manifest because
there is a participant, that is the interpreter, whose task in interaction is to attend precisely
and pre-eminently to communication.
The above discussion has shown that active agency calls for responsible coordination
on two fronts. On the one hand, interpreters need to be acknowledged in their ability to
understand and render appropriately what is said by the other participants (see Baraldi, this
volume). On the other hand, to be recognised as competent and skilled collaborators, inter-
preters must be able to provide suitable solutions which work, visibly and successfully, for all
the participants in interaction (Wadensjö 2018).
In conclusion, the literature on interpreting in healthcare documents how interpreters’
collaboration with clinicians and patients does, in fact, go far beyond a reductive view of
interpreters’ participation. Hsieh (2014: 75–76) provokingly argues that the ‘interpreter-
as-conduit’ metaphor need not be discarded if, and only if, the conduit role is understood
‘not as a passive [one] that simply relays the voices of others but as a means of reaffirming
the primary relationship between healthcare provider and patient. Evidence shows that this
goal can indeed be achieved through interpreters’ active and knowledgeable monitoring
of participants’ talk contributions, cognitive assumptions and emotional perspectives (even
201
when these are not verbally expressed), as well as through their making real-time strategic
judgments about whether, when, and how to interpret.
Relevant related topics

Studies of interaction in monolingual medical communication may help shed light on the
kinds of dynamics that emerge in d octor-patient interaction when language barriers are not
involved. In particular, research based on the approach known as Conversation Analysis
has produced ample research in several healthcare settings. The EMCA bibliography data-
base provides u
p-to-date literature on medical interaction at the following website: http://
emcawiki.net/Medical_EMCA_tag.
The global medical emergency following C ovid-19 pandemic has further highlighted
how crucial it is to communicate effectively with patients speaking a foreign language.
Healthcare interpreting is consequently bound to attract more and more attention as the
principal means of interaction in such situations and imminent vaccination campaigns, pro-
viding ground for novel research directions.
Further Reading
Baraldi, Claudio, and Laura Gavioli (eds) (2021a) “W hen clinicians and patients do not speak the same
language”, Health Communication 36 (9). Special issue.
Sarangi, Srikant (ed) (2018) “Interpreter-mediated healthcare encounters”, Communication & Medicine
15 (2). Special Issue.
Both special issues are publications in research journals of communication in health care and are thus of equal
interest to clinicians, providers of interpreting services, and interpreting professionals. At the time of writing,
they offer the most up-to-date insight into interpreter-mediated clinician-patient interaction.
Heritage, John, and Douglas Maynard (2006) Communication in Medical Care. Cambridge, Cambridge
University Press.
A milestone volume in studies of doctor-patient interaction in monolingual talk, highlighting the different
phases of clinical consultations and their main interactional features.
The study identifies a number of motives behind interpreters’ emotion work (or lack of it), warns against
concrete risks of emotional mismanagement (especially in the context of diverging sociocultural systems), and
proposes an original normative model to help interpreters evaluate the functions of interlocutors’ expression of
emotions, and choose which therapeutic and interpersonal goals to prioritize in any given situation.
Theys, Laura, Demi Krystallidou, Heidi Salaets, Cornelia Wermuth, and Peter Pype (2020) “Emotion
work in interpreter-mediated consultations: A systematic literature review”, Patient Education and
Counseling 103 (1): 33–43.
Focusing on rapport-building work, the paper highlights the dearth of scientific evidence on verbal and,
particularly, nonverbal semiotic resources – such as gaze, gestures, body orientation, and so on – through which
participants in medical interactions co-construct emotional communication.
Related chapters
Mason
Chapter 10, Consecutive interpreting and multimodal sequences: showing evidence at a distance in a video-
mediated courtroom setting by Christian Licoppe
Chapter 13, Challenges and remedies for interpreter-mediated dementia assessments by Charlotta Plejert
ing by Natacha Niemants, Jessica P. B. Hansen, and Elizabeth Stokoe.
202
nique Traverso, and Emilie Jouin
Chapter 23, Interprofessional education … interpreter education: in or and? Taking stock and moving forward by
Demi Krystallidou
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206
13
CHALLENGES AND REMEDIES
FOR INTERPRETER-MEDIATED
DEMENTIA ASSESSMENTS
Charlotta Plejert
Introduction
War and conflict, as well as globalization generally, have resulted in many societies becom-
ing increasingly linguistically and culturally complex. Whereas this development primarily
has many advantages, it also poses challenges for public sectors, such as health-care services,
particularly when changes take place rapidly. One case-in-point is the dramatic migration to
Europe from the Middle East in and around the year 2015, which has put language and cul-
ture into the limelight. In countries that have often been perceived as largely culturally and
linguistically homogeneous, such as the northern countries of Europe (note, however, in-
digenous populations in these countries), the t wenty-first-century political crisis was not the
only challenge to impact on the health-care sector. People who immigrated to these coun-
tries in the 1960s are currently becoming old and are increasingly in need of help for age-
r elated conditions. One of these conditions is dementia. Dementia, in its most common form
Alzheimer’s disease, is characterized by successive memory loss, but also by other symptoms,
like confusion, anxiety, and a gradual loss of language and motor skills (A lzheimer’s Society
2021). Despite the fact that many immigrants over time become proficient second language
speakers of the majority language (by majority language, an official language of a country
is intended here, for example, Swedish in Sweden), very many require the assistance of an
interpreter in settings in which it is important that the degree of understanding between in-
terlocutors is adequate, for example, when seeking care. In addition, in the case of dementia,
there is some evidence that suggests that languages acquired later than one’s first language/s
will be negatively affected by the degenerative disease earlier than the mother tongue/s
(De Bot, Plejert and Simonsen 2020). This means that also in cases of persons who used to
be proficient second language speakers, communication may be enhanced if an interpreter
mediates the encounter or is accessible as a support at points of communicative difficulties.
In many societies, there is a general lack of interpreters, and not the least a shortage of
interpreters with adequate training when it comes to mediating quite specific clinical tasks,
such as tests of cognitive functioning, or tests of speech and language skills. In addition, de-
spite ethnocultural diversity in many countries, clinical assessment tools for adults are often
based on populations who are reasonably educated. Lack of adaptations of clinical tools to
levels of literacy, and/or cultural aspects is an issue that might affect the ease by which a test is
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-16 207

Charlotta Plejert
administered when mediated by an interpreter. This, in combination with large differences

in degrees of proficiency of interpreters when it comes to knowledge of tests as well as of
different cognitive or communicative disorders, may turn formal clinical assessments cum-
bersome for patients, clinicians, and interpreters alike (cf. Langdon and Saenz 2016; Saenz
and Langdon 2019). In addition, it is not always the case that clinicians have great experience
or training in how to work with an interpreter (Langdon and Saenz 2016; Migrationsskolan
2019). Factors such as these may affect the progressivity and outcome of interpreter-mediated
formal clinical assessments in several ways. In this chapter, data come from a screening test
for dementia. However, similar findings have been reported in relation to other conditions
and settings, too, in which formal tests are being used (for instance, aphasia, cf. Roger and
Code 2011).
Against the background outlined above, the aim of this chapter is to shed light on chal-
lenges and remedies for interpreter-mediated dementia assessments when a formal, cognitive
screening test is used. More specifically, it will be demonstrated how the design of specific
tasks in a test, in relation to the interpreter’s as well as patient’s understanding of it, and the
clinician’s conduct, may result in problems that emerge and become manifested in the in-
teraction. The problems, in turn, hamper the progressivity of the task and may, eventually,
affect patients’ results in ways that put test validity at risk. Using Multimodal Interaction
Analysis (see next section), an example from an interpreter-mediated dementia assessment in
the setting of a Swedish memory clinic is used as a showcase of recurring challenges facing
clinicians, interpreters, and patients. The analyses are discussed in the light of clinician-and
interpreter training, growing numbers of immigrant patients with limited reading and writ-
ing skills in need of health care in many countries, and finally conferred in terms of how
existing challenges may be remedied, to the benefit of interpreters, clinicians, and patients
alike, enhancing patient-safety.

The focus of this chapter is on work that has targeted interpreting during quite specific
clinical tasks, primarily screening tasks used to assess cognitive abilities. Studies based on
survey or interview data are only sketchily reviewed here. Instead, emphasis is put on quali-
tative work that highlights interactional practices that are employed by patients, interpreters,
and clinicians, on a moment-to-moment basis during mediated encounters. By and large,
these studies rely on Conversation Analysis (CA; Sidnell and Stivers 2013), Multimodal
Interaction Analysis (e.g. Mondada 2006) (cf. method section, below), and to some extent
ethnography (e.g. Corsaro 1982). This is not to say that investigations based on surveys or
interviews are not important. On the contrary, the interactional approach reported on and
applied in this chapter, and studies based on other approaches are complementary and should
all be viewed as important contributions to the area of interpreting-research (see Gavioli and
Merlini, this volume). In addition to this, some research on the development of culturally
and educationally adapted neuropsychological tests is also briefly touched upon. This is im-
portant, not least since that line of work, together with interactional studies from around the
year 2011 and onwards, have had an impact on policy documents and guidelines for what
materials should be used, for example, when screening for dementia in immigrants who have
limited literacy (A lzheimer Europe 2018). Whereas there is evidence that some tests are less
culturally, linguistically, and educationally biased than others (Nielsen et al. 2019), there is
still a great need to investigate ways of adapting tests so as to make them more appropriate
for interpreter-mediated encounters.
208
Challenges for interpreter-mediated dementia assessments
Literature overview
Even if there exists a fair number of studies on interpreted encounters in which interactional
approaches have been employed (e.g. Wadensjö 1998, 2004, 2018; Bolden 2000; Angelelli
2004; Hsieh 2008; Bridges et al. 2011; Raymond 2014), there is a dearth in research in which
formal clinical evaluations and measurements involving people with cognitive or language
problems are in focus. Work on interpreting in psychotherapy and mental health is, however,
an exception, where the role, behaviour, and impact of the interpreter, and the relationship
between therapist, patient, and interpreter have been explored (e.g. Bot 2003, 2005, 2014;
Miller et al. 2005). The work by Langdon and Saenz (2016) and Saenz and Langdon (2019)
on interpreting within speech and language pathology and audiology offers h ands-on advice
for training interpreters as well as clinicians when it comes to how to prepare for meditated
test administration. This work will be returned to in the discussion part of this chapter.
A handful of studies report how clinicians find it challenging to implement cognitive
tests using interpreters, while at the same time maintaining the professional quality of the
diagnostic process. By and large, empirical information about psychometric validity and
reliability of tests when administered with the help of an interpreter is lacking (e.g. Plejert
et al. 2015; Majlesi, Antelius and Plejert 2017; Majlesi and Plejert 2018; Migrationsskolan
2019). Van De Mieroop, Bevilacqua and Van Hove (2012) reported how an interpreter,
during the administration of the Mini Mental State Examination (M MSE), a commonly
used screening tool in dementia assessments, made additions to the occupational therapist’s
initial test questions. For example, when the occupational therapist asked what season it was,
the interpreter turned the initial open question into a close-ended question with optional
answers, providing the patient the opportunity to choose between spring, summer, autumn,
and winter, despite the fact that this was not part of the original test question. The modified
rendition by the interpreter thus made the task easier for the patient, potentially influencing
the patient’s answer and how it was assessed. Three further studies investigate interpreting
in relation to cognitive screening for dementia (Plejert et al. 2015; Majlesi et al 2017; Majlesi
and Plejert 2018), the latter of which focuses on participants’ (not least the interpreter’s) n
on-
verbal conduct and its potential impact on test results (Majlesi and Plejert 2018).
Many of the reviewed studies above point out that interpreters very often lack knowledge
and understanding of the bases for neuropsychological tests; why a task has a certain form
(for instance, why ask someone to mention as many fruits as possible within 60 seconds?),
and why it must be administered in sometimes quite restricted ways (for example, why not
modify the formulation of a question just slightly when a patient does not seem to under-
stand?). This kind of challenge has been discussed previously in Plejert et al. (2015), and
Majlesi and Plejert (2018) and will also be illuminated in the current chapter. Another issue
that adds to the complexity of formal assessments deals with the lack of suitable tests in all
languages needed. In memory-, as well as in speech and language clinics, it is not uncommon
that interpreters are asked to translate texts (prima vista, or sight interpreting) from tests not
available or validated in the patient’s best language (Langdon and Saenz 2016). There are
many reasons for clinicians to avoid asking for this service. For example, words in different
languages do not generally have exact equivalents in another language. There may also be
words to be tested that refer to a common object within one culture, but the item is uncom-
mon in another one (so the task is culturally biased in a way that makes it difficult for the
patient to respond appropriately).
There may also be differences between dialects, and often words have many synonyms, so
if one interpreter on one occasion translates a piece of text, or names an object in a picture in
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Charlotta Plejert
a test in a specific way, and a new interpreter is enrolled at another point for the same test and
patient, it is quite unlikely that the material is translated in the same way, which of course
may heavily affect what conclusions can be drawn from the patient’s test results from one
time to the next. Interpreters are sometimes not informed beforehand that the appointment
might involve sight interpreting, and very many are not trained for that task. This may put
the interpreter in an uncomfortable position of either accepting a task, which goes against
their professional oath of conduct, or telling the clinician that the task cannot be carried out,
which might then become a dilemma for the patient.
Thus, lack of clinician training in working with interpreters, and the fact that they may
have a simplified view upon important lexical and structural differences between languages
are crucial, too, not just interpreter training. In a report from Migrationsskolan (2019), a
centre in southern Sweden focusing largely on health issues in relation to elderly immigrants,
several challenges are revealed connected to lack of interpreter training, biased test materials,
and limited clinician training in working with interpreters. The findings and conclusions
from that report are quite relevant for this chapter and will be discussed in terms of implica-
tions for h ealth-care professionals and interpreters concerning training, but also of the estab-
lishment of routines along the entire diagnostic pathway, from booking an interpreter, the
mediated encounter proper, to debriefing and evaluation of an interpreted event (Langdon
and Saenz 2016). Some hands-on suggestions for improvements for interpreter-mediated,
formal clinical assessments will therefore be brought forth at the end of this chapter.

In this section, an extract from an interpreter-mediated cognitive assessment in a memory-
clinic in Sweden will be used as a showcase, stressing four critical issues of relevance for
the present volume: (1) cultural, linguistic, and educational bias in relation to clinical tools
used for certain populations; (2) level of interpreter training regarding assessments of cogni-
tive functioning; (3) training clinicians for working with interpreters for administration of
clinical tests; and (4) the relevance of the briefing-interaction-debriefing (BID) procedure
(Langdon and Saenz 2016), particularly for encounters involving minority ethnic patients
with limited education. For coherence, one and the same memory-clinic appointment will
be used to illuminate points (1)–(4). The section below is descriptive and subsequently con-
nects its analytical points to the four critical issues raised above.
Participants, data, and method

The data in the showcase comes from a video recorded, i nterpreter-mediated dementia eval-
uation of an elderly, Iraqi Kurdish, multilingual woman in her 80s. She had been referred
to the memory clinic, since her children perceived that she had problems in her daily living,
for instance, displaying signs of confusion, memory loss, disorientation, and partly language
loss. The woman’s mother tongue was the Feyli variety of Kurdish, but she also knew some
Arabic, and some Turkish. As a child, she learnt how to read and count to a very limited
extent in Arabic by an older relative. The other participants are an experienced occupational
therapist working in the memory clinic, and an interpreter, who was listed by an interpreter
service routinely used by the clinic.
The recording was made during the woman’s second visit to the memory clinic, when she
was to undergo cognitive testing with the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA; Nasred-
dine 2003). The MoCA is a short screening tool that assesses s hort-term memory (i mmediate
210
and delayed recall of five nouns); visuospatial abilities (clock-drawing and three-dimensional
cube copy); executive functions (adapted Trail Making B, phonemic fluency and verbal
abstraction); attention, concentration, and working memory (target detection, serial sub-
traction, digits forward and backward); language (confrontation naming, repetition of two
syntactically complex sentences, and phonemic fluency); and orientation to time and place.
The data is part of a larger corpus for a study of memory assessments involving ethnic
minority persons with suspected dementia, carried out at Centre for Dementia Research
(CEDER) at Linköping University, Sweden, during the years 2 011–16. All participants were
informed about the study and gave their consent concerning participation, which included
the permission to record their interaction. For anonymity, the terms used here are patient,
interpreter, and clinician. The project was ethically approved by a regional board for ethical
vetting.
The method used for this chapter is multimodal interaction analysis (Mondada 2006).
This method derives from CA (Sidnell and Stivers 2013) and has the m icro-level of inter-
actional engagement in focus. It aims to diverge from an observer’s perspective, in favour of
an emic one, in which evidence of what people do in interaction (video-recorded) can only
be determined based on the relationship between an initiative and how it is responded to
in interaction from the interlocutors’ perspective. Multimodal means that any, ever so subtle
communicative cues may be of relevance to participants, so additionally to verbal exchanges,
gesture, gaze, body posture, and prosody are all of potential interest. To give a very simple
example: If Ada meats her friend Bob in the street, she will most likely say ‘Hello how are
you?’, and Bob will most likely respond something like ‘Great thanks – how are you?’. At
this point, if recorded, analysts can understand that there is a greeting exchange going on
that both participants orient to, and the interaction is likely to proceed with a new initiative
taken by one of the participants, for example ‘W hat’s up?’. Had Bob’s response, however,
been absent (i.e. no response at all, verbal or n
on-verbal), it would clearly have been notably
absent and signalled some kind of problem (for instance of hearing, or perhaps of a social na-
ture). The analytical process is performed during repeated and very careful watching, coding
and highly detailed transcriptions of video sequences of interaction. Relevant categories that
emerge through the analytical process are subsequently routinely displayed in data-sessions,
in which experienced analysts collaboratively discuss them; a kind of qualitative validation
forum, one might say.
Interpreter-mediated dementia assessment – a showcase

The task at hand presented in Excerpts 1a–f, below, deals with the patient’s ability to attend
to a focal point (enduring attention), in this case the capability of distinguishing a specific
sound [ɑ:] in the occupational therapist’s presentation of a string of different sounds. [ɑ:] is a
common, prolonged vowel in Swedish, equivalent to the vowel in dance as it is pronounced
in British English. In the manual for the task in English, the following instruction is pro-
vided to the test-administrator to tell the patient: I am going to read a sequence of letters. Every
time I say the letter A, tap your hand once. If I say a different letter, do not tap your hand. Based on
what we already know about the patient’s level of literacy, the way the instruction is formu-
lated, is per se a potential obstacle, since the relationship between sound and letter is perhaps
not obvious to the patient. Due to space, the entire episode from the beginning of the task
to its end has been split up into shorter sequences, followed by analysis. Transcriptions con-
form to the conventions of Jefferson (2004), with some modifications. Transcription conven-
tions are found at the end of the chapter. Original language is provided first, followed by a
211
Charlotta Plejert
Excerpt 1a, P=Patient; OT=Occupational therapist; INT=Interpreter
01 OT: å sen så vill ja att e: ja kommer säga flera olika

bokstäver=
02 =det här kanske vi kan ta på svenska i [å för sig]
and then I want that e: I will say several different

letters=(( hand gesture with both hands, beating movement
from the left to the right as if indicating a row of
things))this maybe we can do in Swedish [as a matter of
fact]
03 INT: [ m ]
04 (0.4)
05 OT: .t vi får se
.t let’s see
06 PAT: cha aizheh
what does she say
07 OT: å så fort jag säger bokstaven a: ( 0.3) så vill jag att du
08 knackar till i bordet
and as soon as I say the letter a: (
0.3) I want you to
knock (( knocks on the table with her right hand)) on the
table
09 (0.4)
10 INT: m:
11 (0.4)
12 PAT: aizhe cha
what does she say
13 (0.9)
14 INT: (agar aek) zhenaftet va soidi
if your hear an a in Swedish
15 (0.3)
16 PAT: a
17 (0.2)
18 INT: e::: sh- e::::
19 (0.3)
20 PAT: ba soidi↑
in Swedish↑
21 INT: ba harfe ka↑
it is a letter↑
22 (0.4)
23 PAT: ha↑=
what↑=
24 INT: =masan aizhem a ( 0.6) bede la
=for example I say a (
0.6) you should knock on ((knocks
on table))
212
25 (0.5)
26 PAT: ch[ane]
how [much]
27 INT: [mez]aka (0.3)aw fanna beka ( 0.7) agar
28 zhenaftitay kh[o]↑
[do] (
0.3) like this (( knocks on table)) if you (
0.7) heard
it ok[ey]
29 PAT: [a]
30 (0.9)
31 INT: harf (0.4)å s- du [säger]
letter (0.4) s- you [say]
32 PAT: [a]
translation into idiomatic English in italics. Minimal responses (generic to many languages)
are not translated. N on-verbal practices of relevance for analysis are provided within double
parentheses in the English translation.
In line 01, the occupational therapist gives a part of the formal instructions as stated in
the material at hand, but her account is not perceived by the interpreter as information to
be rendered to the patient straight on at this point. This is possibly due to the fact that the
instruction is immediately followed by a comment about conducting the task in Swedish
(line 02), and a reservation let’s see (line 05), and this talk is not clearly directed to any of
the interlocutors, albeit the occupational therapist is looking at the patient. The patient
precedes the interpreter, wondering what the occupational therapist is saying in Swedish.
In lines 07 and 08, the occupational therapist elaborates on her instruction, and this elab-
oration is prosodically and syntactically tied to the initial information (line 01) beginning
with and (and as soon as I say the letter a: etc. line 07). The talk is now clearly directed towards
the patient by means of gaze as well as the use of you (I want you to knock on the table lines
07, 08). The occupational therapist also accompanies her utterance with a bodily enactment
(K indell et al. 2013), knocking with her right hand on the table within the visual space of
the patient. The patient again initiates repair in terms of a clarification request, directed to
the interpreter (what does she say line 12). This may be due to the time passing without any
rendition from the interpreter (line 04, 0.4s pause, lines 09–11, two pauses and a minimal
response from the interpreter, but no rendition). In line 14, the interpreter starts rendering
the instructions previously given in Swedish by the occupational therapist. In the continua-
tion of the excerpt (lines 14–32), there is a negotiation between the interpreter and the pa-
tient of what is to be done. Of particular interest is the interpreter’s comment in line 21 that
a is a letter, preceded by the patient’s query concerning the choice of language (in Swedish↑)
with a rise. The interpreter then exemplifies what is expected from the patient (line 24),
accompanied by a similar movement as the one previously used by the occupational thera-
pist (line 08), knocking with his right hand on the table. Again, the patient initiates repair
(l ine 26) and the interpreter repeats his prior verbal and n on-verbal instruction (k nocking);
however, this time not defining the sound [ɑ:], but stating it signalling established shared
knowledge.
It is not just to the patient that the task at hand might seem somewhat unclear. The inter-
preter in this particular case has not received any prior information about how the task is to
213
Charlotta Plejert
be carried out – and for what purpose. What language to use has also been an issue several
times in the talk between the occupational therapist and the interpreter in relation to differ-
ent sub-tasks in the test (see 1b, lines 02, 05). This may explain why some negotiations are
necessary between the interpreter and the occupational therapist before the interpreter can
make any renditions to the patient. This is illustrated in excerpt 1b:
Excerpt 1b
33 INT: på svenska eller bara hon slår till eller↑

in Swedish or she just taps or
34 (
0.4)
35 OT: [aa så fort ja säger]
[aa as soon as I say]
36 INT: [(x xx)]
As can be observed in line 33, the interpreter asks for clarification about the expected conduct
of the patient. Again, the language to be used is an issue. This is of particular interest in relation
to the matter of letters contrasted with sounds, as the occupational therapist will produce letters
in a string of speech as they are pronounced in Swedish. Since alphabets are pronounced dif-
ferently in distinctive languages, this might potentially mean that the interpreter is not certain
whether or not he should also, in fact, render the occupational therapist’s string of letters. The
fact that the patient is simply to knock is confirmed by the occupational therapist in a partly
completed explanation of the procedure of saying aa out loud (line 35). Due to recording qual-
ity, it has not been possible to disentangle exactly what is said by the interpreter in line 36. The
issue that the letters are to be produced in Swedish is picked up by the interpreter as important
information for the patient. In his subsequent rendition, despite the occupational therapist not
saying what language she is using, he adds that the letters will be said in Swedish. This is illus-
trated in Excerpt 1c, when the occupational therapist eventually provides the patient with the
first complete instruction (lines 37–39), followed by the rendition (lines 40–41):
As can be noticed, in this episode, the patient uses a: as a minimal, confirmatory response
(lines 42 and 46). Her confirmations, however, do not necessarily mean that she has under-
stood the instructions rendered by the interpreter. The evidence for this claim is found in
the way the interpreter repeats (and elaborates) his renditions over and over again, so some
semiotic cues, for example, the patient’s facial expression and/or gaze, are treated by the
interpreter as signalling that clarification is needed, even if the patient’s confirmatory verbal
response would typically be perceived as conveying understanding. As before, the clinician
as well as the interpreter use a knocking gesture to illustrate the requested non-verbal rec-
ognition of the letter from the part of the patient. At the point when the clinician knocks
(line 39), the patient, however, is looking at the interpreter and possibly does not take notice
of her gesture, whereas the interpreter’s subsequent knock (line 44) is produced within the
patient’s visual space. 20 turns at talk are omitted after line 47 in the above excerpt. What
happens in those turns is continued explanation work by the interpreter, primarily consisting
of repetitions of the nature of the task and how the patient is expected to act. None of it is
rendered in Swedish to the occupational therapist. Neither does the occupational therapist
interfere. Eventually, the interpreter assesses the patient to be ready to conduct the task and
proclaims to the occupational therapist to go on with the task proper:
214
Excerpt 1c
37 OT: ja kommer ( 0.2) säga flera bokstäver nu ( 0.2) å

38 så fort ja säger bokstaven a ( 0.4) så vill ja att du
knackar
39 till i bordet=
I will (
0.2) say several letters now ( 0.2) and as soon
as I say the letter a ( 0.4) I want you to knock (( knocks
with her left hand))
on the table=
40 INT: mm=aizhe chan harf aizhem ( 0.6) va soidi (0.4) masalan
41 zhenaftet harf a:↑
m m=she says I say a few letters (
0.6) in Swedish (0.4)
for example if you hear the letter a:↑
42 PAT: a:↑
43 (0.4)
44 INT: beda la meza yaane zhenafteta kho↑
you should knock on the table ((
knocks))
it means you hear
it okey↑
45 (0.2)
46 PAT: a
47 INT: bas ye harf a:
so a letter of a:
((
20 turns omitted))
Excerpt 1d
68 INT: varsågod
go ahead
69 (0.4)
70 OT: så nu börjar [( x)]
so now starts[( x)]
71 INT: [alan] bezhnava!
[now] listen!
72 OT: .hh ef::: ( 0.6) bi::↑ (0.4) a:::↑ (
0.9) si::↑ (0.5)
73 em:::(0.7) en::↑ (0.7) a::↑ (
1.0) a::↑ (
0.9) .t .hh=
74 INT: =zhenaftet
= did you hear?
75 (0.3)
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Charlotta Plejert
The perhaps most noteworthy aspect of Excerpt 1d are the many silences between the sounds
in the occupational therapist’s turn (lines 72–73), several of which are longer than half a sec-
ond, and the ones following the sound /ɑ:/ are particularly extended. This, in addition to
prolonging the vowels in general, provides the patient with ample opportunities to respond
and knock on the table when /ɑ:/ is produced towards the end of the turn. However, what
cannot be known at this point is whether the lack of response is due to the patient perhaps
having cognitive difficulties is hard of hearing, or is a result of not understanding the task at
hand. The issue of hearing is addressed by the interpreter (line 74), but his check does not
receive any confirmatory or rejecting response from the patient, so the interpreter is not
provided any input on whether the patient cannot hear or has difficulties understanding the
task. The occupational therapist also acts as if she is not entirely certain that the patient has
really understood what to do, and, whether cognitive decline potentially affects her short-
term ability of remembering instructions. This is evident in Excerpt 1e:
Excerpt 1e
76 OT: kommer du ihåg så fort jag säger ( 0.6) bokstaven a:

do you remember as soon as I say ( 0.6) the letter a:
77 ( 0.4)
78 INT:bas [bezhnava a:! ]
just [listen to a:!]
79 OT: [( xx )knacka] till=
[( xx ) just] knock=((
knocks with her left hand))
80 PAT: a
81 (0.6)
82 INT: e: nazhe masalan a: [ef-]
doesn’t she say for example a: [ ef-
]
83 PAT: [a]
84 INT: a bas bezhnavit a: ka aw fanna beka (( knocks on the
table))
a so if you heard the a: you should do like this

((knocks on the table))
85 (0.3)
86 PAT: a
87 (0.3)
88 OT: m
89 (0.3)
90 INT: kh- famestet↑
got it↑
91 PAT: ya
yeah
Anecdotal evidence suggests that it is not uncommon that people with dementia are asked
questions that explicitly refer to their memory abilities, such as do you remember [X] like the
occupational therapist does in excerpt 1e (line 76). In this clinical setting, it may be a way for
216
the occupational therapist to check if it is the patient’s memory that affects her ability to carry
out the task, or whether it is a matter of finding the task difficult to understand. It is, however,
noteworthy, that this question is not rendered to the patient. Instead, the interpreter trans-
forms the occupational therapist’s question and instruction (line 76) into a directive (line 78),
followed by a repetition of the instruction and an embodied demonstration once more, as he
knocks on the table (l ine 84). After confirmatory tokens by the patient (l ine 86) as well as the
occupational therapist (l ine 88), the interpreter d ouble-checks that the patient has understood
(line 90), which she confirms, this time not just using a, but the word yeah (line 91). After a
few more lines (92–107 omitted), the occupational therapist makes a new try.
Excerpt 1f
108 OT: bi:::::↑ ( 0.3) a::::::↑

109 (0.3)
110 PAT: a: ( 0.6) ((puts her right palm down flat on the table))
111 OT: s[i::::::: ↑]
112 PAT: [a ha koo]
[where is a:]
113 (0.8)
114 OT: [e]m:::::↑
115 PAT: [a]
116 (0.6)
117 OT: en::::::↑
118 (0.5)
119 PAT: a::::::↑
120 (1.4)
121 OT: a:::[::::::]↑
122 PAT: [awa a]
[that is a]
123 (1.2)
124 INT: beda la meza ka(( knocks on the table))
knock on the table (( knocks on the table))
125 (0.5)
126 PAT: a(( taps lightly on the table))
127 (0.5)
128 OT: z[e::::::::::::::::::::↑]=
129 INT: [aw fanna la meza beda]
[you should knock on the table like this] (( knocks))
130 PAT: =bale
=yes
131 (0.9)
132 OT: ko:::::↑
133 PAT: wo:::::↑
134 OT: el::[:::↑]
135 PAT: [en:]::
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Charlotta Plejert
136 OT: .hhh bi:::↑(0.8) a:::::↑=

137 PAT: =a
138 (0.6)
139 INT: beda la me=
knock on the tab-
140 OT: =ef:::::(0.7) a:::::↑=
141 PAT: =a
142 (0.8)
143 OT: ko::::↑
144 (0.5)
145 PAT: ye::::↑
146 (0.4)
147 OT: m↑
148 (0.3)
149 PAT: (ha↑)
(what↑)
The occupational therapist starts producing the letters with vowel prolongation, this time
not leaving quite as long silences in between sounds as previously (lines 108–9). The first
reaction comes after the second letter, where the patient, after a pause a bit longer than half a
second, conducts a gesture which is not a knock, but she puts the palm of her right hand flat
down on the table in front of her in a tapping fashion (line 110), and then withdraws it to its
original position of both arms crossed in front of her chest. This gesture does not seem to be
acknowledged by the occupational therapist, since she is looking down at the test material in
front of her and she continues producing the letters in a prosodically successive way as a list.
The interpreter does not render anything at this point, although there is a possible place for
a rendition (line 113) before the occupational therapist continues with the list. The patient
provides a minimal verbal response in the turn following the occupational therapist (lines
114–15).
Subsequently, an interesting change takes place, as the patient tries out a new way of par-
ticipating in the task. In her turns following the occupational therapist, she herself provides
the sound [ɑ:], with prolongation and a rise in a similar fashion as the occupational therapist
(line 119); a kind of prosodic accommodation to signal orientation towards a common ac-
tivity (Szczepek Reed 2006). The patient also explicitly points out that she identifies a: in a
response to the occupational therapist’s production of the sound (line 121–22), and, again,
the occupational therapist refrains from taking the turn (cf. the 1.2s pause in line 123). At this
point, the interpreter could of course render what the patient said, but instead, he explains to
the patient that this is the point for her to knock on the table (line 124). In fact, the patient
once more produces a gesture that is a light tap in front of her (l ine 126), but on the one hand,
the occupational therapist is not fully aware of what the patient and interpreter are negotiat-
ing, on the other, her gaze is directed downwards at the test materials. It is thus not possible
for her to attend to the patient’s presumably successful response to the task. As the occupa-
tional therapist provides the pronunciation of yet another letter (line 127), the interpreter
218
initiates repair of the patient’s gesture (the flat palm and too light a tap), producing a copy
of the way the occupational therapist had illustrated the knock; a firm and hard tap with his
fist (fi ngers bent) on the surface of the table (line 129). Now, the exercise continues in the
modified form, with the patient displaying an understanding of repeating similar sounds as
the occupational therapist before her, with vowel prolongation and a rise (lines 132–45),
with a slight break in the pattern when the patient responds to the [ɑ:] provided (line 136)
with a short response token (line 137). This is appreciated by the interpreter as a recognition
of the letter, and he advices the patient to knock (line 139), but before finishing his turn,
the occupational therapist continues producing sounds (line 140). Again, the patient reacts
to the sound [ɑ:] (line 141), but she does not knock on the table, and the interpreter does
not act this time. In the continuation, the patient returns to producing prolonged sounds
in a similar fashion as the occupational therapist, and eventually, the occupational therapist
terminates the activity.
Summary of critical issues

In this section, the most prominent critical issues highlighted above will be summarized and
discussed. This is followed by considerations on implications for further research.
Cultural, linguistic, and educational bias in relation to clinical tools

used for certain populations
A linguistic and educational bias seems to be at play in the showcase above and has been
addressed thoroughly in prior work on ethnic minority people with dementia (cf. Nielsen
et al. 2019). For example, in a study by Nielsen and Jørgensen (2013), it was highlighted that
it may be difficult to distinguish results from neuropsychological assessments that are due to
problems in cognitive functioning, from results caused by limited education and literacy. In
the Nielsen and Jørgensen study (2013), results from patients conducting the c lock-drawing
task (where patients are asked to draw a closed circle of the face of a clock, insert the num-
bers, and put the hands on ten minutes to two o’clock), demonstrate that people with limited
education produced illustrations quite similar to those of people with cognitive decline. In
the case of letters that represent certain sounds in a language, as brought up in this chapter,
one rather simple adaptation to limited literacy might be to speak of sounds altogether, and
to listen for the sound [ɑ:], unless, of course, it is possible to conduct the test in the language
of the patient knowing how the specific letters of the patient’s best language are to be pro-
nounced when spoken out loud. Preferably, when assessing a patient with limited literacy, it
should be recommended to choose a test that does not involve sub-tasks that are clearly tied
to an understanding of letters and spelling, if possible.
The case at hand had an additional complexity not touched upon so far. Occasionally
during the appointment, the patient demonstrated that she was hard of hearing, and she was
at the time of the test not wearing any hearing aid. To what extent this had an impact on her
performance is very hard to tell, but it may perhaps sometimes explain why the interpreter
provided a lot of repetitive explanation work following the patient’s brief response token a,
since he might not be certain whether she had appropriately perceived or understood some-
thing previously said (see Excerpt 1d, line 74, where the interpreter indeed makes a check of
the patient’s hearing).
Although evidence primarily points towards a combination of a lack of literacy and po-
tential cognitive problems as explanations for the patient’s inability to grasp and carry out
219
Charlotta Plejert
the task, there is also proof of points where she, in fact, does manage to produce the asked
for action, that is, to knock on the table when noticing the target sound. However, since her
knock is produced rather slowly so that the occupational therapist oftentimes has started to
produce the sound of the next letter on her list, the patient’s adequate response does not seem
to be noticed by the occupational therapist. The way she knocks also does not conform to the
gesture initially modelled by the occupational therapist. This is picked up by the interpreter,
who not only refrains from rendering some verbal information that might have assisted the
clinician in acknowledging the patient’s recognition of the target sound, but he also conducts
repair on the way the gesture is executed. This is potentially due to his noticing that the oc-
cupational therapist does not seem to acknowledge the patient’s gesture when she conducts it
with a flat hand, and too lightly. Maybe, therefore, he focuses on assisting the patient in how
to produce a proper knock rather than rendering her existing verbal and non-verbal responses.
All of this, in turn, can be related to the interpreter’s (a s well as the patient’s) unfamiliarity
with the purpose of the task at hand; something which will be discussed next.
Level of interpreter training in relation to cognitive assessments

In Sweden as in many other countries, there are different levels of interpreter training,
ranging from university BA courses to week-end courses at community colleges. Moreover,
there is a certification system and a national register in place, including authorized interpret-
ers (general level), authorized interpreters with a specialization in medicine and/or law, and
non-authorized interpreters with graduation from state-approved educational institutions.
The register and the national authorization tests are administered by a governmental body,
the Swedish Kammarkollegiet. Overall, this means that the health-care sector primarily
relies on interpreters with very diverse skills, and practical experiences from different assign-
ments play an important role for the quality of an interpreted event. There are sometimes
local initiatives, for example, between a specific clinic and an interpreter service provider,
in which a connection is established between the professionals. In these, often unfinanced
efforts, interpreters are introduced by the clinicians to specific common test materials, how
they are to be carried out, and for what purposes. A challenge is also that interpreters or-
dinarily are registered not only with one specific service provider but with many, so the
usefulness of the collaboration might have only short-term effects for a particular clinic.
As mentioned, a systematic programme, directed towards interpreters as well as clinicians,
has for some time been run in the southern part of Sweden, albeit it is now terminated
(M igrationsskolan 2019). Overall, the programme resulted in the graduation of 62 memory
interpreters, in numerous languages, who had an insight, not only into the specific aspects of
dementia, but also the nature of assessment materials. In a p ost-intervention study, it was
clear that clinical staff as well as interpreters engaged in the programme, all felt a lot more
confident in performing a safe and more trustworthy assessment of immigrant individuals
with suspected dementia (M igrationsskolan 2019).
In the data at hand, the interpreter’s lack of insight into the occupational therapist’s agenda
comes up through his way of performing. Instead of focusing on the task of analysing and
rendering into the other language what the occupational therapist says, and what the patient
utters, he seems to be strongly occupied with trying to make the patient please the therapist
as it were, to make her conduct the task in an adequate way. Had he, for example, rendered
the patient’s recognition of the sound (Excerpt 1f, lines 112 and 122) to the occupational
therapist, this would have provided the occupational therapist with cues of relevance for the
220
test at hand. This also goes for his not pointing out that the patient, in fact, was providing a
tapping gesture as a response to the sound, when the occupational therapist appeared not to
see this (probably due to her often looking down at the test material).
It is not intended here to put any blame on the interpreter, nor on the occupational thera-
pist. If any person without a special knowledge about the purpose of the test in question pon-
ders a bit upon the task, it probably seems rather alien to most. The interpreter had worked in
appointments for this patient before, since he was proficient in her specific language variety
(which is ideal), but those appointments had comprised medical h istory-taking, with a bilin-
gual relative also present. Medical h istory-taking is more like an informal interview, where
the clinician asks questions about the patient’s experiences and symptoms, and the patient or
a relative/peer answers. It may also be easier for the clinician to avoid using complex medical
terms in that activity.
For the formal assessment in this case, practical circumstances affected the possibility to
meet before the appointment to discuss tasks with the occupational therapist, neither did the
interpreter know in advance that test materials in Swedish were to be used. The conditions
for him to perform at his best were therefore also negatively affected in several ways.
Training clinicians for working with interpreters

How clinicians are to collaborate with interpreters is an area so firmly established by now
that it will not be dealt with in-depth here. However, a couple of remarks are offered, relat-
ing specifically to the setting of formal, neuropsychological tests, since this does not seem to
be self-explanatory after all. Thus, the following is of particular relevance to assessments of
cognitive abilities for clinicians: If the interpreter and patient get involved in discussions (for
example, in how a task is to be understood and carried out) that are obviously not rendered,
the clinician needs to interfere, in order to check what is negotiated. This is perhaps particu-
larly important when a patient with cognitive decline is involved. A medical condition might
affect the comprehensibility of the patient’s responses, and, if the interpreter is not sufficiently
trained when it comes to various diagnoses, it may be the case that the interpreter withdraws
renditions until an answer makes sense. This may very well happen with patients who display
dementia symptoms, but, as stated previously, might also have to do with the patient’s edu-
cational background. To disentangle such obstacles, the interpreter plays an important role.
The clinician benefits from any cues that signal what kind of challenge is at stake in relation
to a test/task. If this means that the interpreter needs to do brokering (Raymond 2014) and
render information that goes beyond straight speech, this can assist the clinician in important
ways. Clinicians are not mind readers, who can easily grasp the nature or underlying prob-
lems of the patient in relation to a specific test or task. In this respect, the clinician is very
much in the hands of the interpreter and the interpreter’s proficiency and skill. The more
educated the clinician is into i nterpreter-mediated interaction; however, the more confident
s/he can be in making sure to be in control during a patient a ppointment – for the benefit of
the patient as well as the interpreter. All of this does not mean that clinicians ask the inter-
preter to make any medical evaluations. Rather, it is a matter of accessing information to as
great an extent as possible whether the patient has difficulties understanding the task at hand,
or whether problems are linked to other challenges.
In the showcase, it became evident that the clinician put too much trust into the inter-
preter, or, at least chose not to interfere, or ask about progress in cases where t urn-transitions,
and opportunities for renditions occurred, but never took place. It should be stressed that
221
Charlotta Plejert
the occupational therapist in the showcase was trained in working with an interpreter, being
careful always gazing at the patient, addressing her using the first person, and speaking in
reasonably short utterances and at a slow pace, to ease the work of the interpreter. However,
the contextual affordances related to the educational bias of the test, and other circum-
stances, hampered the outcome of the encounter in several ways. Some issues about how to
deal with such confounding factors are dealt with below.
Briefing-Interaction–Debriefing (BID)
As mentioned several times throughout this chapter, applying the BID routine when an
appointment that involves formal, clinical assessment, is to be mediated, would be one fairly
simple way of enhancing the situation for interpreters, clinicians as well as patients. That
way, interpreters would gain an insight into what materials are to be used, their purposes,
and whether or not the interpreters are willing to conduct any translations of texts (even if
this should generally be avoided), or if they are trained in prima vista interpreting. However,
this is still an issue when it comes to assessment material that preferably should have been
validated clinically, for example, concerning language, age, and cognitive status of patients,
so a language translation by an individual interpreter before a single appointment, is from a
clinical perspective not sufficient in terms of being evidence based, despite its perhaps being
more easily managed in a mediated situation.
In memory clinics in Sweden, there is often an ambition to try to achieve a p re-appointment
talk with interpreters, generally a little bit before the patient arrives (Plejert et al. 2015). How-
ever, clinicians attest that there are often practical, such as interpreters needing to catch a
certain bus, or organizational circumstances, like large number of patient appointments, that
come in the way, and sometimes also economic factors, such as increased expenses for a lon-
ger interpreter assignment (Plejert et al. 2015). For the same reasons, it is not always possible
to have any d e-briefing where the clinician and interpreter go through different aspects of
the interpreted event in retrospect. In lack of specifically trained memory interpreters, as in the
case of the programme of Migrationsskolan (2019) described above, or, of course assessments
performed by a skilled bilingual clinician, the BID routine would nonetheless be an improve-
ment in contrast to insufficiently trained or unprepared interpreters, and clinicians relying on
perhaps biased test materials (which might not be revealed due to lack of renditions), and an
unrealistic trust in the competence of the interpreter.
Further reading
Alzheimer Europe (2018) The Development of Intercultural Care and Support for People with Dementia from
Minority Ethnic Groups. https://w ww.alzheimereurope.org/Ethics/Ethical-issues-i n-practice/2018-
Intercultural-care-a ndsupport/(language)/eng-GB (accessed 19 January 2022).
This report provides an overview of challenges and prospects related to ethnic minority persons with dementia
from a European perspective. It covers issues concerning cultural and educational bias in relation to dementia
assessment processes, including challenges relating to interpreter-mediated encounters in that setting.
Langdon, W. Henriette, and Terry I. Saenz (2016) Working with Interpreters and Translators: A Guide for
Speech-L anguage Pathologists and Audiologists. San Diego, Plural Publishing.
This guide provides a comprehensive overview of the B riefing-Interaction-Debriefing procedure for inter-
preted encounters within speech and language pathology and audiology. However, its content is clearly relevant
for areas beyond these fields.
This book is seminal for anyone with a theoretical and methodological interest in a dialogical approach to
interpreting.
222
Related chapters
Chapter 2, The ambiguity of interpreting: Ethnographic interviews with public service interpreters by Kristina
Gustafsson.
Mason.
Chapter 8, Public service interpreting in court – f ace-to-face interaction, by Philippe S. Angermeyer.
Chapter 10, Consecutive interpreting and multimodal sequences by Christian Licoppe.
Chapter 12, Public service interpreting in health care by Laura Gavioli, and Raffaela Merlini.
Chapter 21, The conversation analytic role-play method: How authentic data meet simulations for interpreter
training by Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen, and Elizabeth Stokoe.
Transcription conventions
really ↑: rise
ye:::a : prolonged sounds
-: cut off word
=: speech immediately latched on to the previous utterance
°mhm°: word or utterance pronounced quietly or soft
.hh: i n-breath
(.): m icro-pause (less than 0.2 sec.)
(0.4): pause
[yea]
[mm]: overlapping speech
((k nocks)): non-verbal action
!: indicates directive
Italics: Idiomatic translation into English
References
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a lzheimers-d isease-dementia (accessed 19 January 2022).
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14
IN SOCIAL CARE
Dorien Van De Mieroop, Antoon Cox and Koen Kerremans
Introduction
id-September 2019 a Belgian newspaper reports that the yearly budget allocated to public
M
service interpreting (PSI) has been exhausted and that counter to tradition, no additional
funds will be provided by the government. The newspaper article quotes a tragic case of a
victim of domestic violence who had to rely on a friend of her husband, the alleged perpetra-
tor of the abuse, to act as an interpreter during her conversation with a social service provider
(Beel 2019). This painful example is just one of the many situations in which the assistance
of a professional interpreter would have been desirable. This is of course not a solely Belgian
problem, nor a problem specific of the social care context, as the n on-availability of profes-
sional interpreters is a ubiquitous phenomenon that is often caused by general reasons such
as a lack of financial resources and of local interpreter availability, depending on the specific
language for which an interpreter is sought (Pöllabauer 2012; Pomeroy and Nonaka, 2013).
Nevertheless, in social care this may sometimes even be more problematic. More than three
decades ago, Freed already pointed at ‘the need for social workers to work with interpreters
as professional teams so that the social workers understand not only the words but also the
nuances of the language and culture of non-English-speaking clients’ (Freed 1988). Yet,
recent research still draws attention to the fact that social workers may sometimes not only
be insufficiently aware of professional interpreters’ added value compared to alternative op-
tions (Pöllabauer 2012; Pomeroy and Nonaka, 2013), but also that they sometimes view the
presence of interpreters in a negative way, for example, perceiving them as potential barriers
in relationship-building processes with their clients (K riz and Skivenes, 2010). This chapter
aims to discuss these and other aspects surrounding interpreting in social care contexts, of
which we first delineate the scope (see “Epistemological considerations”). In the Literature
review section, we review the state-of-the-a rt literature on interpreting in these contexts,
highlighting its main findings. Then we address some of the critical issues that constitute
potential avenues for future research (see section “Critical issues and topics”) and end with a
few concluding remarks.
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-17 225

Dorien Van De Mieroop et al.
Epistemological considerations
Delimiting the area of social care is complex due to its coverage of a wide spectrum of differ-
ent activities, with vague boundaries and a fragmented governance structure. In this chapter,
we consider social care as the provision of help, care and protection from harm to people
who need additional support. These people may range from children to adults who may be
vulnerable due to factors such as physical or mental disability or (chronic) illness, migration
or socio-economic background, or age. The types of support offered to these people may be
w ide-ranging, going from offering physical protection and safety to help with homework,
personal care, administrative matters and so on. For example, people experiencing poverty
may interact with social workers in social welfare centres to discuss financial issues. They
may engage in interactions concerning work permits with community counsellors or con-
cerning job opportunities with consultants at public employment services. They may seek
solutions for school bills with school counsellors and care coordinators or explore housing
options with the local housing department and so on. All these different types of interactions
constitute different ‘activity types’ (Levinson 1992), each with their own particular goals,
level of formality, set of structural properties, expectations regarding allowable contributions
etcetera. Yet, despite this high variability, the provision of help to people in need is central
in social care interactions. Importantly, this provision of help is largely language-based, as is
also the case in many other public service settings (for instance, medical or legal settings). As
Hall and Valdiviezo (2020: 17) argue, social workers are language workers in the sense that
they operate ‘in a community created by language and are immersed in language, which is
their principal medium for doing their work’. Thus, a social worker’s language competence
‘can make a significant difference in building an effective working alliance with a client of a
different culture, background, and demographics’ (Hall and Valdiviezo 2020: 18).
While a high proportion of social care is provided informally and unpaid by relatives, friends
or neighbours, this chapter will primarily consider social care that takes place within institutional
contexts. However, it is important to note that we do not limit ourselves only to social workers as
providers of social care, as a large portion of the wide spectrum of different social care activities
is carried out by various types of professionals (as the examples below will illustrate). Moreover,
we will especially zoom in on situations in which care provision is challenged by the presence of
language barriers or the lack of sufficient language competences. Perhaps because interpreting in
social care covers such a wide variety of contexts, there are countries in which it seems to remain
less regulated than interpreting in other settings. For instance, in the UK, interpreters working
in the justice sector must be registered with a state-regulated register of PSIs (Lucas 2020). In
the EU, Directive 2010/64/EU establishes the right to interpretation and translation in criminal
proceedings. In US healthcare institutions, the provision of language assistance free of charge to
foreign-speaking patients has been mandatory and regulated since 2000. And while in Sweden,
interpreting in public service (including social care) is regulated (cf. The Administrative Pro-
cedure Act (2017:900) 2017)), interpreters can only be certified as legal or medical interpreters,
but not in the domain of social care interpreting. Hence, in the social care sector, the regulation
of interpreting is often a complicated matter, which, in practice, often results in care providers
having to rely on informal interpreters without formal qualifications.
Literature review
Pöllabauer (2012: 214) observes that the interpreting studies literature lags behind in studies
on social service and welfare institutions as compared to studies on interpreting in medical
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Public service interpreting in social care
and legal settings. Moreover, given the wide variety of types of social care, as discussed
above, the – indeed
relatively scarce – literature
is dispersed over a broad range of social
care settings, such as housing and municipal services (Pöllabauer 2012), care for the elderly
(Freed 1988; Van De Mieroop, Bevilacqua and Van Hove 2012) or other vulnerable people
(Berthold and Fischman 2014), child welfare (K riz and Skivenes 2010; Lindsay et al. 2014;
Maiter et al. 2017; Westlake and Jones 2018) and child protection work (Chand 2005; Hum-
phreys, Atkar and Baldwin 1999; Sawrikar 2015; Alaggia, Maiter and Jenney 2017). These
studies usually draw on in-depth interviews with social workers, focus group sessions, and
in some cases direct observations of counselling sessions. They usually take the perspective
of social service workers and emphasize the problems they encounter when working with
non-native speaking clients, rather than looking at the experiences of service users requiring
interpretation services. This reflects the broader discourse on language policy in social care
that often looks at linguistic diversity as a ‘problem’ rather than a ‘resource’, or at language
support policies as a tool to overcome a n on-native speaker’s ‘personal deficit’ rather than as
an affirmation of a ‘human right to equal treatment’ (Harrison 2007).
In particular, the narrative around the use of interpreters is often a problematizing one,
which highlights, above all, the challenges related to poor-quality interpreting (Westlake
and Jones 2018; Lucas 2020). For example, drawing on interviews with child welfare workers
in Norway and England, Kriz and Skivenes (2010: 1358) report that ‘language barriers and
the use of interpreters result in information deficits’, but also other disadvantages are cited,
such as ‘more curtailed relationship-building processes, feelings of mistrust and practical
obstacles’ (on the issue of relationship-building processes, see section below). Along similar
lines, a study by Gustafsson, Norström and Höglund (2019: 22–23) of Swedish social services
and health centres based on an online survey of public service staff, supplemented with data
obtained from group interviews, revealed that although the service providers involved in the
study assumed that professional interpreters were trained, had special language skills and fol-
lowed a code of ethics, they also expressed ‘d istrust towards interpreting services, claiming
that they often find the interpreting conducted by children and relatives to be more reliable
and competent than that of professional interpreters’.
Other studies also highlight interpreters’ shortcomings and how these should be addressed.
For example, drawing on qualitative interviews with clients and service providers, Sawrikar
(2015) highlights a range of challenges related to the use of interpreters, distinguishing be-
tween problems at the level of interpreters, of service providers, of clients and of resources.
Humphreys, Atkar and Baldwin (1999) carried out semi-structured interviews with child
protection workers, case file analysis and direct observation of interpreter-mediated counsel-
ling sessions with Asian families, which led them to identify problems at the level of planning
and availability of professional interpreters (particularly for home visits), their effectiveness
(w ith professional interpreters sometimes acting as gatekeepers), and their suitability (for in-
stance, in situations where the gender of the interpreter plays a role). Chand (2005) arrives at
similar conclusions based on a review of the literature on the use of professional interpreters
in child protection work. Each of these three papers emphasizes the key role of interpreter
training as well as of the training of service providers to work with interpreters.
With regard to training of interpreters, there is some – though fairly limited – literature
explaining which standards professional interpreters in social care need to prepare for. Berthold
and Fischman (2014) propose specific elements for interpreter training beyond language flu-
ency, including attention for contextual elements (for example, how to recognize symptoms of
clients suffering from trauma and mental illness) in settings of c ross-cultural communication.
They further recommend that interpreters working in social care should adhere to a similar
227
code of ethics as used in the (mental) health domain, focusing on maintaining professionalism,
impartiality, boundaries and confidentiality; and avoiding taking up conflicting roles. Pölla-
bauer (2012) illustrates the importance of such standards based on recordings of interpreter-
mediated encounters and in-depth interviews with social workers. She documents a situation
in which a special pool of interpreters was set up to serve refugees in Austria in the context
of an EU-funded project. Interpreters received training that was limited in duration and did
not include language-specific training or interpreting-specific elements regarding professional
roles and interpreting ethics. While social service providers working with those interpreters
considered the project as successful, they nevertheless pointed at shortcomings in terms of im-
partiality and undesirable interventionist attitudes of interpreters, leading to concerns about in-
terpreters acting as ‘gatekeepers’ and hampering social service providers’ access to information.
While appropriate training of interpreters is critical for service quality, the literature has
also considered the lack of attention for working with interpreters in social work training
(Tipton 2016). Based on a review of the literature, for instance, Berthold and Fischman (2014)
emphasize the critical need for effective collaboration between social workers and interpret-
ers in contexts where social workers interact with survivors of severe human-perpetrated
trauma speaking another language. While the authors propose a set of curriculum compo-
nents for interpreters working with trauma survivors, they at the same time argue that social
workers need to ‘understand and manage the dynamics of working with an interpreter, be
aware of the appropriate and inappropriate use of interpreters, and be informed about inter-
preter selection criteria’ (Berthold and Fischman 2014: 3). A related study by Westlake and
Jones (2018), based on audio recordings of home visits by social workers, finds that there is
a set of good practices that social workers can draw on to improve the quality of communi-
cation in interpreter-mediated service interactions. Better communication outcomes were
underpinned by an assertive approach to working with interpreters, which ‘enabled workers
to structure sessions in ways that involved the client more fully in conversation’ (Westlake
and Jones 2018: 1406). Their study shows that – rather than ‘up-skilling’ interpreters –
‘identifying elements of good practice that social workers have more control over may hold
potential for improving the quality of service for non-native speakers’ (ibid.). Finally, based
on focus group sessions with workers in the child and women protection sectors, Alaggia,
Maiter and Jenney (2017) provide some practical examples of the consequences of service
providers’ lack of training on working with interpreters, and in particular of their difficulties
to manage concerns relating to confidentiality and gender-and culturally sensitive issues.
Even though the challenges in terms of interpreting quality and the training of
interpreters – as well as of social workers to work with interpreters – are important, we will
not discuss these further in this chapter as these are general issues that are relevant beyond
social care contexts for which we refer the reader to the first and last part of this volume
containing more general discussions of these topics. Instead, in the next section, we pick up
four critical issues that have been touched upon in the literature on current practices in inter-
preted social care interactions, namely professional interpreting versus alternative solutions,
professionals combining interpreting and social work, rapport-building across language bar-
riers and, in conclusion, interpreters as potential gatekeepers in social care interactions.

The studies discussed above focus on a wide variety of contexts in which an equally wide
variety of goals are aimed for, thus doing justice to the wide spectrum of different activities
that fall within the large scope of social care, as explained above. Each of these activities entail
228
a number of highly c ontext-specific challenges, relating, for example, to the particularities of

interpreting in contexts revolving around child welfare, elderly care, housing issues or financial
problems. In the following four subsections, we focus on a number of critical issues on a more
abstract level that are relevant to many types of social care activities. We will sketch these issues
on the basis of existing literature, and, when relevant, we will make this relatively abstract
discussion more tangible by illustrating these issues by a number of extracts selected from our
recordings of authentic interpreted interactions. All these recordings were made after explicit
consent by all the participants involved. All the names are pseudonyms. In particular:
- Fragments 1 and 2 are both social care interactions that were recorded ‘at the margins’
of two medical interactions between Russian-speaking patients and Flemish specialist
doctors. These doctor-patient interactions were interpreted by a multilingual profes-
sional who worked full-time at the hospital’s support service for ‘language assistance
and intercultural mediation’. This service involves on the one hand social care work, for
instance helping patients with the hospital-related paperwork, and on the other hand
language support, for instance interpreting d octor-patient interactions. In line with
how she labels herself, we will refer to the multilingual professional of this service as
‘intercultural mediator’, but it is important to emphasize that part of her job consists of
interpreting and that she thus has a double role in the context of this hospital.
- Fragments 3 and 4 come from one interpreted Italian-Flemish encounter in a Belgian home
for the elderly. In this interaction, the – recently arrived – resident and the head nurse engage
in a general discussion that focuses on the social side of this new resident’s stay at the rest
home, rather than on medical issues. In particular, the resident’s expectations regarding all
sorts of aspects of his stay at the rest home are discussed. The interaction is interpreted by
a bilingual social worker who works both at the current rest home and the new resident’s
previous rest home. He also has a double role at these rest homes, namely of social worker
and of interpreter, but we will refer to him as ‘interpreter’ in this chapter, as he emphasized
himself that this was the role he was taking up in these interactions.
We analyse these extracts using a discourse analytical approach, in which attention is paid to
the discursive as well as sequential features of the conversations, as we hope that this will help
to provide a critical, nuanced and multifaceted perspective on the topics that are broached in
the subsections below. It is important to note that our approach is descriptive; we do not aim
to provide clear-cut advice on what the ‘best’ way is to deal with the targeted challenges, first,
because the pros do not always easily outweigh the cons; second, because what may be a pro in
one social care context may be a con in another and finally, because pros and cons cannot be
straightforwardly linked to certain interactional circumstances, conditions or distinctions be-
tween categories, such as the use of professional or non-professional interpreters. This is largely
because of the extreme variability of encounters taking place in social care contexts, as sketched
above, for which general advice would entail making problematic simplifications. Instead, our
aim is to shed a nuanced and multifaceted light on these issues separately, but also on how these
may often – but not always – be interrelated, sometimes in contradictory ways.
Choosing between professional interpreters and alternative

solutions in social care contexts
The first issue concerns public service providers’ reasoning around employing interpreters
in social care contexts, in which decisions regarding assigning an interpreter often need to
229
be made quickly and in an ad hoc way. Given the often impromptu character of arranging
interpreting assistance, it is not surprising that service providers regularly prefer alternative
solutions that are easy to resort to as they are readily available (Humphreys, Atkar and Bald-
win 1999). One type of alternative solution is the use of technological bridging tools such
as Google Translate. In a case study of service providers’ practices and beliefs during mul-
tilingual service encounters in the city of Brussels (Belgium), the public service providers
indicated that while they consider professional interpreters to be essential bridging persons
during interactions with non-native speakers, they also confirmed that they use tools like
Google Translate to support interactions between social care providers and service users
(Kerremans et al. 2018). They believe technology to be a successful complementary language
aid in cases where speakers were to a certain level able to communicate with each other using
a lingua franca. Social care providers also reported on asking informal interpreters such as
family members or friends of the service seeker to provide assistance during a multilingual
service encounter (Kerremans et al. 2018), a practice that is also discussed in other studies
(Lucas 2016).
Notably, these ‘solutions’ are often not only regarded as practical but also as an advantage.
Especially in relation to social care contexts, the practice of relying on informal interpreters
is often evaluated positively (cf. Gustafsson, Norström and Höglund 2019). In an editorial
written for the journal Social Work, Pomeroy and Nonaka (2013) argue that this positive eval-
uation of using informal interpreters may be related to the specific goal or nature of social
care – namely ‘to provide a safe environment and to build a trusting relationship despite lin-
guistic differences’ – due to which family members or friends of the client may seem ideally
suited to act as interpreters (Pomeroy and Nonaka 2013: 103). It is thus not so surprising that
Pollock (2020) finds that patients and service users consistently seem to prefer an informal
interpreter. At the same time, however, these authors also point to the disadvantages of this
practice. For example, Pomeroy and Nonaka (2013) refer to confidentiality issues – of which
the example cited at the very start of this chapter is a case in point. Also the potentially
limited command of the majority language by these informal interpreters is mentioned as a
disadvantage (Pollock 2020), especially as it may go unnoticed by the primary interlocutors.
This can then lead to so-called ‘false fluency’ situations where service providers mistakenly
believe that the other party understood their message (Cox et al. 2019).
Overall, we believe that whether to use professional interpreters or draw on a lternatives –
a nd, in the latter case, which a lternative – is not a question that has one straightforward an-
swer given the variability of types of interactions, interactional goals and specific constraints
and affordances of the different contexts and types of social care in which the creation of
trust and the maintenance of social relations is, in some cases, a delicate issue that is of the
utmost importance. Yet, what seems unequivocally clear is that it is important to raise aware-
ness regarding the consequences and potential pitfalls of the choices that are being made by
social care providers in this respect.
The potential implications of double roles

When professional interpreters are not readily available, not only technological tools or
family members, but also multilingual employees may be drawn upon to act as informal in-
terpreters (Humphreys, Atkar and Baldwin 1999). This practice is often regarded as a ‘good’
solution (A laggia, Maiter and Jenney 2017). Employees know how work is accomplished
inside the organization (for instance, protocols for interviewing traumatized clients) – which
is not always the case with external professional interpreters (Sheneman 2017) – and this
230
extralinguistic knowledge may have a decisive impact on the quality of communication

(Berthold and Fischman 2014; Westlake and Jones 2018). Yet, as some of these multilingual
employees may also act as social service providers, they often h ave – at least – a double role.
In some cases, this may lead to blurred boundaries between different types of interactions
(Cox and Lázaro Gutiérrez 2016), but sometimes also to a highly efficient use of the available
time and space. Furthermore, this may then result in a highly fragmented reality for social
care interactions. We demonstrate some of these implications by means of two brief exam-
ples. More precisely, we aim to show that social care encounters may emerge before, after
or even in the course of other – in this case medical – interactions
in institutional contexts.
The first fragment comes from an interaction with a nephrologist. It occurs when the doctor
starts engaging in a phone call to make arrangements for a medical examination of the pa-
tient the next day. Because of this phone call, the main interaction between the doctor and
the patient is thus temporarily suspended, and this creates, what is often called, a ‘w indow
of opportunity’ (McCarthy 2000; Raevaara 2011; Van De Mieroop 2016), for other types of
talk. As shown by McCarthy (2000: 105), such ‘w indows’ tend to be filled with small talk
in non-interpreted interactions and there is no reason to assume that would be different in
interpreted interactions (cf. Van De Mieroop 2016). Yet, in particular during interpreted
Fragment 1 – Encounter 1, interaction between doctor (Dr), patient (P)

and intercultural mediator (IM)
1 Dr k zou eigenlijk nog voor morgenvroeg

i should actually still for tomorrow morning
2 nen oogfundus moeten hebben
have an eye fundus
3 zeventig tachtig is [da he (.) °( to do) thuismedicatie°
seventy eighty is [that hey (.) °(
to do) home medication°
4 [((
sound of phone keys))
5 P (xxx) срок (xxx) кончается (xxx) постоянно как будет это
( xxx) term (xxx) ends ( xxx) permanently how will it be
6 у меня срок (x) кончается тридцать первого
my term ( x) ends the thirty first
7 и они продлевают его постоянно как будет это
and they always prolong it how will it be
8 IM надо чтобы это продлились
it has to be extended
9 P они должны (xx) на три месяца ( выписыва/выписывать1)
they have to ( xx) for three months ( discharging/
write)
10 IM у вас в иностранном паспорте нет (xx)
you don’t have this in your international passport ( xx)
11 когда туда идти
when you have to go there
12 (xx) то это проблема
( xx) then this is a problem
231
interactions, such a window of opportunity may also be ‘too good’ for (relationally oriented)
small talk, as it allows for discussions that are much more goal-oriented than would be
possible for multi-tasking interlocutors in non-interpreted interactions (Van De Mieroop
2016: 309, emphasis in the original). This is exactly what we see in fragment 1. As soon as
the doctor starts orienting towards the phone call, this results in the emergence of two c o-
occurrent conversations (‘schisming’, see Egbert, 1997). Of interest to us here is that during
the doctor’s phone call, the patient initiates a monolingual ‘social care’ interaction with the
intercultural mediator.
In the first lines, the doctor announces the need for an urgent medical examination of the
patient and then starts orienting to making arrangements for this ‘eye fundus’ via the phone.
This is clear in line 3, in which she first d ouble-checks the phone number (‘seventy eighty’),
then starts clicking the phone keys and finally voices a ‘to do’-list for this in a lower voice. All
these activities clearly mark that the medical interaction is temporarily put on hold. As these
signals are understandable non-verbally, the patient does not wait for a translation of the doc-
tor’s turn. Instead, he immediately s elf-selects and initiates a topic that is not directly related to
the medical interaction at hand but is rather a topic that could emerge in a ‘social care’ interac-
tion, that is the potential extension of his term in Belgium. While he initially formulates this
issue in a relatively low v oice – hence
the many unclear formulations marked as (x xx) in line
5 – and asks a general question (‘how will it be’, line 5), he subsequently reformulates the topic
in more specific terms (cf. ‘the thirty-first’, line 6) and also suggests a potential solution for the
issue (‘they always prolong it’, line 7). The intercultural mediator then confirms the need for
this extension (line 8) and further accounts for this in lines 1 0–12. This interaction continues
beyond this fragment (not shown here for reasons of space), but it is clear from the part that
we have shown here that this is not merely small talk between the intercultural mediator and
the patient while they are waiting for the doctor to finish making arrangements. Rather, it
presents an example of how the p atient – who knew the intercultural mediator from various
previous e ncounters – prompted the latter to switch from one professional role to another,
and we could observe here, in particular in line 8, that this shift took place in a seamless way.
This is not at all a unique example in our data. It is not surprising that c are-receivers use
each potential window of opportunity to make the most of the time in which there is an
intercultural mediator present. This, of course, may sometimes pose a challenge to all the
interlocutors involved, as it may become quite confusing to distinguish which role is taken
up at what particular time and which information is relevant when and for whom. We could
observe an example of this kind of role mixing in the following fragment, which occurs in a
situation highly similar to the previous one, namely while the doctor – a liver specialist this
time – is on the phone. In this case, the patient wants the intercultural mediator to ask the doc-
tor why he is still not on the waiting list for a kidney transplant after having been in treatment
for three years. While this issue is clearly medically relevant, the patient adds to this that he
needs to be put on the waiting list to solve issues with his passport.2 Thus, while the former –
medical – issue clearly addresses the intercultural mediator in her role as interpreter, the latter
aspect of the patient’s turn – the implications for his passport – is oriented to the social care
part of her job. When the doctor puts down the phone, the intercultural mediator immediately
self-selects and starts translating the patient’s question as we see in the first line of fragment 2.
We can observe that in this translation of the patient’s question, the intercultural media-
tor only selects the medical information, namely whether this patient is eligible for a kidney
transplant and whether he has now been put on the waiting list. So, in this translation, there
is no trace of the other part of the patient’s preceding turn, which was about the implications
of this medical issue for his passport, and we can thus observe here that the intercultural
232
Fragment 2 –
Encounter 2, interaction between doctor (
Dr) and
intercultural mediator (IM)
1 IM dus hij zegt kijk die dokters van dialyse

so he says look those doctors of dialysis
2 kweet ni wie precies
i don’t know who exactly
3 Dr ja
yes
4 IM die zegge wel euh kijk wij wete ni
they say well erm look we don’t know
5 hoe ernstig u lever beschadigd is
how seriously your liver is damaged
6 Dr ja nu wete we ‘t wel he
yes now we do know it hey
7 IM e:::n als het zo slecht is
a:::nd if it is that bad
8 gaan wij u niet transplanteren
we will not transplant you
9 jij sta ni op de lijst
you are not on the list
10 hij zegt ik ben hier drie jaar
he says i have been here for three years
11 hoe sta ik ni op de lijst
how come i am not on the list
12 Dr ja
yes
13 IM en=euh de vraag is of ik op de lijst sta en zo
and=erm the question is if i am on the list and so
mediator triages the information that the patient provides in relation to the role that she is en-
acting at a particular moment in time. This ‘information triage’ strategy may be considered as
a way to deal with the duality of her professional role as intercultural mediator.
Finally, these fragments also demonstrate that ‘social care’ interactions do not necessarily
always take place in w ell-defined interactional environments that are strictly oriented to
social c are-goals, but rather that many of these interactions occur at the fringes of other
interactions, in which the time that is available may be used to the maximum extent. One
can easily imagine that such interactions occur in the waiting room of a medical practice or
when moving from one scheduled meeting to another, but also, as we observed here, even
while a phone call by a doctor briefly suspends the medical interaction in which the partic-
ipants are involved. This illustrates that the reality of social care may sometimes be highly
fragmented. On the one hand, this may be regarded as an efficient use of available resources,
but on the other hand, it poses an additional challenge for multilingual professionals who
thus face the dilemma of dealing with the input they receive either ‘a s social care providers’
233
(thus focusing on the content of the patient’s questions) or ‘a s interpreters’ (thus focusing on
rendering this content).
The challenge of establishing rapport

The establishment of rapport, defined here as ‘the fundamental belief that we are entitled
to an association with others that is in keeping with the type of relationship that we have
with them’ and that may, for example, be enacted by ‘a n appropriate amount of […] social
chit-chat with others’ (Spencer-Oatey 2000: 14–15), is an important aspect of interactions
in a wide variety of contexts, but it can be considered as especially important in social care
contexts because of the specific nature of this work (Westlake and Jones 2018). In particular,
the establishment of rapport contributes to the care-receivers’ psychological safety, which
creates the perception that it is safe to take interpersonal risks when communicating with
someone, thus improving trust and communication (Torralba et al. 2016). Yet, in some stud-
ies, the presence of an interpreter is discussed as potentially hindering the establishment of
rapport (K riz and Skivenes 2010; Lindsay et al. 2014). This is indeed possible, as for example
illustrated, first, by Van De Mieroop (2016) who discusses a fragment from an authentic
interaction in which an interpreter functioned as a barrier who immediately ended the c hit-
chat that could potentially have contributed to the establishment of rapport and second, by
Westlake and Jones who show an example of chit-chat ending abruptly in an interpreter-
mediated session (2018: 1398). Yet, this is not always the case and there are numerous exam-
ples in our data in which small talk or talk that is not strictly relevant for the achievement
of the interactional goals is translated and even stimulated. We see an example of this in the
following fragment, which was extracted from the recording at the home for the elderly.
In this fragment, the interlocutors are discussing the rules and regulations of the institution
regarding smoking, which are important for the new resident.
Fragment 3 – Encounter
3, interaction between head nurse (
HN),
interpreter (I) and resident (R)
1 HN maar boven boven in de hal mag hij niet roken

but upstairs upstairs in the hall he is not allowed to
smoke
2 omdat ik daar mensen heb met respiratoire problemen
because i have people with respiratory problems there
3 [en da gaat dus niet
[and so that is not possible
4 I [goed das belangrijk
[good that is important
5 allora (.) tu continui a fare quello che fai
so (.) you keep doing what you do
6 dunque fumare fuori dunque
so smoking outside so
7 eccezionalmente puoi fumare nella camera
exceptionally you may smoke in your room
234
8 ma la capo infermiera ci tiene di che tu non fumi sul

reparto
but the head nurse insists that you do not smoke on the
ward
9 perché ci sono delle persone al reparto
because there are people on the ward
10 che ci hanno delle difficoltà con e::h dunque::
who have difficulties with e::h so::
11 e::h jaja dunque: coi polmoni problemi
e::h yes yes so: with lungs problems
((
6 lines omitted containing a search for the right word))
18 I nee nee nee polmone
no no no polmone
19 R xxx) una sigaretta
a::h sofia mia figlia (
a:::h sofia my daughter (xxx) a cigarette
20 quando fa una festa tutti fuori vanno a fumare
when she gives a party then everyone goes outside to smoke
21 I ah sì perché sofia (xxx)
ah yes because sofia (xxx)
22 R non lo sopporta
she can’t stand it
23 I a::h dus zijn oudste dochter sofia
a:::h so his eldest daughter sofia
24 is heel gevoelig he voor het e:h de rook eigenlijk
is very sentsitive hey to the e:h the smoke actually
25 vandaar as er inderdaad bezoek is bij bij die dochter
therefore if there are indeed visitors with with that
daughter
26 gaat iedereen buiten buiten roken
everyone goes outside outside to smoke
27 vandaar dat ze daar zo tegenstander is dat vader rookt
that’s why she is such an opponent of father smoking
28 dus e::h ma ja hij zal altijd gerookt hebben he dus
so e::h but yes he will always have smoked hey so
29 HN °ja°
°yes°
30 I hai fumato sempre luigi nella vita tua
have you always smoked in your life luigi
We see in the initial lines the end of the head nurse’s turn in which she explains the rules
for smoking on the premises. In line 4, the interpreter first acknowledges the importance
of these rules and then starts interpreting the head nurse’s turn. This is quite a lengthy turn
(lines 5 –11), which ends with a word search for the correct ending of the word polmone
(‘lungs’, see line 18). While this turn is fairly technical and clearly oriented to the goal of
235
the interaction, namely making sure that this new resident knows the rest home’s rules, the
latter responds to this explanation by initiating a personal story about his daughter’s aversion
to smoking indoors. While this is of course topically related to the preceding talk (both
referring to smoking), it is unrelated to the rest home context and thus the resident’s talk is
not relevant for furthering the task-related goals of the interaction. Nevertheless, the inter-
preter produces a turn in which he aligns with this shift to a personal story and even adds
a – partially unintelligible – account for the behaviour of the resident’s daughter (see line 21:
‘because…’). In the next turn, the resident aligns with this and finishes the interpreter’s sen-
tence, after which the latter starts translating the resident’s story (see line 27). Furthermore,
he ends his turn with a hypothetical factual statement about the resident, namely that he will
‘a lways have smoked’. This is acknowledged by the head nurse, but before she can add any-
thing else, the interpreter continues in this small talk frame and asks the resident whether this
hypothetical statement is correct, as we see in line 30, after which the small talk continues a
bit longer (not shown here for reasons of space).
So, in this fragment, we first of all observed a switch to more relationally oriented talk,
which – even though it is topically related – does not further the transactional goals of the
interaction. In particular, this small talk is initiated by the resident and encouraged by the
interpreter (see his initiation of an account in line 21 and his follow-up question in line 30).
Hence, in this case, we could observe that the interpreter not only facilitates the establish-
ment of rapport between all the interlocutors involved by interpreting the resident’s story, in
spite of its non-task related nature, but that he also stimulates the continuation of this type of
non-task-oriented talk, by aligning with it and asking a follow-up question. Thus, while in
some studies (K riz and Skivenes 2010; Lindsay et al. 2014), attention is drawn to interpreters’
presence as hindering the establishment of rapport in social care interactions, we have shown
with this extract from our data that the opposite is also possible. In particular, we illustrated
that interpreters may not only facilitate rapport, but that they may also contribute actively to
establishing and maintaining social ties. As they sometimes know many details of the care-
receiver’s personal situation, they may actually act as catalysts of the establishment of rapport
which is of particular importance to social care interactions (see also the recommendation by
Westlake and Jones 2018: 1405). In this subsection, we thus offered a nuanced perspective on
the potential influence of the presence of a third party on r apport-building.
Interpreters as gatekeepers
That participants taking up the role of interpreters may act as gatekeepers who, for example,
omit a particular piece of information in their translation, is a well-documented fact (for an
overview of studies on interpreters as gatekeepers, see Pöllabauer 2012). An example of this
was presented in fragment 2 above, in which the intercultural mediator did not translate the
patient’s reason for his request about being put on the waiting list for a kidney transplant.
Above, we explained this as a triage strategy to deal with the double role that this hospital’s
employee of the ‘language assistance and intercultural mediation’-service had, but this omis-
sion may also be viewed as a gatekeeping strategy. Such omissions are quite common in our
data and many of them seem to be oriented to efficiency improvement, namely that the –
often limited – time that is available for a particular encounter is only used for the transmis-
sion of information that is deemed relevant for the interaction’s specific t ask-related goals.
While this type of gatekeeping is of course most well-known, gatekeeping may also work
in the other direction. Because interpreters are g o-betweens between the different l anguage-
r elated parts of the interaction, they may also add information that they perceive as missing
236
Fragment 4 – Encounter
3, interaction between head nurse (HN) and
interpreter (I)
1 I maar hij hij als ik het goed begrijp hij heeft dus echt
but he he if i understand it correctly so he really has
2 hij is vroeg wakker [maar dat krijg ik hem niet uitgelegd
he is awake early [but i can’t manage to explain that to him
3 HN [ja: ja
[ye:s yes
4 I inderdaad dat hij om vijf uur
indeed that he at five o’clock
5 en als hij alleen zou gaan douchen
and if he would go take a shower alone
6 ‘
k=ben ‘
k=ben zelf iets aan ‘ t voorstellen
i=am i=am proposing something myself
7 HN ma daarbij weet ik ni of hij [da kan
but next to that i don’t know if he [can do that
8 I [weetnie of hij da kan (.)
[don’t know if he can do that (.)
9 misschiens kan hij dat (.) nee ‘ k=denk het niet
maybe he can do that (.) no i=don’t think so
10 allora c’è un’ altra possibilità luigi
so there is another possibility luigi
in one of these parts. Moreover, due to their often multiple roles, they may have knowledge
that none of the other interactional participants have. We see an example of this in the
following fragment, which was extracted from the same intake interview with a new rest
home resident as discussed above. At this point in the conversation, they are talking about a
problem that has arisen in the first couple of days, namely that the resident would really like
to bathe before breakfast, but that there are no spots available for early morning bathing as-
sistance. After a long discussion about this, the talk ends up in an impasse (prior to this frag-
ment). Then the interpreter proposes a potential solution himself, as we see in fragment 4.
In lines 1–4, the interpreter formulates a summary of the issue, as such ensuring a cor-
rect understanding of the situation (see line 1). Then, in line 4, he breaks off his sentence
and in the subsequent line formulates a potential solution, namely that the resident would
shower on his own in the morning. Interestingly, he then explicitly marks this as a proposal
of ‘h imself ’ (lines 6) and by means of this metacomment, he hints at the unusual nature of
this proposal in his current role as interpreter. In the subsequent turn, the head nurse does
not explicitly pick up on this final part of the interpreter’s turn (line 6) but reacts to the in-
terpreter’s proposal and formulates a counterargument (‘I don’t know if he can do that’, line
7). The interpreter first mirrors this formulation in overlap and then reflects on this out loud
(line 9). While he concludes this reflection with a negative evaluation (‘I don’t think so’, line
9), he nevertheless continues and embarks on a translation of his proposal to the resident (of
which we see the start in line 10, the rest is omitted for reasons of space but it may be relevant
237
to know that the discussion ends with the decision to try out the interpreter’s suggestion).
So, even though he initially oriented to the marked nature of his own contribution – see the
metacomment in line 6 – and in spite of an important counterargument that was raised by
the head nurse, the interpreter does not wait for a ratification by the nurse before formulating
this proposal to the resident.
Hence, it is due to the interpreter’s contribution that a potential solution is found. Impor-
tantly, it is because of the fact that this interpreter is actually a social worker acting as an
interpreter, that he has knowledge of many aspects of the issue (that is to say his knowledge
of the care home’s facilities, of the resident’s potential abilities, of the previous arrangements
with this resident in another care home and of the rules and options of the current care
home). We have thus seen that the presence of this interpreter/social worker was crucial
for the furthering of the interactional goals and that his contribution had an empowering
effect for the resident who is thus able to try out a solution that is more tailored to his
needs. Overall, we can conclude that especially in social care interactions, in which dou-
ble roles are quite common and interpreters are often highly knowledgeable parties in the
interaction, gatekeeping may occur in several directions. Next to selecting information as
a way of doing recipient design (see fragment 2), interpreters may also contribute to the
interaction, such as by adding information or, as is the case here, by suggesting ways to
reach t ask-related goals based on their extensive knowledge of various aspects surrounding
the interaction, ranging from the personal situation of the care-receivers to the rules and
regulations of various institutions.
Concluding remarks
This chapter has pointed out that the domain of social care provides a vast array of different
contexts with a similarly wide range of different types of interactions and communication
means. Moreover, interpreting in social care is much less studied than, for instance, inter-
preting in medical and legal settings. Nevertheless, we believe that social care contexts offer
many promising avenues for future research. While some of the critical issues discussed in
this chapter raise potential policy concerns that are very much in line with those observed
in other areas of PSI, including in the healthcare sector, some issues can be considered as
related to the nature of social care in which the creation of a safe environment and the es-
tablishment and maintenance of trusting relationships are central (cf. Pomeroy and Nonaka
2013: 103). Social care contexts thus require careful reflections on the implications of a va-
riety of decisions that have to be made each time, such as those referred to above: what the
implications are of deciding to assign professional interpreters or informal interpreters, or
even go for another alternative; what the effects are of the double roles of n on-professional
interpreters or of acting as an interpreter oneself; how to foster the establishment of rapport
that tends to be so important in social care context (cf. Westlake and Jones 2018); and how
to negotiate the implications of gatekeeping. Each of these decisions entails its own fluid
set of advantages and disadvantages, which have to be carefully weighed depending on the
particularities of each social care situation. For example, while informal interpreters likely
increase the prevalence of role confusion, they can also help care-receivers to feel more at
ease and support the establishment of rapport between the care provider and receiver, which
tends to be especially important in social care. Yet, this is not always the case, which is im-
mediately clear when rehashing the example at the start of this chapter, of the case in which a
victim of domestic violence had to rely on a friend of her husband, the alleged perpetrator of
238
the abuse, for interpreting assistance during her conversation with a social service provider.
This illustrates the delicate balancing acts these decisions present, which would benefit from
further academic scrutiny. In sum, there are still many questions in relation to the domain of
interpreting in social care contexts, which offer exciting new research opportunities render-
ing insights that are set to be important for, but also beyond, social care.
Further reading
Gustafsson, Kristina, Eva Norström, and Petra Höglund (2019) “Language interpreting and broker-
ing in Swedish public service institutions: The use of children for multilingual communication”,
Revista de Llenguia i Dret, Journal of Language and Law 71: 13–26.
This article investigates the issue of children as language brokers in social services. It does so by collecting
the experiences of both service providers and former child brokers. One of the main findings is that there is a
gap between the perceptions of service providers on their work with child interpreters on the one hand and the
experiences of the child interpreters on their situation on the other hand.
Lucas, Siân (2020) “Spoken language interpreters in social work.” 52. Insight. A series of evidence
summaries. Glasgow: Institute for Research and Innovation in Social Services (IRISS). URL:
https://w ww.iriss.org.uk/resources/i nsights/spoken-language-i nterpreters-social-work (accessed
22 November 2021).
This is a recent and holistic review on interpreting in social care. It discusses interpreting in social care from
the perspectives of the different forms of interpreting provision, the legislative and policy contexts as well as
research and practical issues.
Pöllabauer, Sonja (2012) “Gatekeeping practices in interpreted social service encounters”, Meta: Journal
Des Traducteurs/Meta: Translators’ Journal 57 (1): 213–34.
This article offers a broad review on the concept of gatekeeping in institutional encounters. It also presents
a case study of gatekeeping practices by recently trained interpreters and its impact on impartiality during social
and welfare counseling sessions.
Westlake, David, and Rebecca K. Jones (2018) “Breaking down language barriers: A p ractice-near
study of social work using interpreters”, British Journal of Social Work 48 (5): 1388–408.
This article investigates how social workers could better communicate and collaborate with interpreters during
counseling sessions. It does so through an analysis of audio recordings of interpreter-mediated meetings between
service providers and families and focus group sessions with service providers.
Related chapters
Chapter 11, Vulnerable encounters? Investigating vulnerability in interpreter-mediated services for v ictim-survivors
Chapter 12, Public service interpreting in Health Care by Laura Gavioli and Raffaela Merlini
Chapter 16, “Interpreter’s mistake” – Why should other professions care about the professionalization
of interpreters? by Hanne Skaaden
Chapter 24, Training public service providers in how to communicate via interpreter by Tatjana R. Felberg and
Gry Sagli
Notes
1 As the speech is unclear (indicated by the fact that it is written between brackets), it is not certain
what is said here.
2 He literally says: ‘потом сказал (x x) что ты в очереди не стоишь я три года здесь как на, в
очереди не стою (x x) три года здесь и он не ничего не сделал для меня, мне бумаги надо
быть что паспорт поменять, там сказали принеси из госпиталя бумаги что’ – ‘then he said
(x x) that you weren’t standing in line, I’m not standing in line for three years, I don’t stand in line
for three years (x x) three years here and he didn’t do anything for me, I need to change my pass-
port, there they said bring the papers from the hospital’.
239
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241
15
A SHARED RESPONSIBILITY
FOR FACILITATING INCLUSION
IN SCHOOL SETTINGS
WHERE SIGN-LANGUAGE
INTERPRETING IS PROVIDED
Introduction
This chapter examines interpreted-mediated education and how teachers and interpreters
can collaborate on facilitating inclusion when students with signed and spoken language
are in the same class. School programs for sign-language students have changed in step with
the development of legislative mandates for inclusion in public education (U NESCO 1994).
Educational interpreting has therefore become more and more common (Smith 2015). For
instance, it has been estimated that 75% of all deaf and hard-of-hearing students in the USA
depend on sign-language interpreters to access social and academic discourses in schools
(Marschark et al. 2005). While there are no exact figures in Norway indicating how many
students are using interpreter services in primary and upper secondary school, we know that
this is becoming more common at all school levels.
In specialized literature, inclusion is understood as a general approach to teaching and
organization that enhances the learning outcome and sense of belonging for all students
(M itchell and Sutherland 2020). To ensure positive learning outcomes, the teacher can adapt
tasks and activities to each student’s capabilities and their zone of proximal development
(Vygotsky 1978). To ensure a sense of belonging, the teacher can endeavor to establish a social
learning environment where the students recognize and acknowledge their dissimilarities and
know how to deal with them (Berg 2013). This chapter explores possibilities for inclusion in
interpreted-mediated education. In such a setting, inclusion can mean that s ign-language stu-
dents experience belonging, can participate in social and academic activities, and have access
to the same meaning content as the other students. Access and participation promote learning
and development: Sociocultural theory posits that learning requires both individual and social
processes (Wertsch 1991). Students must mentally categorize the subject matter, but they must
also explore the meaning potentials of the subject in question with other students. Mediating
artifacts used in these processes may be books, computers, and models. However, the most
important artifact is ‘language’ as concepts contribute to developing mental schemata, and
‘languaging’ contributes to social interaction and exploration of content (Linell 2009).
242 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-18

Facilitating inclusion through sign-language in schools
The understanding teachers and interpreters have of their roles and responsibilities im-
pacts their professional practice and how they act in relation to the students and each other
(Berge 2016). Roughly speaking, the teacher first and foremost is responsible for planning,
implementing, and assessing the teaching program. The responsibility of the interpreter is
primarily language mediation. However, teaching and interpreting are complex and situated
activities and it is difficult to anticipate all the language barriers that may arise. Both teachers
and interpreters can contribute with insight into how to adapt different c lass-talk activities so
participation becomes accessible to deaf students via interpreting. Research on interpreting
has pointed out how all involved participants in interpreted events share the responsibility
for quality. Ozolins and Hale (2009: 3) argue that: ‘Each speaker needs to assume responsi-
bility for what they say and how they say it and it is critical for all participants in interpreted
encounters to have a mutual understanding of each other’s roles and needs’. To take the
responsibility of adaption, both teachers and interpreters must be aware of the language bar-
riers that may arise in various c lass-talk activities, how they impact deaf students’ learning
possibilities, and how they can contribute to reducing the barriers within the scope of their
professional expertise (Harrington and Turner 2001). In the analyses below, I will show how
collaboration between the professions can facilitate inclusion.
Relevant theoretical considerations

Exploring interpreting as interaction, Wadensjö (1998) demonstrates the ways in which in-
terpreted conversations can evolve as tightly coordinated activities, in which participants’
contributions are attributed meaning and purpose as talk unfolds. Wadensjö’s work is based
exclusively on spoken language discourse data. This implies that her book does not address
communicative features coming with spoken and signed languages different modalities. I
will discuss some of them in what follows. Spoken language interpreters work between lan-
guages in the same modality. Although gestures and paralinguistic features are used together
with sound, the two languages use the diverse modes in very similar ways. Sign-language
interpreters work between languages relying on different modalities. Sign languages are
v isual-gestural languages and simultaneously incorporate the use of various articulators.
Sometimes it can be challenging for the interpreter to decide which visual information to
retain and which to omit in constructing meaningful equivalents in each language (Napier
2015: 129).
This bimodality also impacts the interaction between the primary participants. Deaf
students have a visual orientation as they capture information mostly through their sight
(Hansen 2005). In an interpreted-mediated conversation, they will look at the interpreter
much of the time. Reduced e ye-to-eye contact between the primary participants may chal-
lenge the process of establishing mutual attention, exchanging minimal response signals, and
coordinating turn-taking. Their interaction must also be coordinated for the time lag that
occurs when the interpreter processes their utterances, as various participants have access
to the content and the turn-taking signals at different points in time (Roy 2000; Kurz and
Langer 2004; Winston 2004). The participants’ sequential interaction order, and how they
coordinate timing of pauses and talk, might therefore be experienced as different compared
to non-interpreted conversations.
In mainstream classrooms, teachers’ language and teaching practice are often subordi-
nated to norms in a speaking language culture. If the teacher and the hearing students
neglect to coordinate their language practice for interpreting and visual accessibility, deaf
243
students’ participation may be marginalized. Teachers may thus not know how to adapt
their practice, or they may be unaware of their responsibilities. A familiar assumption in the
literature on interpreting is that ‘the interpreter creates an illusionary access to learning and
inclusion’ (Winston 2004: 132). The teachers believe that their teaching is accessible for all
students when the interpreter is in the classroom. Therefore, they overlook the need deaf
students might have to receive subject and language support (A ntia, Stinson and Gaustad
2002; Thoutenhoofd 2005). Unfortunately, as a group deaf students have poorer subject-
related achievements and a lower sense of belonging than hearing classmates (A ntia and
Kreimeyer 2001; Schick 2004; Hendar 2012; Kermit 2018). One reason might be lack of
bilingual support.
Deaf students are bilingual learners with some different language experiences compared
to those of hearing students (Smith 2015: 269). While most hearing children are exposed
to the language of their parents from the moment they are born, most deaf children have
parents who do not know sign-language and are not able to serve as fluent language models
during the critical years of language acquisition. While most hearing children are members
of a rich language environment with a constant and consistent exposure to a variety of lan-
guages, most deaf children have very few language models at home and at school. This also
influences their access to incidental learning which takes place by overhearing other people’s
talk (Marschark et al. 2008). It is therefore important that both teachers and interpreters
have insight into the language barriers that deaf students can experience. As Smith (2015:
269) argues:
In order to work effectively in educational settings, interpreters must recognize the

complexity of their task. Not only must they master two languages and the complex
task of interpreting, but they also need knowledge about how to promote teaching and
learning in general and how these principles apply specifically to deaf and h ard-of-
hearing students’ needs as dual language learners.
All these essential challenges are identified and highlighted in earlier research on educational
interpreting.
Literature overview
Textbooks and anthologies

Some textbooks and anthologies explore educational interpreting: One example is Brenda
Seal’s Best practices in educational interpreting (1998), providing the first textbook in the area.
Harrington and Turner’s (2001) book Interpreting interpreting has two chapters on educational
interpreting, dealing with the effect on deaf students’ learning and the need to redefine the
role of educational interpreters. Winston (2004) edited an anthology with the title Educa-
tional interpreting and how it can succeed which is highlighting experiences of deaf students,
accessibility, and interpreters’ training. An American textbook on Sign-language interpreting
and interpreter education edited by Marschark et al. (2005) contains three chapters on educa-
tional interpreting: Marschark et al. (2005) on access and outcomes, Davis (2005) on code
choices, and Napier (2005) on linguistic strategies. Smith’s (2013) book More than Meets the
Eye maintains that the primary tasks of educational interpreters are to address deaf students’
visual needs, to promote language and learning, and to cultivate opportunities for social
and academic participation. The author also returns to this theme in the latest edition of the
244
Routledge Handbook of Interpreting (Smith 2015). A recent Norwegian volume has two chapters
on educational interpreting: Ringsø and Agerup (2018) examine interpretation for children
in primary and lower secondary school, underlining the importance of collaboration, partic-
ularly when it comes to preparation. Kermit and Berge (2018) use various field observations
to describe situations where educational interpreters avoid taking part in the work to facil-
itate inclusion. Both chapters argue that the responsibility of educational interpreters must
be part of a new discussion in the field. Other publications are found in various periodicals,
where the Journal of Deaf and Deaf Education is an important publication channel.
Ethnographic research studies

Research studies in educational interpreting are typically ethnographic projects based on in-
terviews and classroom observation through v ideo-recording of everyday teaching activities.
Some studies are interpretations of audio tracks of genuine lectures, often followed by inter-
views with the informants. To my knowledge, studies on educational interpreting published
from the turn of the century until the present originate in the USA, Canada, Australia, and
Norway, where educational interpreting is most widespread. The following sections present
their key points.
Interpreting quality and translation style

Winston (2004) is interested in what she discusses in terms of interpretability and accessibil-
ity for deaf children in American mainstream classrooms. Through her video analyses, she
finds significant loss of information in the interpreted text because the interpreter on duty
had inadequate competence and the teacher did not facilitate for interpretation. The anal-
yses reveal that the deaf pupils do not have the same access to education as their classmates.
Other studies have highlighted the importance of interpreters understanding the context,
the subject matter, and the goal of the activity when interpreting lectures at universities
(Harrington 2000; Napier and Barker 2004; Russel and Winston 2014). Interpreters’ under-
standing can also contribute to making accurate choices of translation style: The fact that
sign-language interpreters work bimodally influences their translation style as their media-
tion are susceptible to the influence of language contact (Napier 2015: 133). Interpreters have
been found to effectively incorporate aspects of the spoken language in their sign-language
interpreting, adapting their mediation somewhere between a free or literal translation style
(Napier 2002, 2005; Davis 2005). In a literal translation, the sign-language interpretation
follows the grammatical structure of the spoken language, using mouthing, fingerspelling
(words being manually coded), and linguistic visual features of the signed language to fa-
cilitate meaningful utterances. This strategy is especially relevant in formal presentations in
university settings where the aim is to provide access to academic and technical terms and
concepts. Literal interpreting, in the above described sense, is also used in Norway, where it
is called tegn som støtte (abbreviated as TSS) (Berge, Raanes and Nyhus 2018).
As I have suggested elsewhere, to understand which information is accessible to their deaf
students, teachers can try to gain some insight into interpreting quality and translation styles
(Berge 2003). Together with interpreters and students, they can explore the subject mat-
ter according to language differences, interpreting problems, and solutions. This discussion
can also be helpful for interpreters in adapting their translation style to students’ personal
preferences. Australian deaf students interviewed by Napier and Barker (2004) appreciated
that the interpreters used different translation styles: At times they felt that the message was
245
more accessible when the interpretation was literal. Other times it was more accessible when
the interpreter liberated herself from the words in the source text and used v isual-gestural
features to illustrate the content. This mediation strategy might also support deaf students’
learning and access. Marschark et al. (2005, 2008) have used v ideo-recordings to study ac-
cessibility in interpreted-mediated lectures, finding that it is of little significance for univer-
sity student learning outcome when it comes to which translation style is used. What is most
important is that the students experience the mediation as meaningful.
Turn-taking and participation

Among several topics, Winston (2004) explores access to turn-taking signals, and infor-
mation about who moderates the talk, in interpreted-mediated class-room interaction. She
found that sign-language students have less access to joining question and answer sessions
than their classmates: Due to deaf students reduced eye-to-eye contact with the teacher
(their visual orientation was directed at the interpreter), they did not have the same access to
negotiate for attention. Due to the time lag, the hearing students answered before the inter-
pretation was completed. Thus, deaf students were ‘lagging behind’ their hearing classmates.
Roy’s (2000) sociolinguistic study provides a fundamental contribution to our understand-
ing of how interpreters coordinate the interaction between the primary participants, by
examining v ideo-recorded guidance talk between a professor and a deaf student at an Amer-
ican university. Inspired by her studies, I have analyzed v ideo-recordings of turn-taking
in interpreted-mediated talks in peer groups, identifying how interpreters use multimodal
techniques to coordinate mutual attention and t urn-taking (Berge 2018).
Visual accessibility
The visual accessibility of sign-language students is the main focus of several studies. Berge
and Thomassen (2015), Hansen (2005), Harrington (2005), Mather (2005), and Winston
(2004) have similar findings: Visual accessibility is challenged in interpreted-mediated ed-
ucation because the teaching is performed according to oral traditions. Key issues here are
physical placement, talk tempo, t urn-taking, and use of the blackboard. Another issue is that
information is provided from several information sources at the same time. For instance,
when the teacher is talking and showing a model to the students, hearing students can both
listen to the teacher’s voice and look at the model, while deaf students must choose to either
look at the model or the interpreter. When they look at one source, they lose access to in-
formation from the other. Focusing one’s gaze on the interpreter over extended periods of
time may also be experienced as demanding for the students’ concentration, and i nterpreted-
mediated education might be experienced as heavier than teaching where teachers and stu-
dents are using the same language (Hansen 2005).
Roles and responsibility

Roles, responsibility, and the division of tasks are important topics in studies of educational
interpreting. A number of studies have shown that there is some confusion among teach-
ers and interpreters when it comes to the interpreter’s role and responsibilities (A ntia and
Kreimeyer 2001; Smith 2015; Berge 2020). The students’ expectations can also be unclear
and contradictory. Napier (2011: 80) asked deaf and hearing students to describe their per-
ceptions of the sign-language interpreter’s role. Both groups of students preferred interpreters
246
who understood their needs as bilingual and deaf learners, acted with professionalism, had
fluent language skills, and had a ‘good attitude’. These expectations are similar among Nor-
wegian upper secondary and tertiary-education students, as shown in a few, relevant inter-
view studies (Hansen 2005; Berge and Ytterhus 2015).
Illustrative excerpts and analysis

In the following, I will draw on my own data which I collected during my PhD project on
interpreted-mediated education in upper secondary school (Berge 2016). I found that sign-
language students have a marginalized education program compared to their classmates:
They have less access to information in situations with several sources (Berge and Thomas-
sen 2015), reduced participation in informal and formal g roup-work activities (Berge 2018;
Berge and Kermit 2018; Berge 2021), and have partly conflicting expectations when it comes
to the interpreters’ role set and which tasks they should assume responsibility for (Berge and
Ytterhus 2015; Berge 2020). The following excerpts and analysis will serve to illustrate my
and other researchers’ findings. For the sake of simplifying access to the readers of the vol-
ume, the excerpts, originally in Norwegian, are presented in English only.
Talk tempo
Facilitating teachers’ talk tempo is important in terms of how teachers and interpreters can
collaborate on making content accessible. If the teacher speaks too fast, the interpreters
struggle to keep up to the detriment of the interpretation quality (Kurz and Langer 2004:
19). The interpreter in the excerpt below points out the opposite: If the teacher speaks too
slowly, may also be a problem. Therefore, the interpreter points to the importance of speak-
ing normally:
The interpreter advises the teachers to talk the way they normally do. However, this can
be a double-edged sword: While the teachers need to talk naturally, they must also adapt for
interpreting. Meaning, they cannot talk and teach like they normally do. The teachers have
obviously learnt an effective strategy for adapting their tempo, taking a break after some
sentences so the interpreter manages to keep up (Teacher 2). Another issue in the excerpt is
that the teachers want the interpreter to tell them if they are unable to keep up. They have
little insight into the language processes interpreters are dealing with. Therefore, teachers
Excerpt 1: Group interview, Child and youth worker
Interviewer: How should a teacher talk so you can translate well?

Interpreter: Natural (laughs). I believe that if a teacher thinks too much about being
interpreted, things will go wrong. Then it’s almost too slow. For me it’s
best if teachers talk the way they normally do. Because I have the option of
stopping them if I can’t keep up.
Teacher 1: This is what makes us confident, we know that you’ll do that.
Teacher 2: The first year I spoke way too fast, really! So, I had to train to go slower.
I’ve learnt to draw a breath when I’ve finished a sentence, because then the
interpreter will manage to keep up.
247
must trust that the interpreter will stop them, and the interpreter must trust the teachers to
take time to wait, repeat, and clarify the content of their utterances.
Visual orientation
Facilitating breaks for textual and visual processing is an important part of the collaboration
between teachers and interpreters that will make the content more accessible. The excerpt
below is from a class where a teacher is presenting technical programing software (Berge and
Thomassen 2015). He enters commands on his computer that are displayed on a big screen
and describes what these commands do. At times, he points to specific sections on the screen.
He expects the students to follow what he is telling them, see where he is pointing, and per-
form the same actions on their own computers. In this situation, sign-language students must
orient their gaze between several sources of information.
The interaction between interpreter and teacher has a time lag that influences deaf stu-
dents’ access to the content and to participate in the learning activity: In line 4 (Figure 15.1),
we notice that when the teacher says ‘Now that’s done. Now you see that it has changed
colors’ while pointing at the blue rectangle on the screen. The teacher’s pointing can be
understood as a situated gesture (Goodwin 2000), and it establishes a reference in his speech
which informs the students about the functions in the software. Access to this information
is vital for mastering the task. The interpreter also points to the screen (Figure 15.2) and
coordinates her interpretation to emphasize the message. However, the teacher and the in-
terpreter are not pointing at the same time, and the interpreter’s pointing does not indicate
the rectangle that is being referred to. The teacher’s and the interpreter’s actions are not syn-
chronized, neither in time nor space, and the meaning potential in the i nterpreted-mediated
text becomes less informative.
Excerpt 2 also illustrates that s ign-language students must orient their gaze between several
simultaneously used information sources: The screen, the computer, the teacher’s gestures,
and the interpreter’s mediation are all artifacts of information (Figure 15.3). However, when
the students are watching one of the sources, they lose information from another (Berge and
Thomassen 2015). The expectation that they should carry out the task while keeping pace
with the teacher is hard to satisfy. Most likely they will lag behind the progression of their
Excerpt 2: Video transcription, Technical drawing:
Line Who Spoken utterances Situated gestures

1 Teacher: ‘Ok: Now we’ll try it out’
2 Interpreter: ‘W E TRY’ points at the screen
3 The teacher starts the program. A new blue
rectangle is created on top of the previous brown
square. John and Ben look at the screen on their
own and each other’s computer.
4 Teacher: ‘Now that’s done. Now you see that it has points at the blue
changed colors’ rectangle with a pointer
5 Interpreter: ‘FINISH. COLOR CHANGE’ points at the screen
6 Teacher: ‘If you see any other color than this, you have
the wrong height on your cutter’
248
Figure 15.1 T
he teacher points to a specific sec- Figure 15.2 The interpreter interprets the utter-
tion on the screen while talking ances, pointing somewhat later at
the screen
Figure 15.3 Visual access
classmates. This may impact their learning experience and undermine their engagement in
the activity (Vygotsky 1978). The teacher’s teaching practice is hardly planned to provide
breaks for time lag and visual accessibility. After watching v ideo-recordings of the situation,
the teacher became more aware of possible drawbacks and said that he could have split the
activity into sequences: First he could have presented the software then the students could
have worked with their tasks. He also thinks that this adaption could have benefited all the
students in the class. In the next excerpt, I will look closer at the relationship between visual
accessibility and physical facilitation.
The physical learning environment

In interpreted-mediated classrooms, sign-language students normally sit at the front, based
on the idea that this placement enables them to see the interpreter, the screen, and the teacher
(see Picture 1). The set-up of the physical learning environment impacts visual accessibility
(Harrington 2005; Mather 2005; Berge and Kermit 2018). The teacher is mainly responsi-
ble for making the necessary adjustments to the physical learning environment in the role
of class manager. However, the interpreters are also responsible: They can contribute with
informing when the organization is not working, discussing possible solutions, and willingly
trying alternative solutions (Berge and Kermit 2018). However, according to my data, not
all interpreters are prepared for collaborating with teachers, answering questions about how
the physical environment and the teaching can be facilitated (Berge 2020):
249
Excerpt 4. Group interview, Child and Youth worker
Teacher: I have asked the interpreters many times ‘W here should I stand?’ and ‘How is
this here?’, and then I think it would be very nice if I could get a clear answer.
Because I have often been told that ‘Just do what you usually do, and we adapt
to you’. I would rather like them to tell me actually what they want me to do,
like ‘If you stand there that would be practical’. I’m asking because I’m unsure,
so I would really like an answer.
Interpreter: Mm. It seems to persist, this idea that we should be the fly on the wall,
not visible at all. We simply follow after the teacher, and then we simply
interpret. We don’t quite manage this way of collaborating.
The excerpt above captures an interpreter’s ambiguity. Even if she seems to be question-
ing the view that an interpreter should be like ‘the fly on the wall’, she acknowledges that
she and the others in the interpreter team at this school do not really want to answer the
teacher’s questions relating to adapting the physical set-up. There may be many reasons for
this: They may not want to distract the teacher’s attention from the teaching, to evaluate
the teacher’s practice or assume responsibility for more tasks than the interpreting itself. It
seems like the interpreter’s understanding of professional role and responsibility limits her
way of collaboration with the teacher. This is why role expectations that highlight concepts
like ‘neutrality’ or ‘invisibility’ may not be relevant for interpreters working in school. This
is particularly the case if these ideas establish a practice that impedes deaf students’ access to
learning and teachers’ access to adapt their teaching (A ntia and Kreimeyer 2001; Thouten-
hoofd 2005; Smith 2015). However, the excerpt shows that there is a certain degree of open-
ness for changing attitudes and practices when it comes to how interpreters and teachers can
work together.
Bilingual support
Facilitating for a bilingual education program is important when teachers and interpreters
are to collaborate (Smith 2013). An issue they must resolve is how they both can apply their
professional knowledge in establishing a bilingual teaching practice. One question is how
they can divide the task of answering students’ requests for explanations of signs and words
(Berge and Ytterhus 2015):
Excerpt 5 shows that the collaboration between interpreter and student is challenged
because the interpreter does not want to answer the students directly. In Norway, there
has been an ongoing debate concerning whether interpreters should involve themselves in
explaining words to sign-language students (Berge 2003: 67; Berge and Ytterhus 2015).
Some believe that this is a task for teachers only because they have insight into the students’
learning process and expert knowledge to explain the word correctly. Others believe that
interpreters have a bilingual competence that provides them with insight into the linguis-
tic differences the students encounter in various texts, and therefore they also have expert
knowledge to explain words and signs. Students’ questions may also relate to clarifying the
interpreting, which the teacher does not have insight into. Nancy, the student in excerpt 5,
shows that she wants the teacher and the interpreter to collaborate, acknowledging that the
250
Excerpt 5. Interview, two deaf students, childhood and youth

development
Interviewer: What skills do you think are important to be an interpreter?

Nancy: They need to be good at understanding us, and at signing. It would also
be good if we could discuss together with the interpreters what certain
signs and words mean. For example, if an interpreter uses a sign I don’t
understand, or if there is a word in the textbook that I’ve never seen
before, I should be allowed to ask her what it means and then she can
help me by explaining it. As it is now, if I ask, the interpreter fetches the
teacher so that he can explain it to me. Of course, if I’m way off we can
go get the teacher, but sometimes I just need a short explanation. I wonder
quite a lot about this: I thought it was normal that interpreters explained
words, but they don’t. Why don’t the interpreters take time to explain
what the words mean? And: if they see that I’ve misunderstood, why don’t
they tell me? I would feel a lot more secure if they would.
division of their responsibilities may be situated and text-dependent. At times, she wants to
discuss words and signs with the interpreter, other times, when she needs a more elaborate
explanation, she wants support from the teacher. This means that both the interpreter and
the teacher have professional knowledge students can make use of to master a bilingual ed-
ucational setting. This also suggests that taking the student’s perspective may though some
light on this lengthily debated problem.
The social learning environment

Strengthening the students’ social learning environment is an important task for interpreters
and teachers as both must strive to maintain a relationship with the students, and between
the students. If the students (whether deaf or hearing) are uncomfortable with the presence
of the interpreter, their feeling may impact their involvement and the quality of the dia-
logue. This is particularly important when organizing interpreter-mediated g roup-work
activities. To have an adult person seated next to them, mediating their informal and formal
talk, can be a new experience. Teachers and interpreters must be aware that in addition to
negotiating about their own membership, sign-language students must also negotiate about
the interpreter’s membership in their peer group (Schick 2004; Berge and Kermit 2018).
Interviews with deaf and hearing students indicate that they find it easier to connect and
talk to each other if the interpreter has a ‘natural presence’ and is willing to contribute some
‘small talk’ when needed (Berge and Ytterhus 2015). It is also important that the interpreter
and the teacher discuss the size of groups (not too many students as overlap of speech and
turn-taking make it challenging to interpret), group composition (the group should consist
of students who know how to speak through an interpreter), and physical placement of the
group (the students and the interpreter must sit so they easily see and hear each other) (Berge
2021). Interpreters and teachers must also be sensitive to the students’ need for information
about differences between the spoken and signed language cultures, and knowledge about
how they can deal with this:
251
Excerpt 6: Interview, two deaf students, childhood and youth

development
Interviewer What do you think about t urn-taking and communication in the class,
knowing when you can start to say something?
Nancy Yes. I’m aware of this. This is something I think about. It feels like: Is it
correct for me to talk now, or what? Many times I just don’t say anything.
Interviewer So, there’s a difference between the ways hearing and deaf students do things
when talking together?
Toril Yes. We, the deaf, we use our gaze before we start to say something.
Nancy Those who hear, they just turn their face away and look at other things when
they talk. Their faces and eyes are not still. We don’t do that. I look at the
mouth and face of the person I’m talking to.
Interviewer I was wondering, the information given to hearing students about this, is it
good enough?
Nancy No. Most people don’t know much about being deaf. We want to make an
information video about what it means to be deaf. Then we don’t have to tell
them: I’m so tired of those who hear asking questions.
Interviewer What can the teacher do to make your interaction easier?
Nancy Information.
Toril Information.
Excerpt 6 is an example of how deaf students can experience inclusion. In their class,
the participants have different languages and cultural norms for connecting, maintaining
the talk, and coordinating turn-taking. The deaf students find it difficult to know when to
start speaking, that often leads them to shy away from participating. Their sense of inclusion
and belonging seems marginalized. In addition, the two students assume responsibility for
informing classmates about sign-language and being deaf. In a way, they are taking on the
teachers’ responsibilities. They actually would like some more help with informing the class.
To do so, teachers need knowledge. They can acquire this through reading books, training,
and guidance. The interpreters’ professional expertise can also be useful. This is especially
important when bearing in mind that there is scarce literature on the topic of interpret-
ing and teaching students with sign language in mainstream classrooms. The mutual goal
of establishing an inclusive learning environment can motivate interpreters, teachers, and
students to have regular meetings with each other (A ntia and Kreimeyer 2001; Seal 2004;
Smith 2015; Kermit and Berge 2018). With insight into each other’s perspectives, they can
promote an inclusive learning environment where all participants know about each other’s
preferences and particularities, and how to deal with them (Berg 2013).
Summary
This chapter has presented several topics where teachers and interpreters can collaborate on
facilitating academic and social inclusion. In summary, we can see that:
When it comes to talk tempo, structure, and time-lag, the teacher can pause between sen-
tences, be precise with topics and focus, wait for a response, and prepare interpreters
252
and students. The interpreters can ask for repetitions and clarifications, inform the
teacher about strategies for adapting talk tempo, and be prepared before the interpreting
commences.
When it comes to bilingual support, the teacher can be sensitive about the need to explain
concepts and be interested in the interpretation process and the language differences.
The interpreter can inform about language differences, explain concepts and signs, and
discuss translation styles and sign choices with deaf students.
When it comes to visual accessibility, the teachers can facilitate placement of the students,
pause for visual processing, and sequence their teaching practice. The interpreter can
time their mediation for visual processing. They can also discuss solutions for how to
organize the physical environment, and when processing breaks are needed throughout
the activity.
When it comes to g roup-work activities, the teachers can be sensitive to group size and
composition, and they can frame the turn-taking in question-answer activities. They
can also frame informal g roup-work situations which develop between the students
when they are working with a task and give instructions for when the students can talk
with one another and when they should work in silence. The interpreter could facilitate
signals for t urn-taking, inform students if they missed rendering talk due to overlap or
unclear turn-taking, and inform the class about the importance of adapting their talk
and seating arrangements.
When it comes to the social learning environment, the teachers must be aware of their role
as a model for the class and their attitude when it comes to preserving diversity and
inclusion for all students. One solution can be to inform the class so that they have
knowledge about how to handle the different language cultures. The teaching must also
be differentiated so all students can experience learning. The interpreter can assist peer
interaction with natural behavior and small talk and inform teachers and the class about
how to adapt their speech in interpreted-mediated communication.
Related topics for further research and reading

The Norwegian research presented in this chapter confirms what has been shown in ear-
lier studies conducted in other countries: In general, the quality of interpreting is a joint
responsibility between all participants (Ozolins and Hale 2009). In educational settings,
teachers and interpreters can have shared responsibility for some tasks, while others may best
be solved by one of the parties (Berge 2016). Inclusion requires a development of the school
culture, and also that the staff take individual responsibility for adapting their own practice
(U NESCO 1994). School leaders must put inclusion on the agenda and ensure that teachers
have the will, knowledge, and resources to follow the overriding guidelines for inclusion.
Bearing this in mind, teachers in mainstream classes must be aware of their responsibility
as ‘the new deaf teachers’ (Berge and Kermit 2018). Historically, the position of the teacher
of the deaf was within specialized educational institutions, where the spatial environment
was adapted for visual communication, the team of teachers was trained, and they could
speak directly with their students. This is not today’s situation. The shift toward inclusive
education has created a situation where general teachers have become the new teachers
of the deaf, meaning that they may not know how to optimize their bilingual teaching
or establish an interpreter friendly language practice. This can create situations where the
learning opportunities for sign-language students are reduced compared to their classmates.
An important theme in future research is how to educate mainstream teachers so they can
253
recognize their responsibility for teaching all students and act as collaborative partners with
the interpreters working in their class.
Judging from current research on interpreted-mediated education, it appears that in-
terpreters do not have w ell-established professional practices of collaborating closely with
students and teachers. Rather it may appear that they expect that teachers should assume the
total responsibility for establishing an inclusive teaching practice (Kermit and Berge 2018).
However, in the interpreting field, there is a certain degree of openness for a change in atti-
tudes and practices. Several researchers have for instance highlighted roles and responsibili-
ties of educational interpreters in relation to satisfying the actual conditions in the classroom
and the overall goal of inclusion (A ntia and Kreimeyer 2001; Harrington and Turner 2001;
Seal 2004; Thoutenhoofd 2005; Russel and Winston 2014; Berge 2016; Ringsø and Agerup
2018). An important theme in future research is to gain more insight in how different teach-
ers and interpreters share the responsibility for facilitating inclusion in school settings where
sign-language interpreting is provided.
It takes time to adjust practices, to share professional wisdom, and to explore possible
solutions. To ensure collaboration between teachers and interpreters, the school leaders must
give them resources to meet outside the teaching hours. Teachers and interpreters need to
establish arenas where they can meet as equal partners. Up to now, it seems that teachers
and interpreters have had an asymmetric relationship. Cooperation has mainly involved the
teacher informing the interpreter about the topic and terms of the day. Of course, this kind
of preparation improves the language interpretation, but as this chapter has shown, several
other areas also need to be addressed when it comes to how they can work together to adapt
the teaching and interpreting practice.
In a larger societal perspective, Dean and Pollard (2011: 158) find that sign-language in-
terpretation services are about ‘doing good’ in the sense of contributing to greater equality
between deaf and hearing participants. One way of ‘doing good’ might be to establish new
practices for co-working between interpreters and students. From earlier studies we know
that the interpreting practice needs to be in balance: On the one hand, the autonomy of deaf
students must not be restricted by the interpreters working in school. On the other, deaf
students must not be prevented from experiencing academic and social inclusion because the
teacher and the interpreter are unable to figure out how to collaborate. The need for and
wish to have access to interpreters’ professional knowledge obviously differ from one student
to the next due to their different backgrounds, education level, and personal preferences.
Moreover, student diversity is becoming more and more complex in terms of cultural back-
grounds, use of technical hearing-aid solutions, language contact, and choices of education
programs. For further insight, several researchers can explore this diversity and help us to
better understand what deaf and hearing students think could help to establish academic and
social inclusion.
Further reading
Linell, Per (2009) Rethinking Language, Mind, and World Dialogically: Interactional and Contextual Theories
of Human Sense-Making. Charlotte, NC, Information Age Publishing.
Vygotsky, Lev S. (1978) Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes. Cambridge,
MA, Harvard University Press.
Both Linell and Vygotsky offer knowledge on basic structures of language, languaging, learning, and human
interaction. They can help to establish a common theoretical platform for interpreters and teachers, which may
help them to focus on their professional practice.
254
Marschark, Marc, Sapere, Patricia, Convertino, Carol, and Seewagen, Rosemarie (2005) “Educational
interpreting: Access and outcomes”, in Sign Language Interpreting and Interpreter Education: Directions
for Research and Practice, Marc Marschark, Rico Peterson and Elizabeth A. Winston (eds). New
York, Oxford University Press: 57–85.
This chapter addresses sign-language interpreting and the need to adapt interpreter-mediated education to
ensure that deaf students actually have access to education and learning.
Smith, Melissa Beth (2013) More Than Meets the Eye: Revealing the Complexities of an Interpreted Education.
Washington, DC, Gallaudet University Press.
This work provides knowledge on how educational interpreters get involved and take responsibility for four
tasks: visual accessibility, promoting language and learning, cultivating opportunities for social and academic
participation, and establishing inclusive learning environments. It promotes discussions on division of responsi-
bility and addresses the assumption that educational interpreters should only act as invisible actors.
Related chapters
Chapter 2, The ambiguity of interpreting: ethnographic interviews with public service interpreters by Kristina
Gustafsson
Chapter 17, Training sign language interpreters for public service interpreting by Christopher A. Stone, Cyn-
thia B. Roy and Jeremy L. Brunson
Chapter 23, Interprofessional education … interpreter education: in or and? Taking stock and moving forward,
by Demi Kristallidou
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257
PART 3
Training and professionalization

16
‘INTERPRETER’S MISTAKE’
Why should other professions care about the
professionalization of interpreters?
Hanne Skaaden
Introduction
Interpreters’ professionalization in the community or public service setting lags behind
other occupational groups (M ikkelson 1996; Wadensjö 1998, 2007; Hale 2007, 2008;
Ozolins 2010; Prunč 2012; Grbić 2015; Tipton and Furmanek 2016; Cirillo and Nie-
mants 2017; Gentile 2017). As a result, high status professionals of medicine and law, in
encounters where they face a language barrier in communication with their patients or
clients, are served by lay persons of interpreting (Skaaden 2018, 2020). In the light of
a general model of professionalization, this chapter revisits some central concepts and
conf licts associated with the interpreter function as performed in institutional encounters.
That is, encounters where ‘one person who represents an institution encounters another
person seeking its services’ (A gar 1985: 147). Interpreting in institutional encounters as
def ined here entails encounters between doctors or lawyers and their patients or clients
also in the realm of these occupations’ private practices, where they still represent the
‘institution’ of their respective professions. In other words, the concern is interpreting
as practiced in the community or public service setting. The term community inter-
preting was coined in the process of professionalizing courtroom interpreters. Thus,
courtroom interpreters used the label to distance themselves from colleagues working
in other settings, as had the conference interpreters done before them, Mikkelson (1996:
126) notes. With setting, in the sense of arena or scene of performance, as the basic cri-
terion of categorization, the three concepts ‘conference’, ‘courtroom’ and ‘community’
interpreting soon came to signify a status hierarchy in interpreting. Today, the labels
‘legal interpreting’ and ‘medical interpreting’ appear as remnants of this hierarchy, al-
though they essentially refer to the same core a ctivity – at least when ‘legal’ interpret-
ing is performed outside the courtroom itself, as it typically is, in asylum and police
interviews or the social services. At the same time, an impression is often created that
interpreting in the community equals ‘d ialogue interpreting’ (see for instance, Tipton
and Furmanek 2016). Although the interpreter’s presence at the table with the parties
is common in institutional encounters, the f ace-to-face mode is not inextricably linked
to setting, nor is the basic method of short sequence consecutive interpreting in both
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-20 261

Hanne Skaaden
language directions. The mode may also occur in the conference and courtroom set-
tings (A lexieva 2002: 220). In line with the European tradition, I shall henceforth use
the term public service interpreting (P SI) instead of ‘community interpreting’. Following
Wadensjö (2 007: 1), PSI here encompasses ‘interpreting performed in legal, health and
social service settings’.
Fragmentation, as illustrated by the field’s multitude of labels, is but one of the factors
hampering interpreters’ professionalization. PSI is still ‘often used in juxtaposition to the
more prestigious conference interpreting’, as Pöllbauer (2013: 5) notes. Despite its low sta-
tus within the interpreter professions’ internal hierarchy, the interpreting of institutional
dialogues is in many ways the most complex form of interpreting, due to the relational and
interactional factors that influence the interpreter’s work conditions in this arena of perfor-
mance as demonstrated by Wadensjö’s (1998) seminal work. Concurrently, the PSI setting is
characterized by its encounters’ sensitive topics, strict confidentiality and interpreters work-
ing a lone – factors
that make quality control difficult compared to the conference and court-
room settings (Gentile 1997: 113). In concert, these factors have an impact on the process of
professionalization and add to conflict (Skaaden 2020: 190–91). Interestingly, PSI is also the
setting where the ‘code of ethics’ and concepts of ‘accuracy’, ‘agency’ and ‘role’ are mostly
debated. What is the core of the conflict(s) and how does conflict and fragmentation impact
the process of professionalization?
Some epistemological preliminaries

Interpreting is one of man’s most complex cognitive activities. The activity rests on the mas-
tery of multiple cognitive skills, with the practitioners’ functional bilingualism at its core
(Gile 2009). When performed face-to-face with the practitioner operating in both language
directions in the short sequence consecutive mode, as is often the case in PSI, a range of
interactional skills, including contextual comprehension and relational-situational aware-
ness, are also required (Wadensjö 1998). Epistemic insights into the activity require cross-
d isciplinary perspectives that involve several research strands within linguistics, psychology,
sociology and translation theory as well as law – to mention a few (Skaaden 2020: 186). Any
approach to the field’s epistemic questions must necessarily be eclectic. The following is no
exception. Drawing on attempts to explore the activity from the angle of socio-theoretical
models, I examine factors that influence the process of professionalization in PSI. The aim is
to discuss some of the field’s conflicts and concepts in the light of a general model of profes-
sionalization. In doing so, I shall pay attention to concepts such as accuracy and agency, as well
as role and the exercise of discretion in professional practice.
By applying a general model of the process of professionalization, the aim is to
demonstrate that the field’s conflicts over its core ethics and occupational role pertain
to the extension of the interpreters’ domain for the exercise of discretion. Second, identifi-
cation of the interpreters’ clients in institutional encounters and the interpreters’ double
allegiance to speaker and listener reveals the importance of setting clear boundaries for
the interpreters’ agency. Third, it is displayed that interpreting, although fulfilling the
performative aspect of professionalization, falls short in realizing the organizational as-
pect. That is, the license and mandate in the form of education that secures society with
quality services of a specialized kind, thus, establishes professional trust (G rimen 2008a:
199). Finally, due to the interrelations between education, practice and research, the sit-
uation affects the professional integrity of those in charge of the institutional encounter
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The professionalization of interpreters
and even has repercussions for interpreting research and the building of the profession’s
knowledge base.
A premise in the following is that a model of the professionalization of PSI must take
into consideration both the m icro-and m acro-levels of the activity and accordingly include
the interpreter’s discursive role as well as societal role. That is the interpreters’ rendering
as well as their coordinating the dialogue at the discursive level – and, at the societal level,
the enabling of communication across linguistic barriers, thus, the clients’ duties and rights.
With a holistic vantage point, the aim is to address the following questions: What may hin-
der the process of professionalization in PSI? What is at the core of the conflicts? What are
the implications for the clients, for interpreting research and the field’s development of its
knowledge base?
Professionalization – literary overview

Interpreting is an old craft that has been practiced since ancient times (Morris 2008: 35).
Yet, PSI is typically characterized as ‘a young occupation’ (Gentile 2017: 63). Models within
sociology depict ‘professionalization’ from different angles and identify a number of the
process’ characteristics. In her analysis of ‘profession’ in the Routledge Encyclopedia of Inter-
preting Studies, Grbić (2015: 322) points to the concept’s function as a ‘central heuristic tool
to explain the social position or development of occupational groups’, on the one hand,
and its use in a ‘descriptive as well as moral and evaluative sense’, on the other. Moreover,
‘profession’ and ‘professionalization’ involve phenomena that are in themselves difficult to
grasp with precision, for instance, phenomena such as trust and quality in performance, Grbić
(2015: 326) recognizes. Notions of trust and quality relate to ethics and education which serve
to establish professional trust Grimen (2008a: 197–99) explains, with reference to education’s
role in professionalization in general. A profession’s code of ethics includes reflections of
its moral and informs the professionals’ clients what to expect when seeking their services
(Grimen 2008b: 144). The clients’ trust in turn depends on their experiences aligning with
their expectations.
Interestingly, a major conflict in PSI concerns the profession’s core ethics. An association
between ‘profession’ and ‘ethics’ in interpreting is further found in the field’s debate over
the interpreter’s ‘role’ whereby the values of the interpreter’s ethics are questioned (for a
summary of some major lines of conflict see Hale (2007, 2008), Pöchhacker (2008), Skaaden
(2020: 161–65) and Critical issues and topics). Analysing the field’s confusion over professional
ethics and occupational role, Hale (2007: 42–43, see Hale 2008: 108) identifies two opposing
poles. On the one pole, the interpreter is seen as a ‘faithful renderer of the original utter-
ances’ and, on the other, as a ‘mediator of culture’ and an ‘“advocate” for the powerless (or
powerful)’ whereby ‘the interpreter is involved in deciding on the content of the utterances
(that is, what to interpret and what to omit)’ (Hale 2007: 42–43). To settle the debate, some
authors suggest ‘role fluidity’, whereby the interpreter’s role extension may vary depending
on the situation (for instance, Tipton and Furmanek 2016: 10). However, an extensively
defined or fluctuating professional role may cause problems with establishing professional
trust for interpreters, as their clients will not know what to expect. This topic will be further
discussed in Critical issues and topics.
The f ield’s fragmentation is ref lected even in the profession’s knowledge base. Until
the turn of the t wenty-f irst century, ‘I nterpreting Studies almost exclusively focused on
simultaneous interpretation and, thus, implicitly on Conference Interpreting’, Prunč
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Hanne Skaaden
(2 012: 3) notices. In part, this situation has to do with the profession’s internal hierar-
chy, and what was def ined as ‘worthy’ of the researchers’ attention. Around the time
that PSI started gaining recognition as a f ield of research, the researchers’ focus also
shifted from cognition to interaction (M ikkelson 1996; Wadensjö 1998; Pöchhacker
2008). PSI has since developed into a productive f ield of research (e.g., Kainz, Prunč
and Schlöger 2011; Vargas Urpi 2012; Tipton and Furmanek 2016; V alero-Garcés and
Tipton 2017), paying attention particularly to the interactional aspect. However, the
divide remains along the lines identif ied by Hale (2 007, 2008). Furthermore, PSI’s lack
of education has bearing on its knowledge base (Cirillo and Niemants 2017: 2; Skaaden
2020: 187–8 8).
Different models of professionalization are applied in analyses of the activity of inter-
preting. Inghilleri (2 005a, [2005b] 2014) in her analysis of interpreted asylum interviews
applies Bourdieu’s (1977) ‘theory of practice’, wherein (somewhat simplified) an activity
relates to a ‘field’ in social space where individuals interact in negotiating material and
symbolic goods and power according to a certain ‘h abitus’ that is based on their expecta-
tions consistent with their previous experiences. (O n Bourdieu’s model and PSI, see also
Valero-Garcés and Gauthier 2010.) Within Bourdieu’s framework, Inghilleri ([2005b]
2014) finds that the activity of public service interpreters occupies ‘a zone of uncertainty’.
Such zones in social space occur ‘where problematic gaps emerge between individual
expectations and actual experience’ (ibid. 3). Referring to a m acro-level of interaction
or experience, Inghilleri ([2005b] 2014: 1 3–14) concludes that ‘interpreters and the in-
terpreting profession must emerge from their position of uncertainty in the wider social
order’. Accordingly, she suggests that members of the interpreter profession in order to
obtain ‘a more stable interpreting habitus’ must come to agreement with respect to “who
they are”’ (loc cit.).
Also exploring asylum interviews, Tipton’s (2 008) interest is placed at the m icro-
level of interaction. Drawing on Giddens’ (1984) notion of ‘r eflexive conduct’ whereby
we, as knowledgeable agents in human interaction, constantly monitor self and others,
Tipton (2 008: 4) observes that the ‘authentic’ voice of the interlocutors is often obscured
in i nterpreter-mediated interaction. Accordingly, reflexivity is ‘t runcated’ thus limiting
each interlocutor’s ability to act as ‘a reflexive agent’, Tipton (2 008: 14) finds and sug-
gests that in compensation the interpreter should act as ‘k nowledgeable cultural agent’.
A general model of the process of professionalization as described by a group of
Scandinavian sociologists (G rimen 2008a, 2008b, 2008c; Grimen and Molander 2008,
Molander and Terum 2008, henceforth, ‘the Scandinavian model’) allows for a m eta-
v iew on some of the aspects hampering the process of professionalization in PSI. The
Scandinavian model sees ‘professionalization’ as a process that integrates a performa-
tive and an organizational aspect. The performative aspect depicts ‘“practice” in the
sense of professional activity’ and describes the ‘professional’ as (1) offering a service
(2) for clients who depend upon the professional’s specialized skills (3) to solve a ‘how
to’ problem, by (4) applying specialized skills in unique situations that are difficult to
standardize. Hence, (5) the professional exercises discretion (Molander and Terum 2008:
18–20). The activity of interpreting fulfils the criteria of the performative aspect just
listed with good margin as displayed in Table 16.1. Hence, interpreting can be regarded
as professional practice.
Consequently, interpreters, like other professionals, exercise discretion. What differs is the
domain for which they are responsible – their area of expertise. Moreover, unique for the
interpreter profession is the fact that there are always two c lients – speaker and listener alike.
264
Table 16.1 The general and the interpreter-specific ways of exercising professional discretion (a fter
Skaaden 2020: 151a)
Professionals generally: Interpreters, more specifically:
1 offer a service offer a service by rendering someone else’s talk in

another language
2 for clients who depend upon the for clients, i.e., speaker and listener, who both
professional’s specialized skills depend on the interpreter’s specialized skills
3 to solve a ‘how to’ problem to solve their problem of how to communicate
(verbally)
4 by applying specialized skills in unique by applying specialized interpreting skills in
situations that are difficult to standardize unique situations that are difficult to standardize
5 Hence, professionals exercise professional Hence, interpreters exercise professional
discretion. discretion.
a
The analysis of the interpreters’ occupational function within this general model of
professionalization was first presented in Skaaden (2013) and since elaborated on (see Skaaden
2016, 2018, 2020).
This aspect places the interpreter in a position of double a llegiance – an aspect I return to in
the subsection on the interpreters’ clients.
In its essence, the Scandinavian model reaches back to the sociologist Talcott Parsons’
(1978) definition of a profession, stating that professions are ‘occupational groups that per-
form certain rather specialized functions for others (“laymen”) in the society on the basis of
h igh-level and specialized competence, with the attendant fiduciary responsibility’ (Parsons
1978: 40). An additional criterion according to Molander and Terum (2008: 18–20) is the ex-
istence of a codified knowledge base. This means that professionals in their exercise of discretion,
in addition to the guidelines found in their professional ethics, ‘apply a systemized amount of
knowledge to unique cases’ (Molander and Terum 2008: 19. My translation from Norwegian,
italics in original). Obviously, the building of a knowledge base is a process, and for PSI one
that has started only recently.
The professionalization of interpreting in the community or public service setting was
the topic of the Stockholm Critical Link in 2004. In her foreword to the conference
proceedings, Wadensjö (2 007: 2 –3) underlines that professionalization is a process that
depends on several factors. Wadensjö (2 007: 3) names three that are labelled by Parsons
(1968) of primary importance: First, according to the factor of ‘u niversalism’, the profes-
sional treats all clients equally. Second, according to the factor of ‘functional specificity’,
the professional carries out a specified task for the collective good and not (primarily)
for personal gain. Third, according to the factor of ‘achieved competence’, the profes-
sional gains competence through training or education and not through heritage. Parsons,
who fathered the sociology of professions through his studies of professionalization within
medicine, has later been criticized for his essentialist distinction between professions and
non-professions (for instance, Freidson 2001). Since Parsons’ time, sociology has further
characterized professionalization in terms of ‘struggles between conflicting interests of
groups and societies’, Wadensjö (2 007: 2 –3) notes. She points to conflicts within the inter-
preter profession, for instance, conflicting conceptualizations of the activity, conflicting
definitions of the occupational role and conflicts pertaining to the profession’s ethics and
its abovementioned internal hierarchy.
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Hanne Skaaden
In sum, based on his studies of the process within medicine and law, Parsons (1968,
1978) emphasized the significance of three factors for professionalization to take place:
the existence of (i) a clearly defined task, (ii) a set of ethical principles upon which there
is general consent, and (iii) organized education to guide the professionals in their ex-
ercise of discretion. The three interrelated factors are far from settled for the interpreter
profession. Nearing two decades after the Stockholm Critical Link, education for practi-
tioners of PSI is still underdeveloped (Cirillo and Niemants 2017; Valero-Garcés and Tip-
ton 2017; Pokorn, Viezzi and Felberg 2020). Moreover, issues pertaining to ‘functional
specificity’ and the interpreters’ occupational role as well as disputes of the value of the
profession’s code of ethics remain unresolved (H ale 2008; Tipton and Furmanek 2016;
Phelan et al. 2020).

In what follows, I show that the Scandinavian model offers a holistic view on the process of
professionalization for interpreters and allows the profession to address its critical issues and
topics in ways that clarify its ‘zone of uncertainty’: How does fragmentation and conflict
influence the process of professionalization and the interpreters’ clients? What are the conse-
quences for research and the building of the profession’s knowledge base?
Accuracy, agency and the exercise of discretion

A prevailing conflict within PSI pertains to the notion of accuracy in interpreting. The accu-
racy requirement touches the very core of the activity of interpreting, described as ‘a form of
Translation in which a first and final rendition in another language is produced on the basis
of a one-time presentation of an utterance in a source language’ (Pöchhacker 2004: 11) as the
interpreter ‘renders orally, and into another language, one person’s speech for other listeners
at the time the speech is made’ (Australia’s Committee on Overseas Professional Qualifications,
after Ozolins 1991: 39). In its interdependency with the impartiality requirement, the ac-
curacy principle forms the heart of the profession’s code of ethics. In fact, since professional
activity in general requires impartiality, the accuracy requirement stands out as the attribute
that most clearly distinguishes interpreting from other professional activities. At the same
time, impartiality can be said to have particular significance for interpreters due to their pro-
fessional function’s double allegiance to both speaker and listener (Skaaden 2018: 8 –10). (For
an overview of manifestations of the principles of accuracy and impartiality in interpreters’
codes of conduct, see Phelan et al. 2020: 93–98.)
Despite its central position in the profession’s moral, some authors question the value
of the accuracy principle (for discussions of the different positions, see Hale 2007, 2008;
Pöchhacker 2008). The objections are typically threefold, claiming that the accuracy
principle (i) rests on the outdated conduit metaphor of human language and communica-
tion thus designating the interpreter as ‘i nvisible’ or ‘m achine’, (i i) strips the interpreter
of agency, and (i ii) is prescriptive, that is, refers to normative rather than consequential eth-
ics (A ngelelli 2004: 2, 130; Tipton and Furmanek 2016: 11). In concert, the objections
lead to the claim that interpreters in accordance with their agency must act as ‘c ultural
mediators’ (A ngelelli 2004: 129–33) or adopt ‘r ole fluidity’, whereby practitioners fluc-
tuate between ‘faithful renderer’ and ‘a dvocate’ or ‘co-diagnostician’ (Tipton and Fur-
manek 2016: 129; 136).
266
Today it is commonly acknowledged that linguistic meaning is context dependent and

negotiated (Langacker 1994: 26). Interlocutors’ interactions with each other and with the
context are considered ‘resources in the meaning-making process’ (Linell 2009: 17). How
to understand ‘accuracy’ within this dialogical view of language is addressed and demon-
strated in Wadensjö’s (1998) model of interpreted dialogues. Hale (2007, 2008), who argues
in favour of the faithful renderer, holds that the directly interpreted approach (accuracy in her
terminology) does not imply that the interpreter is stripped of agency. The question is rather
how to understand the interpreter’s agency, when ‘involved in deciding how to render most
accurately what the other two parties themselves have chosen to communicate to each other’
(Hale 2007: 42–43). Moreover, while the accuracy principle is typically labelled prescrip-
tive by its opponents, they seldom discuss ethical consequences of cultural mediation, Hale
(2008: 101) notes. One way or the other, professional ethics cannot avoid being prescriptive,
Hale (2008: 101) observes. Hale’s observation mirrors the stance in the sociology of profes-
sions that codes of ethics serve to guide practitioners’ actions according to their profession’s
moral (Grimen 2008b: 1 44–48).
The Scandinavian model of professionalization offers an understanding of accuracy and
agency in interpreting in terms of the exercise of discretion (Skaaden 2016). In professional
practice, discretionary powers come into play because the norms of action cannot cover
every detail of the situation at hand, Grimen and Molander (2008: 180) explain and refer to
Dworkin’s (1978: 31) description of discretion as ‘a n area left open by a surrounding belt of
restrictions’. Professional activity is therefore characterized by a degree of indeterminacy. In
fact, indeterminacy is essential to the mere existence of professions:
Without decision-making, in situations with a certain degree of indeterminacy – and

the exercise of discretion in the execution of t asks – there would hardly be any basis for
a profession to lay claim to the legitimate control over certain work tasks. In the absence
of indeterminacy, the tasks could be carried out more or less mechanically. It would
then make no difference really who carried them out (Grimen and Molander 2008: 179,
my translation from Norwegian).
It follows from the necessary exercise of discretion that all professional activity is in its
nature fallible (Grimen and Molander 2008: 188; Molander and Terum 2008: 20). At this
point, the interpreters’ profession is not different in principle from those professions they
serve. What differs is the domain over which they exercise discretion. In line with the
general nature of professional ethics, the accuracy principle provides guidelines for the
practitioners’ exercise of discretion in real life situations and delineates the extension of
their domain of expertise.
The idea that the accuracy principle entails room for the exercise of discretion is not new.
In fact, Cicero depicted the exercise of discretion, when stating that the translator should not
‘count’ the words but rather ‘weigh them out’ to the reader (Venuti 2000: 23 after Jerome).
It goes without saying that reaching accuracy is challenging for interpreters, who have only
split seconds to weigh out their renditions.
Exercise of discretion in general concerns the professionals’ ability to discern between a
‘good’ and ‘bad’ solution to a problem that occurs within their area of expertise (Grimen
and Molander 2008: 180). A short dialogue between prosecutor (speaking Norwegian) and
witness (speaking Bosnian) serves to illustrate the interpreters’ exercise of discretion:
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Hanne Skaaden
1 Prosecutor: Hadde du et kallenavn? – hadde du et kallenavn? (d id you have a nick-

name? – did you have a nickname?)
2 Interpreter: Jeste li Vi imali kakav nadimak? (d id[-Polite] you[-Polite] have[-Polite]
some kind of nickname?)
3 Witness: Dada
4 Interpreter (to the court): Ja, ja (Yeah, yeah)
5 Interpreter (to the witness): Dada?
6 Witness (confirming): mhm
7 Interpreter (to the court): Dada. Tolkens feil, Dada (Dada. Interpreter’s mistake. Dada)
(f rom Skaaden 2018: 7)
The brief dialogue gives a glimpse into the judgements that interpreters must make when-
ever indeterminacy presents itself within the realm of linguistic convention. Here, a problem
occurs when the witness’ nickname, Dada, in line 3 coincides phonetically with a more fre-
quent unit in the source language convention [da:da] (meaning ‘yes, yes’). The interpreter first
discerns the latter option as the witness’ response. Since the highly frequent unit is also a logical
answer (expressing agreement) to the prosecutor’s question ‘Did you have a nickname?’ (lines
1–2), the interpreter’s initial response (line 4) is understandable. The coincidental homonymy is
difficult to anticipate. The interpreter’s swift realization of the alternative option reveals to the
observer the interpreter’s exercise of discretion. Medical and legal professionals must exercise
discretion because the material of their work (symptoms and evidence, respectively) is often
ambiguous. The Dada example illustrates how the material handled by the interpreter – oral
utterances situated in a specific c ontext – is also characterized by indeterminacy. The brief ex-
change, including the interpreters backtracking and repair, shows how interpreters apply their
agency to exercise discretion within a narrow, yet extremely complex, domain.
Obviously, the interpreter is neither a ‘m achine’ nor ‘invisible’, although these metaphors
were originally introduced to signify the accuracy principle as a token of the interpreters’
area of expertise in the early phases of sign language interpreters’ professionalization. The
aim was to rid the occupation of the image of ‘helper’ for the deaf person (Roy 2002:
349). Analysing the concept of cultural mediation, Pöchhacker (2008: 19–24) observes that
‘mediation’ has a dual meaning and may in some languages imply intervention in a con-
ciliatory sense. Mediation’s conciliatory meaning expands the interpreter’s power domain
towards ‘helper’ in ways that may restrict the clients’ voice and integrity, however (Skaaden
2018). Assigning the task of ‘cultural mediation’ to the interpreter augments the problem, Fel-
berg and Skaaden (2012) observe, as ‘culture’ is in itself an extremely complex phenomenon,
harbouring diverse aspects such as age, class, gender, professional, religious and regional af-
filiation. The observation is in line with Inghilleri’s ([2005b] 2014: 9) that cultural mediation
results in a ‘cultural conduit’, with ‘the interpreter as the channel that enables the two sides
to discursively “connect”’. In sum, the cultural conduit is as problematic as the language
conduit. The notion of accuracy in rendition is indeed difficult to define – and live up to.
However, cultural mediation raises serious ethical issues as well. This aspect becomes evi-
dent when in the next paragraphs I shall further delineate the extension of the interpreter’s
domain for the exercise of discretion and identify the interpreters’ clients.
Agency, ethics and role

In interpreting, professional ethics are often linked to the multifaceted concept of ‘role’. On
the one hand, role pertains to an occupational function and, on the other, to a ‘part’ (in a play)
268
defining an agent’s participation status on the ‘stage’ of the dialogue. The distinction, made
by Erving Goffman (1974: 128–29), is emphasized by Wadensjö (1998: 86) in her analyses
of interpreters’ coordinating strategies. Unfortunately, the distinction is often overlooked
when promoters of cultural mediation refer to Wadensjö’s model in defence of an extended
occupational role (Skaaden 2020: 169). The two meanings of ‘role’ may relate to Inghilleri’s
([2005b]2014: 5) distinction between m acro-and micro orderings of experience, wherein
the ‘interpreting habitus is thus, like habitus more generally, by its very nature, contingent
upon macro and micro orderings of experience’ and depends on the agents’ positioning, in-
cluding ‘the positioning of the interpreter within the interpreted event’ (ibid. 13).
Wadensjö’s (1998) model of the interpreted dialogue is first and foremost concerned with
the interpreters’ display of agency on the m icro-level of ordering, that is role in the sense of
‘part’ within the micro cosmos of the dialogue. Performed at this m icro-level the interpreter’s
agency involves both the rendering and coordinating of other speakers’ talk, Wadensjö explains:
As a matter of fact, these aspects condition each other. Seen like this, it is not an empir-
ical question whether interpreters are translators or m ediators – they
cannot avoid being
both. However, the coordinating and the translating functions are foregrounded at par-
ticular moments, sometimes supporting, and sometimes disturbing one another. The
two aspects of interpreting – translation and coordination – are in practice inseparable,
but it is possible and indeed fruitful theoretically to distinguish between them and use
them as analytical concepts (Wadensjö 1998: 106).
Coordination is necessitated by the fact that interpreted dialogues differ in structure from
‘normal’ dialogues (Goffman 1974: 224). The interpreter’s coordinating becomes necessary
because the ‘g lue’ of dialogues, normally manifested through subtle feedback signals, such
as gaze, sighs, hand or body movements, has altered effect in interpreted discourse. Thus,
coordinating refers to the interpreters’ positioning of the professional self within the context
(or ‘field’) of the dialogue, including strategies for t urn-taking, pronoun choice and requests
for clarification. As witnessed in the above example (lines 2, 5 and 7, respectively), the in-
terpreter’s coordinating strategies are both implicit and explicit. Managing the coordination
and rendering of the interlocutors’ utterances refer to the interpreters’ ‘rather specialized
functions’ that they as professionals ‘perform for others (laymen)’, their clients, as Parsons
(1978) defined professional activity in the above quote. These strategies should receive atten-
tion in education as well as research.
Laymen interpreters typically fail to position themselves within the m icro-level of the
dialogue, for instance, by lacking awareness of pronoun choice (Bot 2005: 181). A result of
failed coordination may be the ‘fragmentation of reflexive conduct’ whereby the interloc-
utors while waiting to speak during the interpreter’s rendition ‘a re linguistically debarred
from following the conversation’, Tipton (2008: 11) notes in her observed asylum interviews.
Drawing on Giddens’ notion of interlocutors as ‘k nowledgeable agents’, Tipton labels the in-
terpreter a ‘k nowledgeable cultural agent’. The suggestion hinges the complexity of ‘culture’
mentioned above, as the approach turns the interpreter into a potentially omnipotent agent,
a cultural conduit.
Giddens’ proposal (1984: 9) offers possibility to restrict agency, however, by emphasiz-
ing that ‘structural constraints’ may limit a knowledgeable agent’s capacity to act. What
may limit the interpreters’ agency is their occupational function as expressed by the pro-
fession’s moral. Moreover, their bilingual and interactional skills as well as interpreting
strategies may limit or enable them to remain within their area of expertise, so as ‘to
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Hanne Skaaden
promote primary interlocutors’ continued focused interaction’, as Wadensjö (1998: 274)

describes the aim of the interpreters’ coordinating actions. It follows that practitioners of
PSI, like other professionals, must learn through education various strategies to handle
their area of expertise.
In sum, having established that interpreters’ agency entails the rendering and coordinating
of other’s talk at the m icro-level of the dialogue, what follows is a delineation of their occu-
pational role or societal function. The delineation of the interpreters’ societal function at the
m acro-level of ordering includes a conceptualization of the interpreters’ clients.
The interpreters’ clients, occupational role and double allegiance

The Scandinavian model of professionalization draws attention to the clients, that is, those
dependent on the professional’s services (Molander and Terum 2008: 19). As established
above, what is specific for the professional activity of interpreters is that they constantly serve
two clients, speaker and listener alike, who equally depend on the interpreter’s specialized
skills to solve their mutual how to problem of communicating verbally. This results in the
occupational function’s double allegiance and implies the practitioners’ impartiality.
The inherent need to continuously serve clients on both sides should impact the delin-
eation of the interpreters’ occupational role or societal function. Nevertheless, a tendency to
see the speaker of the minority language as the sole party in need of interpreting is deeply
rooted in society and appears even in academic texts in the way PSI is defined as ‘t ranslating
done for refugees and immigrants’ (Venuti 2000: 500, emphasis added) or as necessitated ‘when
patients need an interpreter’ (Tipton and Furmanek 2016: 113, emphasis added). Such ex-
amples are multiple, and those quoted are just illustrations of a general trend. Moreover, in
cases of language barrier, professionals in need of interpreting to carry out their own job
tend to ascribe ownership of the problem of communication to the speaker of the minority
language and ‘their culture’ (Felberg and Skaaden 2012). The tendency is widespread, as
Prunč observes:
It is an exception to the rule when people acknowledge that smooth communication

in dealing with public authorities (for instance, in matters concerning the law, health
and safety or education) is not only in the interest of the client speaking the “other”
language, but also in the interest of the institutions themselves. It is a fact that inade-
quate and deficient communication primarily harms the efficiency of the institutions
concerned ( Prunč 2012: 3).
The attitude that only the minority speaker needs interpreting opens for the cultural media-
tor to represent ‘them’ who are different from ‘us’. If not emanating from it, the perspective
certainly results in stereotyping: ‘the process by which all members of a group are asserted
to have the characteristics attributed to the whole group’ (Scollon and Scollon 2001: 168).
Thus, preventing the individual to be heard and seen. Using culture as an explanatory tool
in contact between individuals may result in what the philosopher Emmanuel Lévinas la-
belled othering, a division between ‘us’ and ‘them’, that reduces ‘them’ into ‘a categorically
abstract otherness’ (Finkielkraut [1984] 1997, x iv–xv) and subsequent exclusion in the form
of discrimination.
The image of cultural mediator is enthusiastically seized by some practitioners of PSI,
possibly because a more productive societal function may seem to enhance their professional
status, Inghilleri ([2005b]2014: 13) observes. ‘Configurations of the interpreting habitus that
270
establish interpreters as “interactionally equal” participants, though they may empower in-
terpreters professionally, do not guarantee that applicants’ claims for political asylum will be
more adequately or justly represented’, she (ibid. 13) concludes, however.
The fact that in institutional encounters the interpreters’ clients on one side of the table
themselves fulfil a professional function limits the interpreters’ occupational role. From this
perspective, an additional problem arises for the cultural mediator: an extended role allows
the interpreter agency to act in ways that may undermine the professional integrity of the
medical or legal workers in charge and infringe on their domain for the exercise of discre-
tion (Skaaden 2018: 11–12). In defining the societal function of interpreters in institutional
encounters, Norwegian authorities accordingly emphasize that PSI ‘enables professionals
and officials to inform, guide and hear the parties in the case of language barrier’ (NOU
2014: 18, author’s translation from Norwegian). In line with legal and professional standards,
the definition assigns the responsibility to communicate with their patients and clients to
the professional in charge of the institutional encounter. It follows that when doctors and
lawyers allow for lay persons of interpreting to handle their communication, they risk their
own professional integrity and the opportunity to exercise discretion within their own area
of expertise.
In democracy, where duties and rights are acknowledged as two sides of the same coin,
an attitude ‘that people in the country speaking another language – foreigners, immigrants
and asylum seekers – are themselves responsible for communicating successfully with the
authorities’ (Prunč 2012: 3) implies violation of basic human rights (Viezzi 2015: 512). Yet,
economic crisis and ruling populistic ideologies may set the latter principles under attack
even in countries like the Netherlands and the UK (Gentile 2017: 63). Obviously, the trend
has implications not only for the interpreter profession, but also for the professions they
serve in institutional encounters. In sum, awareness should be raised among occupational
groups in charge of institutional encounters about the language barrier’s impact on their
own exercise of discretion and professional integrity. At the same time, the realization that
interpreters engage in a fallible activity through the exercise of discretion exposes the need
for interpreter education.
Education, professionalization and trust

Generally, clients trust professionals with their how-to-problems because professionals are
bound by their occupational ethics and standards to act in certain ways. As clients and pa-
tients, we expect professionals to perform in accordance with such standards. Professional
trust is based on license and mandate that attest to the practitioners’ knowledge and special-
ized skills to carry out specific tasks according to certain standards (Grimen 2008a: 197).
License and mandate are necessary to secure society with high quality services of a specific
kind and pertain to professionalization’s organizational aspect (Grimen 2008b: 147). For
most professions, such license and mandate equal education of some duration. Education is,
thus, the basis for building professional trust (Grimen 2008a: 203).
Few countries have hitherto established interpreter education that meets with society’s
communication needs in PSI (see for instance D’Hayer 2012; Giambruno 2014; Valero-
Garcés 2019; Pokorn, Viezzi and Felberg 2020). Within the interpreter profession’s hierarchy
of settings, PSI earns the lowest status with little training among practitioners (Pöchhacker
2004: 30), and university training programs ‘are underrepresented’ (Pöllabauer 2013: 5).
An analysis of the factors, external and internal that contribute to the educational situation
for PSI falls outside the scope of this chapter (but see for instance, Ozolins 2010; Kainz,
271
Hanne Skaaden
Prunč and Schlöger 2011; Cirillo and Niemants 2017; Sagli and Skaaden, this volume). On
a general note, it is worth observing that extensive and fluid delineations of the interpreters’
occupational role add difficulties to the development of functional interpreter education.
If the interpreter is to act as advocate or co-diagnostician, interpreter education must in
theory – and p ractice – prepare
the students to perform as knowledgeable agents within the
cultures of all professions they may serve in their future practice. Consequently, interpreter
education will become very expensive and lengthy.
Fragmentation of the profession is an obstacle to professionalization and certainly to
establishing education. Following Inghilleri ([2005b] 2014: 5), the profession’s members
must establish ‘a more stable interpreting habitus’ that can ‘a llow all participants to operate
with a shared understanding regarding interpreting activity’. At the same time, Inghilleri
draws attention to the disruption of accustomed power relations caused by interpreting.
The circumstance, that the structure and reflexive conduct of interpreted events differ from
non-interpreted institutional encounters, underscores the necessity to also educate the pro-
fessionals in charge of the institutional encounter on how to communicate via interpreters
(Felberg and Sagli, this volume, Skaaden 2017: 339).
To sum up, the field’s fragmentation serves to reiterate the shortage of educational oppor-
tunity for interpreters. In turn, lack of education has negative repercussions even for research
and the building of the profession’s knowledge base, as I shall argue next.
Developing the knowledge base: education – practice – research – education…

It follows from the Scandinavian model of professionalization that the process generally rests
on the interrelationship between education, practice and research (Grimen 2008c: 82–84).
The interrelationship has bearing on the formation of the profession’s knowledge base, in
that, ideally, research is exploring practice and feeds its results into education, whereupon the
educated practitioners adjust their practice, which is again subject to new research, feeding
into education in continuous development (Skaaden 2020: 185–88).
The interrelationship between practice, research and education draws attention to the
role of research in PSI (on this interrelationship, see also Hale 2007: 198). Evidently, the
lack of education becomes a problem for research as it risks documenting, reproducing
and reinforcing practices that have little to do with the activity of interpreting. The risk
is real so long as only few countries have established education for practitioners of PSI,
and most assignments are carried out by laypersons of interpreting. It follows that empir-
ical research risks creating the wrong image of what interpreting is all about when dis-
playing practitioners who have not undergone training or lack even the basic bilingual
skills to take on the task of an interpreter. In PSI research, even otherwise methodolog-
ically sound studies are based on practitioners of interpreting with little or no training.
Inghilleri (2005a: 143) suggests that Bourdieu’s ‘theory of practice’ with its ‘underlying
assumptions with respect to the production and reproduction of knowledge, captured in the
concepts of habitus, field, capital and illusion’ can provide ‘i mportant insights into what must
be involved in the construction and observation of the object of practice and research in the
field of translation and interpreting studies’. Bourdieu’s theory of practice was originally de-
signed to deconstruct the professional role of the researcher (primarily of anthropology), and
his conceptual framework presents a critique of the researchers’ relationship to their object of
study. In agreement with Inghilleri’s proposal, it is worth reconsidering the production and
reproduction of the knowledge base to which PSI researchers contribute when observing
laypersons of interpreting and letting such practice serve as model for future practitioners.
272
A virtue of empirical research is to describe ‘what is’ and not ‘what ought to be’ (Inghilleri
2005a: 142). Yet, the researcher’s findings are invalid if the object of study is ill defined. An
analogy with the medical profession serves to substantiate my point: One would not observe
lay persons performing surgery and subsequently let the findings model the future practice
of medicine.
To conclude, PSI research may gain from reconstructing its research habitus in order
to avoid (re)producing knowledge that may lead to unintended practices. With its shift
from cognition to interaction, interpreting studies seem to have lost sight of its core activ-
ity and the fact that the activity of interpreting is based on both cognition and interaction.
Wadensjö (1998: 106) emphasizes that ‘it is not an empirical question whether interpreters are
translators or mediators – they cannot avoid being both’. The profession’s knowledge base
must include the study of language as a sense-making activity in interaction, on the level of
micro ordering, as well as the activity of interpreting as societal function, on the level of macro
ordering. As argued here, expanding the interpreters’ occupational role into ‘advocate’ and
‘co-diagnostician’ has undesired implications for the macro ordering of societal functions.
Before the field of research on PSI concludes on the extension of the interpreter’s domain for
the exercise of discretion, the interpreters’ positioning and coordination within the micro
orderings of the interpreted event should be explored in more detail and fed back into prac-
tice through education before being subject to further future research.
Further reading
Cirillo, Letizia, and Natacha Niemants (eds) (2017) Teaching Dialogue Interpreting. Amsterdam, John
Benjamins Publishing Company.
The book presents research based contributions to interpreter education, thereby displaying various as-
pects of dialogue interpreting and the interpreters’ area of expertise, thus, their domain for the exercise of
discretion.
Molander, Anders, and Harald Grimen (2010) “Understanding professional discretion”, in Sociology
of Professions. Continental and Anglo-Saxon Traditions. Lennart G. Svensson and Julia Evetts (eds).
Gothenburg, Daidalos: 1 67–87.
The article explains the nature and structure of the ‘exercise of discretion’ in professional practice in general.
Phelan, Mary, Mette Rudvin, Hanne Skaaden. and Patrick Stefan Kermit (2020) Ethics in Public Service
Interpreting. London, Routledge.
The book discusses the difference between personal and professional ethics, explores the link between eth-
ics and professional development in interpreting and provides a theoretical basis for the field of PSI’s ethical
dilemmas.
Related chapters
hapter 1, General issues of PSI: Institutions, codes and norms, professionalization by Carmen Valero Garcés
C
Chapter 3, Agency in and for mediating in Public Service Interpreting by Claudio Baraldi
Mason
Gry Sagli
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17
TRAINING SIGN LANGUAGE
INTERPRETERS FOR PUBLIC
SERVICE INTERPRETING
Christopher A. Stone, Cynthia B. Roy and Jeremy L. Brunson
Introduction
There are similarities and differences between public service interpreting (PSI) for spoken
language users and for sign language users (de Meulder and Haualand 2019). Often, while
settled immigrant communities may become fluent in local/national languages, deaf peo-
ple may already be fluent but unable to hear the local/national language. Spoken language
communities’ rights to interpreters stem from linguistic access, whereas for deaf people in-
terpreter access is often granted due to disability laws (Mathers 2006; Brunson 2007; de
Meulder 2017). One of the consequences of this is that PSI typically includes social services,
legal, medical, but for sign language interpreters it also regularly includes primary, second-
ary, and tertiary education as well as interpreting in the workplace/workforce and enter-
tainment (for example, theatrical performances). Globally we see many, if not all, of these
settings are paid by the public purse, often with the provision of professional interpreters
as outlined in the UN convention on the rights of people with disabilities (CRPD) (Stone
2013) and in the US in the disability act (A DA) (Brunson 2011).
Historically sign language interpreting (SLI) is something that has been provided by
members of deaf communities with an early Western example being in British North Amer-
ica in the seventeenth century (Carty, Macready and Sayers 2009). Professionalisation has
only really happened in the twentieth century with systemic consequences, including the
institutionalisation of interpreter education. The breadth of PSI settings for SLI has meant
that typically those raised in the community by sign language using parents have become
interpreters and interpreter trainers with very little if any formal interpreter education or
interpreter educator education. Initially, these heritage users provided informal training in
many countries, via workshops and collective action. This training was often in response to
satisfying an assessment of being safe to practice so that interpreters can be listed on a direc-
tory or register and then be eligible to be paid.
As Deaf communities better engaged with governments, and sign language interpreters
professionalised, we started to see the evolution of short-term courses via Deaf associations
or, after the creation of interpreting associations, these developments in collaboration with
interpreters. These often then led to more formalised training within community colleges
or universities (depending on the local context) beginning with training programs as short
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-21 277

Christopher A. Stone et al.
as six weeks to one-year certificate programs, and culminating in BA programs and MA

programs (Napier 2009). In some countries this would mean generic interpreter education at
the BA level and specialist interpreter education (t ypically legal and health [including mental
health]) at the MA level, in other countries MA level programs still focus on several areas
and lead to full professional status as an interpreter (for example, in Australia and the UK).
However, the issue of interpreter educator training is still something that is not systemically
undertaken and often those becoming interpreter educators do so because they are experi-
enced interpreters and learn how to educate interpreters ‘on the job’ as noted by Erlenkamp
et al. (2014).

Let us now move onto the conceptualisation of the education of sign language interpreters.
In this section we will consider the need for teaching sign languages as part of interpreter ed-
ucation programs (I EPs), and recent moves to understand interpreting as a deliberate inten-
tional action. We will also consider shifts towards sociological considerations of interpreting
within the context of power and social justice.
Becoming fluent in sign languages to a professional level

A prominent issue faced by SLI educators is that sign languages tend to be lower status lan-
guages of limited diffusion. Although the increased popularity of sign languages has led to
increased program offerings at the junior college and university level, secondary schools have
only recently begun to offer sign language as part of the curricula (see Rosen 2015). How-
ever, this is still not the case throughout the globe. Because only some secondary schools are
providing sign language classes, programs at the p ost-secondary level accept students who
are not fluent in sign languages and thus much of the initial education consists of teaching
the language to occupational fluency before and/or alongside educating students to become
interpreters. In some countries the only way to receive advanced sign language teaching is
within IEPs and so some students come to class for reasons other than wanting to work as
interpreters post-g raduation.
Educational preparation
There has been an epistemological move in sign language interpreter education towards the
belief that the performance of interpreting should be the making of intentional, informed
choices when crafting an interpretation. To engage in this intentional activity requires stu-
dents to learn how the language communities will behave, be that linguistically, socially,
psychologically, historically, or cognitively (Roy, Brunson and Stone 2018). Experience tells
us that students should know the diverse sociolinguistic and cultural landscapes of the peo-
ple involved in interpreter-mediated interaction, and the impact of broader social forces on
everyone involved in an interpreter-mediated event.
Sign language interpreting preparation programs have long been conceptualised as train-
ing. In fact the naming convention for these programs, until recently, was Interpreter Train-
ing Programs or Interpreter Preparation Programs. Only recently do we see a change in this
nomenclature to IEPs. Training interpreters often implies a focus on technical skills such as
how to render a spoken word effectively at a phrasal or sentential level, without considering
the broader context within which the interpreter-mediated event is occurring. We suggest
278
Training sign language interpreters for PSI
that given that interpreting is a social phenomenon, embedded in social relations, education
is a more appropriate term as this not only focuses on the technical skills but also a more
comprehensive liberal education that better frames the work that PSIs undertake.
Furthermore, training can be understood as being completed when an interpreter gradu-
ates from a program, while completing an educational program implies the preparedness to
learn more. The change in nomenclature has included a move towards a discoursal and sys-
temic level of understanding of interpreter-mediated activity. Although there is conflation
between discourse as a linguistic phenomenon and discourse as a sociological phenomenon,
we would argue that interpreters need to engage in studies of both types of discourse and to
see their work within a sociohistorical context.
There are huge disparities in programs that could be a result of the lack of formal inter-
preter educator education. Many IEPs focus on (textual) equivalence (Wadensjö 1998), that
is, say exactly what they said, while a few programs focus on discourse and systemic-level de-
cisions. As mentioned above we are starting to see the further discussion of SLI PSI as being
part of systems and as such, the responsibilities placed on interpreters at a systemic level are
what we need to be mindful of when working as interpreters within public services. This
involves interpreters understanding that the interpretations they craft happen in a context
with real people and they need to be sensitive to the moments and systems in which they
find themselves.
Furthermore, research has examined the systemic instantiation of sign language inter-
preters’ PSI in video relay interpreting (Brunson 2011), health (Shaffer 2018), secondary
education (Brunson and Stone 2021), to date. These studies shone a light on these aspects of
social justice and suggest a need for interpreters to be much more aware of their agency when
working as interpreters; deaf people are often in an asymmetric power relationship with (
non-deaf ) service providers and the facilitation an interpreter can engage in for both parties
during an interpreter-mediated event moves beyond linguistic work.
SLI educators have been able to draw upon the literature of both spoken and sign lan-
guage IEPs, curricula, and initiatives (such as the MediSign or JustiSign projects funded by
the EU). This has meant that many programs around the world have robust role-models
when establishing programs. Should these programs be established in universities then the
universities often also have language programs and IEPs that enable c ross-fertilisation. How-
ever, Winston (2005) suggests that one of the disadvantages of programs being established
in universities is the lack of ensuring that sign language using deaf people are involved in all
aspects of the programs such that students are given appropriate r ole-modelling of linguistic
and cultural behaviours within the classroom environment. And so interpreter education
needs to ensure that the thought worlds, as in the attitudes, belief systems, assumptions of
both societal groups and individuals – the stakeholders, are included in the classroom in a
meaningful way.
Power, identity, and social justice

As noted above there has been a broadening of focus from that of language and meaning per
se to a focus that encompasses identity, power, social justice, politics, and more, and how this
is made manifest in language use. Some of these considerations fall in line with critical dis-
course analysis (Fairclough and Wodak 1997), some form larger sociological considerations
such as those discussed by Pöllabauer (2012) or Inghilleri (2012, 2003) who consider the
broader implications of interpreter-mediated activity and interpreter actions. These studies
amongst others show how systems are constructed, create expectations, and have normative
279
expectations of who the service user will be and the type of account they will give. There is
a need for interpreters in PSI to understand the questions being asked and the consequences
of the decisions made for those using interpreting services; this promotes a better under-
standing of the agency that interpreters can engage in and its limits. And for more elegant
interpreting decisions.
While these issues are important and necessary, some scholars (Pöchhacker 2016; Roy,
Brunson and Stone 2018) have suggested that the field of interpreting needs a broader con-
ceptualisation, that is, that there needs to be an integration of all of these foci to better rep-
resent interpreting from multiple perspectives and multiple levels of analysis. This drawing
together of multiple levels of analysis is perhaps the most critical issue facing interpreter
education worldwide. And it is rare to see multidisciplinary teams engaged in educating
interpreters.
As educators and curriculum designers, we rely on a conceptualisation of meaning as be-
ing created and determined m inute-by-minute within the participants’ exchange (Wadensjö
1998). This conceptualisation is essential for interpreting students to grasp and facilitate the
development of the threshold foundational interpreting skills of interaction and language
management. That said, we also suggest that a curriculum needs to include issues of so-
cial justice, identity politics, power relations, and more. Our aim must be that we devise a
curriculum that can educate students about the world in which they will be working upon
graduation.
Literature overview
Sign language interpreter education has suffered from a dearth of research into effective
educational strategies. As with the professionalisation of sign languages interpreters, there
has been a professionalisation of SLI educators which has had a commensurate impact on
curricula. Initially we saw those who worked as interpreters were those training other inter-
preters. Gradually we have seen courses develop to educate interpreter educators in teaching
and learning, and ‘andragogy’, that is, adult learning theory (K nowles, Holton and Swanson
2012), to ensure those educators could create appropriate learning frameworks for their
students, although this is something that is still not systemically done. This emerging devel-
opment has been supported by transnational work on program guidelines. More recently we
have seen work on situated learning (Stone and Hughes 2020) and cognitive apprenticeship,
both of which have contributed at improving education of sign language interpreters for PSI.
Below we will deal first with the international program guidelines and then we will discuss
some innovations as presented in the literature.
Program guidelines
Devising curricula involves putting into practice a set of beliefs concerning how people learn,
what they should be learning, and the contexts that will support learning. Within Europe
the European forum of sign language interpreters (efsli) coordinated a project (f unded by the
European Commission) that led to the development of assessment guidelines for IEPs (efsli
2013a) and learning outcomes for a three-year program (efsli 2013b). The project brought
together experts from across Europe who had experience delivering interpreter education in
university settings via efsli’s committee of experts. The aim was to create a standard across
the European Union with a focus on different approaches to assessing interpreters and iden-
tifying outcomes these assessments should measure.
280
Most interpreter training programs in Europe use virtual learning environments (V LEs),
and technology has allowed for the easy use of video recordings of classroom activities that
can support further reflection and analysis of one’s own interpreting work. VLEs and video
tech enable the collection of a dossier or portfolio of different types of assessments such as
reflective journals, practice exercises, and situated learning and situated assessments. These
dossiers support the adult learners to better understand their strengths and weaknesses.
As recommended, marking matrices allow for a transparency of assessment and enable
students to better gauge which aspects of performance they have demonstrated well. The
learning outcomes (efsli 2013b) support the development of programs that are comprehen-
sive, including intercultural competence and sociologically structured knowledge of relevant
deaf communities and of relevant (public service and other) institutions in mainstream soci-
ety. Nevertheless, since signed languages have limited diffusion, programs need to include
the learning and mastery of a signed language which is often how SLI programs differ from
their spoken language counterparts.
In 2019 the Commission of Collegiate Interpreter Education (CCIE) for interpreter ed-
ucation within the United States and Canada established ten standards for designing pro-
grams, evaluating, and analysing postsecondary professional IEPs. The standards address
institutional practices, faculty governance, curriculum development, practicum supervision,
and assessment of interpreter education to provide a common set of expectations about what
basic knowledge and competencies interpreting students should acquire.
CCIE also emphasises the need to involve deaf faculty in teaching interpreting. Although
there has been a long-standing political stance to support signed language teaching by
deaf people, the active involvement of deaf faculty in the teaching of interpreters has oc-
curred alongside the call for a more generally diverse faculty demographic and the exposure
within situated learning to diverse experiences, including deaf blind and deafened people
(Erlenkamp et al. 2014). This emphasis falls very much in line with the growing understand-
ing of the need to embed social justice within the curriculum and that a diverse faculty is
more likely to attract a diverse student body that will then graduate to ensure that the inter-
preting profession reflects the society within which it is found.
Our literature overview of educational programs focuses on three institutions: Mac-
quarie University (Sydney), Northeastern University (Boston), and Gallaudet University
(Washington DC), which have scholars at the forefront of educational developments in SLI
and with a long tradition in SLI training and education. Our discussion concerns two main
areas: innovative curricula, and innovative teaching practices.
Innovative curricula
At Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, Napier (2006) developed a program aimed at
supporting working interpreters who sought further professional development by introduc-
ing a blended approach. Her concept of blending includes three aspects: (1) blending sign lan-
guage students with spoken language interpreting students in the same course; (2) blending
interpreting and discourse theories to provide a theoretical framework for the development
of skills; and (3) blending online and face-to-face teaching.
The proposal in Napier (2006) was innovative because up until that point, sign language
interpreters were typically educated separately from their spoken language interpreter peers.
Napier’s blended approach enabled interaction between interpreters using different modal-
ities, thus allowing for a common understanding of the similarities of PSI irrespective of
modality (that is spoken or signed languages) and for spoken and signed language interpreters
281
to observe colleagues working within situated interpreter-mediated training tasks, like, for
instance, role plays.
Napier’s approach maintained a focus on interpreters working in the community at the
interface between citizens and public institutions. It also enabled a sharing of experiences
and strategies between interpreters working with different language combinations, and with
different language communities, thanks principally to online and face-to-face blended in-
struction. Moreover although the discourse analysis of monologues was included, the pro-
gram shifted its focus to the key concern in PSI, that is dialogue and multiparty discourse.
Blending is an approach that has been championed by other work as well. Since speech
and sign occur in different modalities, a conference norm of simultaneous interpreting is of-
ten expected in SLI. However, given that SLI takes place predominantly as PSI, such simul-
taneous norm is not necessarily followed. For example, Russell (2002) demonstrated how a
blended use of simultaneous and consecutive interpreting in legal contexts resulted in greater
accuracy and benefits those disadvantaged by an unfamiliar environment.
At Northeastern University (Boston, MA) changes happened in light of a survey of the
work assignments of interpreters, including those who had recently graduated from an IEP
(Cokely 2005). The survey found that within their first two years of work more than 60%
of graduates’ work was dialogic assignments, falling to 50% of the work of more senior
interpreters. The work assignments were ranked according to what seemed their main in-
teractional functions. In order of frequency, the top four interactions were: inquiry, where
questions and answers are exchanged; narrative, an everyday telling of what happened; ex-
pository, where information is given or exchanged; and, persuasive, where one speaker is
trying to persuade others to do or believe something (Cokely 2005: 11).
Based on this finding, Cokely revised the curriculum so that students practiced working
in these types of interaction in four sets (one per function) of 1 5-week skills development
courses. Within this program students would not only learn about how to deal with these
interactional functions but would also learn how to determine when or whether to apply
translation (a s in rendering an English medical form into ASL and the ASL responses into
written English), consecutive, or simultaneous techniques while interpreting.
At Gallaudet University innovative curricula focusing on dialogue and interaction were pro-
posed for both the BA and the MA levels (Shaw, Collins and Metzger 2006). Initially the students
took a course labelled discourse analysis and examined spoken English dialogues, American
Sign Language dialogues, and spoken and signed interpreter-mediated dialogues, to understand
question-answer pairs, overlapping, prosody, and other characteristics of communication. This
is done by students’ use of video recordings and then annotating the features of interaction they
found in it, potentially using a video annotation freeware such as ELAN (Version 6.2) (2021).
This knowledge was then transferred and expanded in ensuing courses for interpreting in differ-
ent settings (medical, education, business, and government). The analysis of discourse was to be
integrated and practiced throughout skills development, internships, and practicums, as well as
infused into every assessment product and process. At the MA level the expectations increased
with respect to reading the professional literature, writing essays, and research projects.
Innovative teaching practices
Discourse mapping
Winston and Monikowski (2000, 2005) created the activities of discourse mapping as a
way of introducing the practice of discourse analysis; that is, a way to give students time to
282
identify the linguistic structures, patterns, and strategies that are used to communicate in any
language, and a vocabulary to talk about their findings. Discourse mapping offers a system-
atic approach for analysing any text be it written, spoken, or signed, monologue, dialogue,
or multiparty interaction. Developing the ability to analyse discourse structures supports
students’ ability to create and recognise successful, effective, and appropriate interpretations.
When infused into interpreting courses, discourse mapping sparks critical thinking about
different aspects of interpreting. These include the comprehension and production of lan-
guage within a discourse context. It also provides a framework for self-analysis to examine
the original utterance and/or target language renditions. Learners develop the skills they
need to assess their own interpretations, to review their analyses of the communication, and
to gauge the effectiveness of their own work. They can also identify where discourse goals
were skewed in an interpreter-mediated event.
Discourse mapping includes a rich series of flexible activities designed to help educators
encourage analytical thinking and critical assessment. Its goal is that SLI shifts from simple
lexical equivalence to an improved adherence to interlocutors’ communicative goals. This
has been influential in the teaching of signed language interpreters since 2000 within aca-
demic programs. In many ways thinking of interpreting as a discourse process (Roy 2000)
is today so embedded in our profession that discourse mapping comes as an almost natural
activity in the foundation of interpreter education.
Role plays and situated learning

Role plays have been used within interpreter education since the very inception of programs
(see for instance Dahnberg this volume; Niemants et al. this volume). Typically there is a
simulated context where one person will take the role of a service user, another person will
take the role of a service provider and then a student provides interpreting of the conversation
between the two primary participants. Ideally the simulation will involve a deaf person (most
ideally unknown to the student interpreters) and a qualified professional (if that is not the
deaf person) being brought into the classroom. Various scenarios will be played out, trying to
ensure authentic interaction, language use, and interactional goals, which may also give evi-
dence of conversational features like s elf-initiated and other initiated repairs, q uestion-answer
pairs, t urn-taking and overlapping, prosodic cues, and more. In some programs the desire for
naturalness/authenticity means that these role plays happen in rooms with wall-mounted cam-
eras and ceiling microphones so as to record the situated languaging and gesturing of students’
performance for examination afterwards. Since the technology is unobtrusive, it facilitates
natural positioning and closer-to-real-l ife interactions, including interpreted interactions.
Role plays can constitute situated learning, and particularly if the participants include
‘real’ people rather than people trying to act like professionals, as Stone and Hughes (2020)
demonstrate. At the University of Wolverhampton in the UK these authors have developed
situated learning contexts in collaboration with the nursing program – as well as the BA
social work, and police programs, and the Law School – on collaborative interprofessional
training programs (see also Krystallidou this volume) so that role plays engage senior inter-
preters, senior healthcare practitioners, and Deaf community members. The role plays take
place within a facsimile hospital room, with real medical equipment (d rips, finger pulse
oximeters, blood pressure cuffs, and so on). As Stone and Hughes explain:
Learning within this community of practice exposes students to the multimodal nature
of sign language interpreter-mediated interaction, including co-speech and no-speech
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gestures, linguistic and non-linguistic communicative actions, the use of environmental

tools and the situated use of language and interaction. (2020: 355)
The authors v ideo-recorded student role plays and found examples when student interpreters
were driven by notions of language fidelity, rather than communication fidelity. Sign lan-
guage cultures are gesture-rich cultures (Kusters et al. 2017) and when interacting with non-
signing people, deaf people will use language as well as other communication strategies to try
and engage in direct communication; strategies which should not be overlooked or ignored.
The multimodal nature of the interaction within the situated learning environment facili-
tated the students’ exposure to and learning of situationally driven interpreting choices. This
technical environment thus allowed the practice of interpreting to model r eal-world interac-
tive settings and provided for more authentic data for the analysis of interpreted interaction.
For example, when the nurse named a suggested remedy, the deaf patient used the sign for
drink (that is synonymous with the UK gesture for drink) which the nurse identified. The
student interpreter continued to render the spoken and signed originals without acknowl-
edging that direct interaction had occurred. Debriefing after the situated learning event, and
viewing the video recorded interaction, enabled discussions with the senior interpreter (who
was teaching), senior healthcare professional, and Deaf community member (the patient in
this scenario) about the need to pay attention to multimodal communication both for opti-
mising communication and to improve rapport building.
Technological equipment like w all-mounted video cameras and c eiling-mounted micro-
phones contributed to a fundamental shift in the analysis of sign language interaction since
multimodality is a constitutive feature of this type of communication, so role plays taking
place within a situated learning framework like the one described above are going to pos-
itively influence SLI PSI research. Such technology will probably be used increasingly and
is already more and more frequently employed in practicum, which we shall now discuss.
Practicum
The training of SLI, as with any service field, has always attempted to include moments
when students were expected to learn outside the classroom, observing or working alongside
more senior colleagues, and being better exposed to ‘live engagement’ in PSI. This takes the
form of in/externships, work placement, practicums, and volunteer work during courses and
at the end of courses to support the transition of graduates into the world of work. There
has long been a call for a greater emphasis being ‘g iven to the relationship between what is
learned in the classroom and what is needed outside the classroom, and this has been a valu-
able contribution of the situated learning movement’ (A nderson, Reder and Simon 1996: 5).
This not only focuses on service learning to improve technical skills but also to provide a
better context for the delivery of interpreting service. For most SLI programs there is a need
for students to better understand deaf community structures, institutionalised interpret-
ing provision, developing professional networks, and better understand collegiality in the
field/on the job (Monikowski and Peterson 2005; Shaw 2013).
Historically we have examples in the UK of SLI training as part of training for Church of
England clerics for the deaf (as part of a multi-professional role, Pym 2014). This training in-
volved in-service training within Deaf ‘Missions’ – welfare centre and social clubs for deaf peo-
ple (Simpson 2007). And this ‘earlier provision required the trainee missioner/welfare officers
to spend much of their time in the company of, and interpreting for, deaf people with a conse-
quential emphasis on good communication/interpreting skills’ (Simpson 1991: 217). Gradually
284
with the shift away from those born into the community providing interpreting to the profes-
sionalisation and institutionalised training of interpreters, there was a move away from training
embedded within sign language communities in many Western/Global North contexts.
This has now come full circle with a recognition of the need for both service training for
language development and cultural awareness earlier in SLI education programs, and train-
ing internships specifically focused on observing and junior practice as sign language inter-
preters within community settings supporting transitioning from training to employment.
This can be hard to ensure within u niversity-based courses, where work needs to take place
to ensure, one, there is a network of community places and spaces for language immersion,
and two, there is a network of working professional interpreters appropriately trained to
support and mentor student interpreters within real workplace settings.
Professional interpreters sometimes form part of universities’ extended graders/m arkers of
the student interpreters’ work in the field (see efsli 2013a for some workplace learning rubric
templates). In some institutions these workplace assessments include fitness to practice assess-
ments, that is, to ensure that potential graduates have the appropriate professional integrity
to work as public service interpreters. One criticism of this is that often Deaf community
members are not included in the assessment of interpreters and yet they are the stakeholders
typically most disadvantaged by poor-quality interpreting services.
Sociological issues
Every interpreted event is bound by the social relations in which it occurs. Interpreters and
the interlocutors for whom they are interpreting must contend with their own embedded-
ness in these social relations. Issues of power that are shaped by marginalised identities come
to bear on the interpretation. Interpreters must recognise that their work involves more than
language work. They are also responsible for transmitting culture and context.
In line with greater levels of education of deaf people in society, more deaf people with
formal academic qualifications are now teaching interpreter students and their institutional
status is equal to their non-deaf interpreter educator peers. This also enables greater levels
of sign language medium education, with deaf people actively engaged in conversations,
including cultural sensitivity, different sensory orientations, and cultural differences in the
understanding and application of professional ethics. This also means that the education of
interpreters cannot solely focus on learning to interpret. To provide effective interpretations,
practitioners must be versed in a myriad of topics in which service recipients are competent.
Indeed, an interpreter working at the United Nations must understand geopolitics while
an interpreter working with a philosophy lecturer in a university class on d ecision-making
must have more than a rudimentary understanding of concepts such as consequentialism,
deontology, and virtue ethics to render an effective interpretation. An interpreter focusing
merely on the languages they are interpreting between will likely miss the overall goal (Gish
1987), which will make the service recipient confused or require them to figure out where
the conversation or presentation is going.
Crowded curricula
In broader terms there are some critical issues that IEPs are facing that many institutions
struggle with, and at the time of this writing, with the world economy hit by a pandemic
285
might become more exacerbated. As discussed above, there are many issues that BA and
MA programs wish to cover leading to a very crowded curriculum. Juggling the appropriate
teaching of technical skills development, the professionalisation of working languages, and
intercultural interaction management is already a mammoth task. And yet there is an ever-
stronger desire to ensure that there is a better understanding of the role of the interpreting/
interpreter cog within a much larger systemic machine. Perhaps integrated MA programs
(five years BA+MA) might be a preferred format, but these can be hard to establish in many
contexts as there is no tradition for them, and it limits the flexibility of recruiting students
from different demographics with different educational needs.
Financial viability
We also see that generally there are increasing financial pressures on universities in both the
UK and the US to make money. Most IEPs have smaller class sizes than larger p rofit-making
subjects. Class sizes need to be smaller to ensure good-quality language teaching, appropriate
technical skills development, and meaningful discussions on the role and place of interpreting
within society. Many universities emphasise the retention of recruited students. When stu-
dents are not successful in lower-level classes, faculty might be encouraged to give them pass
marks so as to avoid losing a potential paying student. Furthermore, when too few students are
progressing through the program, the classes can become too small to justify running a class.
Deaf interpreters
One area of import is the e ver-increasing number of deaf people who are practising as profes-
sional interpreters within PSI contexts. The U S-based Deaf Interpreter Institute (DII 2021)
engages a team of experts under the National Consortium of Interpreter Education Centers
(NCIEC). Just as efsli and the CCIE the DII has outlined competencies that deaf interpreters
need, such as identifying the lived experience of being deaf and the communicative experi-
ence that deaf people bring to their professional interpreting. These competencies are a result
of a 2006 survey of deaf interpreters or DIs in the US and so predate both efsli and the CCIE.
The Danish Deaf Association (DDL) led a project to identify and create curriculum
guidelines for deaf people to be educated as interpreters. This was funded by the European
Commission and focused on developing a curriculum as a European standard. Using the efsli
learning outcomes document (efsli 2013b) as a template (w ith efsli being one of the project
partners), a curriculum was devised with experts from European universities with experience
of training deaf people to work as interpreters in a variety of settings. These settings included
PSI either between different sign languages for deaf migrants (either voluntary or through
involuntary displacement, see Mobile Deaf (2017–23), or for language-deprived individuals
with idiosyncratic language use and in need of language adaptation and modification. Some
of the issues for deaf interpreters in IEPs are not dissimilar to hearing heritage language
signers; as programs are typically focused on teaching those wishing to be sign language
interpreters but still needing extensive language teaching rather than those raised using a
signed language and/or using a signed language for primary face-to-face communication.
Video relay and video remote

Although the impact of v ideo-mediated interpreting (V MI) has been largely positive (not
least during the COVID-19 pandemic), there are many challenges associated with its use.
286
Working in VMI presents interpreters with a wider range of linguistically and culturally
diverse customers, topics, and prolonged periods of work than is found in any other in-
terpreting setting. Interpreters are assigned to calls as requests come in, and most calls are
handled with little or no advance preparation to minimise wait time. Work in VMI settings
is physically and mentally stressful, and signed language interpreters may be expected to
work with intimate register (for example, calls to family members), unfamiliar vocabu-
lary, and subject matter outside their level of education, experience, or comfort. There are
different models of VMI across the globe. The one available in Sweden, for example (see
Warnicke and Plejert 2016), is quite different from the US models of service delivery. Even
so, interpreters do report the lack of decision latitude causes additional stress (Dean and
Pollard 2001), a factor that, to our knowledge, is only just being considered in IEPs and is
yet to be embedded in curricula.
Furthermore, interpreters sometimes encounter unfamiliar regional or cultural variations
of signed languages used by Deaf callers, and unfamiliar regional and cultural variations
of spoken languages used by non-deaf callers. The number of deaf individuals from ethnic
and racial minority and immigrant populations using VMI has increased, as has the number
of deaf callers who may use sub-culture or idiosyncratic sign language. Some call centres
employ interpreters with multilingual competence that field international calls. For exam-
ple, in the US, American Sign Language/ Spanish/ English interpreters often serve callers
from Spanish-speaking countries. Even so, there are widely varying regionalisms, and higher
risks of misunderstanding, due to the plethora of cultures and signed languages. In the US,
the idea of being a sign language interpreter with multiple languages is relatively new but
in countries such as New Zealand, where, for example, Maōri is an official language, SLI
IEPs focus on dominant languages while hoping to ensure that SLI can deal with formulaic
greetings typically used in community settings (like the use of Welsh in Wales; Spanish in
the US; French in Canada, and so on).
In VMI call centres, specifically established to ensure accessible telephone calls (k nown
as video relay services – VRS) interpreter skills may vary widely. Unskilled interpreters no
doubt place a large onus on callers to manage their own access. Brunson (2010) describes
how Deaf callers sometimes have to call several times before they are matched with an in-
terpreter they can understand, and who can understand them, a phenomenon he refers to as
‘calculated consumer labour’. Apart from training for SL interpreters, to better adapt their
language for deaf callers, training is also needed for communication facilitators, who can
copy what the VRS interpreter signs on the screen for Deaf Blind individuals, who use tactile
sign language (see Sforza 2014 for a broader description of SLI for Deaf Blind individuals).
IEPs in SLI also rarely focus on the skills needed to provide quality renditions when inter-
preters work into and out of multiple languages in a language chain.
VMI service in public settings, particularly in hospitals, police stations, and prisons, is
fast becoming a default way of providing interpreting irrespective of its appropriateness. It
can, however, be hindered by technical and logistical problems that compromise the intel-
ligibility of the interpretation and the comfort of the deaf individual especially if this is via
mainstream platforms rather than bespoke SLI platforms. Mainstream technology is fraught
with problems attributable to poor quality transmission, equipment function, and issues
related to bandwidth, firewalls, lost connections, and staff’s lack of familiarity with the
technology. Unseen and unheard participants, procedures, and interactions within the room
in which the Deaf person is situated can all influence the effectiveness of the interpretation
because the interpreter is in a remote location. The Deaf individual cannot see who else, if
anyone, is in the room with the interpreter, which can create discomfort and raises concerns
287
about confidentiality, especially in medical and legal settings (see Licoppe this volume, for a
detailed description of spoken-language interpreting via video in court proceedings).
Educating sign language interpreters in how to use available video technique can include
how to ensure the ‘pinning’ or ‘spotlighting’ of interpreters for deaf people to see, and how
to optimise the visual orientation of the deaf service user (Stone and Köhring 2021). Train-
ing in how to collaborate with a non-rendering interpreter-technician may also be needed.
If the Deaf participant is in crisis – frightened, ill, medicated, disoriented, or experiencing
vision d ifficulties – a two-dimensional screen and the lack of full-spectrum view of the
other participants’ room may further hinder access to immediate and accurate information.
Obviously, the video screen is not a viable option for individuals who are Deaf Blind. For in-
dividuals with certain mental health issues, the usefulness of video technique may be limited
too. In a p ost-COVID-19 world interpreters no doubt need to have further training in the
negotiation of VMI-service delivery.
Teaching sign language with interpreting

As our understanding of the complexities of interpreting expands, it becomes apparent that
language education must be separated from interpreter education. In the US 65% of IEPs
are two-year degree programs, but in other places interpreters may be educated for even
shorter periods of time. Although many of these programs have been able to extend student
education up to three years, they generally do not produce graduates who can demonstrate
appropriate fluency in a signed language. As a result, novice interpreters are sorely limited
in the range of populations and settings in which they can begin to gain work experience.
Two or three years of academic study of a language is generally insufficient to acquire flu-
ency in any language, much less when learning a language in a new modality. Unlike spoken
language majors who often experience a semester or y ear-long study abroad, BA interpreting
programs often do not offer extended immersion opportunities. Classroom instruction alone
is inadequate, and meaningful program interaction with diverse communities of deaf people
needed. In contexts such as the US with national certification exams, these graduates take
19–24 months to achieve national certification post-graduation (Cogan and Cokely 2015).
Going forward with greater recognition of sign languages as part of national heritages,
and wider opportunities to learn a signed language before university, we may well see min-
imum sign language fluency requirements for entry into BA programs. This would truly be
transformative – with graduates finally having professional levels of fluency. It might also
contribute to solving some of the issues of the crowded curriculum.
Further reading
Ehrlich, Suzanne, and Jemina Napier (eds) (2015) Interpreter Education in the Digital Age. Washington,
D.C., Gallaudet University Press.
This collection brings together innovative research and approaches for blended learning using digital technol-
ogy in interpreter education for signed and spoken languages.
Napier, Jemina (ed) (2009). International Perspectives on Sign Language Interpreter Education. Washington,
D.C., Gallaudet University Press. (updated volume expected 2022).
This collection provides an international overview on interpreter training from experts in Austria, Australia,
Brazil, Canada, Fiji, Finland, Ireland, Japan, Kenya, Kosovo, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Scotland,
Sweden, and the United States.
Winston, Elizabeth A. (2005) “Designing a curriculum for American sign language/English inter-
preting educators”, in Sign Language Interpreting and Interpreter Education: Directions for Research and
288
Practice, Marc Marschark, Rico Peterson and Elizabeth A. Winston (eds). Oxford, Oxford Univer-
sity Press: 208–34.
This chapter considers the learning requirements of interpreters wishing to become interpreter educators
within a United States context. It explores course content and the rationale behind the type of education edu-
cators require.
Related chapters
Chapter 1, General issues of PSI: Institutions, codes and norms, professionalisation by Carmen Valero-Garcés.
Mason.
Chapter 15, A shared responsibility for facilitating inclusion where signed language interpreting is provided by
Sigrid Slettebakk Berge.
Chapter 18, Role play as a means of training and of testing PSI by Magnus Dahnberg.
Chapter 21, The Conversation analytic role-play method: How authentic data meet simulations for interpreter
training by Natacha Niemants, Jessica P. B. Hansen and Elisabeth Stokoe.
Chapter 25, Education and training of public service interpreter teachers by Mira Kadrić and Sonja Pöllabauer
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18
ROLE PLAY AS A MEANS OF
TRAINING AND TESTING
Magnus Dahnberg
Introduction
The simulated role play exercise is, among other things, a kind of bread-and-butter activity in
interpreter training; a method that in its simplest form (involving only interpreter candidates)
does not require much more than creativity and engagement from peers and could even be
used on a d ay-to-day basis. With teachers, instructors, or assessors engaged as role players and
observers, role play seems to work well to practice and test interpreting skills in a structured
way. And when it is possible to involve professional service providers – medical doctors, police
officers, social workers, and so o n – in simulated, interpreter-mediated institutional talk, this
adds another dimension, which is both interactional and professional, to the test or exercise.
Since a simulation is per definition not an authentic situation, there will always be at least
some elements in a role play that reflect real life to a very small degree or do not reflect it
at all. A classroom does not necessarily reflect the atmosphere of a health care centre or a
police station. An interpreter trainer, trying their best to act like a medical doctor in a role
play, does not necessarily pose questions or talk to the patient in the same way as any of the
real-life doctors that the interpreter student will ever meet in the future. A mock police of-
ficer and a mock interrogee, who are busy reading all of their utterances in a role play from
a script, do not necessarily react to the interpreter’s requests for clarification in a way that
might be frequently seen in the city’s real police stations. And a professional social worker,
who takes part in a role play exercise acting their professional self in a mock situation, does
not necessarily act in the same way as they normally would do at work. Different things are
at stake for participants in authentic interaction and in the role plays. There is good reason to
retain some scepticism about the idea that a role play could fully resemble reality.
The reality of the professional world, though, is complex and the task of pedagogy is to
help students to deal with it little by little. Thus, there is all the more reason to discuss which
skills can really be trained and tested in different types of role play in order to achieve the
desired learning or assessment objectives. There is no universal approach that allows us to
practice or test everything, and different arrangements provide different possibilities and
limitations, as will be shown in the following.
The examples from role plays given in this chapter are from video recordings of Swedish
state authorisation tests for Public Service interpreters, lasting 88 minutes in total, and audio
292 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-22

Role play as a means of training and testing PSI
recordings of training exercises for Swedish military interpreters, lasting 134 minutes in total
( Dahnberg 2015).

Role play here is looked upon as a kind of simulation – creating
a situation that is highly similar
to an authentic one, at least in some ways (Crookall and Saunders 1989: 16). A vital question
throughout the chapter is in what ways different role play setups are suitable and effective
for training and testing specific skills and knowledge needed for future real-life practice. As
for the didactics of training, role play is considered within the concept of situated learning, a
context-dependent approach where the learners fulfil their training tasks in a situation which
is either authentic or highly simulated (Lave and Wenger 1991; Leaman and Flanagan 2013).
Testing interpreting skills is a complex task in several ways, among other things because while
an interpreter’s performance is tested and assessed individually, in an interpreter-mediated
conversation it is always interdependent with the behaviour of the primary participants, who
communicate with the assistance of the interpreter (McNamara 2000: 84–85 on language
testing). Both formative and summative assessment are considered (Schildkamp et al. 2020) as
well as issues of validity and reliability of different tests, that is whether a test really evaluates
what it is supposed to evaluate, and whether it is consistent and stable over time (Han 2016).
Interpreter-mediated talk is reflected upon basically applying a dialogical view of language
and mind (Linell 2009) and exploring interpreting as interaction (Wadensjö 1998).
Literature overview
When setting up a role play, you create a simulated situation with a high or at least a certain
resemblance to a real-life setting, for example, for training purposes (Crookall and Saunders
1989). It can be said to be a part of the concept of situated learning (Gonzalez-Davies and
Enríquez Raído 2018), even though situated learning comprises training in authentic situa-
tions as much as in simulated ones. Tipton and Furmanek (2016) see role play also as a means
of continued professional development for professional interpreters. At the same time, role play as
a method is also being questioned. A critical approach to role playing for training purposes
questions whether a traditional role play can be said to have any useful resemblance at all to
authentic situations (Stokoe 2011; Niemants and Stokoe 2017; and see also Niemants et al.,
this volume).
On the basis of dialogical theory, different contexts of interpreter-mediated talk can be
classified as different communication activity types (Linell 2010), or genres (Tebble 2014), which
seems to be a fruitful approach to creating role plays in order to train or test for different
Public Service Interpreting settings. The concepts of both communicative activity types and
genre focus on how, for example, a medical consultation or a police interrogation usually unfolds,
what happens in a typical situation, what are usually the overall and individual conversational
goals of the participants, and how they are reached. In order to get a high degree of resemblance
to a medical consultation, interpreting students can be trained in role play together with med-
ical students – a n exercise that will also benefit the medical students who then get the chance to
practice situations that they may encounter in their own future practice (K rystallidou et al.
2018). One may also use transcripts based on authentic PSI encounters as study material or as
a starting-point for role play training (Tebble 2014). Authentic data in itself, however, does
not necessarily provide a high degree of authenticity or usefulness for a role play based on
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these data, since such benefits depend also on whether the role play design is successful or
not (Gavioli 2018).
Analysing what should be trained and tested, that is the interpreting skills needed for
professional work, is crucial (Hale 2007). Skills that have been identified as vital are, among
others, complex interactional skills and code-switching (Skaaden and Wadensjö 2014), t urn-
taking (Frøili 2001), knowledge of professional ethics, language competence, listening and
comprehension, memory, public speaking, note-taking, conversational management, cross-
c ultural awareness, and theoretical knowledge (Hale 2007: 1 77–78). A general description of
the interpreter’s work says that it is to render and coordinate the primary participants’ talk. The
interpreter implicitly coordinates the conversation by regularly taking the floor to render a
previous utterance, and explicitly by, for example, requesting clarifications (Wadensjö 1998).
The coordinating function of interpreters has received increased attention in recent years
and is now well-established by research (Wadensjö 1998; Baraldi and Gavioli 2014; Krys-
tallidou 2016; Slettebakk Berge 2018, among others). When testing and assessing, a rubric
system for noting assessment may be used (Hale 2007; Hlavac et al. 2016). The testers need
to have a high level of knowledge about a broad range of subjects, from language standards
and understanding the complexity of sub-skills needed in interpreting, to test design and
advantages and disadvantages of different tests (Skaaden and Wadensjö 2014).

Setting up a role play means that a complex set of variables need to be considered, each of
which may have an impact on how the role play unfolds, thereby affecting the interaction
between the participants and how well the role play suits its planned training or testing out-
come (a nd also how closely it resembles a corresponding, naturally occurring situation). One
such variable is the real language proficiency of the primary participants, that is whether they
actually understand both the languages used in the role play or are in real need of an inter-
preter to communicate with each other. Another variable is whether the primary participants
read from a script or speak in a more or less improvised way. It is also necessary to consider
how accustomed the participants are to role playing in itself, and how familiar they are with
the form of institutional talk that is supposed to be simulated in the role play. The purpose
of arranging the role play is also of interest: training or testing? And, last but not least: what
is at stake for each of the participants – examination, authorisation, or positive feedback and
advice from an instructor?
In this section, I will discuss some fundamental issues concerning instructions for the role
players, the participants in a role play, general and individual objectives of arranging and taking
part in a role play, and training for trainers and assessors. In this context, I adopt a broadened
taxonomy of role plays in the field of PSI, distinguishing not only between closed (scripted)
and open (unscripted) role plays (K asper and Dahl 1991; Kasper 2000; Dahnberg 2015), but
also between professional (w ith service providers in the role of their professional self ), semi-
professional (w ith teachers or actors in the roles of primary participants), and non-professional
role plays (w ith interpreting students acting all of the parts).
The terms closed and open regarding role plays reflect the concept that in a closed role
play, the interaction between participants is more or less limited to one participant giving
responses to the prefabricated utterances of another participant, while in an open role play
one can expect a more complex interaction between participants within the framework of
the play (K asper 2000: 323–24).
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Instructions for the role players

Written instructions for participants are frequently used in order to ensure that a role play
will include what the trainer or test organiser wants it to include, in terms of verbal and other
interaction. The instructions may, for example, be in the form of a script, written lines that
the primary participants are supposed to read out during the role play. They may also be in
the form of a scenario or role cards, or even oral instructions, with more general information
about the situation intended and each participant’s goals during the interaction in the role
play, to be taken as the framework within which the primary parties (a nd the interpreter) can
talk in a more improvised way. In the following, some of the possibilities and limitations of
these types of instructions will be examined.
Scripts
Role plays based on scripts are called closed role plays. Such scripts, where the intended utter-
ances of the primary participants are written as in a script for a theatre play, may be based
on a script-writing author’s own ideas and general experience, or on transcripts from an
authentic PSI encounter.
In the first case, using a script obviously gives a (script-writing) trainer or test organiser
the possibility of working on comprehension and rendition of lexical items, by including any
words or phrases that they would like their students or examinees to use and interpret. Using
a script will also to some extent ensure a certain degree of reliability of a test, since one may
expect the same subject matter and formulations to occur in each and every test based on
the same script, which in its turn could be expected to facilitate the comparison of different
test-takers’ performance. However, the script in itself does not regulate the way it is read out
by the participants when it comes to speed, voice volume, pauses, possible misreading, and so
on. The level of resemblance to authentic PSI encounters will depend strongly on the script
author’s ability to create a base for the role players to achieve such a resemblance when acting.
Scripts based on transcripts from authentic PSI encounters, however, provide fewer pos-
sibilities for the trainer or test organiser to test specific words and phrases (for instance those
which were taught in the course) but can be expected to give a higher degree of resem-
blance to a naturally occurring situation concerning both vocabulary and overall discourse
structure.
Scripts may be written in one language only, mostly with the lines of both the majority
language speaker and the minority language speaker written in the majority language. In
such case, the persons playing the roles of minority language speakers will have to either
sight-translate their lines into the minority language while role playing or translate them in
advance and then read the translation out during the role play. Scripts may also be bilingual,
with each person’s lines written in their own language, and the interpreter being the only
one reacting extemporarily. A proposed rendition for the interpreter to check out afterwards
may also be included in the script.
There are strong indications that the presence of a script in itself has an impact on both
turn-taking and repair sequences in an interpreter-mediated dialogue, carried out as a role
play (Dahnberg 2015). Open role plays (see next section) show quite a complex pattern of
interaction around interpreters’ coordinating activities, such as giving and taking the floor
or asking for clarification, which scripted role plays do not show or show only to a limited
extent (ibid.). This means that when it comes to t urn-taking and the coordinating function
of the interpreter, role plays based on scripts can in general be expected to be less suitable for
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training and testing than open role plays (and, indeed, have a lower level of resemblance to
real-l ife encounters).
The following example is from a scripted training role play, where a professional inter-
preter gets specialised training at the Swedish Armed Forces Language School before being
deployed abroad. It is a mock interview where Julia, who plays the role of a journalist, in-
terviews Andrea, who plays the role of a Swedish military attaché. Ingvar is the interpreter
being trained.
Example 1
1 Julia а ну спасиббольшое (.) итак Андреа ↓ э как вы уже знаете я
well then thanks a lot (.) so Andrea eh as you already know I
заинтересовалась шведским взглядом на вопросы обороны в связи с
тем что
have become interested in the Swedish view of defence issues due to the fact that
в последнее время в средствах массовой информации обращалось
внимание
recently mass-media has paid attention
на высказывание шведского г л-*лавнокомандующего ◊
to the statement of the Swedish sup-*preme commander
2 Ingvar да ээм
yes eehm
3 Ingvar då så jag eh eeh e intresserad av (1.0) ehm den eeh (.) svenska eh eeh svenska eh
well so I eh eeh am interested of (1.0) ehm the eeh (.) Swedish eh eeh Swedish eh
försvars eh politiken på grund av att de eh i media nyligen har uppmärksammats
defence eh policy because media recently paid attention to
eh uttalanden från svenska eh överbefälhavaren
eh statements from the Swedish supreme commander
4 Andrea m
5 Julia ой (.) э да ↓ (.) вы вот меня перебили когда я говорила что /…/
oh (.) eh yes ↓ (.) now you interrupted me when I was saying that
(Dahnberg 2015: 100–3)
Julia is reading from her script (1). Ingvar takes the turn (2) and starts rendering her ut-
terance (3). Julia tells him he interrupted her (5), although there was no overlapping talk or
other signs of a turn-taking struggle, apart, possibly, from Julia’s continuation intonation
towards the end of turn 1. So, Julia’s comment about being interrupted by Ingvar is probably
due to the fact that she has not read through all of her lines yet. Playfully challenging, as it
were, Ingvar’s task, she is orienting to the script where there are still some words to read out
before Ingvar’s supposed rendition and Andrea’s answer to Julia’s question.
Role cards and scenarios

Role plays based on role cards, scenarios, or oral instructions are often called open role plays.
A role card or scenario usually contains information about the situation intended to be acted
out in the role play (for example, a medical encounter), topics to be covered (a patient’s back
pain), how the conversation is supposed to proceed in general (greetings, patient’s story, medical
296
examination, diagnosis, recommended treatment, closure), and the individual goals of each
participant (correct diagnosis and treatment and getting rid of the pain in the back, respectively).
Since instructions for open role plays do not contain any lines to be read out verbatim by
the role players, the role players have more possibilities to improvise and speak spontaneously
than in closed role plays. Thus, role plays with role cards, in comparison to scripted role
plays, focus more on conversational goals and on the coordinating task of the interpreter, as
is seen in the next example below.
In Example 2, Julia is still acting the part of a journalist, but in this unscripted role play
she is having a conversation with Adam, a young Swede, about his life and work. Adam, who
has worked in a museum, happens to mention Greek mythology:
Example 2
1 Adam eh ja Minerva å Athena e ju samma sak fast °den ena e grekisk å den andra e
eh yes Minerva and Athena are the same thing but one is Greek and the other is
romersk tror jag° de e ju (.) a visst e hon visdomens [a fi-]
Roman I think it is of course (.) she is wisdom’s right [a fi-]
2 Julia [a]
[and]
3 Julia а Афина она же ещё отвечала (.) °она не была богиней войны
случайно°?
and Athena she also answered (.) wasn’t she the goddess of war by any chance
да да
that’s right
4 Ingvar [э так по-по-]»
eh so wa- wa-
5 Julia [она же была покровительница Афин]
she was the patroness of Athens
6 Ingvar »[подождите]»
wait a moment
7 Julia [m]
8 Ingvar »пожалуйста а (.) вот (.) Афина и Минерва это же э
please and (.) well (.) Athena and Minerva that is eh
9 Julia [m]
10 Ingvar [такая же]»
the same
11 Ingvar »богиня только Минерва (.) в Риме
goddess only Minerva (.) is in Rome
12 Julia [mhm]
13 Ingvar [a]»
and
14 Ingvar »в Гре- (.) там в Гре- в Греции э (.) э Афина
in Gre-there in Gre-in Greece eh is Athena
15 Julia mhm
16 Ingvar m
17 (1.0)
18 Julia aha хорошо я поняла↓
okay good I see
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Magnus Dahnberg
19 Ingvar а во- эм подо- э

and que- ehm wai- eh
20 Julia [да я хоте-]»
yes I wan-
21 Ingvar [(вос-) вопрос]
ques- question
22 Julia »я хотела спросить что /…/
I wanted to ask what
(Dahnberg 2015: 100–3)
In this example, Julia, who actually understands Swedish, seems to forget to wait for
Ingvar to render Adam’s utterance (1), and so she answers Adam directly (2 , 3, 5) in Russian.
Her talk is then coordinated by Ingvar: he interrupts Julia (4, 6) and explicitly asks her to
wait (6, 8), as it seems, for him to render Adam’s utterance (1). Unlike Example 1, where Julia
tells Ingvar he interrupted her, she now just gives a signal of approval (7). Since there is no
script in this role play, and thus, no lines to be read out, the interpreter seems to be given a
more active role in coordinating Julia’s and Adam’s talk. Even more visible is the interpreter’s
coordinating function in 1 8–21: when Julia in 18 seems to finish the sequence about Minerva
and Athena, not proceeding with the question she initiated in turn 3, Ingvar explicitly puts
Julia back on track (19, 21).
On spoken and written language

Spoken and written language differ from each other in several ways, including in grammar
and vocabulary (Carter 2004; Linell 2009). In authentic PSI settings, written language oc-
curs occasionally when, for example, a service provider reads aloud from a document, but
mostly spontaneously spoken language dominates. Instructions in the form of a script will,
naturally enough, provide the role players with written language cues, based on written
language grammar and using written language vocabulary. Prosody may also be affected by
the reading situation. In other words, using a script will more or less inevitably shape the
language style and syntax in the role play in a way that is different compared to the naturally
occurring PSI encounter.
A frequently proposed way of making a scripted dialogue more like a naturally occurring
encounter is to instruct those acting as the primary participants to avoid reading their lines
verbatim and instead rephrase them so that they feel natural to pronounce. To do so would
mean a transfer, if you like a translation within the same language, from one modality to
another, from writing to speech.1 According to Dahnberg (2015) and the author’s own ex-
perience, this can be seen mostly in repair sequences, after repeated requests for clarification.
One can approach the discussion from a different direction by highlighting the authentic
feature of the presence of written texts in a PSI setting: written interrogation minutes that
are read out and interpreted, information texts that the health care professionals ask the
interpreter to interpret directly from writing to speech, p re-written and read-out charges
are all examples of frequently appearing texts. It should be noted, however, that such texts
that appear in authentic, interpreted conversations are less likely to take the form of dia-
logue. Interpretation of text which is read aloud presents, in part, challenges other than the
interpretation of spontaneous speech (Van Besien and Meuleman 2014). Interpretation di-
rectly from writing to speech (prima vista or sight interpretation) means that the interpreter
298
interprets from a written text and not from the sound of an utterance (Radanovic Felberg
2015). In order for the students to get acquainted with the various modalities and demands of
PSI interpreting settings (and to increase the resemblance of role plays to real-life situations),
there are reasons for introducing sight interpretation as part of the role play. From this point
of view, script use could well be limited to prima vista interpretation of, for instance, drug
prescriptions, or minutes from a police interrogation or an asylum interview.
Concluding remarks on instructions

Examples 1 and 2 above indicate that with a script, you can expect to have a more predictable
unfolding of what is said in the role play, which makes it possible to use scripted role play to
train and test the interpreter’s general and specialised vocabulary. At the same time, there
will be fewer possibilities, possibly none at all, to train and test the interpreter’s coordinating
function. The primary participant’s lines can be expected to have many elements of written
language grammar and vocabulary. With an unscripted role play, however, the interaction be-
tween the interpreter and the primary parties, including the interpreter’s coordination work,
will be visible and possible to train and test, while the element of improvisation may reduce the
possibilities for training and testing vocabulary or standard phrases. Spoken language grammar
and vocabulary can be expected to prevail in what is being uttered by the participants.
Participants
In public service interpreter training and testing, the prototypical set of participants in role
plays includes three persons: one primary participant acting as a public service provider
(medical doctor, police officer, immigration services officer, etc.), one primary participant
acting as a layperson (patient, crime witness, asylum seeker, etc.), while the third person is
the interpreter being trained or tested. The participant acting out the role of public service
provider needs to display to some extent professional knowledge of the subject being dis-
cussed in the role play, and also of the type of institutional talk that is being simulated.
For that reason, I have chosen to use a role play taxonomy based on the composition of
participants when it comes to the above-mentioned level of professional knowledge: in profes-
sional role plays, the part of the service provider is acted out by a r eal-life professional service
provider, in semi-professional role plays the part of the service provider, and perhaps also the
part of the layperson, is played by a teacher, instructor, or actor, while in non-professional role
plays both of the primary participants are played by interpreter students.
The name professional refers here to a service provider’s supposed knowledge of their pro-
fessional field and of the communicative activity type in question, and not to their ability
within the field of role playing. Moreover, the term semi-professional is not intended to reduce
the teachers’ professional abilities in the field of teaching, using role play, which can actually
be expected to be higher than those of a service provider. But a PSI teacher, who usually is
not a professional within medicine, social service, or law, will still in most cases have a higher
degree of knowledge of the professional field of PSI and of the communicative activity type
in question than their students.
Public service providers as primary participants

Example 3 is an extract from a role play exercise where the role players are members of the
Swedish Military Interpreters Association, who were taking part in a voluntary training
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Magnus Dahnberg
course over a weekend. In this role play, Daniel, who is also a professional doctor, examines
a patient who complains of ear pain. Isidor interprets.
Example 3
1 Daniel har du haft nåra andra symtom ifrån halsen eller från nasofarynx
have you had any other symptoms in the throat or in nasopharynx
2 Isidor ээ а у вас какие то э другие ну >проблемы или симптомы< ээ в горле
или
eeh so do you have any eh other well >problems or symptoms < eh in the throat or
3 Isidor va-va sa du sist
what-what did you say in the end
4 Daniel nasofarynx
nasopharynx
5 Isidor эи
eh and
6 Daniel nässvalget
nose cavity and upper part of the throat
When Isidor gives signals (3, 5) that he faces some difficulty in rendering the term naso-
pharynx, Daniel, being a professional in medicine, immediately provides him with a more
colloquial term for the same thing.
The primary participants’ general knowledge and experience of the communication activ-
ity type trained or tested in a role play can also be expected to have a strong impact on their
interaction, and thus, on the resemblance of the role play to a naturally occurring situation.
This has been noted by several authors. Landqvist (2006) compares how experienced and
unexperienced negotiators interact in a series of unscripted, interpreter-mediated role plays:
Results show that competence is generally indicated by the special ways professional
negotiators use communicative projects, create phase structures, and organise topics
in local turns-of-talk and globally in the talk. Competence is also indicated by m
eta-
communication, which is used for constructing participant roles and authority, as well as
global coherence, all of which contribute to a formal level of interactive style (Landqvist
2006:abstract).
Bradford (2017: 5 –6) reflects on the use of professional service providers as primary partici-
pants in training interpreter students via role plays:
A potentially more attractive a lternative – whilst prey to the same issues as in having
two teachers play the roles – is to involve real service providers. Establishing links with
professional communities outside the university would be progressive and mutually
beneficial, as Hale suggests. However, the barrier here might be financial or due to the
workloads of such service providers. That said, if only one ‘real’ service provider were
to participate somehow in one seminar per term/semester, all parties concerned would
be enriched and gain new insights.
Krystallidou et al. (2018) also note the need for interpreter training to account for real-life
professional practice of medical doctors, reporting on a joint training intervention where in-
terpreting and medical students role played together as a means of interprofessional education.
300
The main point with the joint training is that each to-be practitioner (interpreter student
or medical student) gets to know about the work and practices of a professional group with
which they will collaborate in the future. In addition, the level of resemblance of the role
play encounter to a real-life situation is likely to be high for both doctors and interpreters.
Teachers, instructors, or actors as primary participants

Unlike public service providers (above), professional teachers or assessors can be expected to
be experts in the field of giving instructions or feedback to the interpreters, and in acting out
their roles in a way that is efficient from the viewpoint of pedagogy or assessment. As Cirillo
and Radicioni (2017) point out, teachers in the role of primary participants in training role
plays have the possibility to adopt their acting to the students’ level of performance and to
make sure that the training is conducted in a structured way. When it comes to testing and
assessing, a teacher or assessor in the role of a primary participant can ensure that the test is
carried out in more or less the same way from time to time (for reliability and validity issues,
see Education and training of testers and assessors below).
In Example 4 below from a testing role play, Peter, a professional actor who plays the role
of a police officer, is about to interrogate a suspect. Ingvar, the interpreter, introduces himself
to the primary parties.
Example 4
1 Ingvar hej jag heter ingvar ahlgren jag e tolk (.) jag e neutral opartisk har tystnadsp-
likt jag
kommer att tolka allt som säjs här och jag tolkar i första person↓
hi i am ingvar ahlgren i am an interpreter (.) i am neutral impartial have a duty of
confidentiality i will interpret everything said here and i interpret in the first person↓
2 Ingvar varsågoda
please
3 Ingvar пожалуйста
please
4 Peter bra tack (.) å så e de bra att du talar så starkt å tydlit också som du gör här så
vi får mä allting
fine thanks (.) and it’s good that you speak loudly and clearly as you do so that
we get everything
When Ingvar has finished his introduction (1) and asks the primary parties to start talking
(2 , 3), Peter makes a positive comment on Ingvar’s way of speaking (4). It is not quite clear
whether Peter makes this comment in his role of police officer, in his capacity as test or-
ganiser, or as a professional actor. But he seems to at least partly orient towards the testing
situation, making sure that it will be easy to hear and assess the interpreter’s renditions. In
a similar way, teachers as primary participants can make sure that their training session is
conducted so that its didactic goals are reached.
Fellow students as primary participants

Role plays where both the primary participants and the interpreter are interpreter students
do not require any additional resources in the form of professional public service providers
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Magnus Dahnberg
or extra teachers acting out the role play parts and so may be used quite extensively during
a training programme. But interpreter students cannot be expected to have the professional
knowledge of real service providers, or the pedagogical abilities of their teachers. Thus, the
students will probably need detailed instructions about how to practise and what to practise
in a specific role play. In order to make the students practice special terminology, standard
phrases, or cultural references, the role play organiser can provide the students with scripts
(see Scripts above) where the needed phrases or terms are included.
Tebble (2014), in her genre-based approach to teaching interpreting, underlines the sim-
ilar structure and framework content (genre) of different medical consultations, suggest-
ing that interpreting students can benefit from role playing typical interactional sequences
(genre elements) in a d octor-patient encounter, if they first thoroughly study transcripts
from real PSI encounters and then themselves create scenarios based on these. Thus, prior
to role play, students would study and analyse the communication activity type in question,
including both typical genre elements such as greetings, stating the problem, diagnosing the
facts, and so on, and typical formulations and phrases occurring in these moments or phases.
In any case, fellow students role playing together can be expected to orient both towards
the mock institutional talk, the classroom situation, and their interpersonal relations. In
Example 5, Dennis, a (mock) doctor, examines Pavel, who (in the role play) suffers from
angina pectoris. Ivar interprets.
Example 5
1 Dennis a de e ju så för oss män att eh att fettet sätter sej (.) på magen de måste man
akta sej för
well it’s the case for us men that eh that the fat settles (.) on the stomach you have to
beware of that
2 Ivar /…/
3 Pavel э надо сознаваться у меня довольно большое брюшко
eh must admit I have a rather big belly
4 Ivar ja eh å eh jag har ju en rätt stor eh (.) mage
yeah eh and eh I have quite a big eh (.) belly
5 Dennis ja SKRATTAR
yes LAUGHS
Pavel claims to be fat (3) and Ivar interprets this (4). Dennis bursts into laughter (5), proba-
bly due to the contradiction between Pavel’s words in the role play and his slim real-life figure.
This form of role play, involving only interpreter candidates working on the basis of scripts,
might end up low on a resemblance scale if measured against a professional encounter. How-
ever, it can be used as a kind of everyday quantity training that does not require much prepara-
tion and may still help the students broaden their repertoire of common phrases and specialised
terminology in both their working languages (or, as in Example 5, help them deal with cre-
ativity and irony, which may introduce elements of unexpectedness into the scripted role play).
A concluding remark on participants and professional knowledge

As a concluding remark on the question of role play participants, one might note that
the impact on the interaction of the primary participants’ professional knowledge of the
302
communicative activity type trained (or tested) can be expected to be higher in role plays
based on role cards or scenarios than in role plays based on scripts. The more the primary
parties have to improvise during the role play, the more their understanding of the intended
situation, and their professional knowledge of the communicative activity type trained or
tested, affects the way the interaction will unfold.
General and individual objectives

The overall reason why a certain role play is arranged, for example, for training interpreting
students, testing students’ level of proficiency in order to give them further advice (formative
assessment) or for an exam (summative assessment), or assessing a professional interpreter’s
performance during a certification test (summative assessment), also seems to have an impact
on the interaction between the participants during the role play (for the distinction between
formative and summative assessment, see Schildkamp et al. (2020)). The same goes for the
individual goals of the participants – what
is the purpose of taking part in the role play and
what is at stake for each participant?
There are strong indications that the interaction in a training role play can be expected to
differ in several ways from that in a testing one. In the following two examples (f rom Dahn-
berg 2015), the primary parties’ different reactions seem to indicate this. In both examples,
the interpreter indicates that s/he has problems with understanding or rendering.
Example 6 is an extract from a training role play for members of the Swedish Military
Interpreters Association, who were taking part in a voluntary training course over a week-
end. The programme includes role play, lectures, and social events. The participants in such
a training course usually have the objective of brushing up their language and interpreting
skills, meeting with friends and colleagues, and showing their level of performance to the
teachers in order to get interpreting jobs in the future, and to get a formative assessment from
their teachers. In this scripted role play, Daniel, a doctor, examines Patrick, a patient who
complains of ear pain. Isidor interprets.
Example 6
1 Daniel men nu är den inte pärlemorfärgad utan röd och den buktar ut
but now it is not pearly white but red and it bulges out
/…/
2 Isidor сейчас он красноватый и и ээ чуть (.) щас ээм (1.0) ну он
now it is reddish and and er a little (.) well eerm (1.0) well it
просто (3.0) как сказать (1.0) ээ (1.0) ну не знаю э
er just (3.0) how do you say (1.0) eer (1.0) well I don’t know er
3 Patrick н
е знаете? я думаю что это ваша ваша работа знать (.) *ну правда*
SKRATT
don’t know? I think it’s your job to know *well really* LAUGHTER
Isidor signals (2) that it is difficult for him to render Daniel’s “it bulges out” (1), which is met
by a joking remark (3) from Patrick (these words are not included in the script), after which all
three of the role players start laughing. The individual objective of having a social gathering
with friends and colleagues is shown by the informal atmosphere of joking and laughing, as
well as the focus on brushing up language skills, as seen in Patrick’s utterance 3 (“I think it’s
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your job to know”). Patrick’s joke in 3 may also refer to Daniel being a medical doctor in real
life. Later in the dialogue, Patrick helps Isidor with finding an appropriate word in Russian.
This can be compared to the formal atmosphere in the next example from a state certi-
fication test. Paul plays the role of a police officer, interrogating a suspect on the matter of
goods smuggling. Paul is also part of the authorising commission which after the role play
will make a formal a ssessment – a summative one – of the interpreter’s skills. Inga interprets.
The results of her performance will decide whether she will receive the status of authorised
interpreter or not.
Example 7
1 Paul /…/ Liselott klinga→ har avgivit en fullständig bekännelse↓
Liselott Klinga has given a full confession
/…/
2 Inga eh (.) skulle du upp[repa]
er (.) would you re[peat]
3 Paul [hon har avgivit en] fullständig bekännelse
[she has given a] full confession
4 (3.0)
5 Paul hon har alltså erkänt allt
so she admitted everything
(Dahnberg 2015: 97)
No jokes are made, and no laughter is heard. When Inga asks for repetition (2), Paul repeats
the words from his line in the script more or less word by word (1, 3). Since the result of this
is silence (4), Paul again says, and now in his own words in a more colloquial style (these
words are not included in the script), that the suspect’s mate has made a full confession (5).
For Inga, what is at stake is her possible status as an authorised interpreter. It seems that
this makes her unwilling to take risks and make mistakes, or confess that she does not know
how to render Paul’s utterances. Instead, she asks for repetition or simply keeps quiet. Paul,
in turn, is both a primary participant in the talk and an assessor of Inga’s performance. For
him, what is at stake is, among other things, his contribution to a correct assessment, which
seems to make him want to stick to the script as strictly as possible. According to his instruc-
tions, he is supposed to act as naturally as possible, on the one hand, and on the other to make
sure that what he says matches the text in the script.
So, the interaction in a test role play can be expected to differ from the interaction in a
training one. At the same time, the participants’ individual objectives and goals also have
an impact on the interaction and thus, on how closely it resembles the authentic situation.
This means that a role play organiser should bear in mind the purposes for which a role
play is set up, since the participants’ interaction shows their orientation to these purposes.
Training and/or testing such different skills as general professional behaviour, interaction
(coordination, turn-taking), or rendition (accuracy, terminology, language treatment) are
likely to require different types of role play instructions and participants.
Education and training of trainers and assessors

The level of education and training of both trainers and assessors is vital for the outcome of a
training or testing session when role play is used. As we have seen, the way a role play is set
304
up is likely to affect how the interaction between the primary participants and the interpreter
will unfold, which means that a trainer or a tester should be able to choose an appropriate
setup for the purpose of each role play. If, for example, the purpose is to practice rendering
standard phrases or specialised terms, it would be appropriate to set up a scripted role play
where these phrases or terms are included in the script and occur there frequently. For such
a purpose, it seems unnecessary to hire a real public service provider just to read the lines
of the script – the students should probably be able to read the lines to each other. If, how-
ever, a role play is set up in order for students to practice the coordinating function of the
interpreter, it would be appropriate to set up a role play based on a scenario or on role cards,
where the students speak freely within the framework of the scenario. In order to allow the
interpreter students to become acquainted with a certain communicative activity type, it
seems appropriate to set up (unscripted) role plays that, as far as possible, involve participants
who are professionally specialised in the fields or institutions in question.
Thus, an interpreter trainer will benefit f rom – as a m inimum – knowing to what extent
one or the other role play setup can be expected to meet the trainer’s requests for their inter-
preter students to practise one or the other training element in their syllabus.
A very free scenario is provided by the Conversation Analysis Role Play Method (CARM)
(Stokoe 2011; Niemants and Stokoe 2017), described in another chapter of this volume.
Within the CARM framework, a short sequence of authentic interaction is shown to the
PSI students for them to analyse and discuss. Then the students take the roles of participants
in the sequence and act out its continuation. This method is intended on the one hand to
develop candidates’ theoretical understanding of interpreter-mediated interaction and, on
the other, it provides a scenario where only the beginning is set out, leaving the participants
free to imagine possible continuations. Hence, it can be used as an efficient part of education,
particularly for training t urn-taking and coordination techniques, but hardly replaces any of
the other kinds of role play training methods described in this chapter.
For testing, a constant problem is achieving validity (a test measures what it is purported
to measure) while securing reliability (everyone is tested equally). Arranging a series of role
plays for the purpose of testing and assessing the interpreting skills of several persons pres-
ents one with the problem of making the role plays such that they trigger skills necessary in
authentic situations, on the one hand, and making them equal, or at least equally difficult
(or easy), for each person undergoing the test, on the other. At first glance, using a script
with lines to be read out by the primary participants may seem to solve the reliability issue,
provided the lines will be read out in more or less the same way for every test. However,
this may not actually happen. On the contrary, different actors can be expected to read these
lines with different speed, intonation, pauses, and so on. Moreover, different interpreters
will most certainly render these lines differently and will regularly ask for clarifications
and repetitions, which will change the dynamics of each role play. To achieve a high level
of validity and authenticity, it would probably be appropriate to arrange a scenario where
specialists in the field play the role of their professional self, which at the same time most
certainly will make the role plays unfold differently each time, thus potentially jeopardising
reliability.
However, a role play based on a scenario (role cards), where the primary participants act
freely, but strictly within the frames of the intended communicative activity type and the
given scenario, can be expected to give the assessors input to assess the interpreter’s coordi-
nating skills as well as their rendering, language proficiency, and knowledge of specialised
terminology. This is despite the fact, or one might even say thanks to the fact, that such
role plays will most surely differ from one another at the level of single utterances. The
305
Magnus Dahnberg
coordinating function of an interpreter as an active part of interaction is w ell-established

by research (Wadensjö 1998; Baraldi and Gavioli 2014; Krystallidou 2016; Slettebakk Berge
2018, among others), which means that a test that does not provide an opportunity to assess
coordination misses out a crucial interpreting skill.
Moreover, since a dialogue interpreter can be said to achieve closeness in rendition through
accuracy in coordination rather than always providing close renditions directly in the next
turn (Baraldi and Gavioli 2014), tests that exclusively examine a textual equivalence of a ren-
dition (Wadensjö 1998) following a read-out line from a script may not be able to assess ac-
curately either the interpreter’s rendition skills or their coordination skills, in the worst case.
A risk with using scripts for testing is that the assessors may have unrealistic expectations
that the interpreter’s renderings will end up very close to the script or preferably coincide
with it. Those assessors who know only one of the two languages may also get an exagger-
ated idea of their ability to assess the interpreter’s renditions, comparing them to the lines in
the script rather than to the utterances actually spoken in the language they do not under-
stand. Both trainers and testers would benefit from a theoretical education on interpreting
based on research, as well as a practically oriented training where the possibilities and lim-
itations of different role play settings are scrutinised through practice.
Role play setups – summing up

A fruitful approach to using role play for PSI training and testing seems to be variation
depending on the current purpose and the budget available. One type of role play does not
exclude the other.
A closed role play would be appropriate for training and testing the knowledge of standard
phrases, terminology, and cultural references, where the focus is on words and phrases, and
not on interaction, including coordination (Hale 2007: 151).
An open role play would be recommended for training and testing coordination, turn-
t aking, rendition, and different communicative activity types.
A professional role play, while resource-demanding since the presence of external profes-
sionals needs to be organised, provides the possibility of concentrating on a certain com-
municative activity type. This would be highly recommended for training Public Service
interpreters who are not beginners but at an advanced level. With due preparation of the
professionals, it is also recommended for testing and examination.
A semi-professional role play claims teaching resources and is therefore not as easily organised
as a n
on-professional one. With teachers properly prepared for such a task, a s emi-professional
role play can be recommended for the purpose of examination of PSI students. The teachers’
presence in the role play is likely to ensure quite a high level of reliability for an examination.
A non-professional role play, with students only, claims no extra resources in the form of
real service providers, or extra teachers acting the part of doctors or police officers, and can
therefore be used extensively at least for closed role plays, and also for open ones with due
preparation of the students, for the purpose of practice and training.
Further reading
Bancroft, Marjory A., Sofia García-Beyaert, Katharine Allen, Giovanna Carriero-Contreras, and
Denis Socarrás-Estrada (2015) The Community Interpreter®: An International Textbook. Columbia,
Culture & Language Press.
306
Bancroft, Marjory A., Sofia G arcía-Beyaert, Katharine Allen, Giovanna C arriero-Contreras, Denis
Socarrás-Estrada, and Hank Dallmann (2015) The Community Interpreter®: An International Work-
book on Activities and Role-Plays for Medical, Educational and Social Service Interpreters. Columbia, Cul-
ture & Language Press.
These two books, a textbook and a workbook, adopt an interpreter-oriented perspective on teaching commu-
nity interpreting, with a special focus on medical interpreting, including role play exercises.
Leaman, Lori Hostetler, and Toni Michele Flanagan (2013) “Authentic role-playing as situated learn-
ing: Reframing teacher education methodology for h igher-order thinking”, Studying Teacher Edu-
cation 9 (1): 4 5–61.
This article proposes a kind of training role play where the action can be paused and discussed by the students
and their instructors, and then start again from where it stopped. It is called Authentic Role Play as Situated
Learning (A RSL), and while the article describes teacher education and not interpreter education, it still gives
food for thought on how to develop the role play as a training method.
Related chapters
Mason
Chapter 13, Challenges and remedies for interpreter-mediated dementia assessments by Charlotta
Plejert
Chapter 23, Interprofessional Education …. Interpreter Education in or and? Taking stock and moving forward
by Demi Krystallidou
Gry Sagli.
Note
1 This might be comparable to respeaking, when speech is to be transferred to writing (in the same
language), namely when interpretations are provided in writing for the deaf and hard of hearing,
and where the respeaking becomes a dictation with a written structure and where punctuation is
explicitly given (Eugeni 2008).
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language”, The Language Scholar Journal 2: 18–36.
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19
MONITORING IN DIALOGUE
INTERPRETING
Cognitive and didactic perspectives
Introduction
This chapter explores the concept of monitoring and how it can be understood as a central
cognitive process in dialogue interpreting, one of the main interpreting techniques used in
public service. We use the term dialogue interpreting for short consecutive interpreting, in both
language directions, utterance by utterance, in dialogues between two or more primary par-
ties. The interpreter may use notes but in many cases does not. Dialogue interpreting in this
sense is used not only in public service interpreting, but also in other settings such as business
meetings or diplomatic encounters.1
Dialogue interpreting has so far mainly been investigated from a sociological and inter-
actional perspective. This is not surprising because, in most encounters in the public sector,
the spoken language interpreter works in absolute proximity to the primary participants,
which has tended to foreground social and interactional aspects in research. After Waden-
sjö’s (1992) seminal work, many studies have investigated dialogue interpreting in various
settings (Roy 1993; Straniero Sergio 1999; Angelelli 2004; Tebble 2009; Baraldi and Gavioli
2012a are cases in point) elucidating the constraints and challenges of different contexts from
an interactional perspective. As Wadensjö (1992, 1998) has shown, dialogue interpreters not
only translate but also coordinate talk in social interaction. It can therefore be assumed that
the dialogue interpreter functions differently in the interpreted event as compared to, for
instance, conference interpreters working in simultaneous mode. Interaction is an inherent
feature of dialogue interpreting.
However, understanding also the cognitive (mental) processes underlying dialogue in-
terpreting and the interpreting performance is both theoretically important and crucial
from an applied perspective, not the least in the context of education and professionaliza-
tion of interpreters in the public sector. Traditionally, cognitive research on interpreting
has focused on the simultaneous or the long consecutive techniques (for an overview see
Liu 2008), which are typically used in conference interpreting. Thus, most cognitive re-
search in interpreting has focused on conference interpreting. There are also some studies
about sight translation (for example, Shreve, Lacruz and Angelone 2010), but very few
cognitive research studies have focused on dialogue interpreting as used in the public
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-23 309

service sector (for an overview, see Tiselius and Albl Mikasa 2019). In his conceptual
analysis of the interpreter’s role in interaction, Pöchhacker (2 012: 67) points to ‘a need to
apply a more distinctly cognitive perspective to the sociolinguistic analysis of participation
in discourse’. Answering this need, this chapter addresses the complexities of cognition in
dialogue interpreting through the concept of monitoring. We will show that monitoring
is a multifaceted concept which can be fruitfully applied to research on dialogue inter-
preting from several theoretical perspectives. We will also demonstrate that a more general
understanding of monitoring can be a useful pedagogical concept to apply in interpreter
education.
Epistemological and theoretical considerations
Interpreting acts and interpreting events

Following Toury (2012: 40), ‘the translation act’ is a theoretical concept referring to a cog-
nitive activity: to render an utterance in one language into another. Toury stresses that this
act cannot be directly observed nor simulated, but by observing the activity, we can make
assumptions about the act. Toury further contextualizes the act by stating that the actual
cognitive activity to translate cannot be divorced from its environment, being the event of
the act (2012: 67). He proposes that ‘[i]t is not unthinkable that the internal [act] and the
external [event] may even exert mutual influences’ (2012: 68) but concludes that so far this
has not been theorized. This idea is further pursued by Chesterman (2015), who states that
‘[a]n act is thus embedded in an event: the event is the sociological or situational context of
the act’ (2015: 8). Chesterman (2015: 9) also adds that although the distinction between act
and event in interpreting may seem less clear than in translation, the act of interpreting as
well as the event of interpreting still can be and are studied using different types of methods
and models.
Chesterman (2015: 9) continues to discuss how acts and events can be further applied
to the investigation of translation processes, suggesting a threefold distinction of models,
namely, models of virtual processes, reverse-engineered processes, and actual processes.
According to Chesterman, models of virtual processes describe a possible translation prob-
lem in a hypothetical situation, that is, these models are not an actual description or obser-
vation of a problem. However, models of reverse-engineered processes start from an actual
situation/t ranslation and then b ack-track to possible translation problems in order to describe
the process. Finally, models of actual processes describe the translator’s process as observed
in research. Muñoz (2016) disputes Chesterman’s conceptual separation between acts and
events and states ‘that [the concepts] may be adequate to map some of the main areas of trans-
lation studies, but that using them within the cognitive study of translating and interpreting
would be misguided’ (2016: 146). The reason for this claim is that, according to Muñoz and
contrary to Chesterman’s claim about the division of (cognitive) acts and events (see above),
there simply cannot be a cognitive act without an event. The act is firmly embedded in the
event (cf. Toury 2012: 67–68).
We would argue that Muñoz’s argument is particularly relevant to dialogue interpreting,
as the interpreter in a dialogue c o-creates the interpreting event together with the pri-
mary parties, making it impossible to investigate the cognitive processes of the interpreter
without placing them within the event. However, research data often allows for analysis of
different levels of detail and depth depending upon the research question to be answered.
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Monitoring in dialogue interpreting
In the words of Risku (2014: 339), ‘each research endeavour will focus on specific research
questions and naturally cannot include the whole complexity of human cognition.’ There-
fore, in our view, a research study can have its main focus on one element in the event, such
as the cognitive processes of the interpreter. Such a focus can also be of use for a number of
didactic purposes.
Interpreters, in our understanding, monitor not only themselves, but also the other par-
ticipants. Therefore, it seems natural to assume that dialogue interpreting is characterized by
distributed cognition (Hutchins 1995). Following Kirsh (2006) and Sutton (2006), distrib-
uted cognition is not only interpersonal but indeed comprises all components which con-
tribute to a system performing its task. In dialogue interpreting, the cognition is distributed
over the participants, but also artefacts (such as notepad and pen, computer, telephone, dic-
tionaries, brochures, and forms) typically present in an interpreted event, which contribute
to the fulfilment of the task.
In translation studies, the notion of distributed cognition has been taken up by, for
instance, Ehrensberger-Dow (2 014) and Risku (2 014). Risku (2 014: 335) points out the
need to investigate the translation process using both experimental and ethnographic ap-
proaches, as research suggests that cognitive processes are c ontext-dependent (see, for ex-
ample, Clark and Chalmers 1998; Suchman 2007; Clark 2008). Dialogue interpreting is
very much context-dependent (Wadensjö 1998), and the cognitive processes of dialogue
interpreters can be assumed to both have impact on and be affected by the interpreted
event.
Sutton (2 006) and Michaelian and Sutton (2 013) stress that coordination is an im-
portant feature of distributed cognition, since all the components potentially involved in
task fulfilment have to be coordinated for a successful outcome. Wadensjö (1998) has also
pointed to the interpreter’s work of coordinating the exchange in an interpreted event.
As we will show below, monitoring is a crucial cognitive factor in the interpreter’s co-
ordination work.
Monitoring – a
multifaceted theoretical concept
The M erriam-Webster dictionary (2019) defines monitoring as the act ‘to watch, keep track
of, or check, usually for a special purpose.’ We assume that all cognitive processes are moni-
tored to certain degrees; however, space limitations prevent us from offering a fuller account
of the cognitive processes monitored in dialogue interpreting.
Several disciplines relevant to the study of dialogue interpreting have proposed con-
cepts of monitoring. In the three consecutive sub-sections below, we review three partly
different notions of monitoring, proposed within different theoretical frameworks, all po-
tentially relevant for the study of dialogue interpreting and the education of dialogue
interpreters. To illustrate the theoretical concepts, we give examples from our own re-
search. The examples in the text come from material collected for the project The invisible
process – Cognition and working memory in dialogue interpreting ( V R 2 016- 01118), funded by
the Swedish Research Council. The data consists of interpreted scripted role plays between
a Swedish job counselor (C) and a newly arrived French-, Spanish-, or Polish- speaking job
seeker ( JS), both actors, professional or amateurs. Although the role plays were scripted,
which means that the study is based on elicited data, the interpreter-participants (students
and experienced interpreters) had not seen the scripts and had only been briefed on the
overall topic of the encounter (for more information about the data, see Tiselius and
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Englund Dimitrova 2019, 2021; Tiselius and Sneed 2020). In the subsequent section, Mon-
itoring in dialogue interpreting, we introduce our understanding of monitoring. Finally, in
the section called Interpreting practice and education, we discuss the ideas and data presented
from a didactic perspective.
The model of self-monitoring in translation studies

In translation studies, the so-called monitor model is known within descriptive translation
studies first from Toury (1995: 184, 1 91–92, 2012: 225, 287). Discussing translators’ work pro-
cess and revisions as a ‘series of moves’, he claims that the translator practices ‘self-corrective feed-
back involving a constant self-monitoring process’ (Toury 1995: 184, italics in the original; cf also
Toury 2012: 216) and suggests the term ‘monitor model’ for this (Toury 1995: 191, 2012: 225).
This discussion is further developed by T irkkonen-Condit (2005), who, on the basis of empir-
ical process data, proposes that literal translation seems to be a default choice and that not until
the monitor signals a problem, will the translator actively work on other solutions. Although
the suggested monitor model is closely related to written translation and the process of pro-
ducing several target versions, it may still be of relevance to dialogue interpreting. Tirkkonen-
Condit (2005: 411) indeed suggests that (simultaneous) interpreting data is more suited than
translation data to test her monitor model as the time constraints in interpreting probably result
in a material more closely reflecting the o n-line interpreting process; presumably, this should
also hold for dialogue interpreting data. We suggest that Toury’s and Tirkkonen-Condit’s pro-
posals can be used for describing interpreters’ self-monitoring, both during the listening phase
(their understanding), and during the production phase (their speech production).
Example 1 shows the interpreter’s self-monitoring during listening (see description of the
data of the examples in the previous section). David (experienced Swedish-Spanish interpreter)
listens to the JS (Spanish) who, in turn 51, recounts that she is alone with her three children
and does not have any news from her husband, as they got separated during their flight. David,
however, misunderstands the JS’s word huída (‘fleeing’), understanding it as oída (‘hearing’), but
this meaning does not fit with the context. This evaluation of the situation makes him take
action by interrupting the JS in turn 52 asking for clarification. Before the interruption, his
gaze goes from gaze aversion to gazing at the JS, and when asking for clarification he also shows
his own understanding by pointing his index finger to his ear. The JS repeats huída (‘fleeing’)
in turn 53, also paraphrasing it with a verb phrase, and David nods to indicate understanding.
Example 1 S elf-monitoring of understanding Interpreters

gaze * and gesture ⧫ are given above the related utterance
(transcription key in the appendix)
I* >> gaze to C -----------------------* *gaze aversion------------------->*
51 JS vale y estoy un poquito preocupada por * * las actividades porque son son a*
good because I’m a little worried for those activities because are are they
I* *gaze to C--------->* *gaze aversion --------------------------------->
*tiempo completo ↑ * *y: y: que pasa con los hijos porque yo tengo hijos y
full time an: an: what happens with the kids because I’m alone with
I* ------------------ --------------------------------------------------->*
los cuido yo sola (.) porque su padre y yo nos separamos durante la huída*
the children because their father and I got separated during the fleeing
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I⧫ ⧫ turn tw JS-- ->⧫

I* * gaze to JS------- ----------------------------------->
⧫ y hasta el día⧫* de hoy no [sabemos (.) de]
and to this day we don’t have any news of
I⧫ ⧫L index to L ear⧫
I* ------------------ ------------------------------------------------->*
52 I [perdona no entiendo] eso ⧫de la oída ⧫=
sorry I don’t understand this with the hearing
I⧫ ⧫nod------------------⧫
I* ---------* *gaze aversion------------------------------------------>>
53 JS =la huída* ⧫[desde que huímos]⧫
the flight from the time we fled
I* ------------------ ------------------------------------------------->*
I [a: vale vale]
[a: okay okay]
David said during the post-task interview that based on the JS’s European Spanish accent,
he was taken by surprise when she mentioned ‘fleeing’ (turn 51). This example shows how
David’s monitoring of his own understanding, quick evaluation, and action avoids a misun-
derstanding which could have challenged the participants’ mutual understanding.
Levelt’s and Laver’s models of speech production

In Speech Studies, the concept of monitoring is described in relation to speech disfluencies from
a psycholinguistic approach by Levelt (1983) in his model of speech production. The model de-
scribes the on-going monitoring of speech as flowing in a loop as long as the monitor does not
detect problems, thus taking place during speech production and while listening to one’s own
speech production. From a neurolinguistics approach, Laver (1980), however, situates monitoring
in the phase before speech production, linking it to the planning of the speech production. The
placement of monitoring during or immediately before speech production would, thus, suggest
that listening, speech planning, and speech production are parallel processes. For a recent overview
of the cognitive processes in language production, see Nozari and Novick (2017).
Example 2 shows Marie (experienced Swedish-French interpreter), who interprets be-
tween the C (Swedish) and the JS (French). In this excerpt, turn 20, the JS explains that
she had trouble finding her way because she speaks neither Swedish nor English. This is a
fairly straightforward expression but can be expressed in Swedish both as I don’t know or I
don’t speak. In turn 21, Marie’s false start/d isfluency seems to be a trace of this type of self-
monitoring of word choice in speech production, as she starts off with pra:, possibly as in
prata (‘speak’), and then goes on to ka: as in kan (‘k now’), and finally decides (takes action)
on ‘speak’, which is closer to the French parle.
Example 2 S elf-monitoring of word choice Interpreters

gaze * and gesture ⧫ are given above the related utterance
(transcription key in the appendix)
I⧫ ⧫nod ⧫
I* *gaze to JS------------------------------------------------------------>
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20 JS *=mm et je parle ni suédois ni anglais ⧫alors⧫ j’ai essayé de demander

=mm and I speak neither Swedish nor English so I tried to ask for
I* ------------------ --------------------------------------------------->*
mon chemin mais c’était °pas facile° ↓h
directions but it was not easy
(0.2)
C [mm]
Mm
I⧫ ⧫slow nod⧫
I* >----------* *gaze aversion------------------------->*
21 I [mm]* .hh *å ja– ja pra: ka:⧫ pratar ⧫ varken svenska eller*
an I-I spea: kno: speak neither Swedish nor
I* * gaze to C* *gaze aversion-------------* *gaze to C*------*
* engelska * *ja försökte fråga runt lite* *men det var svårt*
English I tried to ask around a little but it was hard
The type of monitoring (Levelt 1980; Laver 1983) discussed above and exemplified in
Example 2 stems from theories of speech disfluency and is thus restricted to speech production.
It covers the interpreters’ listening phase (assuming that their speech planning starts during the
phase of listening to the primary parties), and also their production phase when they monitor
their own utterance. This view is, quite clearly, of importance for dialogue interpreting, but,
as this understanding of monitoring only covers self-monitoring of speech planning and pro-
duction, it is not sufficiently broad to cover all relevant aspects of dialogue interpreting. Levelt’s
and Laver’s understanding of monitoring is close to Toury’s monitor model.
Goodwin’s monolingual talk monitoring
In theories of interaction, the concept of monitoring captures how the participants in a

monolingual conversation monitor each other’s talk and different paralinguistic and gestural
responses to ensure understanding among other things. Goodwin (1980) describes monitor-
ing in monolingual talk as participants’ mutual attention to each other’s talk providing them
a basis to co-construct meaning. This understanding of monitoring focuses on the reciprocal
signals provided by the interlocutors to each other, not only those coming from the single
speakers; it, thus, describes the interactional processes between the participants rather than
their cognitive processes. Such a concept is clearly relevant to dialogue interpreting and is
closely related to Wadensjö’s (1998) study of interpreting as interaction.
In Example 3, Beata (inexperienced/student, Swedish-Spanish) interprets between the C
(Swedish) and the JS (Spanish). The example shows self-monitoring of the interpreter’s cog-
nitive capacity and also monitoring of the primary party’s speech flow in order to possibly
take action regarding t urn-taking. After the first couple of words in turn 94, Beata gazes at
her notepad and makes a move to start scribbling, but without doing so. At the end of turn
94, the C pauses and Beata, without gazing at him, puts up the palm of her right hand to-
wards him, indicating that she wants to take and keep the turn. Her averted gaze indicates
increased cognitive effort (Doherty-Sneddon and Phelps 2005). There is a pause of 0.8 s
before she starts her interpretation, which may be seen as an indication that she has not yet
planned her production and still needs to keep the turn. This action suggests that she has the
capacity to self-monitor her understanding and memory capacity and also to monitor the
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primary party’s utterance, in this case stopping them from intervening, but constraints in
her cognitive capacity has not allowed her to plan her production. Therefore, she has to use
a moment at the beginning of her utterance for planning.
Example 3 Interpreter’s s elf-monitoring and monitoring of primary

party’s utterances Interpreters gaze * and gesture ⧫ are given above
the related utterance (transcription key in the appendix)
I⧫ ⧫lifts pen------------->
I* *gaze to C----------------------- ------------* *gaze to pad---------->
94 C =*okej då är det på det här sättet att när du deltar i* *⧫ aktiviteterna som vi
okay then it is like this that when you participate in the activities that we
I⧫ --------- ----------⧫
I* ------------------- * *gaze to C> ----------------------------------->
kommer överens om⧫* * i din etableringsplan så får du etableringsersättning
agree on in your establishment plan you get settlement allocation
I* -------------------------------------------------------*
och du får den ersättningen för fem kalenderdar i veckan ↓*
and you get that allocation for five calendar days per week
I⧫ ⧫R H-PALM UP > C⧫
⧫(0.8)⧫
I* *avert g aze----------------------------------------- ---*
95 I *e entonces es así que cuando usted participa en el plan de*
and it is like this that when. you participate in the plan
I* *gaze to JS---------------->* *avert g aze---------------->*
*actividades en las actividades* *e: le vamos a dar (0.5) un e (.)*
of activities in the activities e: we will give you an e
*gaze to JS----------------------------------- ----->*
*subsidio para establecerse para cinco días a la semana*
allocation for settlement for five days per week
As we have shown above, monitoring is understood somewhat differently depending

upon the theoretical perspective. 2 Given the great complexity of interpreted encounters,
various understandings can be applied, depending upon the researcher’s or teacher’s focus of
interest. In the next section, we propose an understanding of monitoring for the context
of dialogue interpreting (see also Englund Dimitrova and Tiselius 2016).
Describing monitoring in a dialogue interpreting context

We propose the following understanding of monitoring for a dialogue interpreting context:
interpreters’ monitoring is a cognitive process through which they observe, evaluate, and take actions
relating to their own cognitive processing and that of the other participants in the interpreting event.
We have suggested that dialogue interpreters monitor not only their own interpreting
process, but also the coordination of the t urn-taking and the planning ahead of the interaction
(Englund Dimitrova and Tiselius 2016: 203). We also assume that monitoring is crucial in at
least six processes of dialogue interpreting, three more prominently when the interpreter is
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listening and three when the interpreter is speaking. When one of the primary parties speaks
and the interpreter listens, the interpreter monitors: (a) their own comprehension of that ut-
terance, as illustrated by Example 1 above; (b) the relation of that utterance to the interpreter’s
recent rendition (was it understood as intended?); and (c) their own memory and processing
capacity (ready to take the turn if necessary; Example 3 above). When the interpreter speaks,
the interpreter monitors: (d) their own utterance (in relation to the given language; Exam-
ple 2 above); (e) the relation between their own utterance and the primary party’s previous
utterance (in those cases when the interpreter’s utterances are renditions of a primary party’s
utterances); and (f ) verbal and non-verbal reactions of the primary parties. Carrying out these
processes would entail particular ways of cognitive processing, as detailed below.
From our perspective, monitoring includes both self-monitoring – as described above with
references to Toury (2012), Levelt (1983) and Laver (1981) – and monitoring of other partic-
ipants, that is, understanding their utterances, the relationship to other utterances, and non-
verbal reactions, similar to the mutual attention described by Goodwin (1980). As shown by
our examples, we explore monitoring primarily as an element of the interpreter’s cognitive
processes when performing in face-to-face encounters. In doing this, we do not see the in-
terpreter as an isolated individual, but as a participant solicited in the context of an event and
thereby contributing in co-constructing meaning. Monitoring, in our view, is a necessary,
pervasive, and continuous element of the dialogue interpreter’s all cognitive processes.
Studies related to monitoring in dialogue interpreting

The processes necessary for interpreting are, thus, monitored constantly by the interpreter
during the interpreted event. Several of these processes have been empirically studied, such
as in the following examples. Studying the interpreter’s gaze through eye-tracking allows a
more fi ne-grained analysis of t urn-taking and sequence organization than video recordings
(Vranjes, Brône and Feyaerts 2018) but is also an important tool to infer the underlying
cognitive processes. Tiselius and Sneed (2020) found that depending on the language di-
rection, the interpreter may behave differently. When interpreting into the language of the
non-institutional speaker (client), the participants in their study: (a) gazed more often at the
face of the client compared to gazing at the institutional provider’s face when interpreting
into that language (Swedish in the case in question), and (b) had more instances of averted
gaze when interpreting into the language of the client compared to when they interpreted
into the language of the institutional provider. And, vice versa, when interpreting into the
language of the institutional provider, the participants: (a) gazed less often at the face of the
institutional provider compared to gazing to the face of the client when interpreting into
their language, and: (b) had fewer instances of averted gaze when interpreting into the lan-
guage of the institutional provider compared to when interpreting into the client’s language.
Both of these instances indicate monitoring of primary participants.
The result of monitoring can be observed in the behavior displayed by the interpreters
for managing their cognitive constraints. We have shown that the directionality (that is,
which language the interpreter is working into) may have an impact on the cognitive effort
required in dialogue interpreting (Tiselius and Englund Dimitrova 2019; Tiselius and Sneed
2020) – that is, interpreting in one language direction may increase the cognitive load more
than the other.
Also related to monitoring is Arumí and Vargas-Urpi’s (2017) study of strategies in pub-
lic service interpreting. They studied five Spanish/Catalan-Chinese dialogue interpreters
who interpreted three different role plays each (the same ones for every interpreter) and also
316
completed a questionnaire and performed a retrospection task. Arumí and V argas-Urpi ana-
lyzed how the interpreters handled potential problems (lexical, pragmatic, cultural, conver-
sation management, impromptu speech, pronunciation/expression, and ethical dilemmas)
in the interpreted role plays. One of their findings was that information management strat-
egies were used to segment information, emphasize important segments of the rendition,
clarify, and explicitate meaning. These information management strategies can be seen as
responses to issues identified through monitoring. They also found that turn-taking man-
agement serves – among other functions – as a strategy to handle the interpreter’s cognitive
load (compare with Example 3 above).
Herring (2018, 2019) studied dialogue interpreters (novices n = 3, and experienced n =
8) between Spanish and English as they interpreted a simulated encounter where the par-
ticipants had been instructed as to what issues they would discuss and what terminology to
use but had no script. The interpreters also participated in p rocess-tracing retrospection after
the task. She investigated the interpreters’ online self-regulation (cf. Boekaerts, Zeidner and
Pintrich 1999), which she describes as actions to (a mong other things) modify performance
‘to create or maintain alignment between current and goal states’ (2019: 286). In contrast
to our proposed understanding of monitoring, Herring distinguishes between monitoring
(the observation) and control (the action; cf. Nelson and Narens 1990). Herring found that
interpreters monitor their own knowledge/understanding of various aspects of the situa-
tional context, the backstory, the identities of and relationships between the parties, and
external factors impacting the encounter or interpreting (2019: 296). Herring also stresses
turn-taking as a strategy to handle cognitive load, especially in emotionally charged inter-
actions (2019: 290).
In our project, we found that, with experience, the interpreter’s professional self-concept
changes and strengthens. This, in turn, contributes to more effective monitoring, since the
interpreter will know what action to take (Englund Dimitrova and Tiselius 2016). We have
also found indications that different levels of language competence may increase or decrease
cognitive load. A change in cognitive load may, in turn, require extra monitoring effort
(Thomsen 2018, Tiselius and Englund Dimitrova 2019).
Monitoring needs processing capacity and is therefore dependent on working memory
(WM). In a general study (not related to interpreting) of WM, Miller, Watson, and Strayer
(2012) suggest that individuals with greater WM capacity also show greater monitoring
capacity. Research on interpreters’ WM has mostly focused on conference interpreters but
findings are relevant to dialogue interpreting too. M eta-analyses of studies on interpreters’
WM by Wen and Dong (2019) and Mellinger and Hanson (2019) have shown that the WM
capacity of experienced interpreters is larger than that of non-interpreters. Timarová, Drag-
sted, and Hansen (2011: 122) established experimentally that in simultaneous interpreting,
the ear-voice span, or lag, is approximately between two and five seconds, and not going
beyond ten seconds. Ear-voice span is clearly correlated to the interpreter’s WM capacity and
can be seen as an analogue to what we label processing span in dialogue interpreting (Tiselius
and Englund Dimitrova 2021). In our study on temporal aspects of dialogue interpreting,
we found that there may be a universal cognitive constraint limiting the length of turns in
dialogue interpreting.
In neuroscience, researchers have proposed that the anterior cingulate cortex is the area
of the brain which monitors conflicts and detects errors in cognitive tasks. (M iller, Watson
and Strayer 2012). This is also the area of the brain where Hervais-Adelman and Babcock
(2020) found differences between interpreters and n on-interpreters in their overview of
fMRI studies on the interpreter’s brain. Monitoring, thus, is a central cognitive process, and
317
the interpreter’s brain seems to develop accordingly, suggesting that monitoring is what helps
interpreters regulate cognitive effort in order to handle cognitive load.
Coordination and monitoring

In monolingual talk, coordination is present in the stream of speech, where it provides par-
ticipants with reference signals which help them to synchronize their behavior (Goodwin
1981: 28). Goodwin compares this coordination of talk to how trapeze artists coordinate their
movements to the music, with the exception that in talk, the ‘music’ is not predetermined,
but a result of the coordinated actions. In interpreting, the interpreter’s utterances bridge
linguistic gaps (between the two languages in the encounter) and social gaps (between the
participants in the event). Applying this perspective to interpreting, interpreters’ utterances
can, thus, be oriented towards the text (that is, the rendition of an original utterance into
another language) or towards the interaction (for example, a demand for time to interpret,
an utterance can of course serve both orientations). Following Wadensjö (1998: 109f ), the
interaction-oriented utterances can have a coordinating function of the speakers’ talk. This
coordination happens implicitly when the interpreter interprets in the event; since the inter-
preter is expected to take every second turn in order for the c ross-lingual communication
to happen, the interpreter’s talk serves as implicit coordination. Explicit coordination occurs
(through the interpreter’s regulation) when the interpreter asks for a clarification, asks for
time to interpret, or comments on a rendition. Coordination is ‘a fundamental characteristic
of interaction in general and of interpreter-mediated interaction in particular’ (Baraldi and
Gavioli 2012b: 1).
Monitoring, as we describe it, is part and parcel of the interaction. Being a cognitive
or mental process, it is dependent on and stemming from the interpreter’s cognitive abil-
ities as described in the previous section, but it is likewise a natural part and consequence
of the interaction. Monitoring is one of several cognitive processes necessary for dialogue
interpreting and, as argued, can be seen as a central component of those processes, both
to translate and to participate in the coordination of the interaction. Interpreters monitor
all six processes described above that are crucial for both their own performance and their
coordination w ork – namely, when listening, monitoring of (1) one’s own comprehension,
(2) agreement between original utterance and rendition, and (3) memory and processing
capacity; and when speaking, monitoring of (4) production of one’s own utterance, (5) its
relation to the previous utterance, and (6) verbal/non-verbal reactions.
Hence, monitoring in dialogue interpreting is a cognitive process not linked only to
speech production or only to interaction, but rather to the whole interpreted event where
the interpreter needs to assess continuously their own and other participants’ actions in or-
der to adapt behavior if necessary. Thus, monitoring by the dialogue interpreter is a crucial
cognitive process not only in talk production and comprehension and in the co-construction
of meaning. It has much more far-reaching functions and needs to be approached as a mul-
tidimensional phenomenon. Indeed, interpreters’ coordination would (especially in terms of
explicit coordination) not be possible without interpreters’ monitoring. Monitoring is a key
cognitive factor for coordinating the interaction.
Interpreting practice and e ducation – is there room for monitoring?

The dialogue interpreting technique is traditionally taught using roleplays (Dahnberg, in
this volume). More recently, the Conversation Analytic R
ole-Play Method (CARM) (using
318
animated audio or video recordings, see Niemants, Hansen and Stokoe, in this volume) has
also been introduced.
There are many aspects of the interpreted dialogue which are difficult to highlight in a
roleplay. Several of these aspects can be identified and discussed using CARM, but they also
need to be understood, practiced, and hopefully automatized through the course of an inter-
preter education. In short, students need to develop their meta-cognitive awareness and learn
how to steer their cognitive capacities. They need to be able to visualize and describe their
cognitive processes. We argue that this is where an understanding of the various processes of
monitoring comes into play.
To manage a dialogue interpreting encounter, interpreters need to learn to recognize and
handle their own cognitive constraints, identify cognitive demands, and manage cognitive
effort. This can be done systematically in interpreter education by focusing on the described
six cognitive processes. Many students learn to do it intuitively but, by identifying the need
for monitoring and making students aware of techniques interpreters use, students are likely
to do so more effectively, and perhaps more of them can learn to use relevant techniques.
Furthermore, it will also help both students and interpreters identify ineffective actions or
contradictory signals. When students acquire meta-cognitive awareness, they are given tools
and also a language to talk about their cognitive experience and resources.
In order to foster the development of meta-cognitive awareness and of learning how
to steer one’s own cognitive resources for dialogue interpreting, we suggest a combined
theoretical and experience-based approach. First, the students will be guided through the
theoretical background of the monitoring models we introduced above. Ideally, the students
would read the relevant scholarly literature but, if that proves too abstract, the teacher can
support learning through, for instance, short v ideo-recorded overviews of each of the ar-
ticles, which will allow for students to go back to the recorded overviews when they are
reading on their own. The articles can also be discussed in class.
Second, transcribed examples illustrating each process are reviewed and discussed in class.
In this step, the examples we provide in the text can be used as a point of departure. In the
next step, we would also encourage teachers to use their own examples, whether found in
the literature or the instructor’s own. These examples can be presented in recorded and/or
transcribed formats (similar to those used in CARM). It is important that these are also
discussed in class.
The aspects we suggest to highlight in the examples, so as to enhance students’ under-
standing of monitoring are:
• urn-taking, and how it impacts communication and information transfer. This can be
T
done by observing individual strategies for handling t urn-taking, used by the interpret-
ers in the examples, as well as by their student peers in exercises, in order to test them
later. Also, students can observe how problems with t urn-taking may result in overlap-
ping talk, loss of information or misunderstandings.
• Gazing, its impact, and how it is handled by interpreters. Understanding the impact
of gaze direction and gaze aversion gives interpreters a strong tool to coordinate the
conversation (compare Vranjes, Brône and Feyaerts 2018 and Davitti 2013). By under-
standing the impact of gaze, the interpreter student learns how to use gaze to take action
when monitoring and, for instance, regulate turn-taking for the benefit of their own
or the participants’ comprehension, or for coping with their own cognitive constraint.
• Gesturing, and how body and gaze can be powerful resources in the interpreting pro-
cess. This can be done by practicing the use of bodily resources as a tool in t urn-taking,
319
an often u
nder-explored area in training. Furthermore, in relation to monitoring, it is
important to master one’s own bodily expressions so as not to confuse the participants’
understanding.
Third, after the theoretical and observation steps, students can record themselves and their
classmates when interpreting and discuss and analyze their own performance.
Finally, the students need to be offered the opportunity to discuss the implications of
each and all monitoring of the different processes and how important each one of them is (in
relative terms) to the interpreting process.
Students may also be further invited to investigate themselves in smaller research s tudies –
for example, for a final course paper or a final program thesis – where they use their own
recorded interpreting as data and investigate them from a cognitive perspective.
We believe that interpreting exercises should focus not only on the linguistic aspects of
the students’ renditions, as is sometimes the case, but must take into account the full range of
cognitive resources in the process. Through the steps we suggest, future dialogue interpret-
ers are trained through combined theoretical and practical methods to understand monitor-
ing. Students will, thus, learn how their own monitoring w orks – through video recordings
and transcription exercises of their own performance – and will also (better) understand
their own cognitive constraints, also through video recordings and transcriptions.
Conclusion
In conclusion, we see the application of monitoring to research and education as a road to
improve interpreter students’ performance through their conscious access to their own cog-
nitive processes. In this chapter, we hope to have shown that monitoring is crucial in the
dialogue interpreter’s cognitive processing. We have also given examples of how monitoring
can be used in a cognitive approach to teaching dialogue interpreting. Finally, we argue that
more research on cognition in dialogue interpreting in general, and research on monitoring
in dialogue interpreting in particular, is sorely needed.
Further reading
Angelone, Eric (2010) “Uncertainty, uncertainty management and metacognitive problem solving
in the translation task”, in Translation and Cognition, Gregory M. Shreve, and Eric Angelone (eds).
The article presents a study looking into the metacognition of translation students and a translation teacher,
that is how participants think about their process. Through think-aloud protocols and screen recordings, the
author investigates how inexperienced and experienced participants handle situations when they are not certain
about how to solve a translation problem. Furthermore, the author discusses monitoring as one component of
metacognition.
Fernández Bravo, Elena Aguirre, (2019) “Metacognitive self-perception in interpreting”, Translation,
Cognition & Behavior 2 (2): 147–64.
This article reports on the development of a tool for students to identify learning processes and development
of interpreting skills. The aim of the instrument is to help students achieve a metacognitive understanding of
their interpreting (and learning) process. The authors suggest that the tool can be used for diagnostic and for-
mative assessment and that the scale proposed can be useful for further competence development of professional
interpreters.
Orlando, Marc ( 2012) “ Training of professional translators in Australia: Process-oriented and
product-oriented evaluation approaches”, in Global Trends in Translator and Interpreter Training,

Séverine Hubscher-Davidson and Michał Borodo (eds). London, Continuum: 1 97–216.
320
In this article the author describes the translator education curriculum at Monash university in Melbourne,
Australia. An important part of the training is the integration of “the integrated translator’s diary” (see also
Gile 2009) aiming at developing students’ metacognitive awareness. The article is further relevant (and appli-
cable to interpreting) as it also discusses how trainers can approach the assessment of the process of translation
both from a formative and a summative perspective.
Related chapters
Chapter 10, Consecutive interpreting and multimodal sequences by Christian Licoppe.
Chapter 18, Role play as a means of training and of testing public service interpreting by Magnus Dahnberg.
training by Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen and Elizabeth Stokoe.
nique Traverso and Emilie Jouin.
Gry Sagli.
Chapter 25, Education and training of public service interpreter teachers by Mira Kadrić and Sonja Pöllabauer.
Notes
1 In public service interpreting different interpreting techniques are used. Public service interpret-
ers interpret both simultaneously and consecutively, and they do sight translation from a written
text (for an overview of the skills needed for, and teaching demands of dialogue interpreting, see
for instance Tipton and Furmanek 2016).
2 Pöchhacker (2012: 60, 62) mentions interpreter’s monitoring too, but in a more general sense.
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Appendix: Transcription conventions (adapted

from Norrby (2014) and Mondada (2018))
[ ] overlapping speech
[[ simultaneous started utterances
: dragged out sound
= latching
↑ rising intonation
↓ falling intonation
° ° uttered in lower voice
+ + uttered in stronger voice
^ ^ uttered with legato
.hh breathing in
(x xx) inaudible
(.) pause shorter than 200 ms
(0.2) pause length in seconds in the parenthesis
* * between these symbols the indicated gaze direction is taking place
⧫ ⧫ between these symbols the indicated action is taking place
------> ongoing action
>> action begins/continues before/a fter excerpt
324
20
BLENDED LEARNING IS HERE
TO STAY!
Combining on-line and on-campus learning in
the education of public service interpreters
Introduction
Blended learning refers to educational approaches that combine on-campus and on-line learn-
ing activities (Bersin 2004; Bonk and Graham 2006; Skrypnyk et al. 2015; Stein and Graham
2020). This chapter addresses blended learning in the education of practitioners of public
service interpreting (PSI).
The teaching of interpreting is traditionally organized by means of o n-campus activities
(Sandrelli and Jerez 2007; Pöchhacker 2013, 2016). To the extent training options exist for
practitioners of PSI, the training likewise appears to be predominantly on-campus–based
(Driesen 2012). The on-site organization of learning activities is an obvious choice be-
cause interpreting is a skill-based activity, and the learning of skills requires options for
practical e xercise – that the traditional classroom setting naturally offers. Despite this basic
premise, the utilization of on-line activities and digital technology has recently increased
in interpreter education (Sandrelli and Jerez 2007; Skaaden and Wattne 2009; Sandrelli
2015; Pöchhacker 2016; Skaaden 2016, 2017; Kim 2017; Fantinuoli 2018a). From 2020,
due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the digitalization of education – including interpreter
education – exploded.
Our focus is the education of students preparing to practice in PSI, that is, the practice of
interpreting in various institutional encounters. Following Agar (1985: 147), an institutional
encounter is an ‘encounter between a representative of some institution and another person
seeking its services’. From this vantage point, PSI refers to interpreting that ‘enables profes-
sionals and officials to inform, guide and hear the parties in the case at hand despite language
barriers’ (Skaaden 2017: 323, with reference to Norwegian legal documents).
Against this backdrop, this chapter seeks to examine the following questions: What is
blended learning and what purposes does it serve? What is the state of blended learning in
the education of students preparing for practice in PSI? How can blended learning advance
the education of PSI practitioners? Given that interpreting is a practical skill, a critical issue
is how on-line learning activities can possibly facilitate students’ mastery of interpreting.
What learning aims can be acquired on-line and which must be addressed on-site? In order
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-24 325

to elaborate on this final question, we shall use examples from blended learning organized
as part of a Bachelor’s (BA) program in PSI at Oslo Metropolitan University (OsloMet).
We shall argue that didactic approaches that stimulate student interactivity and the forming
of community in knowledge building are essential in creating opportunity for learning,
whether o n-site or on-line (Kolb 1984; Cherny 1999; Herring 2004; Holmer 2008; Skaaden
2017). A basic criterion is that the learning aims are appropriately matched with learning
activity and channel of communication (Palloff and Pratt 1999, 2001; Osman and Herring
2007).
Relevant epistemological and theoretical considerations
What is blended learning?

Blended learning was introduced as a concept in modern education already in the 1960s, as a
basic component of the distance teaching system of the United Kingdom’s Open Univer-
sity (Cross 2006: xxiv). As has technology since evolved, so have educational practices that
combine (or blend) on-campus and on-line activities (Skrypnyk et al. 2015; Ma’arop and
Embi 2016; Rasheed, Kamsin and Abdullah 2020; Stein and Graham 2020). Our point of
departure is a broad definition of blended learning, that is, didactic approaches that combine
on-l ine and on-campus learning activities.
What should count as an exact definition of blended leaning has been debated, however
(Graham 2006: 4). The concept is currently used for a wide spectrum of practices, represent-
ing a continuum between fully face-to-face to fully on-line interactions (Bonk and Graham
2006; Skrypnyk et al. 2015). Skrypnyk et al. (2015: 61) provide an umbrella definition, con-
sidering that ‘any instructor who employs technology in his/her teaching practice, whether
f2f [face-to-face] or through web-based distance education practices in online education
[…], could legitimately refer to such experiences as blended’. It adds to the vagueness of
the concept that blended learning is associated with several other interrelated names, such
as m ixed-mode learning, hybrid learning, computer-a ssisted learning, computer-a ided in-
struction, fl ipped-class rooms, and often, but not always, are these terms assigned meanings
that are interchangeable (Skrypnyk et al. 2015).
In this chapter, we use blended learning whenever we write from the current authors’ posi-
tion, but in references to other authors, we use their terminology.
Innovations in technology and perspectives on learning

The level of development that digital technology has reached in the twenty-first century
forms an important platform for the increased use of blended learning. A whole range of
digital tools have radically changed the options for communication over geographical dis-
tance and have thereby opened for interactivity and communication between students and
between teachers and students situated in different locations.
While some authors pay primary attention to the new technology, others pay more at-
tention to the purposes for employing blended learning. Reasons that are often mentioned
as to ‘why blend’, are, according to Graham (2006: 8 –10): increased access, flexibility and
cost-effectiveness, in addition to improved pedagogy and the blended approaches’ potential
to advance learning. While traditional teaching has been criticized for its transmissive strat-
egies, blended learning approaches are perceived to facilitate student-centered activities and
peer-to-peer interactions (Graham 2006: 8 –9).
326
Blended learning is here to stay!
More recent studies indicate that blended approaches’ positive effects on students’ learn-
ing are to a large extent fulfilled. A summary of systematic reviews and meta-analyses of the
effectiveness of blended learning found that the students’ academic achievements in blended
approaches were higher than in fully face-to-face approaches or fully on-line learning modes
(Skrypnyk et al. 2015: 71). However, as the included studies lacked consistency in forms of
blended learning environments and learning outcomes compared, ‘the research offers lim-
ited evidence as to what aspects of BL [blended learning] pedagogy and technology influence
learning outcomes’, Skrypnyk et al. (2015: 74) conclude.
Notwithstanding the promising effects of blended learning, the design and contents of
the blend are of importance for success, as well as the match between learning aims and ac-
tivities. In sum, to succeed in organizing blended learning, the type of knowledge or skills
to be mastered must be combined with the appropriate learning activities and channels of
communication – whether o n-line or on-campus (Palloff and Pratt 2001: 52; Osman and
Herring 2007; Skaaden 2017). Before we return to this issue, a brief literature review follows.
Literature overview
What does the literature tell us about the status of blended learning in interpreter education?
What are the major themes addressed? Most importantly, to what extent is blended learning
practiced in the education of interpreters in general and in the training of students of PSI in
particular?
The academic interest for the general topic of new technologies in interpreting has in-
creased (Fantinuoli 2018a, 2018b; Pokorn and Mellinger 2018; Braun 2019). C omputer-
a ssisted interpreter training, including blended learning, is, together with remote interpreting
and computer-assisted software, the areas that have received most researchers’ attention
(Fantinuoli 2018a: 157).
However, literature with specific focus on blended learning in the education of students
of PSI is still scarce (but see Skaaden and Wattne 2009; Skaaden 2016, 2017). Publications
are more abundant if the scope is extended to include associated topics, such as blended
learning in the education of interpreters working in other settings than PSI (see for instance
Moser-Mercer 2008; Şahin 2013; Chan 2014; Sandrelli 2015; Motta 2016; Deysel and Lesch
2018; Stengers, Kerremans and Segers 2018), new technology and interpreting (for exam-
ple, Braun et al. 2013; Carl and Braun 2018; Fantinuoli 2018a, 2018b; Skaaden 2018; Braun
2019; Kerremans et al. 2019; Eser, Lai and Saltan 2020), and blended learning in the broader
field of education (for instance, Skrypnyk et al. 2015; Ma’aro and Embi 2016; Alizadeh et al.
2019). Within the current frame, we cannot, however, provide a comprehensive review of
the entire field of blended learning.
In what follows, we concentrate on issues considered central to the education of PSI stu-
dents, and where relevant for this purpose, also include research from other fields of knowl-
edge. Blended learning in this context means that at least three major strands of research
meet: interpreting research, pedagogical research and research on C omputer-Mediated
Communication (on CMC, see for instance Cherny 1999; Herring 2004). Furthermore, it is
worth stressing that great variation in the terminology used in the literature on interpreting
and interpreter education complicates internet literature searches. Despite such challenges,
we have identified some issues that are recurrently discussed in the literature. The issues
sort along the three main strands that will also be followed in the below presentation: (A)
increased cost-effectiveness, access and flexibility; (B) technological innovations; and (C)
pedagogical and didactic approaches.
327
A Increased cost-effectiveness, access and flexibility

In the literature on blended learning in interpreting, cost-effectiveness, increased
access and flexibility are recurrently mentioned along with improved learning (Gran,
Carabelli and Merlini 2002, Hansen and Shlesinger 2007). Gran, Carabelli and Merlini
(2002: 281) summarize several practical advantages of blended learning, such as:
- flexibility of space
- flexibility of time
- possibility of sharing resources
- increased access to education
- increased number of users
- greater flexibility in management
- easier quantitative assessment
- cost reductions
Gran et al.’s summary of the practical benefits and positive impacts that technology may
have on learning are typical for reports from this phase of technological evolution, while
critical discussions and scientific evaluations of learning outcomes are scarce.
Increased access, flexibility and cost-effectiveness are of special relevance to PSI ed-
ucation where acquisition of complex skills requires practical exercises in small groups,
thus, high teacher density. Access and flexibility are also imperative factors for PSI
education for additional reasons: First, the language needs in PSI are multiple. Even
in a scarcely populated country like Norway, there is a need for interpreting in more
than 100 languages (I MDi and NHO 2018). Second, the needs for specific language
combinations constantly fluctuate in line with migration and market trends. Third,
the students’ working languages are often of lesser diffusion in the area they practice
(Giambruno 2014; Balogh and Salaets 2016). In sum, these factors necessitate educa-
tional programs that can absorb multiple language groups and can integrate the learn-
ing of both theory and practical skills. Without cost-efficient solutions, PSI education
may quickly suffer in times when the funding of higher education is under pressure.
All in all, blended learning seems to improve cost-effectiveness and increase access
and flexibility, factors that are of special importance for PSI education. Blended learn-
ing, thus, appears a path worth considering for PSI educators.
B Technological innovation
Evolving technology is a foundation for blended learning, and available technolo-
gies may expand or restrict the range of blended learning practices that are realizable.
Descriptions of various technologies accordingly make up another major issue in the
relevant research literature. However, as technological development is immense, articles
that date more than a decade back may have only historical interest.
While a wide range of information and communication technologies have been avail-
able for decades, it was not until the m id-1990s that a number of researchers and teachers
in different countries began to test computer-assisted approaches in interpreter training
(Sandrelli and Jerez 2007: 270). Sandrelli and Jerez (2007), whose primary interest is in
the conference setting, provide a systematic overview of the initial phase of development
of computer-assisted interpreter training, including blended learning, and they present a
description of some main technological efforts of the early phases. First, r epository-based
initiatives with IRIS, The Interpreter’s Resources Information System, as an example, were cre-
ated in the m id-1990s. IRIS aimed at providing teachers and students access to a database
328
of written, audio and video material in different languages (Sandrelli and Jerez 2007:
278–86). Second, authoring programs (or dedicated software programs) for interpreter
training were developed and employed. Interpr-It was such an authoring program, aimed
at improving students n ote-taking techniques through a guided approach to discourse
analysis (Sandrelli and Jerez 2007: 286, see also Gran, Carabelli and Merlini 2002: 277).
Similarly, Interpretation (produced between 1999 and 2002) was an authoring program that
‘would make it possible to create language-independent teaching material for interpret-
ing’ (Sandrelli and Jerez 2007: 287). Finally, e-learning platforms for interpreter training
were developed. Here, one of the first examples is The Geneva e-learning Portal with its
‘integrated VLE (Virtual Learning Environments) developed specifically to meet the re-
quirements of interpreter trainers and trainees’ (Sandrelli and Jerez 2007: 292). A later de-
velopment along this trend is The Geneva Virtual Institute, which employs blended learning
as it ‘involves a mixture of f ace-to-face and online activities, structured and unstructured
activities, and individual and collaborative tasks’ (Sandrelli and Jerez 2007: 293).
In sum, technology has obviously made quantum leaps in the past decades. As far as
technology goes, the only conclusion to be drawn with certainty is that its development
is continuous.
C Pedagogical approaches and didactics

Sandrelli and Jerez (2007: 275–76) list several pedagogical reasons why pioneer train-
ers of interpreters thought computer-assisted training might be a valuable addition to
traditional o n-site training methods (see also Gran, Carabelli and Merlini 2002; Hansen
and Shlesinger 2007; Lim 2013). In light of the technological innovations just men-
tioned, it is worth noting that c omputer-based tools were assumed to make the simula-
tion of real-life environments possible and thus reduce the distance between professional
practice and classroom settings. Another pedagogical reason was the assumption that
dedicated tools would help making stronger connections between classroom activities
and learning material and the students’ self-directed work (Sandrelli and Jerez 2007:
276). Moreover, as underscored also by other scholars, it was anticipated that appropri-
ate tools could enhance students’ self-assessment skills and, in this way, promote a more
student active learning process (Deysel and Lesch 2018).
The first innings of the revolution of digitalization coincide with a shift in educational
theory and sociolinguistics from transmissionist teaching approaches toward constructiv-
ist learning models. While a transmissionist approach assumes that teachers distribute
knowledge to (essentially passively receiving) students, a constructivist or collaborative
approach, in contrast, considers that knowledge ‘is constructed by individuals engaged
in collaborative dialogue with others’ (Sandrelli and Jerez 2007: 272). Accordingly, the
students are considered a vital resource in the learning process. According to Sandrelli
and Jerez (2007: 272), a central belief was that computer-based tools can, if appropri-
ately designed, facilitate the shift away from the t eacher-centered approach that was still
dominating programs of interpreter education.
Scholars of professional education and adult learning have long embraced and prac-
ticed the ideas of collaborative learning, recognizing that such an approach involves a
change in our image of the teacher role from transmitter of knowledge to facilitator
of learning (Schön 1983; Kolb 1984; Gee and Green 1998). Whether the on-line class-
room would allow for meaningful interaction was long questioned, however (Palloff
and Pratt 1999, 2001). Cherny (1999: 150–53) who is concerned with the interplay
between the channel’s technical affordances and the learning environment’s discourse
329
patterns, describes for instance synchronous chats as a ‘medium [that] is far from ideal for
formal lectures or debates; without the n on-intrusive visual feedback, it is disconcert-
ing to speak for any length to an audience that does not respond’ (Cherny 1999: 177).
Apparently, to allow for the social construction of knowledge to emerge, it is central
that community is established in the sense delineated by Herring (2004). Herring (2004:
19), whose interest lies in CMC and learning, identifies five criteria that indicate virtual
community: the occurrence of structure (for example, by reference to group, ‘we/they’);
the negotiation of meaning; interactivity through reciprocity; expression of solidarity/
conflict management; and participation over time.
Synchronous text-only-chats are discursive events where students, via their home-
computers’ keyboard, are able ‘to “talk” to each other at the same time in m ulti-
party dialogue or polylogue while being physically distant’ (Holmer 2008: 1). In
their study of synchronous chats as a channel of learning activities, Osman and Her-
ring (2 007: 127) analyze the construction of knowledge in terms of five types of
observable behavior (1) sharing and comparing of information, (2) discovery and
exploration of dissonance, (3) negotiation of meaning, (4) testing and modifica-
tion of proposed construction, and (5) agreement statements/applications of new
constructed meaning. They show that despite the chat discourse’s fragmented ap-
pearance, virtual community can be observed, thus, providing opportunity for the
social construction of knowledge. In sum, it seems that the o n-line learning environ-
ment favors approaches that utilize student involvement and stimulate interactivity,
both student-teacher and among peers (Palloff and Pratt 1999, 2001; Herring 2004;
Osman and Herring 2007).
‘Technology is not the “be all and end all” of the online course. It is merely the
vehicle for course delivery’, Palloff and Pratt (2001: 49) accentuated at the turn of the
twenty-first century. Twenty years later, the progress of o n-line communication is
massive. Smartphone applications, allowing for real-time audio-visual contact via con-
stantly developing channels, are changing the options for o n-line collaborative learning
considerably. The question is, thus, no longer whether o n-line channels should be part
of education, the question is how. In sum, the collaborative building of knowledge and
student involvement in the process of learning are of importance for o n-line learning
to succeed (Palloff and Pratt 1999: 2 8–32) and become essential topics in the further
development of o n-line classrooms and blended learning.
General principles for the organization of blended learning

What forms of knowledge and skills do students of interpreting need to learn? What can be
acquired on-line and what needs to be practiced on-campus? Since interpreting is something
you do, interpreter education cannot rely on the learning of epistemic k nowledge – the
knowing what – alone. Most importantly, interpreters need to know how. In preparing stu-
dents for professional practice, educators of interpreting, thus, struggle with a pedagogical
challenge in the integration of theory and practice, Gentile (1995: 55 and 5 8–59) notices.
The challenge of integrating the knowing what and the knowing how is one that is shared
with educators of other professions, however (Schön 1983; Grimen 2008; Kinsella and Pit-
man 2012). Interpreting students, like other professions, must apply their specialized skills in
real-life situations. This type of knowledge, referred to as phronesis or tacit knowledge, has to
330
do with the building of confidence, Grimen (2008: 72) stresses. It follows that, in interpreter
education, where learning aims involve complex practical skills and the exercise of discre-
tion, the complexity of knowledge types must be taken into consideration when organizing
learning activities in the blended classroom.
As described above, the literature highlights that collaborative and student-centered ap-
proaches are key concepts for the social building of knowledge to emerge whether o n-
c ampus or on-line (Palloff and Pratt 1999; 2001; Herring 2004; Osman and Herring 2007).
Palloff and Pratt (1999: 32) underscore the following general indicators that o n-line com-
munity is forming:
a Active interactions involving both course content and personal communication

b Collaborative learning evidenced by comments directed primarily student to student rather than
student to instructor
c Socially constructed meaning evidenced by agreement or questioning, with the intent to achieve
agreement on issues of meaning
d Sharing resources among students
e Expressions of support and encouragement exchanged between students, as well as willingness to
critically evaluate the work of others
In the organization of blended learning, the appropriate matching of communication chan-

nel with the type of knowledge or skill to be acquired is of the essence (Palloff and Pratt
2001: 52). Therefore, it is vital to analyze the type of knowledge that your students need to
acquire and make considerations as to whether the learning aim is best suited for on-line or
on-site activities, and whether learning activities should be organized in plenary lectures or
group exercises. Next, we illustrate some of the choices made in our courses at OsloMet and
how the indicators of community materialize in the channels chosen.
On-line or on-campus learning activities? A case illustration of

blended learning in PSI
Notably, most of the research on interpreter education presented in the above literature
overview concerns conference or business interpreters. The trend mirrors the circumstance
that few countries provide education for PSI practitioners (Ozolins 2010; Giambruno 2014;
Balogh and Salaets 2016; Pokorn, Viezzi and Felberg 2020). To our knowledge, few full BA
programs on blended learning in PSI are presented to date (but see Valero Garcés 2019).
Designed to include a wide variety of working languages, the BA program on PSI developed
at OsloMet is one exception (Skaaden 2016, 2017; Felberg and Skaaden 2020) and we turn
to examples from the BA as a case illustration.
Given the basic premise that students to be admitted in OsloMet’s BA are already func-
tionally mastering both working languages before entering the program, the training
of interpreting as a situated, practical skill, encompasses four main topic areas, running
throughout the different BA courses and learning aims:
i Professional ethics, integrity and status: introduction to the profession and its knowledge
base; drawing the boundaries of the interpreters’ area of expertise and domain for their
exercise of discretion.
ii Language: introduction to the nature of language and bilingualism as phenomena; rais-
ing awareness of the students’ bilingual and personal competencies.
331
iii Situated knowledge and interpreting techniques: characteristics of institutional and interpreted
discourse; how to employ interpreting methods and strategies in different contexts.
iv Specific context knowledge: general strategies for entering new language domains; how to
acquire specific terminology and context knowledge.
The general learning aims summarized under i.-iv. are addressed from different angles
throughout the BA’s courses.
The next paragraphs briefly illustrate how the blending of on-line and on-campus ac-
tivities may create learning opportunities for the learning of different knowledge types and
skills, using examples from the BA’s first year course on consecutive dialogue interpreting
and its third-year course on video remote interpreting (V RI). During the first year, on-
campus weekend gatherings take place three times each semester, while mandatory on-line
activities occur weekly. In the third year course on VRI, all activities occur on-line after a
kickoff gathering on campus (Skaaden 2017, 2018).
In our blended courses, the learning activities on campus involve both group and ple-
nary sessions and the on-line activities involve asynchronous and synchronous channels of
communication. Depending on their aims, learning activities are organized in language-
specific groups or mixed language groups. To exemplify, gathering in their language groups’
synchronous chat channel, the students approach bilingual terminology and context knowl-
edge (that is the above learning aims ii. and iv.) This activity is illustrated in (1) below with
an excerpt from the German group. In chats with students from various language groups
(example (2) below) issues of professional ethics, integrity and status (learning aim i.) are
discussed on-line. Furthermore, turn-taking strategies in dialogue interpreting (learning
aim iii.) are addressed in on-campus roleplay sessions with students from various language
groups. Finally, the latter topic is revisited in o
n-line chats later in the BA program, as illus-
trated in example (3) below.
On-line learning activities: utilizing synchronous text-only

chats as a path to learning
Synchronous chat is more often associated with recreational than pedagogical uses, and Pall-
off and Pratt (1999: 47) recommend asynchronous over synchronous channels since, ac-
cording to them, the latter type ‘rarely allows for productive discussion or participation’.
However, we find synchronous chats to have the advantage that their required real-time
participation creates a feeling of presence and upholds student motivation when the next
campus gathering is weeks away. Our experience is also in line with the observations made
by Osman and Herring (2007: 136–37) that synchronous text-only-chats allow for mean-
ingful communication and community to form, despite the chats’ unusual discourse patterns
where adjacency pairs occur postings apart. In fact, several community indicators can be
identified in our text-only chats, as illustrated next.
Example ( 1) illustrates how students collaborate in synchronous text-
only-
chats in
language-specific groups. Clarifying bilingual terminology and context knowledge from
the asylum domain (learning aim iv. above), the students in the German group here collabo-
rate in negotiating meaning, by actively posing questions (postings 1, 3), seeking encourage-
ment (postings 4, 8) sharing praise (posting 5) and resources (posting 6) as well as critically
evaluating other’s contributions (posting 9). Thus, all indicators of community as described
above (a.-e.). In all chat sessions, the students appear under their full names. They are here
given aliases for the sake of anonymization. With exception of the Norwegian terms to be
332
discussed, the students here chat in their mother tongue, German. For the sake of brevity, the
excerpt from the chat log is in (1) rendered in the authors’ English translation:
Example (1)
1. Anna 19:00> I just throw my first word into the ring: overføringsflyktning [Norwegian for
‘resettlement refugee’]
2. Bibi 19:00> I still have not found a good word here
3. Cora 19:00> quota refugee?
4. Cora 19:01> or:
5. Dina 19:01> Thank you for the many links [facilitator’s name] the sites were really in-
formative and useful
6. Cora 19:01> Refugee within the frames of a declaration for takeover from the Federal
Ministry of the Interior
7. Dina 19:01> Super, I just googled it, but did not come across that [one]
8. Cora 19:02> Do you, Bibi, find that both [suggestions] work?
9. Bibi 19:03> Cora, [I] believe yours is not the same and too long (Skaaden 2016: 56)
In posting 1, the ‘r ing’ used as a metaphorical description of their joint activity is an indica-
tor of the participants experiencing community. The interactions in example (1) are all student to
student. An exception is posting 5 that is directed at the facilitator, who in line with principles
of collaborative learning takes on a secondary role in the chat discourse. However, as posting
5 reveals, the facilitator has prior to the r eal-time chat shared links on the topic to be discussed
via the learning platform. Simultaneously, the personal nature of Dina’s feedback to the facili-
tator is another indicator of community. Along with the reference to Google in posting 7, post-
ing 5 also indicates how the students utilize o n-line resources in their strategies for accessing
constantly new language domains – quite in line with the general learning aims sketched in iv.
above. Finally, example (1) shows how students, such as Bibi and Cora, take on different roles
in their language group collaborations. The excerpt, thus, illustrates how group diversity offers
opportunity for the individual student to develop bilingual registers and bilingual sensitivity.
In the synchronous chat discussions of mixed language groups, the students’ diverse back-
grounds represent a resource in the learning process as well. In these chats, students with
different working languages communicate in their common language Norwegian, which
is also most students’ second language. Again, for the sake of brevity, the excerpts are here
represented in the authors’ English renditions only. In the mixed language group chats, issues
of professional ethics, professional integrity and status are addressed in accordance with the
learning aims mentioned under (i.) above. This is witnessed in example (2). Here, five students
of Lithuanian, Somali, Sorani and Spanish discuss the interpreters’ own health and work sit-
uation in response to a curricular text on stress management and the danger of burnout. The
exchanges in example (2) occur in response to the facilitator’s open-ended question (posting
1) that refers to a specific quote from a curricular text on psychological burnout effects:
Example (2)
1. Facilitator 19:39> ‘The fuzzy boundaries of your responsibilities’ is included in the lit-
erature as one element [that may lead to burnout]. How does this [element] apply to the
interpreter?
333
2. Sonia 19:40> All users [of the interpreter’s services] do not understand in the same way
what an interpreter can do and cannot do and therefore the boundaries of the interpret-
er’s area of responsibility appear unclear
3. Leja 19:41> if someone is uncertain about what [type of ] tasks an interpreter should
actually take on
4. Leja 19:41> ito [‘in terms of ’] ‘extra’ tasks that suddenly pop up during an assignment
5. Sara 19:42> Fuzzy boundaries would be if s/he [the interpreter] is given tasks which
are outside the interpreter’s boundaries [of responsibility], and carries them out without
clearly signalling that this is not the interpreter’s responsibility
6. Seza 19:44> Vague boundaries may also mean being unclear about your own skills and
abilities as an interpreter
7. Sofia 19:44> and it may also be that users ask the interpreter to breach her/h is own pro-
fessional ethics, like client confidentiality? (That a user asks the interpreter about how
his case is coming along, like in the video we watched at our [on-campus] gathering?)
(Skaaden 2017: 333)
The students’ reflections here indicate community by the forming of a ‘we’ as opposed to
‘them’ in their reference to their clients’ expectations (postings 2 –5). Reciprocity is also
emerging from the students’ incremental associations to their own work conditions (postings
4 –6). Furthermore, the link made between professional ethics and the negative effects that
the vague role boundaries have on their professional integrity (6 and 7) signals interactive
reflections over course content, in line with the abovementioned community indicators.
Finally, in posting 7, the student’s mention of ‘the video we watched at our [on-campus]
gathering’ demonstrates the course’s topical integration of learning aims addressed o n-line
and those addressed on-campus – and the student’s recognition of such integration.
All in all, the chat logs indicate community in terms of interaction student to student,
socially constructed meaning and the sharing of resources, negotiations, questions and ex-
pression of (d is)agreement. As examples (1) and (2) briefly illustrate, the facilitator’s role is to
inspire student-to-student interaction and reflections by posing open-ended questions rather
than providing a set answer. The excerpts show that with this approach, even technologically
primitive channels like text-only-chats provide opportunities for learning through mean-
ingful joint reflections.
On-campus learning activities: utilizing roleplays

Learning activities aiming at epistemic knowledge, ethical issues and professional status
may be fruitfully reflected upon on-line, as just witnessed. Apparently, building the stu-
dents’ practical skills in the on-site interpreting of dialogues is less convenient on-line.
With reference to professional practices in general, Schön (1983: 276) points to the fact that
much like skiing, practical professional skills cannot be mastered simply by reading a book.
The same holds for the basic skills of interpreting, such as the interactional skills in on-site
dialogue interpreting, that is the learning aims sorting under interpreting strategies in iii.
above. In our courses on dialogue interpreting, these skills are explored in roleplay sessions
on campus.
Roleplays are commonly used both in the training and testing of practical interpret-
ing skills (Wadensjö 2014; Dahnberg 2015; Cirillo and Radicioni 2017; Kadrić 2017). The
method is particularly appropriate in familiarizing the students with the mode of consecutive
334
on-site interpreting of dialogues, where coordinating and interactional skills play a promi-
nent role in enabling the interpreter’s rendering (Wadensjö 1998). In our fi rst-year course,
roleplayed interpreting exercises are organized on campus in mixed language groups, where
the students play the parts of patient/client and professional based on role cards and scripts
and take turns playing the part of the interpreter. The students who are not assigned a part in
the roleplay itself take on the task of observers and subsequently provide peer feedback to the
student playing the part of interpreter, as illustrated in the photo image.
Illustration: o n-campus activity-roleplays in mixed language groups
Each roleplay exercise is video recorded and is subsequently fed back to the student playing
the part of interpreter via the on-line learning platform. This enables each student to further
reflect upon own performance after returning home from the o n-campus sessions. However,
the main purpose of the roleplays is for each session to serve as a tableau for the group’s joint
observations of both translational and interactional strategies. The facilitator who leads the
subsequent reflections stimulates peer feedback by posing open-ended questions on the strat-
egies applied, such as pronoun and register choice, turn-taking and clarification strategies
(Felberg and Skaaden 2020: 98–100). While Palloff and Pratt (1999: 31) underscore that
open-ended questions serve to stimulate student interaction in the o n-line classroom, in
our experience, the questioning strategy is a resource also in on-campus sessions. Here, the
open-ended questions serve to elicit subsequent reflections over each roleplay situation – a
strategy well known from professional training in general (see for instance Kolb 1984).
In an e xperiential-dialogic approach, the aim is to stimulate collaborative knowledge build-
ing through joint experience, observation and subsequent group reflection (Skaaden 2017:
335
336). In a collegial chat session organized for facilitators of roleplayed exercises, the question
is raised how one may learn from observing someone else’s mistakes. In their response, the
facilitators accentuate the advantages of student diversity in the approach and conclude that
both the novice and the experienced [interpreters] learn, because it is limited how much
interpreting even the experienced ones have actually observed – so observing others is
a way of observing variations of yourself […] And they are not used to getting feedback
from someone who is able to “control” their target renditions and interpreting perfor-
mance (Skaaden 2017: 338).
The aim of the roleplay activity is, as indicated by the facilitator’s comment, for the group to
explore, through observation and reflection, different choices and their consequences for the
interpreted dialogue. Thus, the students, much in line with Kadrić’ (2017: 290) description,
discover that ‘there is an alternative to every action. Every word, gesture or decision could
have been different’. In this manner, the observations and joint reflections may add to the
students’ professional confidence and ability to apply their ‘tool’ in real-life situations, thus,
develop confidence in their application of interpreting and interactional strategies, in line
with the abovementioned learning aim iii.
In our experience, an important effect of observing interpreting in a working language
other than your own is that it serves to unveil aspects of interpreting that are independent of
the specific pair of working languages. For instance, the on-site consecutive interpreting of
dialogues requires the intentional application of subtle feedback signals such as breath-taking,
gaze or hand and body movements to coordinate the turn-taking. In the joint reflections’
phase following each roleplay, the facilitators draw attention to such features whereby the
students develop awareness for how the subtle feedback signals can be applied strategically
for turn-taking. In particular, the observation of peers adds to the understanding of these
tools’ importance in positioning the interpreter’s professional self in the interpreted dialogue.
Evidence from several studies reveals that t urn-taking in video remote interpreting (VRI)
is problematic (see for instance Braun and Taylor 2012). The students in our third year BA
course on VRI also pinpoint problems associated with t urn-taking during VRI after having
practiced roleplay exercises ‘on the screen’. In excerpt (3), students from three different lan-
guage groups (A rabic, Polish, Sorani) describe their experiences with on screen (V RI) inter-
preting as opposed to the accustomed on-site interpreting and how the medium affects their
turn-taking signals. Again, the students communicate in their common language, Norwe-
gian, but their postings are here represented in the authors’ English renditions and aliases are
assigned for anonymization.
Example (3)
1. Petra [19:47:56]> You don’t know whether they are looking at the interpreter, right. I
mean, difficulties with visual signals
[…]
2. Sefu [19:50:00]> [you] have to use more words to manage it [the turn-taking] instead of
a simple hand gesture
[…]
3. Aisha [19:52:20] > Eye contact does not function the same way as in on-site interpreting
(Skaaden 2018: 845)
336
Observing that the effects of accustomed feedback signals are altered in channels like
Skype, Teams or Zoom, the students here link the experienced difficulties with t urn-taking
during VRI to how they utilize feedback signals in coordinating on-site interpreted dia-
logues. In this manner, example (3) serves to illustrate that certain skills and strategies are less
suitable for acquisition o
n-line. The subtle t urn-taking strategies applied in o n-site dialogue
interpreting exemplify a learning aim that is difficult to acquire via o n-line channels. This
speaks in favor of a blended approach in interpreter education also in the future.
Concluding remarks
This chapter has demonstrated how some general principles of on-line and blended learning
can benefit courses on PSI – where education is scarce and flexible learning opportunities
are much needed. In the case demonstrated, all learning activities, whether on-line or on-
campus, lean on principles of collaborative learning. This means that student involvement
and interaction is central, whether the focus of attention is the students’ joint observations
and reflections over on-campus roleplays or their reflections in on-line chats over profes-
sional ethics or bilingual terminology and context knowledge. Not all learning aims can be
achieved through on-line communication, however. As elaborated on above, the interac-
tional and coordinating skills required in the performance of on-site, consecutive interpret-
ing of dialogues, serves to remind us of this fact.
The outburst of the pandemic in 2020 created urgent need for digitalization of most uni-
versity courses. Still, as stated by Graham (2006: 6 –7): ‘it is imperative that we understand
how to create effective blended learning experiences that incorporate both face-to-face and
computer-mediated (CM) elements.’ This remains a principle to be r emembered – although
technological development is continuous. In organizing blended learning, it is imperative to
address which learning aims and activities are suited for o n-line communication and which
activities can best be dealt with face-to-face when the students gather on campus.
Further reading
Cirillo, Letizia, and Natacha Niemants (eds) (2017) Teaching Dialogue Interpreting: R esearch-based Propos-
als for Higher Education. Amsterdam, John Benjamins Publishing Company.
The book provides research based contributions to interpreter education, illustrating various pedagogical and
didactic approaches and addressing epistemic issues of interpreter education. It includes a chapter on epistemic
issues of PSI education in the context of blended learning.
Fantinuoli, Claudio (ed) (2018b) Interpreting and Technology. Berlin, Language Science Press.
This book explores core issues, approaches and challenges important for interaction between interpreting and
technology in various settings.
Pokorn, Nike K., Mauricio Viezzi, and Tatjana R. Felberg (eds) (2020) Teacher Education for Community
Interpreting and Intercultural Mediation. Selected Chapters. Ljubljana, Ljubljana University Press/N IJZ.
The book addresses the need for educating the trainers and teachers of ( future) practitioners of PSI, presenting
different pedagogical approaches, including blended learning.
Siemens, George, Dragan Gašević, and Shane Dawson (eds) (2015) Preparing for the Digital University: A
Review of the History and Current State Of Distance, Blended, and Online Learning. Athabasca, Athabasca
University. URL: https://researchmgt.monash.edu/ws/portalfiles/portal/256525723/256524746_
oa.pdf (accessed 1 December 2021).
This publication presents a series of articles offering an overview of research on distance, on-line and blended
learning and positions blended learning in the wider complex domain of digital learning.
Skaaden, Hanne (2017) “‘That we all behave like professionals’: An experiential–dialogic approach to
interpreter education and online learning”, in Teaching Dialogue Interpreting: Research-based Proposals
337
for Higher Education, Letizia Cirillo and Natacha Niemants (eds). Amsterdam, John Benjamins Pub-
lishing Company: 323–40.
This is one of the r esearch-based chapters in the a bove-mentioned book. It explores epistemic issues of PSI education
in the context of blended learning. A qualitative analysis of chat logs shows how the applied didactic approach
allows for professional identity and knowledge to develop.
Related chapters
Chapter 16, “Interpreter’s mistake” – Why should other professions care about the professionalization of inter-
preters? by Hanne Skaaden
Chapter 18, Role play as a means of training and of testing public service interpreting by Magnus Dahnberg
Chapter 19, Monitoring in dialogue interpreting – cognitive and didactic perspectives by Elisabet Tiselius and
Birgitta Englund Dimitrova
training by Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen and Elisabeth Stokoe.
Chapter 22, Training interpreters in asylum settings: the REMILAS project by Anna Claudia
Chapter 23, Interprofessional Education …. interpreter education: In or and? by Demi Krystallidou.
Gry Sagli.
Chapter 25, Education and training of public service interpreter teachers by Mira Kadrić and Sonja
Pöllabauer.
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21
THE CONVERSATION ANALYTIC
ROLE-PLAY METHOD
How authentic data meet simulations for
interpreter training
Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen and

Elizabeth Stokoe
Introduction
Developed by Stokoe (2011a) to train professionals working in communication-rich insti-
tutions (for instance, healthcare, police interviews, classrooms, sales, crisis negotiation), the
Conversation Analytic Role-Play Method (CARM) uses anonymised extracts from authen-
tic conversations, recorded in situ as part of the daily work of the organisation, to enable
trainees to learn from what actually happens in encounters. Having seen and heard a se-
quence of turns whose transcript is synchronised with the audio/v ideo recording, trainees
discuss possible interactional difficulties and suggest candidate next turns. The original next
turn of the conversation is revealed, and trainees consider its likely effectiveness. Starting
from Stokoe’s observation that even trainees with extensive experience have problems in
predicting what works, as well as articulating ‘tacit knowledge of their own practices, de-
spite the fact that “they can do it” in real situations’ (2011b), the CARM method appears
particularly relevant for the professionalisation of Public Service Interpreting (PSI) and for
training four possible targets.
First, CARM can be used to train practising PSI interpreters. While they are profes-
sionals in their own right, interpreters work across settings in which they are not members
(Garfinkel 1967). For example, PSI interpreters may not have equivalent epistemic access to
the work of medicine and the interactional actions that comprise it, as argued already in the
seventies by Labov and Fanshel (1977). Interpreters may therefore benefit from observing the
building blocks of the kinds of medical or other conversations they may interpret, so as to
adapt their skills to different ‘communities of practice’ (Wenger 1998).
Second, CARM may be applied to the training of student-interpreters (K rystallidou
2014; Dal Fovo 2016, 2018; Niemants and Stokoe 2017), allowing them to engage with au-
thentic contexts of a future profession they may have seldom (or never) experienced before,
which may make it difficult for them to reliably simulate interactions in traditional r ole-play
exercises. In contrast to role-plays presented by other authors (see, for example, Dahnberg
this volume), which presume trainees already understand the interpreting process and the
settings sufficiently to simulate i nterpreter-mediated encounters and/or are used to train and
342 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-25

The conversation analytic role-play method
develop different interpreting skills separately without presuming a thorough understanding

of the process as such, CARM uses r esearch-derived materials to help them observe conver-
sations in specific settings and respond to their interactional contingencies. It may therefore
augment the kinds of role-plays that are traditionally used in interpreter training (see, for
example, Pöchhacker 2004: 187; Rudvin and Tomassini 2011: 94–109), ideally with some
domain-specific terminology in order to prepare them for the greater complexity of authen-
tic interactions in institutional settings, where communication difficulties in, for example,
healthcare, may be linked ‘not only to language but also to socio-cultural, health literacy and
even institutional issues’ (Chiarenza 2020: 203) as well as to asymmetries between service
users and providers (Gutiérrez 2013). CARM has already been used to raise issues that are
relevant to asymmetrical institutional talk (Stokoe 2013a) and may be used to observe and
exercise interactional practices, such as the simultaneous rendering and coordinating of talk
in social interaction (Wadensjö 1998; Baraldi and Gavioli 2012).
If one assumes that PSI is not ( just) about the interpreter (Ozolins 2017) but is jointly
constructed, its quality and success also depends on service providers and users. While it
may be difficult to train the many users (and both sides) of the wide range of public services
requiring an interpreter, using CARM to raise service providers’ awareness of interpreter-
mediated communication is feasible and has been done (for instance, Stokoe has trained
providers and users of the same service).
Finally, CARM may be used to train the trainers (Wadensjö 2014). While guiding train-
ees towards the profession as idealised in codes of ethics and conduct (on ethics in PSI see
Phelan et al. 2020; Valero-Garcés this volume; Skaaden this volume), trainers can explore
the tensions between formal guidance and actual practice (the latter can be more effective,
see Stokoe and Sikveland 2017) and engage with trainees in responding to interactional and
professional dilemmas which can occur in real life. Such dilemmas may be used to make
scripted role-plays more authentic (Falbo and Dal Fovo 2019), or brought to the fore through
group debates (such as those proposed by Chiarenza 2020) or through CARM and other
Conversation Analysis (CA)-based activities (see below). But the fact remains that coping
with the complexity of PSI, where turns and sequences are neither linear nor predictable, and
where decisions on if/when/what to say and translate are jointly negotiated, requires that
interpreters are trained ‘not only on what they should do in principle’ – for instance interpret
accurately – ‘but also on what such principle actually involves in the complexity of real-life
situations’ (Chiarenza 2020: 204).

PSI training depends on descriptive findings from interpreting studies and related fields,
but the question remains of how to bridge the gap between research findings and classroom
activities (that is about role-played simulations vs. actual encounters), as well as of how to en-
able trainees to both observe and participate in institutional interactions they may interpret.
Analysing role-played simulations vs. actual encounters

According to Van Hasselt, Romano, and Vecchi, r ole-plays are ‘simulations of real-world in-
terpersonal encounters, communications or events’ (2008: 251). Role-play methods involve
the participants being trained or assessed to interact with actors or other simulated interloc-
utors, using ‘narrative adaptions’ of hypothetical or actual scenarios as the basis for the sim-
ulated encounter (Van Hasselt, Romano and Vecchi 2008: 254). R ole-plays can be carried
343
Natacha Niemants et al.
out in different ways in interpreter training, ranging from ‘closed’ role-plays where primary
speakers are enacted by following a script and trainees interpret their pre-determined t urns-
at-talk, to more ‘open’ role-plays making use of cue cards and/or short role descriptions
where primary speakers, possibly played by professionals from that field, enact their role
according to what they believe they would say in that given situation (see Dahnberg this
volume). Irrespective of the method chosen, role-play activity is complex in two ways: as
Francis (1989) and Linell and Thunqvist (2003) underline, the framing activity involves actors
(typically trainers and trainees) pretending to be different characters, and the framed activity
involves the characters being acted (for instance, a doctor, a patient, and an interpreter).
Analyses of simulated encounters have shown that trainees tend to orient more to the fram-
ing than to the framed activity (De la Croix and Skelton 2009). Since trainees primarily
design their turns for the purpose of evaluation by the trainers rather than for the purpose
of communication between the primary participants (Niemants 2014), it is ‘hard to support
a claim that participants in role-play are oriented to the same interactional contingencies
as they would be in the actual settings’ (Stokoe 2011a). Even where r ole-plays are based on
authentic data, or scripts reproduce precise words spoken by real participants, what is at stake
to those participants will not be at stake to the trainers and trainees who simulate it, since
‘reality does not travel with the text’ (Widdowson 2003: 711) and authentic data do not nec-
essarily entail authentic activities (see Seidlhofer 2003; Boulton and Tyne 2014). As shown
in Stokoe (2013b), Niemants (2015), and Stokoe et al. (2020), a second level of inauthenticity
occurs since the participants in r ole-plays may use different communicative strategies to the
real settings, either with the aim of reproducing assessable talk or by invoking (stereotypical)
category-based knowledge of roles (see Francis 1989: 59).
However, empirical studies of authentic (interpreter-mediated) interactions have under-
mined many of the conventional arguments about r ole-played interaction, showing that:
- we cannot trust c ommon-sense intuitions since they tend to caricature what really hap-
pens (a s also pointed out by Schegloff 1996: 166–69 and Speer 2005: 54);
- translations are not necessarily provided on a t urn-by-turn basis as ‘conversation unfolds
through t urn-taking, with options at each point’ (Hepburn, Wilkinson and Butler 2014:
248), and interpreters may choose to negotiate their own understanding of the talk as
well as that of others before attempting to translate (Wadensjö 1998; Bolden 2000;
Davidson 2000, 2002; Baraldi and Gavioli 2012);
- interpreters do not only respond to primary speakers’ actions but also make ‘sequence-
initiating actions’ (Davitti and Pasquandrea 2014) – and do so at particular ‘choice
points’ (Hepburn, Wilkinson and Butler 2014: 248);
- interpreting is not just about verbal communication but also involves non-verbal com-
munication (Niemants, Ticca and Traverso 2021), whose importance is particularly vis-
ible when participants cannot share the same physical space and communicate through
telephone (Castagnoli and Niemants 2018; Russo, González Rodríguez and Iglesias
Fernández 2019) or through video interpreting platforms (Hansen 2020; Licoppe and
Veyrier 2020; Licoppe this volume) that appear on the increase because of the pandemic.
Such studies have started to pay much closer attention to ‘how people actually talk (a nd re-
spond) when interpreting and being interpreted’ (Turner and Merrison 2016: 138), thereby
questioning textual evaluations of interpreting as more or less accurate renditions of source
text into target texts, and highlighting ways in which apparently imperfect practices (such as
breaches of tenets of faithfulness and neutrality) can have effects on the coordination of PSI
344
as a social interaction (Baraldi 2012: 323), be it onsite or remote. As shown by Shaw et al.
(2016) and Stokoe et al. (2018), sometimes best practice, as identified by CA research, con-
tradicts existing guidance for practitioners. The implication is that when people turn guid-
ance into talk, it might not work, and that o ver-riding objectives and primary speakers’ first
moves may create unpredictable contingencies of interaction (that is, professional dilemmas
or choice points) which call for situated responses.
Observing vs. participating in interpreter-mediated interactions

An increasing number of unpredictable contingences created by primary speakers can be
observed in recent studies on PSI, such as doctors communicating with patients directly
thereby doing without the interpreter ( A nderson 2012), doctors inviting interpreter-
mediators to tell and explain delicate issues to patients (Gavioli 2015), or doctors asking
for interpreter-mediators’ advice (Falbo and Niemants 2020). It can also be observed that
patients do not always respond (immediately) to doctors’ questions (Niemants 2019), which
calls for interpreters’ understanding of why that may be the case (for example, ‘trouble in
speaking, hearing and/or understanding the talk’, Schegloff 2007: xiv), and for their action
in the next turns.
By looking at the transcripts of authentic data analysed in PSI research, trainees can
explore the complexity of interpreter-mediated interaction at their own pace, or ‘in slow
motion’, as reported by trainees addressed by Baraldi and Gavioli (2019: 222). But to better
prepare trainees to react to interactional contingences of ongoing talk and silence in in-
teraction, which call for quick and turn-by-turn decisions, it may be worth using a train-
ing method where trainees can both observe and participate in the interactions themselves.
According to Gavioli and Aston,
while the participant interacts with the text as an intended recipient, the observer
views this interaction from the outside, adopting a critical analytical perspective.
Observer as well as participant roles can allow learning: observation allows strategies
of interaction to be noticed, while participation allows such strategies to be tested
(2 001: 241).
As we will see in the following section, the CARM method enables learners to observe
authentic interactions as they unfold as well as to participate by responding to participants’
ongoing talk, thereby providing two ways of preparing to the complexity of PSI in different
settings and language combinations.
We illustrate the technique developed by Stokoe via authentic (interpreter-mediated)
healthcare audio data in an Italian hospital and video data of interpreting in Norwegian
hospital encounters, with the aim to train both (practising and would be) interpreters and
healthcare professionals. However, CARM can readily be adapted to fit other languages, do-
mains, and target audiences, provided that the trainer bases their workshops on conversation
analytic research.
Literature overview
Over the last decade, CARM has been used to address some of the shortcomings of closed and
open role-plays in different training settings and for different talk-based institutions (Stokoe
2014). CARM prompts workshop participants to analyse naturally occurring talk ‘in the
345
wild’ (Stokoe 2020: 333) and to investigate why a specific action is accomplished at a partic-
ular moment (why that now? being the quintessential CA question) then encourages discussion
of possible next turns. Although CARM almost always matches the data setting to the partic-
ipants (mediators see mediation, police see investigative interviews, salespeople see sales calls,
and so forth), workshops also include practices from other settings. For example, mediators
encounter crisis negotiation and crisis negotiators encounter sales calls, partly to show how the
workshop will run via clips from another setting, and also because many (in)effective practices
are shared across settings. In Church and Bateman (2019), for instance, trainers are confronted
with classroom recordings, and the ‘forensic reflection on practice’ CARM stimulates can
be valuable in informing trainers, that is early childhood teachers, and show that rather than
rely on hypothetical scenarios or role-plays, workshop participants can discuss what actually
happens in classrooms and how teachers respond to children, thereby stimulating reflection
on strategies for intervening in disputes (which are a productive site for learning). So CARM
provides them with an opportunity to gradually observe what is happening immediately prior
to a teacher intervention, to hypothesise about its likely trajectory, and assess whether the
teacher did manage to effectively intervene in the dispute. Halfway between those who advise
that children should resolve conflicts themselves and those who encourage direct intervention
by teachers, CARM here shows how practices are contingent to prior actions and how teach-
ers can locally respond to the children’s needs and concerns on a turn-by-turn basis, rather
than aprioristically adopt one position or the other. Quoting Pomerantz and Fehr (1997: 184),
the authors argue that this method ‘involves moving away from discussing what particular
people did on the occasion, to considering what people need to know and do in order to ap-
propriately perform the action in any new situation they encounter’.
The reach of CA, and thus of CARM (Stokoe 2020), is expanded by its openness to work
across disciplines and languages and makes of it a perfect candidate to deal with interpreter-
mediated interactions in different institutional settings, where just like in any other setting,
every word matters.
While CA-based activities have been used for about 20 years in interpreter training (for
instance by Merlini 2007; Zorzi 2008; Bührig et al. 2012; Davitti and Pasquandrea 2014;
Baraldi and Gavioli 2020), to the best of our knowledge the first attempt to use CARM in
PSI interpreting dates back to 2011, when, within the framework of her PhD project, Nie-
mants was comparing role-played vs. actual interpreter-mediated encounters in healthcare
and had identified CARM as a viable solution to avoid the two layers of inauthenticity she
has found in her corpus (see above). Since then, other trainers have used CARM, or variants
thereof, in interpreting classes at graduate level (Dal Fovo 2018), in sessions for postgraduate
students (K rystallidou 2014; Dal Fovo 2016), as well as in sessions for interpreters’ trainers
(Wadensjö 2014), and CARM is an entry of the Dictionary of Education and Assessment in
Translation and Interpreting Studies (Dastyar 2019).

CARM takes CA research findings as a basis for training, so extracts and recordings rep-
resent a first critical issue for its use. Trainers who want to test this method need to know
how to deal with primary and secondary data together in presentation software, since the
transcripts and the associated audio or video recordings are exported into some sort of
PowerPoint presentation, and then animated such that the transcribed turns-at-talk appear
synchronously.
346
As with any work involving use of recordings, training data must conform to the ethical
consent permissions with which they were collected. In particular, one must be aware that
even with voice pitching and blurred video clips, participants, especially interpreters, may
be identifiable based on for instance regional dialects. In general, it is important to encour-
age trainees to consider respectful treatment of participants whose actions we are discussing
before the data are presented, as suggested by Parry et al. (2016: 1281) in their recommen-
dations for good practice in video recording and especially in dissemination, reporting, and
use of the research findings.
Two CARM workshops

Key to CARM is to identify findings from research ‘that are not just of interest to academics
but also useful for practitioners’ (Stokoe 2020: 338), and then deciding how best to guide
trainees through the complexity of actual encounters by selecting likely discussion points
and trainables. By trainable we mean an observed conversational practice that can be intro-
duced in an individual slide (see Figures 21.1 and 21.7 below) then turned into a t ake-home
message and possibly guidance for effective communication.
In the following subsections, we will propose two alternative training paths, one based
on audio data with setting and language-specific examples and the other based on video
data from various hospital encounters with interpreting in various languages. The practice
detailed in both sections, questioning in medicine, has been much studied by conversation
analysts (Heritage and Maynard 2006; Heritage 2010). What we aim to show, however, is
that this practice is equally interesting for healthcare practitioners and interpreters alike as
a methodology for reflective observation and participation in interpreter-mediated interac-
tions they will be jointly constructing. As we will see, CA – and thus CARM training –
focusses attention on the interplay between interpreters’ actions and those of the primary
participants, and on the responsibility they all share to achieve effective communication.
Figure 21.1 S lide introducing questioning in men’s health consultations with Italian patients
347
Setting-specific training path on onsite interpreting

A first example may serve to get trainees to know the machinery of conversations in a spe-
cific medical setting where doctors and patients communicate directly, like a men’s health
(‘a ndrological’) service that has recently been the object of CA research (Niemants 2019,
2021a) and that here involves an Italian physician (A NDm) visiting three male patients
(PATm) and asking the same routine question about age.
The first patient is Italian. The slide below may be used to introduce trainees to ques-
tioning in consultations about infertility problems, which in the corpus1 always start with
a general question about the couple (any children?) and the partner (any gynaecological
problems?) and only then move on to talking about the patient (generally through doctor’s
prefaces like ‘t alking about the male part’ and the like).
Starting from such a simple introductory excerpt can enable, on the one hand, trainers to
get acquainted with CARM style and use animations so as to synchronise transcripts with
anonymised audios (each line shall appear when it is uttered), and on the other trainees (be
them practising and/or would be interpreters or doctors) to progressively enter into the wild
of andrological conversations, where the meaning of a simple turn-at-talk, here quanti anni
ha? (which can be a formal version of ‘how old are you’ and/or a question referring to a third
person ‘how old is s/he/it?’), depends on the pragmatic context in which it is uttered. Here,
the question is understood (by PATm) as ‘how old is s/he?’, referring to the child mentioned
at turns 1 and 2, but the very same question may also refer to somebody else.
The second patient is a foreign migrant who speaks Italian well enough to communicate
with the physician directly. The trainer may start by playing the excerpt in F igure 21.2, so
as to make trainees hear and read what happens before the physician utters the same quanti
anni ha? question as before.
With the help of trainer’s comments, trainees can be invited to discuss lines 1–8 and
raise awareness on the fact that the meaning of the same utterance changes according to the
pragmatic context: here it follows a question about the patient’s partner (compagna, line 1) and
is thus referring to her. Trainees are then supposed to produce next turns (interpreters are
Figure 21.2 E
xample of questioning in men’s health consultations with foreign patients (a)
348
Figure 21.3 E xample of questioning in men’s health consultations with foreign patients (b)
likely to produce different types of renditions and possibly some requests for clarifications,
while doctors will probably produce candidate answers by the patient) and the trainer finally
shows what follows (Figure 21.3).
In this second part of the excerpt, participants show that meaning may need clarification
even when patients and doctors communicate directly, because it is not in the utterance
itself (in this case quanti anni ha?) but is the result of a joint construction between speaker
and listener who, by reacting, show what they are making of previous turns. As such, this
non-mediated interaction may be fruitfully used both with (practising and would be) inter-
preters and with doctors, to raise their awareness of the machinery and sequential structure
of conversation beginnings in this specific medical context. Trainers may possibly comment
on the fact that in line 10, ANDm shows he is aware of a possible misunderstanding, then in
12 he shows his own understanding, and in 14 he utters something in a low volume, thereby
showing that he addresses his colleague who is writing down the medical report and tran-
scribing what is jointly negotiated in this excerpt, that is that the patient and his partner are
about the same age.
In the CARM workshop focussing on a men’s health context, trainers may venture as
far as showing what may happen if and when the patient’s partner is not only talked about
but also present in the consultation, which often happens in the case of infertility problems,
where partners can react to questions like quanti anni ha? and take some interactional space.
Once trainees have entered infertility consultations and realised that initial questions may not
be addressed to the patient but to relatives, trainers may move on to an interpreter-mediated
consultation where the same quanti anni ha? question appears. This final example aims to
raise trainees’ awareness of how/when interpreters talk in such consultations, demonstrating
how the interpreters’ participation is locally negotiated in collaboration. From the trainers’
viewpoint, there are no added constraints for the use of CARM with interpreter-mediated
data, which still make use of anonymised audios and synchronised transcripts. While from
the trainees’ viewpoint, be they practising or future interpreters and/or doctors, the two Fig-
ures below show that mediated interactions are not just the sum of original turns plus their
349
Figure 21.4 E xample of questioning in interpreter-mediated men’s health consultations (a)
(immediate) renditions into the other language, but a different and co-constructed object,
where all participants – a nd especially doctors and interpreters – contribute on a t urn-by-
t urn basis (Figure 21.4).
In the excerpt above, there is no need for the pragmatic context to disambiguate the
quanti anni ha? question, since the physician makes the referent explicit in his turn 3. How-
ever, the trainer may want to comment on the fact that the doctor does not only produce
the routine question about age, as he did when interacting with the patients directly, but
he packs it with two other questions (one about how long the couple has been looking for
a child and the other about their having other children already). By blocking the transcript
synchronised with the audio after the 0.6 silence at line 6, trainers may additionally invite
trainees to reflect on its meaning, before asking them to produce candidate next turns and
playing what really happened in this authentic consultation, where the E nglish-speaking
woman called to interpret shows visible/audible troubles in rendering the series of questions
(Figure 21.5).
If used with experienced and in-training interpreters, these last two excerpts can show
that PSI is not just about the interpreter, since here it is the doctor himself who changes the
way in which he asks the same routine question (a s a standalone vs. in a series of questions).
This practice is not necessarily functional in interpreter-mediated interactions, where the la-
tency increases after long turns and series of questions, which both seem to project dyadic se-
quences in the foreign language where the I talian-speaking doctor is temporarily excluded.
Interpreters may thus be called to reflect on the need to intervene in medical consultations
where doctors’ first moves may determine non-functional conversational mechanisms, to
create some space for their translating and coordinating activities, and to ensure more effec-
tive communication.
If used with doctors, the very same excerpt can lead them to conclude that asking ques-
tions one at a time, and making their referent explicit, may possibly be more functional in
interpreter-mediated interactions, where interpreters need to easily understand and then
render jointly constructed meaning. Trainers may show doctors alternative examples of ex-
plicit standalone questions present in the corpus (like la sua compagna quanti anni ha?, quanti
350
Figure 21.5 E
xample of questioning in interpreter-mediated men’s health consultations (b)
anni ha sua moglie?, where the partner and the wife are explicitly referred to) and, in case
video recordings were present, let them examine the gazes and gestures that accompany
and/or substitute turns at talk or parts thereof, thereby further raising their awareness of
non-verbal communication.
Training path on interpreting through video technology

Based on question-answer sequences in hospital encounters where medical professionals
(M Ps) and patients do not share a language and interpreting is provided through video tech-
nology, this second training path demonstrates how the participants collaboratively organise
the activity of interpreting. Furthermore, it shows how the complex interactional space is
of import for the participants’ interpretation of ongoing activities and relevant next actions.
This training path is based on video recordings of v ideo-interpreted hospital encounters,2
with the interpreter placed at a different location than the other participants. The first ex-
tract, ‘do you have any questions Paulina?’, serves to provide an example of a (relatively)
simple question-answer sequence.
Presenting the situation with an image before playing the video clip (Figure 21.6) allows
the trainer to provide some information about the setting and to guide the trainees’ focus of
attention. The image shows what the interaction looks like from the interpreter’s point of
view, where video technology provides the interpreter with visual and auditory access to their
co-participants at the hospital ward. While the interactional setting at the ward may seem
quite complex with many participants present, the current interaction is mainly between two
participants, the N orwegian-speaking MP and the Polish-speaking patient Paulina, who do
not treat the interaction as particularly complex. After an introduction describing the setting
and providing a brief outline of what will happen in the extract, the trainer can play the video
clip as recorded from the interpreter’s point of view (that in Figure 21.6 above).
While this extract is chosen as a (relatively) simple introduction to the interpreter-
mediated question-answer sequence, the extract includes a range of possible discussion points
351
Figure 21.6 First slide in training path, image for introduction to the setting
Figure 21.7 S econd slide in training path, presenting the extract
(Figure 21.7). The extract demonstrates how the MP poses a question directed to Paulina
through physical orientation, gaze and by naming her, and as such explicitly allocates her as
the next speaker. Since Paulina and the MP do not speak the same language, interpreting is
treated as relevant by all participants, and the interpreter produces the next turn. Although
the interpreter does not have available all the same resources for directing the utterance to
Paulina (interpreter’s gaze and bodily orientation from a remote location will not have the
352
Figure 21.8 Slide with images from both sites in the interaction
same referential meaning for the participants at the ward), the MP’s use of name makes it
possible for the interpreter to direct the utterance in Polish, which in turn makes relevant a
response by Paulina. If it was not already clear to all participants who were addressed by the
question based on prior speech and local context, the question’s design makes it clear to all
participants who are addressed. From a conversation analytic point of view, the long silence
following the interpreter’s rendition (line 4) could indicate trouble responding to the ques-
tion. However, time lag may occur in v ideo-mediated interaction changing temporality of
the interaction (Rusk and Pörn 2019). So, while the extract is seemingly simple and only dis-
plays an interpreted extract of a question-answer sequence, it is still rich in discussion points.
The next extract shows a similar learning point, however the example is more complex.
The slide illustrated in F igure 21.8 contains images from both sites in the interaction, both
the interpreter’s point of view (to the left) and the ward’s point of view (to the right). The in-
terpreter has only partial visual access to the doctor and cannot see the patient as the patient
is seated beyond the scope of the camera. After introducing the seating arrangements and
visual affordances to the trainees, trainers may play the first part of the excerpt, where the
doctor and patient have begun to speak directly in Norwegian. For this example, we suggest
showing the video as recorded from the interpreter’s point of view first (that in the left-hand
side of Figure 21.8 above).
The doctor asks questions and the patient responds without leaving space for interpreting
(line 1). The interpreter produces an audible i n-breath (line 2), which due to time lag is only
audible in the ward during the patient’s response (line 3). The doctor treats the patient’s
response as adequate and moves on to a next question (line 9). After the patient’s minimal
response (line 11), the doctor expands his question, specifying ‘w ith the medication’ (line
12). Again, the interpreter produces an audible in-breath that is only audible in the ward
during the doctor’s utterance. After the doctor’s utterance, follows a long silence. This would
be a place to stop the video and invite trainees to discuss what the next move would be and
why (Figures 21.9 and 21.10).
353
Figure 21.9 S lide showing second example in the training path up until focus point
Figure 21.10 Slide showing what happens after focus point
What happens next is that the doctor verbally invites the interpreter to interpret (see
Hansen 2020 for an in-depth analysis). The example demonstrates how the relevance of
interpreting, and thus the interactional trajectory, is locally negotiated by all participants.
This last example confirms, although from a different perspective, that translation is jointly
negotiated: while in Figures 21.4 and 21.5 it was the doctor’s first move that affected the
interpreter’s rendition, here it is the patient responding directly that makes interpreting a
matter of negotiation (and again far from the ideal pattern where interpreters closely translate
after every single turn at talk).
Showing the same sequence with the video from the ward’s point of view will demonstrate
to the trainees how participants in interaction may rely on embodied resources in interaction,
354
which are not available to participants at other sites. This training trajectory has demon-
strated how both the interactional space afforded by the visual ecology, an interactional space
participants-in-interaction create and shape by using the technology, and primary partici-
pants’ actions may affect interpreters’ understanding and actions. This training path, with
escalating complexity, enables to observe embodied conduct and how interaction and as such
interpreting is organised as a complex set of actions, both verbal and embodied. In their un-
derstanding of what is (a) the meaning of a primary participants’ utterance, and (b) what is a
relevant next action to this, interpreters do not only draw on the verbal conduct, but also on
the complex multimodal utterances situated within a specific setting (Hansen 2020).
Trainables, trainees, and some further ideas for CARM workshops

Language professionals may need to interpret, both in the sense of understanding and giving
meaning to what is said – or
unsaid – in the interaction, and in the sense of translating that
meaning for the other participants (Seleskovitch and Lederer 2001), so that it can be added to
a conversational ‘common ground’ (Clark and Brennan 1991). Such ground is more complex
to build when two languages and ‘territories of knowledge’ are involved (Heritage 2011,
but see also Mason 2006; Raymond 2014) and when interpreting is provided remotely, thus
leaving participants with different levels of access to the interaction (Hansen 2020).
Depending on the chosen path, on the type of training in which CARM is used (setting-
specific or not?; language-specific or not?; onsite or remote interpreting?), on the target
trainees (practising or would be interpreters?; doctors?; trainers?), and on the time available
for the workshops (two-hour classes?; half a day?; more?), trainers may vary the number of
trainables to be presented. In the case of the training paths we presented above, the final slide
may for instance look as follows (Figure 21.11).
Our suggestion is to include between one and five take-home messages that are directly
related to the excerpts and conversational practices presented.
Figure 21.11 A sample slide with t ake-homes
355
For the sake of convenience, the above training paths have been exemplified using au-
thentic (interpreter-mediated) healthcare data and focussing on just one building block of
medical encounters (the q uestion-answer pair). However, CARM may readily be adapted
to fit any language and PSI domain (police interviews, asylum interviews, school settings,
political interviews, and so forth), provided that the trainer has (a) a collection of audio-
and/or v ideo-recorded interactions available or can use data collected and analysed by other
researchers, and (b) a thorough understanding of CA enabling the identification of the same,
or other, conversational patterns. A first related topic to this chapter is therefore the prob-
lem of data availability. While both text and multimodal corpora are increasingly available
through archives, still not much data are available in the area of interpreter-mediated inter-
action and trainers may find it difficult to obtain the necessary data. When data are available
and transcribed, trainers may need support for analysing and presenting them. They may
thus benefit from attending a CARM workshop (https://w ww.carmtraining.org) as well as
from reading CA studies applied to interpreting in different institutional settings, possibly
becoming a CARM affiliate (https://w ww.carmtraining.org/a ffiliate).
A CARM workshop may be carried out with smaller groups of 15–35 participants, which
is perhaps more common, to larger groups of as many as 1 00–50. The workshop may be car-
ried out as a short session of a couple of hours, a series of sessions of a range of time, or longer
workshops lasting for a day or two. The CARM trainer chooses a number of ‘trainables’ and a
number of examples to demonstrate the trainable depending on the duration of the session and
the purpose of the workshop. The latter can be carried out as a live session with all participants
physically co-present at one location, it can take place remotely using video-technologies or it
may involve both on-site and remote participants in synchronous blended mode. Irrespective
of the mode and of the number of trainables and trainees, each example is framed and intro-
duced for the participants. The extract is played for them using audio or video recordings and
synchronised transcripts. The script is stopped at a specific point in the interaction and the par-
ticipants are invited to discuss what the next move should be. This is then generally discussed
in smaller groups of three to six participants. The trainer then shows the participants what was
the next move in this specific setting. The groups proceed to discuss what the practitioner/s
did in the extract. The trainer moves on to a next example, scaffolding the participants to iden-
tify effective (and less effective) practice from the evidence laid out to them. Many different
topics may be brought up during the workshops depending on the chosen trainables, on the
extracts presented, and on the discussions brought up by workshop participants (professional
ethics, professional practice, or interactional practices, to mention just a few). As exemplified
in what follows, the workshops may also possibly prepare the ground for some role-playing,
where the trainees can act out the conversations they have observed and participated in.
Although CARM has so far mainly been used in language-specific interpreting courses
involving single language pairs such as those in the experiences dealt with in this chapter, we
would argue that it may also be suitable in general interpreter training. One general course
of this type was experimented in a master interpreting program held at the University of
Bologna/Forlì in the academic years 2020/21, 2021/22 and 2022/23. This 30-hour mod-
ule presented 32 Italian-speaking students having five different language combinations (Ita
lian<>English/French/German/Russian/Spanish) with authentic data recorded in a range
of languages and specialised settings. The aim was to foster discussion on relevant theory
starting from the practice of interpreters and mediators in, for example, healthcare, a sylum-
seeking interviews, business meetings, and TV talk-shows (see Niemants 2021b for further
details). While dialogue interpreting classes in Forlì are traditionally taught in c o-presence
by two university trainers at the same time, one for each language, CARM could here
356
make ‘a language-specific cohort dependent on one teacher’ (Hale and Ozolins 2014: 7),
thereby preparing the theoretical ground of all first year students (the module was in blended
synchronous mode with most of the students in the classroom and some at home following
and interacting via Microsoft Teams in 2020/21 and 2021/22, while it was entirely onsite
in 2022/23) before they started their additional 20-hour traditional role-play exercises per
language pair. We would thus venture as far as stating that such a language-independent use
of CARM proved suitable to respond to cost-cutting pressures, which over the last years
have affected a number of courses not only at Bologna/Forlì, as well as to address remote
teaching/learning needs, such as those required during current pandemics.
Further reading
Baraldi, Claudio, and Laura Gavioli (eds) (2021) “W hen clinicians and patients do not speak the same
language – Interpreting in health care”, special issue of Health Communication 36 (9).
The seven papers published in this special issue of Health Communication inquire what happens when a
bilingual interpreter and/or mediator participates in talk between health care professionals and patients who
speak different languages, thereby providing a good basis to identify some possible trainables in view of a setting-
specific CARM workshop.
Hansen, Jessica, and Jan Svennevig (2021) “Creating space for interpreting within extended turns at
talk”, Journal of Pragmatics 182: 144–62.
This article explores multimodal practices employed by medical professionals and interpreters to collab-
oratively manage the temporary suspension of medical professionals’ longer turns in progress, which allows
interpreters to begin interpreting. It also addresses how video-technology provides a complex interactional space
challenging the fine-tuned moment-by-moment negotiation of turns.
Niemants, Natacha, and Anne Delizée (eds) (2021) The Interpreters’ Newsletter 26.
This thematic issue of The Interpreters’ Newsletter focuses on dialogue interpreting methodology and the
eleven contributions it contains are based on authentic data in different communicative contexts, thereby proving
useful to identify trainables across languages-cultures and settings, as well as to raise awareness of the wide
range of possible analytical lenses.
Stokoe, Elizabeth (2018) Talk. The Science of Conversation. London, Little Brown Book Group.
The book describes key domains of conversation analytic research and challenges much of what we think we
know about talk, including many communication myths. It was written as a result of the public engagement
generated by CARM workshops so that the multiple non-academic stakeholders of CA research, and anyone
who is new to this method and approach, could learn about it.
Related chapters
Chapter 1, General issues of PSI: institutions, codes and norms, professional quality by Carmen Valero-Garcés
Chapter 5, Corpus-based studies of PSI by Bernd Meyer
Chapter 12, Public service interpreting in healthcare by Laura Gavioli and Raffaela Merlini
Chapter 16, ‘Interpreter’s mistake’ — Why should other professions care about the professionalization of inter-
Chapter 18, Roleplay as a means of training and of testing public service interpreting by Magnus Dahnberg
Chapter 23, Interprofessional education … interpreter education: in or and? Taking stock and moving forward by
Demi Krystallidou
Chapter 24, Training public service providers in how to work with interpreters by Tatjana Radanovic Felberg
and Gry Sagli
Notes
1 The data consist of three sub-corpora of men’s health consultations: the first with Italian patients,
the second with foreign patients speaking Italian, and the third with foreign patients communi-
cating through an interpreter-mediator. The data were collected as part of an interdisciplinary
project financed by the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia and gathering andrologists,
357
sociologists, and linguists (FAR 2017, Claudio Baraldi, PI, together with Federico Corradini and
Laura Gavioli as linguists, as well as with Antonio Granata, Michela Locaso, Vincenzo Rochira,
Daniele Santi, and Giorgia Spaggiari as andrologists).
2 This work was partly supported by the Research Council of Norway through its Centres of Ex-
cellence funding scheme, project number 223265.
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22
TRAINING INTERPRETERS IN
ASYLUM SETTINGS
The REMILAS project
Anna Claudia Ticca, Véronique Traverso and Emilie Jouin
Introduction
This contribution is based on the REMILAS (Refugees, Migrants and their Languages in
healthcare services) research project1 which examines communication and mutual under-
standing in multilingual health, mental and social care consultations in France. We specif-
ically focused on the complexity of resources participants turn to in order to overcome the
communicative problems they encounter. The data we gathered are characterized by diver-
sity at different levels, including data collection methods, types of consultations and partic-
ipation formats, as well as diversity of analytic and conceptual approaches (from linguistic
analyses to medical sociology and the sociology of immigration).
In this chapter, we first discuss the diversity of the collected data and the issues it raises for
the analyses. We then turn to a short overview of recent studies devoted to Public Service
Interpreting (PSI) and asylum contexts. In the last section, we illustrate how we reinvested
our data for training interpreters and caregivers to deal with multilingual encounters with
asylum seekers (henceforth ASs). A particular emphasis is placed on the multimodal character
of such interactions and on the relevance of an interactional approach to training.
Epistemological and theoretical considerations in working

with diversified PSI settings
In this section, we briefly describe the diversity of the REMILAS data. This diversity may be
useful and suggestive for PSI research since it reflects the complex reality that might confront
(novice) interpreters exercising their profession. We will then discuss our analytic approach
to the data before presenting some major results of our research.
Diversified sets of data

A one-year intensive fieldwork allowed us to collect 91 v ideo-recorded consultations (for a
total of around 75 hours of recordings) in several settings.2 The recordings are designed to
enable fi ne-grained interactional multimodal analysis, while taking into account the large
range of semiotic resources participants employ in order to communicate, including the use
362 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-26

Training interpreters in asylum settings
of artifacts, such as the computer or the telephone (Piccoli, Ticca and Traverso 2019; Tra-
verso 2019). We also conducted participant observations and informal interviews at the time
of the recordings.
Another set of data consists of more formal interviews with caregivers, interpreters and
migrants (a total of 34 interviews). It also includes self-confrontation interviews in the form
of workshops, to which we invited the caregivers (individually and collectively), as well as
researchers not associated to the project. These data gave us, as researchers, access to the in-
terpreters’ and caregivers’ awareness and understandings of the (general situation of ) consul-
tations with both non-French- and French-speaking migrants and refugees. Moreover, they
offered these professionals the occasion to observe and consider their own practice through
different analytical lenses.
This rich set of data also made it possible to construct a more holistic approach, which con-
jugates the fi ne-grained analytic process of interactions with the s elf-confrontation sessions.
Diversified types of interactions and participants

Another level of diversity is represented by the variety of participating professionals, such
as general practitioners, psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, nurses and interpreters.
Nonetheless, we realized that these categories are too broad to grasp the issues and con-
cerns at stake in each specific consultation. For instance, important features distinguish what
might appear at first glance as one and the same type of consultation. By way of illustration,
in the case of general healthcare with ASs, first consultations focus on getting informa-
tion about the individuals, establishing their personal file and determining their needs, aids
and welfare they may be entitled to have, while follow-up sessions more strictly concern
healthcare. Other visits, the medical assessment ones (from French consultations d’expertise
médicale), attempt to produce a medical certificate stating, among other things, that the scars
or any psychological signs of violence are compatible with the narrated events. During these
consultations then, doctors re-examine and clarify the person’s history and their asylum
narrative in order to identify new elements that may help them build their case for getting
different types of administrative protection (see section The normality of rule-breaking, extract
2). Such diversity within the types of consultations has implications in terms of interaction
development and structure, as well as in terms of turn formats.
Diversity in the data also concerns participants. Some patients present in our corpus
are migrants involved in the asylum procedure; some benefit from either international or
subsidiary protection, while others are in the process of applying to obtain such a status or
protection. Still others are appealing to the National Court of the Asylum Right (CNDA)3
after their first claim was rejected by the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and
Stateless Persons (OFPRA).4 Some participants have not yet formally started any procedure,
or all procedures have failed and they live in France without a right of residence. This diver-
sity of participants combines with that of the consultations, resulting in a variety of interac-
tional formats and activities.
The presence of people at different stages of their asylum procedure, requesting different
administrative and healthcare-related services, puts us in a liminal position in relation to PSI
research in asylum settings which typically focuses on a circumscribed, well-defined situ-
ational context. If we look, for example, at the Handbook for Interpreters in Asylum Procedures
(U NHCR Austria, 2017), the so-called ‘asylum context’ is limited to formal interviews
with case officers, often assisted by interpreters and in the presence of legal counselors. All
the less formal meetings that ASs may have with legal counselors and supporting NGO
363
Anna Claudia Ticca et al.
members to prepare for such formal interviews are not considered, nor are other interviews
and consultations that usually take place beforehand. Yet, the variety of situations that we
have recorded turned out to be invaluable for our research in that it enabled us to observe
the role played by context in the development and understanding of the social encounters
in which participants are engaged (van Dijk 2007). For instance, we realized that ASs were
not always aware of why they were offered a visit to a practitioner, nor the kind of practi-
tioner they were consulting. Not knowing the reasons and goals of the visits can hinder an
AS from understanding conversational practices correctly, such as questions, statements and
recommendations. As for interpreters, they may adapt their practices to the challenges of a
certain type of consultation and be prompted to make interactional choices so as to orient
the conversation in ways considered useful for the outcomes of the encounter (Ticca 2020b;
section In-person training to a mixed public of professionals).
Finally, while some encounters are monolingual (in French or English as lingua franca),
most are interpreter-mediated with either family or community members with knowledge
of English or French or members of a local interpreter’s professional association in which
they have been trained. The receiving health institution generally provides the latter.
The asylum context – A literature overview

In the social sciences, the asylum context has been observed through the lenses of different
disciplines, such as anthropology, (m icro)sociology, social psychology, interpreting stud-
ies, discourse studies and (socio)linguistics. In most cases, authors manifest some degree of
activism and/or self-engagement, emphasizing the dominant role of institutions over the
ASs (see, for instance, Jacquemet 2009; Fassin 2012) who are viewed as victims of what
Bourdieu (1997) would call the ‘symbolic’ violence experienced along the asylum procedure
(Nossik 2018).
Disparities related to language, cultural knowledge and the general understanding about
the asylum process, as well as the imposition of an institutional agenda and the difficulty in
understanding the subjacent, n on-transparent logic of formal hearings are often pointed out.
ASs are often described as being unable to conform to institutional expectations (Fassin and
d’Halluin 2005; Good 2007) which often determines their failure in obtaining protection
from the host country. In this framework, the asylum narrative produced in formal as well
as in preparatory hearings represents an important object of interest. Linguistic, pragmatic
and discursive features are described in detail, illustrating how storytelling in the context of
migration and asylum is constructed and revealed through the situated use of language and
other semiotic resources (De Fina 2003; Jacquemet 2005; Delahaie and Canut 2020). In such
a perspective, language diversity and disparity emerge, unsurprisingly, as a central topic of
research in which interpreting plays a major role, mainly to quality, intercultural mediation
and training. So, for instance, in political asylum application processes in the UK, interpret-
ers’ practices vary according to context (whether it is in initial ports of entry or the Immi-
gration Appellate Authority), and expectations concerning interpreting are not the same,
oscillating from a solidary and supportive attitude to a more rigorous impartiality (Inghilleri
2005). It is typically the institutional party who, more or less openly, sets the agenda and
its demands concerning interpreting. Nonetheless, discordancy between such demands and
expectations, and the interpreters’ actual practice may appear. Interpreters can mobilize their
linguistic, cultural and legal knowledge in assisting a client in whatever context within the
asylum process, and in doing so they may not align with institutional expectations or other
364
professional norms. Such variability depends, in part, on the interpreter’s personal biogra-
phy, professional experience and level of training. This is important because it highlights the
peculiarity of interpreting in the asylum context, at the continuum between the more nor-
malized legal interpreting and PSI (Inghilleri 2005), where the interpreter’s self-initiatives
are not only tolerated, but also encouraged (Baraldi and Gavioli 2012; Ticca and Traverso
2017; Chambon et al. 2021).
Because they are the only ones who understand linguistic and pragmatic meanings
of both sides, the interpreter’s privileged position can promote an alignment with the
dominant, institutional side ( Jacquemet 2011), putting them in the role of institutional
gatekeepers (Davidson 2000; Pöllabauer 2004; Jacquemet 2009). Yet, interpreters’ epis-
temic and cultural knowledge is clearly controversial, even more so in the asylum context.
Indeed, Barsky (1996: 46) suggests considering them as ‘agents of culture’ who should
participate more actively in asylum hearings and openly support the claimants by disam-
biguating seemingly unclear or contradictory testimonies. Nonetheless, Inghilleri (2 005)
cautions against building an idealized vision of the interpreter as a cultural broker. Like
Mason (2 000), she argues that, in reality, interpreters may themselves not have access to
the discursive strategies needed to make such a connection come about. Others underline
the potentially counterproductive use of interpreters’ cultural knowledge vis-à-vis the AS.
This is evident in interpreters’ reluctance to translate tout court for political reasons (Duque
2020), or more occasionally, only segments of talk because of differences in their beliefs
and those of the AS. For instance, Jacquemet (2 016) reported a case in which a Kurdish
Sunni interpreter refused to translate a Kurdish Yazidi AS’s answer about his religion
because she considered it as devilish. Instilling or not elements emanating from the inter-
preter’s own epistemic and cultural knowledge in interaction relates to the more general
issue of providing faithful and precise translation. While the latter is required, important
and desirable in any given context, it is even more so in a sylum-seeking procedures, in
which the future and the very survival of claimants is at stake. In fact, in such multilingual
contexts, the insurgence of ‘c rosstalk problems’ (Gumperz 1979) and/or incoherencies may
determine a negative outcome of a hearing (Barsky 1996; Jacquemet 2011). Interpreters are
therefore considered to play a major role, not only in the formal hearings, but also in the
numerous preparatory interviews and encounter refugees attend throughout the asylum
process.
on-profit associations who are themselves refugees
In the case of France, interpreters of n
or asylees participate in meetings aimed at producing the asylum narratives to be presented
to the OFPRA. Their role is often crucial, in that they reinvest their own experience in
both evaluating beforehand the supposed AS’s legitimacy to ask for protection in the host
country and shaping a refugee’s storytelling according to what is expected by the OFPRA
(Clappe 2019; Niemants 2022). This has inevitable consequences for interpreters’ training
because it makes evident the tensions between the need for neutrality and fidelity of trans-
lation with the importance of mobilizing the interpreter’s knowledge when producing the
AS’s narrative.
Interpreting training in the asylum context in France

Existing literature shows that interpreting in the asylum context involves situations
within the formal, legal domain. We investigated what may be considered a ‘corollary’
context within asylum, that of mental and healthcare. These diverse contexts in which
365
asylum interpreting takes place need to be taken into account in interpreter training,
where different types of knowledge, experience and savoir-faire are to be highlighted and
developed.
Formal, university-based training in interpreting has among its main objectives to en-
hance students’ awareness of the importance of guaranteeing a trustful translation, as well
as their commitment to ensure h igh-quality interpreting (Bergunde and Pöllabauer 2019).
In this regard, the effort of European countries, including France, to train interpreters in a
standardized fashion appears to be insufficient (U NHCR 2010). Moreover, besides the lack of
trained interpreters, especially in the so-called languages of limited diffusion (LLDs), training
in France is clearly distinguished by two main domains: conference interpreting, which is
typically offered at universities, and PSI (interprétariat en milieu social et médical),5 which does
not have a professionalizing university training. Training for court interpreting is offered at
university as well as at a lower, local level by private institutions such as, the Compagnie des
experts de la cour d’appel (Eng. the Companies of Appeal Court Experts) that occasionally ded-
icate its activities to court interpreting.6
Compared to other European countries, such as Austria, Belgium, Norway, Spain,
Sweden, and Switzerland, PSI training in France remains underdeveloped, even though
some efforts to implement new training programs and sensitize governmental institutions
on the necessity of providing professionalization to PSI are nowadays emerging.7 These
initiatives are undertaken both by universities and local organizations involved in migra-
tion and a sylum-related procedures, who, compelled by the growing need for interpret-
ers, ask for institutional support to finance vocational training of interpreters. Training is
also delivered by the associations for whom interpreters work (Chambon, Zeroug-Vial,
and Carbonel 2017).8 Such vocational training courses, limited in hours, do not provide
an official, recognized certification of PS interpreters as professionals. As a consequence,
interpreters are poorly remunerated, making the profession insufficiently attractive to
new entrants.
As for academic interest in training in the asylum context in France, studies focus
mainly on language-related difficulties of ASs navigating different pathways to request
asylum ( see, for instance, the edited volume of S aglio-
Yatzimirsky and G alitzine-
L oumpet 2020). Other work describes the m icro-details of interactions. It highlights
the interpreter’s impact on the coordination of talk in video asylum hearings (L icoppe
and Verdier 2013, 2015), showing how troubles emerging in participants’ turn-taking
transitions may eventually negatively affect the hearing’s outcome (L icoppe and Veyrier
2020). Considerably less research analyzes asylum interpreters’ training itself or ques-
tions how to reinvest observations and analyses of interpreter-mediated interactions in
training (but see Chambon, Z eroug-Vial, and Carbonel 2017; Ticca 2018; Ticca, Lam-
bert and Traverso 2020). An exhaustive report issued by a joint meeting of researchers,
interpreters, lawyers, former OFPRA and CNDA assessors, among others (C ollective
authors 2000), identifies several major difficulties related to interpreting in asylum in-
terviews. One concerns language choice and the fact that when it is impossible to find
an interpreter for the language chosen by the AS, a relay language has to be selected.
Similarly, if an interpreter is available in the first chosen language, there is no guarantee
that his or her skills in the French language are sufficient to conduct the interview, or
that regional differences will not emerge, leading to mistakes that may compromise the
goal of obtaining protection (for example, this is the case for Dari and Pashto, two offi-
cial languages spoken in Afghanistan).
366
The complexity emerging from cases, such as these, which are more frequent than
we might think, is proportional to the difficulty in proposing holistic training that
embraces a multiplicity of needs (
e.g., linguistic, cultural, interactional, social and
anthropological).
Critical issues and t opics – How to transform and reinvest interactional

analysis results and fieldwork observations in training materials
The constitution of training material emerges as a natural consequence of the research activ-
ity carried out within the REMILAS project. The analyses and knowledge built throughout
the years represent an invaluable asset that we wanted to exploit and make available to a
wider audience. The large variety of situations we came across, as well as the range of data
collected led us to conceive of diversified ways to reinvest such knowledge.
In this section, we present two distinct training formats that we implemented and later
delivered to an audience of professionals (interpreters, medical staff and social workers). The
first, i n-person presentations, is more traditional (section below). The second, the ODIMEDI
platform, is offered in a self-learning modality via the use of a dedicated digital application
(section ODIMEDI – A self-training digital tool).
Before illustrating these training modalities, some information is worth mention-
ing. First, although our corpus of medical consultations consists of general health
and mental healthcare, which imply different types of activities and sequence formats
(Heritage and Robinson 2006; Peräkylä et al. 2008; Heritage 2009), some interactional
patterns are observed in all contexts. This is even more the case for medical assessments
of ASs where doctors retrace the patient’s storytelling, looking for new information
as they examine medical and psychological and, thus, intimate issues (Ticca 2022;
Chambon et al. 2021). As a result, interpreters need to differentiate their interventions
more dramatically, making moves that display their organizational function and nav-
igating between implicit and explicit coordination (Wadensjö 1998). The latter may
be aimed at both helping the doctor to solve communicative impasses and mobilizing
knowledge considered useful for the purposes of the visit (Ticca 2020a; Ricet and
Noûs forthcoming).
A second salient point concerning interpreters is that, because our target audience is com-
posed of people already involved in PSI, our work is positioned in the context of vocational
training. With our material we show how, in real-life situations, interpreting is a complex
activity that cannot be reduced to a list of norms and behaviors.
In-person training to a mixed public of professionals

A key challenge of training relates to preparing materials out of in situ v ideo-recorded con-
sultations. Since data are confidential, all images and texts must be anonymized. Such tech-
nical manipulations are both time-consuming and invasive with regards to data visibility.
Moreover, using multilingual data means translating into the training language (French in
our case) several languages, including LLDs, necessitating finding translators in these lan-
guages and obtaining translations that fit our fi ne-grained standards.
The goals of our training can be resumed in two broad objectives: (1) stimulating train-
ees to enhance their attention to the verbal and n on-verbal micro details of interactions;
and (2) helping them critically observe and understand the interactional choices that are
367
Figure 22.1 View 1 Participants are about to begin the consultation
locally made, and therefore reconsider in a more useful way existing norms and principles.
As is known, prescribing activities or attitudes within a profession implies a simplification
of real-life situations (inevitably circumscribed by certain constitutive elements) which
builds a notable gap between real work and prescribed work (L eplat and Hoc 1983: 18). In
this sense, working on authentic video data has the value of allowing participants to delve
into the complexity of real professional practice and grasp its finer details (Filliettaz and
Zogmal 2017).
In what follows, we present a selection of the topics and phenomena included in our train-
ing courses. We begin with some observations on the multimodal dimension of PSI that are
valuable for any type of interpreter-mediated interactions, focusing on the organization of
participation. Here we draw particularly on C. Goodwin (1981) and C. Goodwin and H. M.
Goodwin (2005), who, even though they did not specifically focus on i nterpreter-mediated in-
teractions, offer invaluable insights on the place of gaze and body orientation in framing partic-
ipation. We will then turn to cases where ‘deviation’ from norms, such as translation fidelity and
neutrality, occurs and gives rise to ethical issues related to interpreters’ professional discretion.
A close look at gaze and the organization of participation

We present here a case that is part of the essential content we mobilize in our training courses
to health professionals (general and mental healthcare) and interpreters. It is particularly ef-
fective because, in its simplicity – it illustrates a q uestion-answer sequence occurring at the
beginning of a follow-up visit in psychiatry – it gives rise to a large number of central issues
in PSI.
It concerns a consultation with a couple, both ASs, who speak Albanian. An interpreter
(INT) speaking Albanian and French is present in the room see Image 1. The consultation
begins just after the signatures for informed consent have been obtained and the researchers
have left the room. Then the interpreter sits down, taking a comfortable position and drink-
ing water from his bottle. In the training sessions, we usually opt to present the trainees with
the French version of the interaction, thus omitting talk produced in Albanian. Only for the
purposes of this chapter, we will show the original talk with interlinear translation in English.9
One of the elements that stand out is that the way the doctor (DOC) selects whom to
address (both patients, through the orientation of her gaze) does not correspond to the way
they participate in this first phase of the visit. Indeed, only the male patient (PAH) answers
the doctor’s question after the interpreter’s translation10 (lines 12, 14, 17):
368
1. ‘Médicaments’11
A close look at the v ideo-recordings shows that, while DOC directs her opening question
to both patients (lines 01–02, 09; Figures 22.2–22.3), when translating, the interpreter only
gazes at PAH (lines 04–05, 10; Figure 22.4) and uses the singular when rendering the doc-
tor’s talk (line 10). This seems to explain why the female patient (PAF) does not speak at
all in this sequence. Indeed, it is PAH who replies (line 14), including PAF in his talk. The
interpreter next renders the patient’s answer, constructed with the indefinite form ‘on’, used
in spoken French as a substitution for nous (‘we’).
As we mentioned above, during the opening sequence of the consultation INT is still
drinking from his bottle (see Figure 22.2). Since he has no access to the doctor’s gaze, he
might be interpreting the use of ‘you’ (vous) in its singular meaning (line 09). In any event,
he might then consider DOC’s addressee to be the male patient, whom he does select as the
recipient of his own turn at talk (line 10).
Even though we prepare our audience to focus on participants’ multimodal behavior
when examining this short extract, it is only a minority of them who actually elaborate a
sequential analysis where ‘g aze’ emerges as a relevant element. Indeed, trainees, mostly in-
terpreters, tend to mobilize cultural reasons when asked to explain why they think it is the
369
Figure 22.2 V
iew 2 Line 01, DOC: so we didn’t see#
Figure 22.3 View 3 Lines 01-02, DOC: because# I went on holidays
Figure 22.4 View 3 Line 04, INT: so you didn’t see each other before
male patient who replies to the doctor’s question (‘in Albania men have the right to speak
more than women’ being the most common reply). Although their g ender-oriented analyses
are certainly legitimate, we take this as an opportunity to invite participants to consider in
addition to what they already saw, the impact of the micro details of interaction (that is gaze)
in their analyses and, ultimately, in their professional practice.
370
The normality of rule-breaking

When observing our naturally occurring consultations with trainees, we come across cases
where interpreting rules and norms are discussed. If such situations can be challenging in
terms of group management, since both caregivers and interpreters tend to concentrate on
the ‘deviant’ behavior as the origin of interactional troubles, they offer us the opportunity to
explore some crucial issues related to PSI. We thus orient the participants’ attention on how
and why ‘r ules and norms’ are broken and discuss their expectations vis-a-vis the interpreter’s
role in interactions similar to the ones under observation.
The following extract of a lengthy interaction (of an almost two-hour consultation) is
particularly useful to stimulate reflections on how to exercise professional discretion as an
interpreter (see Skaaden, this volume).12 A brief contextualization is necessary before exam-
ining the data.
In a medical assessment visit, doctors prepare a certificate attesting to the correspondence
between the physical and psychological harm reported in the AS’s story and the physical
traces left on their bodies. This certificate will be integrated into the paperwork for the ap-
peal judgment that offers a second chance to the claimant to be awarded refugee status after
a first refusal. One of the tasks of the doctor is to (re)organize the narrative in order to make
it coherent and reliable. Precision is therefore crucial, as we will see in extract 2.
Participants are reconstructing the events that brought the AS, Angela (PAT in the tran-
scription) to cross several African countries before arriving in France. One of the main trou-
bles in the storytelling is the alternate use of the personal pronouns he or she to talk about
a female referent, the supposed pimp who first forced Angela into prostitution. This pro-
nominal alternation, whereby he and she are used as a n on-marked gender variation, seems
to characterize the variety of English spoken by African populations.13 Nevertheless, it raises
doubt among the interlocutors as to the veracity of the patient’s story.
Even though the doctor speaks English, the language used by the AS, an interpreter is present
in the consultation. She typically intervenes when the doctor switches to French or when some
troubles emerge, as in the case below. In the extract, participants’ talk is produced in English.
2. ‘Truth’
371
It is important to keep in mind that in formal hearings, ASs are very often suspected of lying
when telling their asylum story, whose truth needs to be continually proved and assessed
(Fassin and d’Halluin 2005; Ricet and Noûs 2022). What happens in this case, which might
be seen as a reflection of a generalized suspicion of ASs, is particularly interesting because it
highlights the source of the doubt, that is, the (apparent) incoherence of this AS’s talk due to
the alternating use of he and she to refer to the pimp and, thus, the doctor’s confusion about
this person’s gender (line 01).
Also of relevance is the interpreter’s intervention starting in line 08, in which she ac-
complishes several activities during the same turn at talk: she reformulates what the doctor
just said in line 06 (e.g. this becomes very difficult for the doctor, lines 1 1–12) and then adds new
meta-communicative information (e.g. the doctor has to know exactly what happened, to write you
a-you are here for a medical certificate lines 1 2–14), before encouraging PAT to tell the truth (so
just please tell him the truth, line 23).
Trainees’ reactions to the extract are quite interesting. Most of them, regardless of pro-
fession (caregivers or interpreters), disapprove of the interpreter’s self-initiative, considering
it as lying outside the framework of an interpreter’s role. Only a few display a more nuanced
position, finding the interpreter’s talk useful and appropriate. Some also notice the doctor’s
multimodal behavior, illustrated in Images 5 and 6, and also visible in line 06, when he uses
the plural ‘us’. Indeed, such moments show that the doctor himself includes the interpreter
in his m eta-comment, verbally and with his body movements and gaze. Also, when the in-
terpreter speaks, the doctor looks at her several times, showing alignment and affiliation to
her line of action (a s in line 22).
Pointing out that the interpreter’s action is the result of a collaboratively built sequence
of interaction consisting of micro details, such as gaze, body movement and lexical choices,
372
brings trainees to revise their stern judgments toward the interpreter’s intervention,
which they considered as ‘inappropriate’, ‘unorthodox’, ‘inadequate’ and ‘unprofessional’
(comments heard in class). In fact, PS interpreters quite often consider themselves and are
considered by others, to be ‘translating machines’ whose task is translating while being as
invisible as possible. Interestingly, in PSI, interpreters’ previous contextual knowledge and
(cultural) experience are actually evoked in the formal ‘Competency framework’ for health-
care linguistic interpreting published by Haute Autorité de la Santé in 2017: the interpreter
‘a nalyzes situations and knows how to discern the origins of dysfunctions or blockages in
the exchange that arise from interpretation (lexical void and blind spots), taboo words, and
stereotypes’ (our translation from French).
The case above clearly illustrates the interpreter’s understanding of both the doctor’s
difficulties in carrying on the consultation and the challenges of the visit, in which the fu-
ture of the patient is at stake. This generates a tension between professional discretion and
interpreting practice, visible in the interpreter’s effort to make the interaction progress when
difficulties clearly emerge. Her choices here turn out to be successful, favoring the resolution
of the ongoing communicative troubles.
The richness of collective analysis of interactional

extracts in training sessions
One interesting way of using films of interactions in training sessions is to involve the par-
ticipants in collective data analysis or guided d ata-sessions (see also Ticca, Lambert and Tra-
verso 2020). They are invited to watch and comment on one interactional sequence. More
precisely, they are asked to make sense of how the interactional exchanges are constructed,
how talk is distributed and the interactional circumstances that invite the interpreter to step-
in. Although they have been given the directive to focus on interactional phenomena and
avoid any judgment or normative considerations concerning the speakers’ behaviors, the lat-
ter are generally the first remarks that emerge. This is a very interesting and important step.
Indeed, it initiates discussion of principles and beliefs that are taken for granted and thought
of as shared, such as the overarching importance of gender issues and its impact on turn-
t aking and rights to talk, or of cultural differences as explanatory principles (a s in the extract
1). During these sessions, the researcher proposes her own analysis based on interactional lin-
guistic tools. This is done with several purposes in mind. One of them is to open and refine
the participants’ consideration of interactional details. Another is to make it obvious to the
audience that the logic of the interpreters’ interactional work cannot be captured by a sole
explanation but arises from a multiplicity of intricate rationales. This also shows that a broad
account of a given behavior fragment does not exclude more fi ne-grained explanations.
But the greatest contribution of the collective analysis is to allow each of the participants to
discover that his or her own questions, difficulties and worries are often shared with their
colleagues. Conversely, the details, motivations and issues that some participants considered
as relevant may not be jointly held. This is the case of the ‘metalinguistic comments’ (Piccoli
and Traverso 2020), such as the one found in the next extract. It is an excerpt from a mental
health consultation involving a psychologist, a Kosovar female patient (PAT in the transcrip-
tion below) and an interpreter. The two languages spoken are Albanian and French (but only
their English translation is shown in the extract). The main topic of this one-hour consulta-
tion revolves around the patient’s contradictory feelings related to the positive evaluation the
teacher has formulated of her son.
373
3. ‘Dizzy’
There are several elements of the interpreter’s translation (such as, the mention in line 10
of her own question, which is not a translation, or the insertion of the minimizer a little
bit, line 09) that we cannot address here. Instead, we focus on the metalinguistic comment
in lines 14–15. From a normative point of view, this comment is critical. It is not a trans-
lation of the patient’s talk, but the interpreter’s comment on it, which emphasizes a word
choice by pointing it out as important, unusual or surprising (P iccoli and Traverso 2020).
Here the interpreter reveals her own interpretation and subjectivity. Also, it momentarily
stops the translation process of the patient’s turn (the segment when I think of it it makes
me too too nervous, line 7 is not translated). A collective discussion would probably elicit
further remarks about what this (t ype of ) comment does in a negative sense. Conversely,
it might also shed light on its utility in the context of psychotherapeutic consultations by
calling the psychologist’s attention to the patient’s word choice at specific moments of the
interaction. In this respect, Piccoli and Traverso show that these comments appear mainly
during the patient’s evocation of her emotional state. These findings show that meta-
linguistic comments do not reveal weaknesses in the interpreters’ linguistic proficiency.
Rather, they give the psychologist access to nuances of meaning that would otherwise
remain unnoticed (see Piccoli and Traverso 2 020 on the translation and metalinguistic
comments on the Albanese word përjetoj,14 which launches an almost 3 -minute collabo-
rative sequence).
With respect to training for professionals other than interpreters, such considerations can
raise awareness on the usefulness of metalinguistic sequences, thereby encouraging their use
in consultations.
ODIMEDI – A self-training digital tool

In continuity with the training approaches described above, we developed a digital format
method which allows more freedom of use in terms of time and space. We wished to create a
self-training tool that could also be used as a support for our in-person training courses. As a first
step, we carried out a preliminary survey directed to interpreters’ and medico-social workers’
374
training needs and expectations. If healthcare-oriented content was the priority for caregivers,
interpreters showed interest in receiving training on issues directly linked to the dynamics of
communication, provided that such training was not time-consuming. Taking into account these
criteria of accessibility and time, ODIMEDI15 was designed as a free, concise, simple-to-use and
nomadic self-training tool, accessible via a computer or smartphone without any prior software
installation (Piccoli 2021).
The characteristics we wanted to include posed a number of challenges concerning the
conception of the digital tool. In fact, its design required an important adaptation on our
part, both in terms of content and layout; it had to take into account the constraints re-
lated to our target audiences, our field of research and its specificities, and technical issues
imposed by web distribution. Briefly, we proceeded as follows. We selected the most re-
current and relevant phenomena our analyses foregrounded: convergence, misalignment,
reformulation and the transmission of emotions. Indeed, these issues shed light on com-
plex situations, such as dyadic sequences, telephone interpreting and online administra-
tive procedures conducted during the consultations. In order to make them interesting
for our audience, we formulated these phenomena as assertions or questions responding
to real problems and issues. For example, the module concerning the phenomenon of
‘convergence’ is titled ‘I reproduce the behavior of the one I interpret for’; the unit on the
‘t ransmission of emotions’ is represented by ‘I almost cried while translating her story’; and
the segment on ‘online administrative procedures’ by ‘I try to do the online paperwork
without neglecting the user’.
Each of these phenomena constitutes a chapter, organized as follows: (1) a brief descrip-
tion of the phenomenon; (2) two or three video extracts analyzed from the point of view of
Figure 22.5 O
DIMEDI application
375
Figure 22.6 Screenshot from chapter ‘Convergence’
376
Figure 22.7 Video 1 chapter ‘Convergence’
Figure 22.8 Video 1 chapter ‘Convergence’. Analysis of the interpreter’s point of view
Figure 22.9 Video 1 chapter ‘Convergence’. Transcription
377
each participant (caregivers, patients and interpreters) and (3) some final recommendations as
to how to reinvest the results of the proposed analyses into practice.
Some images of the interface are presented above.
The downside of such a tool is that, given the absence of trainers, a simplification of the
contents was necessary. All the material, from the analysis to the recommendations, had to
be phrased in a less specific and less technical way. In order to meet this need, we collabo-
rated with a non-expert external consultant so as to avoid jargon and make the content ac-
cessible to a large audience. To this end, a glossary was added. Similarly, the texts had to be
succinct in order to adapt to the web format, and each chapter quite short, lasting between
15 and 20 minutes, in line with the users’ time constraints.
To sum up, our main goal in such training activities and modalities was to develop an
understanding of how interaction works in practice. By building a critical perspective, we
wished to offer trainees the opportunity to deconstruct a normative approach to their pro-
fessional practice and engage in a more conscious experience of PSI.
Discussion and related topics

In presenting the relevant aspects of our research REMILAS, its heterogeneous data and
the analytical methodology we built up, we aimed to discuss the challenges of our approach
and illustrate some of its theoretical and practical outcomes for training. We underlined the
importance of associating a close exploration to the details of interaction with the more glo-
balizing one at work in professional practice.
Discussion
In this chapter, we have described how we offer our trainees – interpreters and care
providers – ways to understand how and when participants in i nterpreter-mediated asylum
related encounters may be led to behave in ways that are perceived as unorthodox, occa-
sionally breaking the normative and deontological rules of their respective professional
practice. In so doing, we wish to problematize the functioning of communication, bring-
ing to the fore micro details that may be unnoticed in situations, but that play a major
role in meaning-building and interactional organization. Indeed, trainees underlined their
interest in watching real-life data that illustrated situations they come across themselves
in their professional practice. Observing the multimodal details of meaning negotiations,
disagreements and misunderstandings, and how participants get involved in them, pro-
vides them an opportunity to examine their own practice from a different perspective and
reflect on it in new ways.
Several scholars focus their research on exploring, together with the social actors involved,
the social dynamics of professional practice on the basis of v ideo-recordings. From this per-
spective, interaction is conceived as both a research object and a training tool (Filliettaz,
Vinatier, and Laforest 2018). Such an approach enables the identification and collective as-
sessment of the savoir-faire displayed in actual work. Relying on a close collaboration between
researchers and professional actors allows them to share their knowledge and expertise in an
original and constructive way (see among others, Filliettaz 2013; Filliettaz, Vinatier, and
Morrissette 2020; Ticca, Lambert and Traverso 2020).
We have also discussed the use of video data and the ways in which it may challenge the
interactional approach to analyses that we promote in our training sessions by favoring the
unfolding of a cross-cultural perspective. Of course, this does not mean that cultural or
378
gender-related issues play no role in interpreting practice. As we have seen earlier, these are
among the issues that are immediately perceived by the trainees – perhaps because they were
at the center of prior training or because they are more common questions and are, therefore,
more immediately visible. Nonetheless, our goal is to highlight more fine-grained – and less
evidently culture-related – interactional phenomena, long-neglected despite their crucial role
in meaning making.
Further reading
Antaki, Charles (ed) (2011) Applied Conversation Analysis: Changing Institutional Practices. Basingstoke,
England, Palgrave Macmillan.
The work reported in this collection shows how Conversation Analyses, by exploring naturally occurring
data, can be used to identify, and improve, communicative practices at work.
Goodwin, Charles (1997) “The blackness of black”, in Discourse, Tools and Reasoning. Essays on Situated
Cognition, Lauren B. Resnick, Roger Säljö, Clotilde Pontecorvo, and Barbara Burge (eds), New
York, Springer Verlag: 111–40.
This paper develops the idea of ‘situated activity system’ illustrated by several enlightening examples show-
ing how participants in interaction weave together the different semiotic resources they resort to in order to
accomplish their social actions.
Les Cahiers de Rhizome 75–76, No1 (Mental Health and Precariousness), January 2020. URL: https://
www.c airn- i nt.info/j ournal- r hizome.htm#xd_co_f=MTQ2MGY4YWMtMjVmZi00Yjlm
LTg2Y2ItM2ViODAwMzM3OGI1~
This issue of the Cahiers de Rhizome journal offers an overview of how interpreting is considered by inter-
preters as well as medical practitioners in a various range of medical contexts.
Related chapters
Chapter 12, Public service interpreting in health care by Laura Gavioli and Raffaela Merlini,
training by Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen and Elizabeth Stokoe
Chapter 16, ‘Interpreter’s mistake’ Why should other professions care about the professionalization of interpreters?
by Hanne Skaaden
Notes
1 The project description and its realizations, funded by the French National Research Agency,
2016–20, can be found here: http://w ww.icar.cnrs.fr/sites/projet-remilas/.
2 The length of consultations varies depending on the setting in which they occurred (psychiatric
and general health care, medical assessment, etc.), that is why providing any quantitative informa-
tion would not contribute to describing our data.
3 Cour National du Droit d’Asile.
4 Office Français de Protection des Réfugiés et Apatrides.
5 It should be noted that PSI in France is provided by private associations that can operate in public
as well as in private contexts.
6 Interestingly, in order to become a sworn interpreter in France one needs to be appointed by the
Courts of appeal, and no specific educational level or curriculum is required. The less the language
requested is spoken, the easier the interpreter will get an assignment.
7 See for instance the training courses financed by the Health Regional Agency (A RS) of the
R hône-A lpes district and organized by the O rspere-Samdarra (http://w ww.ch-le-v inatier.
fr/orspere- s amdarra/ressource/formations/l-i nterpretariat- en- s ante-formations- a- destination-
des-i nterpretes-et-des-soignants/session-de-formation-2020-2651.html), the Inter-University
379
Diploma (DIU) organized by INALCO and financed by the French National Research Agency
research project LIMINAL (Hospitalité, mediations, migrations), the new University Diploma im-
plemented by the Orspere-Samdarra, ICAR research lab and the LabEx ASLAN, and supported
by the University Lyon 2 (Mediation, interprétariat, migration). Other University Diplomas (DU)
are also held at Paris-Diderot University (Médiateur-Interprète dans les services publics, jointly orga-
nized with a national interpreting service, Interservice migrant), and at Paris-Descartes University
(P ratiques de médiation et de traduction en situation transculturelle).
8 A number of non- profit interpreting associations has signed in a document ( the “Code of
medical and social professional interpreting in France”, 2012), wishing to improve equal ac-
cess to social and legal rights by guaranteeing the principles of fidelity, confidentiality and im-
partiality (italics is ours). https://w ww.unaf.fr/I MG/pdf/charte- signee- scan19-12-2012.
pdf#xd_co_f=YzBlYmViMmMtY2IyNi00ZDI1LWE4OTYtNzQzODczNDhkZDRk~
9 The images we selected to illustrate the situation are taken from a m ulti-view recording (V1 and
V2), which allows us to grasp more globally the participants’ visual activity.
10 For the purposes of this paper, we opted for a simplified transcription, in which we omitted the
duration of pauses or prosodic features among others.
11 Translation in English of talk originally produced in Albanian and French is provided in italics.
12 An analysis of this extract can also be found, in French, in Ticca 2020b; Ricet and Noûs 2022.
13 This is what the interpreter says just a few moments before the extract we present here: “elle
mélange le he and le she donc ça c’est classique, ça c’est classique”, tr. “she mixes up the he and she
so it’s a classic, it’s a classic”, data not showed.
14 The word përjetoj is composed of the verb jetoj, to live, and the prefixe për, which the interpreter
first rendered by “lived”, and then extensively commented on it as difficult to translate.
15 Project financed by the Technology Transfer Acceleration Company PULSALYS.
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23
INTERPROFESSIONAL
EDUCATION … INTERPRETER
EDUCATION, IN OR AND
Taking stock and moving forward
Demi Krystallidou
Introduction
Interprofessional education (IPE) is typically associated with education in health sciences
and social care, but many care pathways (e.g. mental health) involve professionals from other
sectors, such as education or police. Consequently, IPE has become relevant for professions
outside of health sciences and social care. Over the past years, IPE has attracted significant
interest in the field of interpreting, too. This is due to the increasing linguistic diversity:
service providers and beneficiaries do not always share a common language and need to rely
on language support including interpreters. Although interpreters might have been exposed
to the working practices of other professionals at some point in their training, it is only in the
last few years that the concept of IPE has become known in the field of interpreting.
Unlike in interpreting, IPE in healthcare dates back to the 1960s (Thistlethwaite 2012)
and was reinforced in the 70s and 80s through two World Health Organisation (W HO)
reports (W HO 1973, 1988). In 2010, two influential publications highlighted the need for
IPE further: the WHO Framework for action on interprofessional education and collaborative practice
(W HO 2010) and Health professionals for a new century: transforming education to strengthen health
systems in an interdependent world, which was released by the independent Lancet Commission,
a globally constituted group of 20 professional and academic leaders (Frenk et al. 2010). The
commission highlighted ‘a slow-burning crisis’ arising from the ‘m ismatch of professional
competencies to patient and population priorities because of fragmentary, outdated and static
curricula producing ill-equipped graduates’ who are not always able to respond to the new
challenges healthcare systems are faced with (Frenk et al. 2010). In the last two publications,
IPE is portrayed as an optimal way to improve the education of healthcare professionals by
providing them with the attitudes, knowledge and skills needed to work effectively together,
become ‘collaborative practice-ready’ (W HO 2010) and be better prepared to respond to
local health needs. In other words, the need for IPE was born from the mismatch between
the complexity and multifaceted nature of patients’ health and social care needs, and the
outdated and static educational curricula that failed to deliver healthcare professionals who
could address these needs in a coordinated and effective manner.
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-27 383

Demi Krystallidou
What is interprofessional education and how does it translate into practice?

IPE is a teaching and learning process that enables learners from various fields and disciplines
to work together to the same end, to a shared interprofessional goal. IPE is not a single co-
herent idea in professional education (Ford and Gray 2021) and that makes it challenging
to pin it down. One of the most widely used definitions of IPE in the literature is the one
provided by the WHO: ‘interprofessional education occurs when students from two or more
professions learn about, from and with each other to enable effective collaboration and im-
prove health outcomes’ (W HO 2010). Variations of this definition exist such as the definition
provided by the Centre for the Advancement of Interprofessional Education (CAIPE) which
recognises IPE as
a teaching and learning process that fosters collaborative work and improves quality of
care between two or more professions. IPE occurs when members or students of two or
more professions learn with, from and about each other to improve collaboration and
the quality of care and services (CAIPE 2016).
In healthcare, the overarching interprofessional goal that students following IPE strive
for is the provision of optimal and personalised care that is tailored to the patient’s needs.
Within that overarching goal, students strive to reach intermediate goals that are specific
to healthcare conditions that are portrayed in the intervention (e.g. medical and nursing
students learning to understand each other’s professional roles by collaborating with each
other while negotiating a care plan for e nd-of-life patients). IPE comes in many shapes and
formats and its specific scope is defined by its developers while taking the local context into
account.
Typically, IPE provides the conditions for students to acquire a hands-on approach with
the facilitators of the sessions maintaining a discrete presence and empowering students to
actively engage in problem solving which reflects professional practice. It should be clarified
that activities that involve learners from different professions merely sharing lectures without
however learning about, from and with each other by interacting with each other, do not fall
within the scope of IPE, as shared listening alone does not lead to interprofessional learning
(see e.g. Hammick et al. 2007). IPE should not be seen as a replacement for uniprofessional
education.
Is interprofessional education effective?

The literature suggests that the evidence of the effectiveness of IPE remains rather incon-
clusive mainly because there are a limited number of studies that have investigated the ef-
fectiveness of IPE interventions in pre-post status of various healthcare disciplines. Despite
the currently inconclusive evidence, however, there is consensus in the literature that IPE is
mostly associated with positive outcomes, such as enhanced acquisition of knowledge, skills
and attitudes of learners. In light of this, IPE in the UK is now part of the curriculum for
over two thirds of pre-registration professional courses in health and social care and is ex-
tending into continuing professional development (Ford and Gray 2021). Similar trends are
to be found in other countries, too.
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Interprofessional education
What are the main characteristics of interprofessional education?

There is consensus in the literature that a prerequisite for IPE is the explicit interprofessional
interaction among students from different fields and disciplines towards a shared interprofes-
sional goal (Hammick et al. 2007; Thistlethwaite 2012). This is because interaction promotes
the development of the competencies required for effective collaboration (Barr et al. 2008).
The way in which IPE interventions stimulate interaction among learners from various fields
and disciplines varies according to the educational setting, interprofessional goals, availability
of resources and the facilitators’ own competencies and preferences. Among the most com-
mon strategies are problem-based, simulation-based, observation-based and practice-based
activities, where students from different disciplines are invited to collaboratively find a solu-
tion to a problem (e.g. diagnose and suggest treatment plan for a patient) while communicat-
ing interprofessionally with each other (see e.g. Freeth et al. 2005).
Besides interaction, there are at least four more aspects that IPE interventions should have
according to the relevant literature. IPE should be (i) based on explicit learning outcomes
that are made clear to both staff and students; (i i) assessed with respect to what students were
intended to learn; (iii) offered by trained facilitators who have received staff development in
this area; (iv) evaluated for both process and outcomes. The above aspects have been identi-
fied as central to IPE by the WHO (2010) and other organisations promoting IPE (see also
Ford and Gray 2021). Recently, there has been a fifth aspect that has received increasing
attention in the literature: IPE is underpinned by theory drawn from various domains such
as psychology, sociology and pedagogy (Hean, Craddock and Hammick 2012).
For reasons of space, I will discuss the above characteristics directly in relation to inter-
preting by relying on the current literature.
Literature overview on IPE in relation to interpreting
Interpreting and interprofessional education

In IPE students share their knowledge and understanding, participating in collaborative
interprofessional learning activities to negotiate meaning (Hean Craddock and Hammick
2012). It is this very negotiation of meaning that is of paramount importance in IPE between
interpreting students and students from other fields and disciplines, as meaning negotiation
needs to be reached at two distinct, yet interrelated, levels. First, the interpreting students
ensure that meaning is successfully negotiated and co-constructed between them and the
patient, them and the healthcare provider and between the patient and healthcare provider
(through the interpreter). However, once meaning has been negotiated between the par-
ticipants in the consultation, the interpreting student and the student from the other field/
discipline need to ensure that meaning is negotiated between them at an interprofessional level,
too. Interprofessional negotiation of meaning aligns with interprofessional communication,
one of the core competences for interprofessional collaborative practice (Interprofessional
Education Collaborative 2016). Although negotiation of meaning as an act of translation is
the core element of interpreter education, interprofessional negotiation of meaning can nev-
ertheless be experienced as challenging both by interpreting students and the students from
the other discipline. As a result, students from both groups might find themselves struggling
to communicate with each other as professionals ‘in a responsive and responsible manner that
supports a team approach to the promotion and maintenance of health and the prevention
and treatment of disease’ (Interprofessional Education Collaborative 2016). This is probably
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due to incongruent role expectations with a team approach to the patient’s treatment, health
and care (e.g. students from health sciences might expect interpreting students to work
with them as a team and advise them on sociocultural aspects pertaining to the patient, an
expectation which might be left unmet by interpreting students who might feel that this
would exceed their remit and will therefore limit their contributions to the linguistic ne-
gotiation of meaning as an act of translation). This can be partly explained by the fact that
interpreter education has traditionally been interpreter-centred (K rystallidou 2014) and has
been primarily preoccupied with familiarising student interpreters with genres and speech
types, memory training and note-taking, vocabulary and technical jargon, accuracy, com-
pleteness, naturalness and closeness in meaning between the source and target text, fluency,
presentation skills, ethics and professional conduct. What seems to have been overlooked
in interpreter education is the students’ ability to communicate with other professionals while
working with them as a team to the same end. This is often in stark contrast to the codes
of conduct professional interpreters are requested to abide by which often seem to promote
the idea of the impartial and uninvolved interpreter (see e.g. the code of conduct for public
service interpreters in Flanders, Belgium). The notion of non-involvement can be easily mis-
understood by (especially novice) interpreters who may feel that n on-involvement extends
to their interaction with the other professional(s) across the board.
It is the duality of the negotiation of meaning at the level of translation and interprofes-
sional communication, as well as the clash with uniprofessionally conceived codes of conduct
that might create a sense of uncertainty for the participating students and would therefore
require advance support by trained IPE facilitators who can navigate and model interprofes-
sional interaction and interprofessional communication.
A review of IPE interventions, developed by health sciences scholars and including health-
care professionals and interpreters as the professions at stake, reports on healthcare students
working with trained/professional interpreters (see e.g. Bridges et al. 2011; Bansal, Swann
and Smithson 2014; Strong et al. 2014; McElfish et al. 2018), student interpreters (e.g. Quick
et al. 2019; Woll et al. 2020) or even bilingual students in health sciences who are assigned
the role of interpreter (e.g. Pechak, Summers and Velasco 2018). There have been calls in
the literature for (i) real-life professional practice in interpreter education (Crezee and Grant
2013; Crezee 2015; Krystallidou et al. 2018a), (ii) training interpreters with other profes-
sionals together (Malek 2004; Perez and Wilson 2007; Raval 2007; Cambridge, Singh and
Johnson 2012; Balogh and Salaets 2015), (i ii) involving professionals from other disciplines in
the training of interpreters (Perez and Wilson 2007; Balogh and Salaets 2015), and (iv) famil-
iarising interpreting students with the communicative strategies used by other professionals
(K rystallidou 2014; Tebble 2014). However, when reviewing studies authored by interpreter
educators and scholars in Interpreting Studies that report on training student interpreters
with students from other fields and disciplines, the limited number of studies shows that IPE
in interpreter education at present (in 2021) is still in its infancy. Anecdotal evidence and
personal communication with interpreter educators suggest, however, that interpreting stu-
dents are now more likely than ever before to be exposed to learning activities that involve
students from other fields and disciplines. Yet, such initiatives remain often undocumented
and no reports are available for perusal and systematic investigation by other scholars and
educators in the field. Although undocumented interventions might have direct benefits for
the actors involved in the local context of the intervention (e.g. students, faculty, institution),
the contribution of these interventions to knowledge exchange with interested stakeholders
outside of the local context remains limited, preventing them at the same time from contrib-
uting directly to the advancement of IPE development in public service interpreting, as they
386
do not provide us with the opportunity to benefit from the knowledge generated from them.
More importantly, they do not allow us to gain insights into what Freeth and Reeves (2004)
call the presage (influences and constraints on the design and delivery of IPE), process (the
delivery of IPE) or product of the intervention (interprofessional outcomes of the IPE, such
as attitudes, knowledge, skills, collaborative practice and impact on client care). Therefore,
it is of paramount importance to report on and disseminate findings of IPE interventions
and their evaluations, facilitating in this way the exchange of knowledge and evidence and
promoting a collaborative IPE community within the field of Interpreting Studies.
Interprofessional education in interpreting

One of the first observations that stand out while reviewing the relevant literature is the
diversity in the terms used (a s opposed to a single, commonly used term) to refer to IPE
(-inspired) interventions.1 I deliberately add ‘inspired’ because not all of the documented
interventions provide evidence of the essential IPE characteristics briefly mentioned above
as I will discuss below.
Learning objectives
While most of the studies authored by Interpreting Studies scholars do refer to the explicit
interaction of interpreting students with students from other fields/d isciplines, surprisingly,
only a few of them mention whether the intervention addressed explicit learning objectives
that would help achieve interprofessional learning outcomes (one of the key characteristics
of IPE interventions, as discussed above). Most of the studies refer to overarching learning
outcomes, such as to increase the knowledge, skills, practice and confidence of students in
working effectively with each other, familiarise participants in training with each other’s
professional roles, expertise, institutional constraints and deontological codes of conduct.
Below I will briefly discuss some key aspects as presented in a number of selected studies that
were initiated by Interpreting Studies scholars and which – at the time of w riting – provide
more comprehensive accounts on I PE-related issues than other studies in the field of inter-
preting which refer to IPE aspects only in passing.
In their recent study, Hlavac and Harrison (2021: 576) helpfully clarify that their IPE
sessions were
structured in a way to enable the following learner outcomes: increased familiarity with
the other professional group and how they work; an augmented conceptualisation of
their own professional practice through interaction with and feedback from another
professional group; understanding of the function of a pre-and a post-interactional
exchange between doctor and interpreter; awareness of how to work not only with the
other professional, but also the patient speaking a language other than English (LOTE)
with limited English proficiency.
Crezee and Marianacci (2021: 6) provide insights into the reflections of 22 students on ‘t wo
shared interprofessional role-play scenarios that student interpreters made in their reflective
written assignments’. The authors state that their
aim was for [the interpreting] students to critically reflect on their role in the [speech
language therapy] SLT setting, since interpreters in this setting tend to enter into a
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therapeutic alliance with the SLT, for instance by providing metalinguistic commentary
of the client’s speech.
Later on, the authors clarify that the students were asked to ‘critically reflect on their shared
learning experiences in light of the interpreter code of ethics’.
Krystallidou et al. (2018a) report on IPE between 35 interpreting students and 256 third-
and 238 fourth-year medical students. The overarching interprofessional outcome of the
intervention was ‘to familiarize each of the two student groups with the communicative and
interactional practices that the students in the other group are expected to employ in their
professional practice’ (2018: 129). The study states specific learning objectives for interpret-
ing students, clarifying at the same time that the ‘selection of knowledge and skills as mea-
surable objectives was informed by the relevant literature in the fields of Interpreting Studies
and Clinical Communication, as well as by professional practice’ (K rystallidou et al. 2018a:
129). The authors make special reference to the knowledge and skills interpreting students
were envisaged to acquire by working with medical students, namely to become aware of
the different stages of the consultation, of the doctors’ communicative goals, the impact of
structured information, emphasis and empathic communication on the consultation out-
comes. Another learning objective for the interpreting students was to be able to interpret
accurately while maintaining the transparency of the communication and their own impar-
tiality (K rystallidou et al. 2018a: 1 29–30).
Assessment against intended learning goals

Hlavac and Harrison (2021) employed a questionnaire to collect students’ views on ‘their
knowledge of the other professional group, their knowledge of their own professional group,
as well as their beliefs on the expected effects of skill acquisition that benefit patients who
have limited English proficiency’ (2021: 573) after they had participated in the IPE session.
The analysis of their questionnaire revealed that (i) the students’ knowledge of how to work
with professionals from the other group had increased, and (ii) the knowledge of one’s own
professional group had increased too, albeit somewhat less than the knowledge of the other
professional group. However, as the authors acknowledge, no t-tests were performed to de-
termine statistically significant differences with and across cohorts.
In a similar fashion, the students in a study by Crezee (2015) were invited after their par-
ticipation in the ‘shared pre-professional practice’ to take part in a survey asking them what
they had learned about working with each other. Information on the contents and format of
the survey as well as on outcomes remains limited.
In a more recent study by Crezee and Marianacci (2021), the analysis of the students’
reflective reports revealed findings that related to the students’ ‘development of new knowl-
edge by learning through being involved in a safe situated learning scenario with practising
health professionals’ (2021: 14).
In the intervention conducted by Krystallidou et al. (2018a), interpreting and medical stu-
dents were invited to complete pre-and post-intervention self-efficacy questionnaires. The
self-efficacy scales focused on intended learning objectives (described above) and were pre-
tested by means of cognitive interviewing.2 The analysis of the questionnaires showed that
the interpreting students ‘noticed the most significant shift in their knowledge of the doc-
tors’ communicative goals at the different stages of the medical consultation’ (K rystallidou
et al. 2018a: 136). With regard to the development of skills, the interpreting students re-
ported greater development in skills that involved direct interaction with the doctors and/or
388
patients (e.g. restore interactional flow), as opposed to skills that were related to self-initiated
actions (e.g. provide complete renditions).
Evaluation of process and outcomes

In their questionnaire mentioned above, Hlavac and Harrison (2021) included questions
that were meant to capture the students’ views on the use of role-plays as a teaching tool, as
well as on the students’ overall increase in knowledge of how professionals in their own and
other’s discipline work, and in students’ confidence in having obtained skills that will be of
benefit to patients. The analysis of the questionnaires showed very high levels of agreement
with the statements that (i) the role-plays were useful, and (ii) patients with limited English
proficiency would benefit from the application of skills acquired in the IPE sessions.
The interpreting students and speech science students who participated in the ‘shared
pre-professional practice’ sessions described by Crezee (2015: 56) took part in a brief survey
that was administered after the sessions. Overall, the students were very positive about the
shared learning experience and made suggestions for future practice (e.g. highlighting the
importance of briefing ahead of the interpreting assignment).
Crezee and Marianacci (2021) report that following the shared pre-professional learning ses-
sion, both groups of students were asked to complete a brief post-session survey, the results of
which are reported elsewhere. However, no further information is available at the time of writing.
In the study by Krystallidou et al. (2018a), medical and interpreting students received
feedback from each other, from two facilitators (one from medicine, one from interpreting)
who were present in each parallel session, as well as from a small group of observers (fellow
students). They all commented on each other’s behaviour during the process of the interven-
tion both at a m icro-(e.g. students’ verbal and non-verbal interaction) and macro level (e.g.
accomplishment of the doctor’s and patient’s communicative goals in the various stages of the
medical consultation and how these goals were facilitated or hampered by the participants’
use of verbal and n on-verbal semiotic resources). The process of the IPE intervention was
also assessed separately by participating facilitators from both disciplines during a debrief-
ing session following the intervention. The facilitators and developers of the intervention
pointed out practical aspects pertaining to the organisation of the intervention (e.g. obsta-
cles) while acknowledging the added value of exposing students to IPE.
The role of theory

Given that interpreting has traditionally been seen more as a p ractice-oriented profession
than a theory-driven practice, interprofessional learning activities that involve interpreting
students are not always set in a theoretical rationale – at least not in an explicit way. This
might be explained partly by the fact that interpreter trainers and educators are often prac-
titioners who pass their valuable practical expertise to their students without necessarily
embedding theory into their teaching practice. The reasons for this might be found at an
institutional and practical level (e.g. curriculum development, feasibility) and can extend to
individual preferences and the educator’s own approach to teaching. All of the interventions
discussed above seem to have relied on experiential learning, as all of them used r ole-playing
as a learning activity. Hlavac and Harrison (2021) do make an explicit reference to experi-
ential learning, though in passing.
Apart from some implicit referencing to experiential learning, there is limited evidence
of theory that guided the development of the above interventions. Crezee and Marianacci
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(2021) helpfully situate the students’ reflections in the theory of educational assessment that
distinguishes among assessment for, as and of learning and clarify that the students’ reflections
presented in their study relate to assessment as learning.
Krystallidou et al. (2018a) too situate the development of their IPE intervention within
the six steps to curriculum development for medical education proposed by Kern, Thomas
and Hughes (2009), which is considered a theoretically sound framework for developing,
implementing, evaluating and improving educational experiences in medicine. The six steps
that informed the development of the IPE intervention presented by Krystallidou et al.
(2018a) are the following: (i) problem identification and general needs assessment, (ii) tar-
geted needs assessment, (i ii) goals and objectives, (iv) educational strategies, (v) implementa-
tion and (v i) feedback and evaluation.
Facilitators
In all of the above studies that were discussed in some detail and involve interpreting stu-
dents, there is very little evidence of the role of facilitators. Any information that is provided
is limited to brief descriptions of the tasks performed by the facilitators but no further in-
formation is provided on the facilitators’ own training in relation to the IPE interventions.
In Crezee’s (2015) study, the tasks that were performed by facilitators from the participating
disciplines included listening in, observing, occasionally interjecting with questions and
handing out tests used in professional practice. In the study by Krystallidou et al. (2018a),
facilitators who were trainers in clinical communication skills provided the content of the
consultation, which was further enhanced by facilitators who were interpreter trainers.
Facilitators from both disciplines identified the need for the IPE intervention and partici-
pated in formative assessment following the intervention. In a similar fashion, Crezee and
Marianacci (2021: 2) do state that educators at their institutions ‘have embraced a situated
learning approach to interpreter education, which has involved (…) inter-professional edu-
cation (I PE)’. However, the authors do not provide further information on the facilitators’
IPE skills either.
The following section provides a brief reflection on the available evidence of IPE in
Interpreting Studies as discussed above and suggests a few ways of moving forward. It should
be conceded that the list of recommendations is not exhaustive, and it focuses on aspects
that seem to be common across the board as evidenced in the literature, experienced by
interpreter educators who have developed or participated in IPE interventions (personal
communication) and from my own experience as a c o-developer and facilitator of three IPE
interventions at three universities in Belgium at the time of writing. Other parameters might
merit attention too, depending on the local context.
Do we need interprofessional education in interpreter education?

Similar to uniprofessional curricula in health sciences education that have failed to deliver
graduates who were able to respond to the new challenges healthcare systems are faced
with, mounting evidence stemming from the analysis of real-life interpreted interactions
in healthcare seems to suggest a similar shortcoming in interpreter training/education. Evi-
dence suggests that interpreters with uniprofessional training might display behaviours that
390
could compromise collaborative practice (e.g. they might act in ways that can be to the det-
riment of the goals the primary participants strive for during interaction; see e.g. misalign-
ment between healthcare professionals’ communicative goals and interpreters’ behaviour
in interaction in Hsieh (2 007)). Misalignments of this kind can result in core aspects of
person-centred care, such as empathic communication, being compromised (K rystallidou,
Bylund and Pype 2020). Against this backdrop, it becomes clear that interpreter training
and education would benefit from more collaborative and interprofessional learning pro-
cesses, so that trained interpreters can work collaboratively with other professionals to a
shared goal. It must be conceded that shared goals across disciplines might not be visible
at first glance and it is up to the IPE developers to identify them and design their inter-
ventions accordingly. For example, in a bad news delivery consultation the doctor’s goal
is to inform the patient in an accurate, yet empathic way, and discuss a treatment or care
plan, if applicable, preferably by means of shared decision-making with the patient. The
interpreter’s goal is to ensure that accurate information reaches the patient in an empathic
way while enabling the patient to be involved in the shared decision-making process. The
goals which the two professionals have in common and together should be working to
are accuracy, empathic communication and patient involvement. 3 A uniprofessional take
would be for interpreters to strive for accuracy and completeness while maintaining their
own impartiality and refrain from engaging in interprofessional communication with the
doctor. However, this approach could undermine the doctor’s empathic communicative
practices (e.g. research has shown that interpreters might fail to detect, assess and accu-
rately render patients’ empathic opportunities and doctors’ empathic responses to those,
resulting in empathic communication being compromised; see Krystallidou, Bylund and
Pype (2 020)). It is the interpreter’s responsibility to ensure that they strike a right balance
between the communicative goals they have in common with the other professional (e.g.
healthcare provider), and the patient’s own communicative goals. This requires a specialist
skill set that goes beyond adhering to the principles of accuracy, completeness and im-
partiality that are advocated in many interpreters’ codes of conduct and which, however,
might be misunderstood by (novice) interpreters lacking reflexive understanding in IPE
settings. If we envisage highly skilled interpreters to become an indispensable part of ex-
tended interprofessional healthcare teams in linguistically and culturally diverse healthcare
settings enjoying an equally valuable status as the other members of the healthcare team,
we need to ensure that interpreters receive interprofessional support at all stages of their
professional development. IPE seems to be one of the pathways to ‘collaborative-practice
ready’ (W HO 2010) interpreters, too.
The following subsections provide a brief overview of some key aspects and recommen-
dations that interpreter educators who are considering developing IPE interventions might
find useful.
The complexity of IPE interventions

It is helpful for IPE developers in interpreting to think of IPE interventions as complex inter-
ventions that comprise several interacting components (Medical Research Council 2019).
The dimensions of complexity may differ and can range from the number and variability of
(i) outcomes (e.g. what should the learners/f acilitators/i nstitutions acquire from the inter-
vention?), (ii) number of groups or organisational levels targeted by the intervention (e.g.
how many professional groups will be involved at undergraduate/postgraduate/vocational
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level?), (iii) availability of resources (e.g. proximity to the venue, availability of learning
spaces and materials), (iv) faculty b uy-in, capacity and development, (v) number and dif-
ficulty of behaviours required by those delivering or receiving the intervention (e.g. are
facilitators required to act in a certain way? Are learners required to have prior knowledge
in order to display certain behaviour during the intervention?). Admittedly, the above
are complex questions that require careful consideration, advance planning and thorough
preparation that can take up considerable amounts of time. Interpreter educators wishing
to develop IPE interventions for their students should address the above questions from
the beginning in partnership with educators from the fields/d isciplines they want their
students to learn about, from and with. In order to do so, IPE developers must have a
good understanding of the curriculum and communicative practices of their own and
other discipline(s), have an open attitude to IPE and be willing to negotiate understand-
ing with the educators from the other discipline(s). This will enable them to identify
shared communicative goals which can inform the learning outcomes and overall process
of the intervention. When it comes to interprofessional outcomes, IPE developers in inter-
preting could draw inspiration from the core (sub)competences for collaborative practice
(Interprofessional Education Collaborative 2016) and tailor (preferably in collaboration
with IPE developers from the involved fields/d isciplines) the envisaged interprofessional
outcomes to the local context.
Identifying and relying on relevant theory

A good theoretical understanding is needed of how the envisaged intervention could cause
change in current educational programmes and overall learners’ experience by instilling
collaborative-practice–oriented attitudes, skills and competencies, so that any weak aspects
in the complex causal chain can be identified and improved (Medical Research Council
2019). As Hean et al. (2 018) point out, ‘w ithout engagement with theory, curricula risk
offering only partial accounts that ignore assumptions about how and why phenomena oc-
cur’ (2 018: 542). IPE developers need to develop a theoretical understanding of the com-
plex interactions that take place at different levels and how the intervention would bring
about change. For example: what are the implications of bringing together masters stu-
dents in interpreting and seventh as opposed to f ourth-year students in medicine? How can
the (i m)balance between students’ competencies affect interaction and learning outcomes?
Are there differences in the learning needs, styles and objectives among students? Con-
sidering the complexity of IPE, reference to a single theory (a set of propositions and/or
hypotheses linked by a rational argument (see Jary and Jary 1995)) from one field alone is
insufficient. Instead, drawing on a combination of theories, not only from Translation &
Interpreting Studies but also from various disciplines, such as sociology, psychology, edu-
cation and management, will be more appropriate as they will capture more aspects of the
complexity inherent in IPE. For example, a crucial aspect in the theoretical underpinnings
of IPE is the social dimension. Social psychology along with complexity theory explains
the influence of interaction of internal (cognitive) and external (environmental) factors
that are key to IPE. Also, theories related to professionalism and stereotyping, communi-
ties of practice, reflective learning, transformative learning, and adult learning theory are
some of the theories that play a key role in IPE. Developers of IPE interventions should
select theories to inform their interventions depending on the context within which IPE
takes place.
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Evaluating outcomes
Apart from informing our understanding of the various interactions within the IPE sys-
tem, a theory (or set of theories) also allows us to evaluate the intervention. Once we have
identified the mechanisms that trigger certain interprofessional outcomes within a specific
context under certain circumstances for interpreting students and students from other fields
and disciplines, we will be able to propose solutions that aim to improve the effectiveness of
the IPE intervention. To paraphrase Pawson and Tilley (1997), it is only by understanding
and probing its apparatus of change that one can evaluate an IPE intervention. Ideally, the
evaluation that should be undertaken should consider a realist methodology relying on the
generative theory (i.e., look into (human) action in terms of its location within different
layers of social reality) instead of the successionist theory of causation (i.e., observing only
linear ‘external forces at work’ (Pawson and Tilley 1997: 33)). This would enable evaluators
to determine what (a spects of ) interventions (do not) work for whom, under what circum-
stances and how, and use that knowledge to improve future interventions (on realist evalua-
tion, see Pawson and Tilley’s (1997) seminal work). However, a realist evaluation takes up a
considerable amount of time and requires training in specific realist methodology, resources
and a dedicated (interdisciplinary) team of evaluators. For this reason, IPE developers might
find it useful to measure outcomes at a micro level (e.g. interprofessional communicative
level). In health sciences (education), there are several scales that measure learners’ change in
competences, attitudes and perceptions (e.g. the Interprofessional Collaborative Competency
Attainment Survey (ICCAS), the Readiness for Interprofessional Learning Scale (R IPLS),
the Interdisciplinary Education Perception Scale (IEPS)). However, evaluators wishing to
measure interpreting students’ change in competences, attitudes, perceptions and overall
performance will soon notice that not every item of existing scales can be applied to their
own IPE context and may therefore need to consider alternatives (e.g. draw inspiration from
existing scales, develop and test new ones that are tailored to the local IPE context and their
interpreting students’ needs and report on them for further dissemination). Although many
of the existing tools could be adapted for interpreting students, due care should be taken
when adapting an existing scale or developing a new one and a pilot testing should ideally
be conducted. What is also important to consider is the combination of p re-post evaluations
(a s opposed to only post-evaluations). In this way, evaluators can obtain more clarity on the
outcomes that emerged from the IPE intervention and can make a valid contribution to the
evidence base.
Barriers and facilitators to interprofessional education

Developers of IPE interventions may want to consider ways to ensure support, both at
institutional and at faculty level. Organisational support is crucial to the success and sus-
tainability of any IPE intervention. It is equally critical to ensure leadership. However, it
should be clarified that IPE leadership does not necessarily follow the academic hierar-
chy. In fact, academic hierarchy may have a detrimental effect on IPE leadership and the
overall success of IPE interventions (e.g. hierarchical forces posing barriers to leadership
assumed by IPE developers who are not high enough in the academic hierarchy, under-
mining in this way the successful implementation of the intervention). It is important for
the i nstitution – and to the benefit of s tudents – to install mechanisms that value leadership
with interest, knowledge and expertise to advance IPE development and implementation
393
Demi Krystallidou
(Wilhelmsson et al. 2009). High levels of commitment and ‘buy-in’ are required from all
participating entities (e.g. schools, departments, faculties) within an institution. On a prac-
tical level, scheduling, timetabling, allocating sufficient time and identifying appropriate
teaching resources (Guraya and Barr 2018) are important. Preparatory work, such as adapt-
ing or translating scenarios into various languages, is required. Ensuring that the sessions
are facilitated by trainers/educators from the concerned disciplines who all are trained in
IPE and together are able to assess interpreting performances in both languages is equally
important. More importantly, ensuring shared understanding with developers and facili-
tators from the concerned disciplines of what IPE is, what the interprofessional goals and
competencies are, where IPE is situated in the respective curricula and what student as-
sessment and IPE evaluation methods will be used is essential. These are only some of the
most common challenges IPE developers working within Interpreting Studies typically are
faced with. Interpreter educators may find useful to identify faculty from the other disci-
pline(s) with an affinity for languages and communication and task them with exploring
opportunities of collaboration at their institution within the framework of an IPE inter-
vention with interpreting students. With regard to teaching resources, the facilitators’ IPE
knowledge and preferably IPE expertise cannot be stressed enough. Facilitators who, for
whatever reasons, do not subscribe to IPE objectives and are resistant to interprofessional
change should ideally not be entrusted with facilitating IPE sessions. After all, as Hammick
and Anderson (2 009: 219) state, introducing IPE means that ‘we need to align language,
learning approaches and curriculum time tables…and arguably the most challenging, we
need to align people’.
Concluding remarks
The development, implementation and evaluation of IPE interventions is a complex and
laborious undertaking, which, however, has the potential to bring about change and deliver
‘collaborative-practice ready’ professionals (W HO 2010). The above discussion has shown
the potential IPE has to revolutionise interpreter education and enhance respect for the
interpreter profession among other professionals, while at the same time acknowledging
the complexity of this learning and teaching process. IPE can be the pathway to delivering
professional interpreters who can function interprofessionally as members of interdisciplin-
ary teams and contribute in this way to more linguistically and culturally inclusive provi-
sion of services. This can be achieved when students immersed in IPE start to develop dual
identities, namely a robust sense of belonging to both own profession and to the interpro-
fessional community in which they see themselves as members of their own profession and
the interprofessional team (K ahlili et al. 2019). However, it should be acknowledged that in
order for the above to occur, consideration in codes of conduct for more collaborative in-
terprofessional practice and, more importantly, shifts in interpreter education towards more
interprofessional attitudes are required.
Further reading
Health Professions Accreditors Collaborative (2019) Guidance on Developing Quality Interprofessional
Education for the Health Professions. Chicago, IL, Health Professions Accreditors Collaborative.
This document provides general consensus-based guidance on the development and implementation of qual-
ity IPE in health sciences.
394
Interprofessional Education Collaborative (2016) Core Competencies for Interprofessional Collaborative

Practice: 2016 Update. Washington, DC, Interprofessional Education Collaborative.
This document provides an updated version of the core competencies for interprofessional collaborative practice
in healthcare. These core competencies, which have been widely disseminated throughout the health professions
and embedded into both curriculum and accreditation standards, can inspire interpreter educators wishing to
develop and implement IPE modules.
The USA-Based National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education. https://nexusipe.org/
advancing/a ssessment-evaluation-start (accessed 27 December 2021).
This website includes a wide range of resources and measurement tools that can help IPE developers assess
individuals, teams, or work environments and evaluate the impact of IPE.
Related chapters
Chapter 13, Challenges and remedies for interpreter-mediated dementia assessments by Charlotta Plejert
training by Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen and Elizabeth Stokoe
nique Traverso and Emilie Jouin
Chapter 24, Training public service providers in how to work with interpreters by Tatjana R. Felberg and Gry
Sagli
Notes
1 The terms that are found in the literature include ‘i nterprofessional training’, ‘workplace training’
(Zhang et al. 2021); ‘skills-based training in working with (students from another discipline)’
(Quick et al. 2019); ‘interactive workshops with students from other professional faculties (…) or
institutions’ (Ozolins 2013); ‘shared pre-professional practice’ (Crezee 2015); ‘joint training ini-
tiative’ (K rystallidou et al. 2018a); ‘ joint training’ (K rystallidou and Salaets 2016).
2 Cognitive interviewing is a psychologically oriented method for empirically studying the ways in
which survey participants mentally process and respond to questionnaires. Cognitive interviewing
is commonly conducted for the purpose of pre-testing questions and determining how they should
be modified to make them more understandable or easier to answer (Lavrakas 2008).
3 For a closer inspection of how student interpreters handled empathic communication in bad news
delivery consultations with medical students within the framework of an IPE intervention at the
University of Antwerp, see Krystallidou et al (2018b). The development of the intervention was
based on a previous IPE intervention that was implemented and evaluated at Ghent University
and described by Krystallidou et al (2018a). However, since the focus of the paper was not on the
IPE intervention as such but on how empathic communication is negotiated and co-constructed
among student interpreters, medical students (a nd simulated patients), the intervention by Krys-
tallidou et al (2018b) is casually described as ‘ joint training’.
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24
TRAINING PUBLIC SERVICE
PROVIDERS IN HOW TO
COMMUNICATE VIA
INTERPRETER
Introduction
Public service providers around the world, for example, health care personnel, police offi-
cers, teachers, and lawyers, encounter situations in their professional lives in which they need
to communicate with service seekers but are faced with a language barrier. Overcoming
language barriers usually requires engaging an interpreter. Engaging interpreters is an essen-
tial prerequisite for providing equal and fair access to services for all. Inadequate communi-
cation because of poor-quality interpreting can result in a lack of access to services, which
sometimes results in fatal consequences, as abundantly described in the literature ( Jahr 2005;
Kale 2018; see also the Norwegian Official Report on the state-of-the-art public service in-
terpreting profession in Norway published in 2014, henceforth NOU 2014). Therefore, the
quality of interpreting is a key issue.
To ensure the quality of interpreting, there is a general agreement that training inter-
preters is an essential element (Ozolins 2000, 2010; Pöchhacker 2013; Skaaden 2013), and
thus, training interpreters is now a w ell-established field of research and practice (a s Sagli
and Skaaden, this volume; Skaaden, this volume, as well as the other chapters in section 3 of
this volume also show). However, because interpreting is interaction, the training of public
service providers—not only interpreters—is important. Noticeably, the training of service
providers in how to communicate via interpreters has received little attention in the litera-
ture. To address this dearth of knowledge, this chapter will discuss issues of central concern
for the training of public service providers.
When available, service provider training seems to follow a different rationale compared
with interpreter training. It usually consists of a list of recommendations that service provid-
ers are encouraged to follow or a series of impromptu advice about what to do and what not.
Overall, there is little research-based knowledge on how training should be organized and
what topics should be included in training.
Against this background, this chapter discusses the following issues: First, we address the
underlying principles for the training of public service providers. Based on this, we describe
issues that stand out as central to include in the training of public service providers: (a) skills
training for communicating via interpreters, (b) delineating public service providers’ and
interpreters’ areas of responsibility, and (c) the wider socio-political context of the public
DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-28 399

service sector and official approach to interpreting. Thereafter, turning to the research liter-
ature, we explore topics that have been discussed in the literature regarding how to prepare
public service providers for service in the multilingual society. Then, in the final section, we
use the example of a Norwegian public service provider training program as a case study to
discuss the organization and content of training (Felberg 2013, 2016). The Norwegian case
is also turned to throughout the chapter to illustrate the issues being discussed.
We believe that the training program in Norway has special relevance for this chapter
for several reasons. One reason is that the training program is different from most available
courses in that it encompasses skills training, discussion about communication participants’
areas of responsibilities, and lectures concerning contextual factors. The training program
also demonstrates how a course can be designed so that it is pedagogically tailored to fit
specific groups of public service providers while still encompassing content that is standard
for all groups.
A characteristic of the Norwegian situation is that the Norwegian government has taken
an active role in the field of public sector interpreting and has developed a policy that in-
cludes university-level interpreter training, a state accreditation exam, testing of bilingual
language skills, a national register of interpreters, and the Interpreting Act, a law specifi-
cally addressing interpreting (NOU 2014: 8; Kunnskapsdepartmentet 2019; Interpreting Act
2021). The government policy also includes training for public service providers on how
to communicate via an interpreter, and this is another reason why we focus on the existing
Norwegian training program.
The Norwegian case may also illustrate the ways in which the policies concerning inter-
preting services reflect and are embedded in wider socio-political contexts. The Norwegian
government’s initiatives concerning interpreting in the public sector are in line with the
engaged role of the state in the Nordic welfare state model. This model implies that the state
is responsible for providing universally available and accessible services for all citizens in
domains such as healthcare, jurisprudence, and education (Christiansen et al. 2006; Pedersen
and Kuhnle 2017). Access to services, therefore, is a given r ight—at least in principle—and
does not depend on charity or aid. This is also valid for interpreting in the public sector,
which the Norwegian government defines as ‘a question relating to the right to due process
of law and equal treatment’ (NOU 2014: title page).
Relevant theoretical considerations: public service

interpreting—a dance for three
Following Wadensjö (1998), in this chapter, interpreting is understood not just as a kind of
translation, but as a kind of social interaction (see also Hsieh 2016; Álvaro Aranda, Lázaro
Gutiérrez and Li 2021). This perspective on interpreting implies that all participants con-
tribute to the ongoing meaning-making in interpreter-mediated encounters. In her ground-
breaking work, Wadensjö (1998:12) suggests a ‘communicative pas de trois’, a dance for three,
as a metaphor for the interpreter-mediated encounter. We find this to be an inspiring met-
aphor and by using it here we wish to highlight the interactional nature of interpreter-
mediated encounters in public services. Thus, we use it as a guide for our discussion in this
chapter. Notably, we take the metaphor further and in other directions than Wadensjö (1998)
as we use it to elucidate why training for public service providers is crucial for ensuring h
igh-
quality interpreting. Further, we use it to focus on some issues of public service interpret-
ing that deserve attention when training public service providers—namely skills training,
delineating areas of responsibility, and contextual topics. The issues raised in this section
400
Training public service providers
are further discussed later in this chapter, with special reference to the specific Norwegian
training course on how to communicate via an interpreter (Felberg 2013, 2016).
Learning to dance—skills training offered to public service providers

In interpreter-mediated encounters in the public service sector, the typical ‘d ance part-
ners’ are interpreters, public service providers, and public service seekers who are m inority-
language speakers. The dancing metaphor helps explore interpreting not just as interaction,
but as situated interaction requiring skillful participants. Although interpreter training re-
quires environments with the options for skills training through practical exercises (Skaaden
2013; Dahnberg 2015), there is no agreement as to what skills training other participants
in interpreter-mediated encounters should acquire. To address this gap, we must consider
the kinds of practical learning activities that could be organized for service providers in the
training of interactional skills, which are particular for multilingual encounters. One of the
interactional features that providers need to master is to anticipate when the turn needs to be
allocated to the interpreter and that interpreters may have strategies for how to stop a person
who is talking if not given the turn to interpret in time. Public service providers must know
about interpreters’ strategies in order to react to their signals. This can be learned through
practical skills training such as role-play.
Interactional features differ depending on setting and methods of interpreting. For ex-
ample, interactional patterns differ in court and healthcare settings, and onsite interpreting
differs from remote interpreting. This means that service providers also need to learn about
the interpreting modes and methods that are applied in their respective professional practice.
Delineating service providers’ and interpreters’ areas of responsibility

The quality of interpreter-mediated dialogues can be improved if participants are aware
of each other’s responsibilities; thus, all participants need to know what they can expect
from their partners in terms of their tasks and duties. This implies that public service
providers should be well equipped for smooth interactions with interpreters, and this
can only occur if the service providers are aware of the importance of communication in
their own professional work and their responsibility with respect to interpreter-mediated
communication.
The area of responsibility for public service providers regarding communication differs
according to professions, public sector domains, and countries. What makes the situation
more complex is that the responsibility assigned by the authorities to public service providers
regarding interpreter-mediated communication is not necessarily well known by the public
service providers themselves. In Norway, for example, government documents clearly state
that the main responsibility for satisfactory communication, including interpreter-mediated
communication, is placed on public service providers (NOU 2014; Interpreting Act 2021).
Studies, however, have revealed that many public service providers in Norway are not fully
aware of what their responsibility implies in relation to interpreters (Rambøl 2010; Berg
et al. 2018; Felberg and Sagli 2019). This means that although some public service employees
may feel the need to learn more about how to communicate via interpreters, others do not.
This has been documented in a series of five surveys on the use of interpreters in different
areas of the public sector in Norway (child welfare services, primary school, medical services
at the GP level, criminal proceedings chain, and the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Service
(I MDi 2007a, 2008, 2009a, 2011a, 2011b)). The objective of these reports is ‘to obtain a good
401
indication of the situation, increase awareness about the use of interpreters and to obtain an
informed basis on which to implement measures’ (I MDi 2011b: 8).
Public service providers’ work with interpreters also requires familiarity with the inter-
preter’s defined area of responsibility (Felberg 2016; Hlavec and Harrison 2021). In principle,
the trained interpreter’s area of responsibility is defined by the code of ethics they adhere
to because ethical guidelines are essential to the training and education of interpreters ev-
erywhere (Pöchhacker 2016). Ethical guidelines have several core elements that are similar
across different countries (for an overview, see Viezzi, 2020). These elements include an em-
phasis on accuracy, neutrality, impartiality, and confidentiality. We will return to the role of
the interpreters’ ethical guidelines in the training of service providers below.
The range of tasks and duties expected of the interpreter depends on how interpreting
is perceived by those who organize interpreting services, those who educate and certify
interpreters, and those who practice interpreting, with or without being certified and/or ed-
ucated for the task. The competing perceptions range from the interpreter being understood
as a ‘mere conduit’ or tool without agency, via the interpreter being seen as someone assisting
two parties (Skaaden 2013), to the interpreter being understood as an advocate for one of the
participating parties, be it the institutional party or the minority language speaker (Brisset,
Leanza, and Laforest 2013; Pöchhacker 2016).
The problem of interpreters’ ethics and delineation—or their areas of responsibility—is
complex (see Valero Garces, this volume and Skaaden, this volume for a discussion). How-
ever, what is most important here is not necessarily the debate concerning what tasks and
duties interpreters should take on when working with public service providers, but rather
the fact that diverse views on this coexist in praxis (K limidis and Minas 2009: 363). If public
service providers are not aware of the variety of expectations on interpreting that exist, they
may not respond relevantly in practice and, hence, are facing the risk of unnecessary misun-
derstandings in communication (for example, Nilsen 2005; Kale 2018).
In short, clarification regarding the participants’ different ideas of their respective areas of
responsibility stands out as an issue that deserves attention in the training of public service
providers.
The dancing theater—issues of context

As with all other types of communication, interaction in public service interpreting is in-
evitably influenced by institutional environments. Interpreter-mediated conversations are
embedded in specific contexts, and satisfactory communication depends on the participants’
knowledge of the contexts in which they act and their awareness of their expected behavior
within those contexts (Svennevig 2009; Hora et al. 2019). The setting where the interpreted
encounter takes place matters, be it a courtroom, a health clinic, a social service situation, or
asylum interviews. Therefore, how specific institutional settings influence the communica-
tion situation is an issue that is useful to address in the training of public service providers.
The wider socio-cultural-political contexts of a country also play an important role. For
example, the way public service provisions are built up varies by country. Many countries
deliver health and social services through NGOs and religious or voluntary associations.
Other countries base their general service provision on governmental institutions that are
publicly administered and financed. A model in which access to public services is the right
of every citizen (Molander, Grimen, and Eriksen 2012) clearly contrasts with models in
which services are primarily family provided or offered by religious organizations, charities,
or other aid and care-providing associations. We, therefore, suggest to include reflections on
402
the official policy, if any, regarding the provision and organization of interpreting services in
the country or institution targeted, to be a part of service provider training.
As Ozolins (2000: 5) points out, the variation found worldwide in models of how public
services are provided is also reflected in the large differences between interpreting arrange-
ments. Observing how different governments around the world have responded to multi-
lingual challenges, including interpreting needs, Ozolins (2000, 2010) outlines a model of
governmental responses, including those of neglect, ad hoc measures, and the provision of
generic language services based on a comprehensive approach. Here, the comprehensive ap-
proach implies arrangements for interpreter training, accreditation, and registration (Ozolins
2010). The Norwegian case may again serve as an example. The Norwegian government
has adopted a comprehensive approach toward interpreting, which also defines the duties of
public service providers regarding communication over language barriers (NOU 2014). The
policy documents and the new Interpreting Act (Interpreting Act 2021) clearly place the
responsibility for communication with clients, patients, and so forth, on the public service
provider, not on the minority language–speaking individual alone. It is the responsibility of
the public service provider to engage an interpreter when necessary. This also implies that it
is the public institution that must pay for the interpreting services in public service settings.
The range of institutional responsibilities has recently been extended by the Interpreting
Act, which states that public service providers should only hire interpreters who are qualified.
In this context, qualified is defined as being registered in the Norwegian National Register of
Interpreters (Kunnskapsdepartementet 2019; Interpreting Act 2021).
To some extent, the good intentions of the Norwegian system are countered by the
unregulated market. There is no law preventing interpreting service bureaus from deliv-
ering services offered by persons who are unqualified and not registered in the Norwegian
National Register of Interpreters. Statistics from 2019 show that those interpreters listed in
the National Register were used in only 40% of public service assignments (IMDi 2020),
despite the fact that qualified interpreters have reported that they have spare capacity (43% of
their capacity was not utilized) (IMDi 2018b: 3). More than 70% of assignments organized
by private bureaus used unqualified/untrained persons (IMDi 2020). This means that de-
spite the government’s good intentions and policies, public service providers are still likely
to work with untrained and unqualified interpreters, a situation that is useful for public
providers to be aware of.
Today, it is possible for public service providers in Norway to check in the National Reg-
ister whether interpreters are qualified or not. However, countries vary when it comes to
interpreter education as well as national registers, hence possibilities to distinguish between
qualified and unqualified before assigning an interpreter are not always available to public
service providers.
Literature overview
The topic of training public service providers to work successfully with interpreters has so
far received sporadic and fragmented attention, with valid calls to investigate this topic being
expressed for at least the past two decades (Corsellis 2000, 2008; Pöchhacker 2016; Felberg
and Sagli 2019; Pokorn, Viezzi and Felberg 2020). The literature spreads across different
fields, including the healthcare and justice sectors (for example, Avidicus 2008–13; Corsellis
2008; Hsieh, Pitaloka and Johnson 2013; Hsieh 2016; Li et al. 2017; Kale 2018; Krystallidou
et al. 2018; Cox and Li 2019), consequently, it is difficult to obtain a comprehensive over-
view of the subject. Despite this, some recurring research topics can be outlined, such as the
403
justification of the importance of training public service providers, the inclusion of train-
ing in professional education, interprofessional cooperation, and the importance of skills
training.
One recurring topic in the literature is that training public service providers is important
and necessary for improving the quality of interpreting (Corsellis 2008; Li et al. 2017; Hsieh
2018; Kale 2018). Several research articles and reports support this idea by including a plea
for training individuals how to communicate via interpreter (for example, Hudelson et al.
2013). A related research topic is the design of the projects and measures undertaken to set
up the training of public service providers in particular contexts (Corsellis 2008; Felberg
2013, 2016).
Yet another research theme is the extent to which communication via interpreter is in-
cluded in the curricula of future professionals, such as dentists, lawyers, doctors, and social
workers. Lessons on this seem to be an exception rather than a rule. In Norway, this is
documented in different reports and surveys (for an overview, see Felberg and Sagli 2019).
A recent survey of nursing students at the largest university that trains future medical profes-
sionals in Norway shows that the topic of communication via interpreters was not fully in-
tegrated into the curricula in either theory or praxis (Felberg and Sagli 2019). This situation
seems to be similar in other countries (H lavec and Harrison 2021: 3).
Interprofessional practice and cooperation have become a more visible topic recently,
for example, in the research about interpreting students and students of other professions
learning together (for example, medical students [Hlavec and Harris 2021; Krystallidou
et al. 2018; Krystallidou, this volume], psychology students [Skaaden 2016], and dentistry
students [Woll et al. 2020]). This type of training prepares students for future interprofes-
sional cooperation (Brisset, Leanza and Laforest 2013; Hlavec and Harris 2021). The degree
of involvement of the interpreter in other professionals’ areas of responsibility is another
question that has been discussed in this context. The tendency seems to be to advocate that
the interpreters assume more tasks than accurate interpreting (Á lvaro Aranda, Lázaro Guti-
érrez and Li 2021; Krystallidou, Langewitz and Muijsenbergh 2021). In the aforementioned
studies, potential valuable effects are envisioned, but possible negative consequences are
seldom addressed.
The importance of skills training has been given due attention in a few recent publica-
tions (Woll et al. 2020; Álvaro Aranda, Lázaro Gutiérrez and Li 2021; Krystallidou, Lange-
witz and Muijsenbergh 2021). For example, Woll et al. (2020) have found a simulation of
real-life situations and interprofessional education to be effective strategies for creating a
hands-on training course for dentistry and interpreting students.
There are also several guidelines on how to communicate via interpreter in different set-
tings that are readily available. Some guidelines are specific to certain sectors and are often
presented for specific areas, such as the end-of-life communication process (K limidis and
Minas 2009: 364) and guidelines for interpreting within healthcare settings (M iletic et al.
2006; Hadziabdic and Hjelm 2013). The guidelines do not usually describe the types of skills
one needs to communicate via an interpreter or how to acquire them.
The research outlines discussed above have inspired our work too. There are some is-
sues, however, including discussions of o n-the-job training programs for service providers,
how these training programs fit in particular public service systems, and the importance
of skill training in training programs for service providers that, to the best of our knowl-
edge, have not been given much attention until recently. In what follows, we draw from
the topics raised in the literature and bring them forward to encompass a discussion of the
latter topics.
404
Critical issues and topics: examples from a course setting in Norway
Course content
In this section, we revisit the theoretical considerations and questions raised previously in
the section about relevant theoretical considerations, showing how they can be addressed
in training for service providers, here by referring to the case country of Norway. The
t raining—that is, the course referred to here—was financed by the Norwegian Directorate
of Integration and Diversity (IMDi), which is responsible for the strategic development
of the field of interpreting in the public sector in Norway. Thus, training public service
providers is part of a comprehensive governmental approach to interpreting in the public
sector.
The course was developed at Oslo Metropolitan University (OsloMet) (earlier Oslo
and Akershus University College) by interpreting teachers, practicing interpreters, and
m inority-language speakers and in cooperation with public service providers. The inclu-
sion of public service providers, interpreters, and m inority-language speakers in designing
courses, which is in line with the user involvement strategy, can help ensure the relevance
of the training. The course runs for one day and lasts for six hours; and it is offered to public
service providers across Norway. Any individual or group of service providers can apply to
attend the course. The maximum number of participants is between 20 and 25. The courses
are led by course facilitators trained by the course developers. The course is administered
by OsloMet and is an onsite course offered either at OsloMet or at the service providers’
locations.
The learning outcomes of the course are as follows:
Knowledge about
• how the language barriers influence public service employees’ own professionalism
• the interpreter’s area of responsibility and working methods
• prerequisites for successful communication via interpreter
Skills in
• how better to communicate via interpreter in the most typical situations
General competence regarding

• how to prepare for successful communication via interpreter
• how to understand the connection between one’s own professionalism and communi-
cation via interpreter
The course consists of the following topics: (1) general information about the institutions,
actors, and regulations concerning interpreting in Norway; (2) the official view of the areas
of responsibility of public service providers working with interpreters, as well as that of the
interpreters; (3) interpreting ethics and its impact on the work of service providers; (4) informa-
tion about the (un)regulated interpreting market; (5) the interpreters’ required qualifications
to be listed in the National Register; and (6) laws and regulations controlling interpreting in
Norway.
An online version of the course—Communication via interpreter—a virtual dance for three—was
developed in 2021. The online course is based on the same principles as the onsite course, but
it is organized in a different way. It consists of a combination of two digital seminars, lasting 90
minutes each, and a self-study module; an e-learning-course developed in the EdEx platform.
405
Pedagogical approach
When it comes to the choice of a suitable pedagogical approach for a heterogeneous group
of adults, such as public service providers, the e xperiential–dialogical pedagogical approach
(Kolb 1984) has produced good results in Norway (Sagli and Skaaden, this volume; Skaaden
2017; Skaaden and Felberg 2020). The experiential–dialogical model starts with the premise
that course participants are the most important resource in the learning process and that
trainers and facilitators do not come with ready-made answers. Their role is to encourage
reflection in a group by asking open-ended questions. It is important to put the course par-
ticipants’ problems at the center of the learning experience. Therefore, all courses start by
eliciting course participants’ expectations of the course outcomes, as well as their former
experiences with interpreting and challenges with interpreter-mediated encounters. Inter-
activity among course participants and between course facilitators and participants through
discussions, group work, and the use of role-play is essential for this type of learning.
Public service providers are usually not a homogenous group; they have a variety of pro-
fessional backgrounds and working-life experiences. In addition, their experiences with
interpreter-mediated encounters can vary. In on-the-job training, it is not unusual to have
different professionals learn together. Therefore, when developing training, it is desirable to
gather information beforehand about the course participants and their work circumstances.
Collecting information is also a crucial element of the course itself—to start with a session de-
voted to course participants’ explication of their previous experiences with language barriers
in their work. The participants are asked questions such as the following: How often do you
communicate via interpreter? What kinds of challenges do you encounter while communi-
cating via interpreter (please describe some situations)? What do you expect to learn from this
course? Typical examples of challenges reported by course participants at the beginning of
training include questions such as the following: Where do I find interpreters? Do interpreters
have to adhere to confidentiality? How do I know when to call an interpreter? How can we
handle intercultural differences in meetings? Can I refuse to engage an interpreter with the
‘w rong’ sex, for example, a male interpreter in an encounter with a sexually abused woman?
All answers are categorized and written on a blackboard, which stays visible throughout
the entire training. In that way, the course facilitators and course participants can make sure
that they have addressed all the challenges during the training. In the online version of the
course, the participants are asked to fill out a questionnaire beforehand so that the course facil-
itators can fine-tune the course for that particular group. The answers are also made available
to all participants in a discussion forum and are revisited during and at the end of training.
As the questions above show, the complexity of the material requires experienced facili-
tators who are trained in the experiential–dialogical model. The course facilitators need to
have in-depth knowledge of about regulations, institutions, services, and actors related to
interpreting in the country in question. Ideally, courses for the course facilitators themselves
should be readily available, as was the case during the development of the o ne-day course
in Norway. However, to the best of our knowledge, there is no account in the literature of
specific training for facilitators of public service providers. This is a topic that we suggest
should be addressed in future research and practice.
The relevance of delineating areas of responsibility

All participants in communication— that is, service providers, service seekers, and the
interpreter—inevitably make explicit or implicit assumptions about what it means to be a
406
professional interpreter. Therefore, it is relevant to raise awareness of the various perspectives

on interpreting that are in circulation. Consequently, service providers should learn about
the interpreter’s area of responsibility and vice versa.
To understand this topic, the training program needs to explore some elements from
various perspectives on interpreting, as discussed above. This may require pedagogical and
organizational resources, but these resources are well worth the cost. For example, one ses-
sion in the one-day course is devoted to a presentation of different interpreting models and
perspectives, followed by a discussion about interprofessional cooperation and what different
perspectives on interpreting imply for professional practice.
In this context, we can differentiate between ‘official’ and ‘unofficial’ perspectives on
interpreting. We understand the official perspective as the one promoted in the official docu-
ments, laws, and regulations of a particular country. This perspective may vary from country
to country and even within the same country. For example, the course participants discuss
what happens if a provider expects a w ord-for-word translation by an interpreter, while a
m inority-language speaker expects the interpreter to be a cultural broker or advocate, and
the interpreter’s behavior, following ethical guidelines, may be perceived as contradicting
these expectations and, hence, cause confusion and even conflict. Service providers and
service seekers are often unaware of their own assumptions about interpreting, and training
should focus on raising awareness about this point. Ideally, all communication participants
should share a common understanding of interpreting and interpreters’ and public service
providers’ respective areas of responsibility. Competing perspectives, especially when they
are not made explicit or if there is no awareness of them, may be one of the main obstacles
to successful interprofessional cooperation.
The ethical guidelines that govern the interpreter’s work, such as accuracy, impartiality,
confidentiality, and neutrality, are mandatory topics in the training of service providers. In
our experience, a good pedagogical method for addressing ethical guidelines in training is
to use the course participants’ own experiences as cases for discussion and reflection. For ex-
ample, a typical experience by service providers involves interpreters discussing something
with service seekers without translating it for service providers. The discussion then re-
volves around how to approach such examples and the consequences of different approaches.
Skills training
Being able to communicate via an interpreter is a skill, and it should be practiced like any
other skill. To practice actual communication, the training can make use of simulations
of real-life situations (Woll et al. 2020) or role-playing (Dahnberg 2015 and this volume;
Felberg 2013, 2016; Wadensjö 2014; Hlavec and Harrison 2021), which is similar to the
role-play methods used in the education of future interpreters (see Dahnberg, this volume).
Role-playing and simulations allow service providers to try out the roles of interpreters
and m inority-language speakers, giving them a sense of what others’ positions feel like. To
acquire complex skills obviously requires more time than just a o ne-day course. That being
said, the training in the course gives a fi rst-step experience.
Particular attention is given to developing role-plays that are suitable for the particular
group of course participants. There are at least two strategies for choosing the topics for role-
p lays: one can choose a topic either from (a) the course participants’ area of expertise, for
example, a role-play from a medical setting for medical doctors, or (b) from another field, for
example, a role-play about a visit to an employment office that is given to medical doctors to
role-play. From our experience, introducing role-plays from other fields of expertise makes
407
course participants more relaxed and focused on the particularities of interpreted communi-
cation rather than on showing how good they are as professionals.
Role-plays are written in Norwegian and are supposed to be ‘interpreted’ from Norwe-
gian to Norwegian. This is another way to remove unnecessary stress from the course partic-
ipants who might not want to expose their language abilities in English (or other languages).
Interpreting from Norwegian to Norwegian is difficult enough because it challenges course
participants’ memory and t urn-taking abilities. Discussions and reflections become more sub-
stantial when based on actual skills training as an active way of learning rather than being pas-
sive exposure to the subject through lectures or by reading recommendations and guidelines.
Skills training also involves those elements that public service providers should attend to
before, during, and after i nterpreter-mediated encounters. Practicing these skills is interwo-
ven into the role-play. Instead of being just a list of guidelines, these elements become the
issues upon which participants can reflect and connect to their own experiences.
Before the actual interpreter-mediated encounter, public service providers must prepare.
They need to know what qualifications interpreters have, what language will be used, and
whether the interpreter’s gender or ethnicity, or any other elements might be relevant. The
availability of interpreters differs across different countries and regions. In Norway, for ex-
ample, there is the National Register for qualified interpreters, and course participants prac-
tice how to use the register during the course.
Public service providers also need to be aware of which interpreting methods and tech-
niques that can be used in which settings and how they differ. For example, compared to
onsite interpreting, remote interpreting adds challenges both when it comes to the use of
technology and concerning how communication participants can interact. Turn-taking in
remote interpreting requires more coordination and preparation from all participants be-
cause it is more difficult to notice subtle signals, such as sighing or hand movements online.
These subtle signals are often used by interpreters onsite when they want to take their turn
and start interpreting.
The spatial placement of participants in the room also requires adjustments, here depend-
ing on whether all participants are in the same room, two of the participants are in one room
and the third in another place, or each participant is in their own room. The placement
of a participant in a room also depends on the physical setting in a room—whether it is
happening next to a patient’s bed or in a courtroom. The main idea is that the interpreter’s
placement allows service providers and service seekers to establish contact. In the Norwegian
course, we ordinarily suggest service providers to, if possible, inform the interpreter before-
hand about the task, the nature and purpose of the meeting, and the specific terminology and
methods that will be used by the public service provider.
To prepare for what happens during a given encounter, service providers must consider
who is going to introduce the interpreter’s function in the meeting and how language and
speed of utterances might be adjusted to the situation so that the service seekers and service
providers can communicate without unnecessary hindrances. Many misunderstandings can
be avoided if the service provider or interpreter presents the interpreter’s area of responsi-
bility at the beginning of the encounter. Our course participants also get the opportunity
to practice how to word the main points of such a presentation, including short information
about the interpreter’s impartiality, neutrality, and confidentiality. Finally, we advise service
providers to take some time after an encounter with a client, to invite the interpreter to eval-
uate the just finished communication process, that is their own efforts and the communica-
tive efforts of the service provider; if they have ideas concerning how it could be improved,
and so forth.
408
Contextual issues: different public sectors, different settings

Training service providers alone will not solve all the problems facing the multilingual
public sector. Although service providers might be aware of the advantages of using qual-
ified interpreters, structural contexts might prevent them from doing so (Gray et al. 2011).
Learning about the work and organization of public service institutions in their country
gives service providers contextual knowledge about how the public sector functions and how
interpreting fits in. Ozolins’ model (2010) is a good structuring tool for describing different
measures concerning the provision of interpreting services in a society. Relevant questions to
address in training might include the following: What is, if any, the official policy on inter-
preting in a particular country? What is the service provider’s responsibility with respect to
communication in institutional settings? Is interpreting services paid as professional work or
done as voluntary work? If paid, who is paying? How are interpreters qualified? Where can
providers find qualified interpreters? How and where can providers find training in how to
communicate via interpreters? Is the market for interpreting services regulated?
Using the Norway example once again, the official policy on interpreting is expressed
in official documents, such as white papers, laws, regulations, and guidelines (NOU 2014;
Kunnskapsdepartementet 2019). However, the official policy may not be followed by all
service providers, as shown in the ongoing debates in research (Berg et al. 2018; IMDi
2018a). The aim of addressing this topic in training is to raise awareness among public service
providers regarding the desirable and undesirable consequences of complying or not with
existing governmental strategies.
In Norway, IMDi promotes laws and regulations, as well as official definitions of inter-
preters’ professional task in the public sector. Furthermore, this governmental body encour-
ages all public service e mployees—through their sector m inistries—to receive training and
only engage with registered interpreters. The IMDi also encourages university training for
interpreters and public service employees (Felberg 2013, 2016). This is an important point
that supports our argument about the importance of having complementary and not com-
peting understandings of areas of responsibility. In the training context, this means that
public service providers in Norway should learn about the importance of engaging qualified
interpreters and about the National Register, in which they can find interpreters, and about
the possible implications of assigning lay interpreters.
The private market in Norway has capitalized on the unregulated provision of inter-
preting services (Felberg and Sagli 2019). In other words, interpreting bureaus have sold
interpreting services by non-qualified persons (I MDI 2018a). The public service providers
who buy those services and, importantly, those responsible for the procurement of lan-
guage services are often unaware of the fact that these services are being provided by un-
qualified persons. Because the market for interpreting services is unregulated in Norway,
developing the knowledge and skills described above allows providers to be competent
customers of interpreting services. Raising awareness of this issue, we believe, is essential
for improving the quality of interpreting in general and should, therefore, be included in
training.
Summary
In this chapter, we have argued that training public service providers is a key measure for
achieving quality interpreting in public service sectors. Consequently, it requires more at-
tention and the allocation of pedagogical and organizational resources. In our view, the
409
training of public service providers should be an obligatory and standardized measure. How-
ever, the details of these elements need to be tailored to fit the specific circumstances of the
group of public service providers. It should be based on service providers’ needs and should
consider their experiences. Being able to communicate via an interpreter is a skill; accord-
ingly, the training should include both theory and skills training. The theoretical part should
address the wider context of the public service sector and official approach—if any—to
interpreting in the public sector of a particular country. The training should be conducted
by professional facilitators, which requires the development of a professional profile of the
trainers of facilitators.
Further reading
Felberg, R. Tatjana, and Gry Sagli (2019) “Training public service employees in how to communicate
via interpreters in Norway: Achievements and challenges”, FITISPos International Journal Public
Service Interpreting and Translation 6 (1): 141–55.
This article provides an overview of the training options for public service providers in how to communicate
via an interpreter in Norway. It approaches this topic not as an isolated phenomenon but rather in the context
of the actors, relations, and systems that constitute interpreting in the public sector.
Ozolins, Uldis (2010) “Factors that determine the provision of public service interpreting: Comparing
perspectives on government motivation and language service implementation”, The Journal of Spe-
cialised Translation 14: 194‒215.
This paper gives an overview of service provisions and language service policy in different countries through
an examination of how different social aspects affect language service policies.
Pokorn, Nike, Maurizio Viezzi, and Tatjana R. Felberg (2020) Teacher Education for Community Inter-
preting and Intercultural Mediation. Selected Chapters. Ljubljana, Ljubljana University Press.
The EU policy project Training Newly Arrived Migrants for Community Interpreting and Intercultural
Mediation (T RAMIG) reveals a need for teacher profile descriptions for those who teach interpreters and in-
tercultural mediators. The results from the TRAMIG project, which is built on organizational, interpersonal,
instructional, assessment, and field competences, is found in this publication.
Related chapters
Chapter 16, “Interpreter’s mistake” – Why should other professions care about the professionalization of inter-
thia B. Roy, Jeremy L. Brunson
Chapter 20, Blended learning is here to stay! Combining online and on-site learning in the education of public
service interpreters by Gry Sagli and Hanne Skaaden
Chapter 23, Interprofessional education …. Interpreter education: In or and? Taking stock and moving forward
by Demi Krystallidou
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25
EDUCATION AND TRAINING OF
PUBLIC SERVICE INTERPRETER
TEACHERS
Introduction
Teacher training and education is a c ross-cutting topic across different fields and disciplines.
The topic is naturally present in education sciences, but also taken up in other fields. Besides
academic literature, there is a wide range of handbooks that take a more practice-oriented
perspective, and both general and specialised trainer courses are offered internationally by
approved adult education institutions as well as non-official or in-house providers. However,
in interpreting, teaching often plays the ‘second fiddle’ (Kelly 2008: 100) for practitioners –
teachers are expected to be practitioners, but do not necessarily have much or any teacher
education, when what is actually needed are ‘professional’ teachers, that is educators with
proven teaching skills.
Terms such as ‘teacher’, ‘t rainer’, ‘educator’, ‘instructor’, and ‘facilitator’ are at times used
synonymously, but in other cases, ‘educator’ is used for those providing a broad education,
while ‘trainer’, ‘instructor’, and ‘facilitator’ are used to refer to those who teach practical
skills for a concrete use. In line with Pokorn and Mikolič Južnič (2020: 82–83), we argue
for the use of ‘teacher’ to encompass those teaching at universities as well as those in fur-
ther education programmes and professionalisation workshops: ‘high-quality education of
community interpreters […] should not be narrowly vocational: it should not only enable
students to acquire particular skills which are needed to perform interpreting […] but should
also transform the students’ outlook and their mind’.
In this contribution and with a focus on interpreter education, we use the term dia-
logue interpreting, rather than public service interpreting (PSI), as the fundamental theoretical
and methodological approaches in interpreter education are the same, regardless of spe-
cific interpreted communication settings. PSI can be considered as part of a larger whole of
interpreted encounters in dialogue format in different institutions and n on-governmental
settings. While conference interpreting is roughly defined by two d imensions – conference-
t ype events in a monologue format, and the predominant use of simultaneous interpreting,
with little differentiation by setting or topic of the e vent – PSI is increasingly differentiated
into separate categories according to the settings in which it takes place (healthcare inter-
preting, court interpreting, legal interpreting, with police or asylum interpreting as specific
domains). Although such a differentiation by settings is relevant in describing the discoursal
414 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-29

Education and training of public service interpreter teachers
features of interpreted occurrences, it may not always be needed when the skills and tech-
niques for interpreting are looked at. In some legal systems, moreover, court interpreting is
not considered part of PSI (a lso reflected in the different ISO standards, see ISO 2014, 2019),
which is our reason for using dialogue interpreting as an umbrella term when it comes to
addressing issues of educating interpreters for different fields which are characterised by a
dialogue format. It goes without saying that interpreters working in different fields will
still often use the setting as a classificator to differentiate their work from that of others (for
example, court interpreter, diplomatic interpreter) and will carry out their interpreting/
rendition choices accordingly.
Taking a more general approach to dialogue interpreting, as with conference interpreting
above, the typical setting for dialogue interpreting, with the exception of diplomatic inter-
preting, could be defined as national institutions (a s opposed to international organisations),
that is interpreting in national economic, political and diplomatic institutions (for example,
ministries, expert organisations, and governments, both national and local). Positioning PSI
as a part of this wider field of dialogue interpreting may not only serve to bolster its public
image, but also makes sense in terms of didactics: dialogue interpreting, whether it is done
in a healthcare, legal, political, business, or diplomatic setting, addresses shared theoretical
and methodological questions. Building on a common foundation (for example, interpreting
techniques), teachers as well as interpreters can then add knowledge specific to each setting
(field-specific subject knowledge and skills). Therefore, although we focus predominantly
on literature and programmes for PSI teacher education, we also consider the wider field of
interpreting in our discussion of pedagogy.
Epistemological considerations and literature review

The need for training interpreters has long been viewed as essential, though for some fields of
interpreting more than for others: for international diplomacy or business, ‘the best is [often
considered] good enough’, while for administrative/judicial contexts, ‘the good enough is
best’ (Pöchhacker 2007: 136), or even ‘anything is better than nothing’ (Scouller 1988: 66).
Independently of this situation, characterising PSI in particular, relatively little in-depth
attention, has however been paid to the need for educating teachers in general, in both trans-
lation studies (TS) and interpreting studies (IS).
It is only over the last two decades that ‘the profession has become more and more aware
of the need for training the trainers’ (Orlando 2019a: 219). A case in point is that a special
issue on ‘Training the Translator Trainers’ was published as late as 2019 in The Interpreter and
Translator Trainer. In their introduction, the issue editors highlight that teachers’ education is
‘a remarkably neglected field of inquiry given the strong interest shown in translation peda-
gogy since translation studies first emerged as a discipline’ (Massey, Kiraly and E
hrensberger-
Dow 2019: 211). Orlando (2019a) is the only contribution with a focus on interpreting,
which may be taken as an indication that the topic is even less prominent in IS than in TS
(for a review of TS literature on trainers’ training see Massey, Kiraly and E hrensberger-Dow
2019 or Orlando 2019a). Kelly’s (2005) Handbook for Translation Trainers is one of the few, and
much quoted, t ranslation-specific manuals that is also relevant for interpreting and includes
an entire chapter dedicated to educators’ training (2005: 150–56; also see Duff 1989, one of
the earlier resource books, for remarks on educators’ training).
In conference interpreting, the topic of interpreter teacher education has been spear-
headed by a group of scholars of the then École de Traduction et Interprétation (Eng. School of
415
Translation and Interpreting) at the University of Geneva (now Faculty of Translation and
Interpreting), who report on their Master of Advanced Studies for Conference Interpreter
Trainers (for example, Moser-Mercer, Class and Seeber 2006; Class and M oser-Mercer
2013). In PSI, the topic of interpreter teacher education has long been neglected and only
recently more innovative approaches seem to have taken hold (for example, Englund Dim-
itrova and Wadensjö 2013; Pokorn, Viezzi and Radanović Felberg 2020). These may have
been triggered also by work on emancipatory and participatory approaches to teaching and
learning (Baraldi and Gavioli 2012; Cirillo and Niemants 2017), and perhaps fuelled by de-
velopments in sign language (SL) interpreting (Roy 2006).
While teacher education has been a topic in both SL and spoken language interpreting,
American Sign Language (ASL) interpreter educators early on took the lead by establishing
the Conference of Interpreter Trainers (CIT), the first specific trainers’ network, as early
as the late 1970s. Exchange was not confined to ASL, however; the network sought to estab-
lish the involvement of spoken-language interpreter teachers at an early stage (Pöchhacker
2016: 206), as evident in the proceedings of the CIT conferences (see CIT 2020), or contri-
butions in the International Journal of Interpreter Education, published by CIT since 2009. Other
teacher educator networks, that were established later, are the Australian Interpreter Train-
ers’ Network (ITN 2010), an association for SL interpreter teachers founded in 2009, and the
Nordic Network for Interpreter Trainers (N NIT 2015) that was initiated in 2011 and has so
far published three volumes (in English and Scandinavian languages) on educators’ training
(Skaaden and Radanović Felberg 2011; Wadensjö 2013, 2016). More recently, the Russian
Association of Translator and Interpreter Trainers was established in 2017 (Naimushin and
Stepanova 2018).
Publications on translation and/or interpreting (T/I) training and pedagogy deal with an
array of topics associated with training (a ssessment, testing, quality, curriculum design), but
rarely mention teachers’ education, and if so, mostly in passing only. The topic was discussed
in detail in a contribution by Englund Dimitrova as late as 2002, and a popular German
handbook on T/I didactics (K autz 2000) outlines a curriculum for ‘interpreting didactics’
(2000: 520–27) with practical exercises, but no details or references.
When PSI gradually started to gain a foothold in academia in the 1990s, the topic of
teachers’ education remained a niche topic if one takes into consideration the fast expansion
of literature with a specific focus on PSI after the 2000s. Among the range of handbooks
and introductions on interpreting that have been published since the late 2000s, the topic of
interpreter teacher education, for instance, is taken up in a subsection by Pöchhacker (2016:
205–6) and mentioned briefly in the Routledge Handbook of Interpreting (Boéri 2015: 39). That
fact that interpreter teacher education is not included as a separate entry in the Routledge
Encyclopedia of Interpreting Studies (Pöchhacker 2015) also points to the fact that this is a field
that lacks attention in research.
While in the early stages, scholars mention the importance of training the trainers as
one of the steps towards professionalisation of PSI (for example, Schweda Nicholson 1994;
Roberts 1997), practical workbooks or teaching guides that were published in the 2000s
(for example, Lee and Buzo 2009; Rudvin and Tomassini 2011) do not address the topic.
Specific handbooks on PSI, however, devote subchapters to the specialisation of trainers
(Hale 2007: 169–76; Corsellis 2008: 65–66), which they view as an important prerequisite
for h igh-quality interpreter training: ‘Trainers are the vital ingredients in the process of
development and for the future’ (Corsellis 2008: 65). The first more detailed, though mostly
theoretical, discussions of educators’ training in PSI date back to the early 2000s (see below
for references).
416
Generally, only few publications on interpreter teacher education are empirical (Englund
Dimitrova and Wadensjö 2013; Lai and Mulayim 2013; Skaaden 2013; Maloney 2018), and
no studies present a longitudinal perspective. Instead, publications are mostly literature-
b ased reflections on the challenges of and recommendations for interpreter teacher educa-
tion (for example, Corsellis 2001; Giambruno-Day Miguélez 2003; Patrie 2003; Lederer
2007; Townsley 2011), or descriptions of specific training courses (for example, Mikkelson
and Neumann Solow 2002; Furmanek 2010; Radanović Felberg 2013), focusing predom-
inantly on PSI teacher education, and to a lesser degree on conference interpreter teacher
education.
What can be inferred from this review is that, while the need for educating the teachers
was voiced early on, it is still overall underrepresented in scholarship. We can only speculate
as to the reasons why. They may be linked to the fact that in the early days of interpreter ed-
ucation and research the field was mostly concerned with establishing training programmes
and consolidating itself as a discipline.
Fundamental issues and topics: teaching, learning, evaluating

With the academisation and emancipation of PSI from conference interpreting, PSI had to
grapple with establishing specific training formats. These often have had to cater to current
social needs and were often ‘d ictated by pressing needs’ (Furmanek 2010: 84), so that content
may have ranked above teachers’ qualifications. In what follows we also use the term PSI, in
addition to dialogue interpreting, as it is often used this way in the literature we are drawing
on for this review.
There is a wide range of very different education and qualification measures for PSI,
from regular undergraduate and graduate courses and certificate courses at universities to
brief workshops that aim to familiarise (untrained) providers of interpreting services with
at least the basic principles of the profession. Furthermore, we see a wide variety of training
formats: short-term, l ong-term, cross-language training versus language-specific training,
different curriculum design and workload, differences in content and so forth (Bergunde and
Pöllabauer 2019: 4 –6).
Courses for interpreter teachers, where they exist, are of similar heterogeneity. Furmanek
(2010: 82) comments that ‘[i]t has become a trend, an infamous trend to offer training work-
shops rather than solid education in interpreting didactics’. As has been noted, there is hardly
any empirical research in the area, meaning there are no long-time studies that provide pro-
found data on which formats are successful and why.
Examples of training formats for interpreting teachers include the Polytechnic of Central
London (now University of Westminster), which was among the first academic institutions
to offer a train-the-trainers programme in 1989 (Schweda Nicholson 1994: 135), and the
first courses for conference interpreter trainers organised by the Faculty of Translation and
Interpreting at the University of Geneva (FTI; formerly ETI), and the International Asso-
ciation of Conference Interpreters (A IIC) (ETI see Class and M oser-Mercer 2013; AIIC see
Pöchhacker 2016: 205). Orlando (2019a) compared three courses at the Royal Melbourne
Institute of Technology (R MIT) in Melbourne, the FTI at the University of Geneva, and
at Macquarie University in Sydney, concluding that the setting up of such courses ‘w ill
not be an easy task’ (2019a: 228) and will also be costly. Englund Dimitrova and Wadensjö
(2013) describe training of interpreter educators at the Stockholm University, where teach-
ers for conference interpreting, (spoken-language) PSI and SL interpreting are trained to-
gether rather than in separate tracks, under the assumption that many of the skills the future
417
teachers would have to be able to impart to students would be the same in any interpreting
programme.
Townsley (2011) drafted a sample curriculum and defined prerequisite competencies and
core competencies for the legal field, while Radanović Felberg’s (2013) focus is highly spe-
cific and describes the example of a model for the training of trainers. More than 30 years
after the launch of the course at the Polytechnic of Central London, still only a few uni-
versities offer specific t rain-the-trainer programmes. In addition to those mentioned above,
the (not exhaustive) list includes London Metropolitan University, Monterey Institute of
International Studies, Stockholm University, and University of Massachusetts. Courses
are also offered by non-academic organisations such as the international training agency
Cross-Cultural Communications LLC in the United States, AIIC, or the European Union’s
Directorate-General for Interpretation; in the case of the latter mostly with a focus on train-
ing teachers for conference interpreting.
Outside of h igh-profile conference interpreting courses where the teachers are mostly
full-time professionals (Donovan 2011: 121), interpreter training is mostly delivered by
‘practisearchers’ (Boéri 2015: 39) with backgrounds as both practitioners and scholars, or
‘practitioner trainers’ (Hale 2007: 173). Neither of these usually have formal training in
didactics, though, on a positive note and following Boéri (2015: 39), the academisation of
the discipline seems to have increased ‘autonomy from the organized profession’, that is, the
conference interpreting field, and lead to more reflexivity with respect to teaching/learning
paradigms and curriculum design that are more suited to dialogue interpreter training.
In part of the literature, there appears to be a wide agreement on the matter that teachers
should be qualified interpreters, perhaps a heritage from A IIC-organised conference inter-
preter courses, regardless of whether they are researchers, practitioners, or practisearchers.
As Lederer (2007: 17) writes, ‘to teach translation, one has to be an expert practitioner’.
Townsley (2011: 4) goes even further than that, suggesting ‘a minimum of 200 hours of legal
interpreting and translation, acquired over at least one year’ is needed for being able to teach
(legal) interpreting. Furmanek (2010: 94), in turn, believes that educators
do not need to be expert interpreters in public service interpreting BUT they need
to understand what they are teaching and why they are teaching it; and in order to
be able to do so, they need to have a thorough knowledge of the most recent research
(2 010: 94).
This call for research-based translation-specific knowledge seems particularly relevant for
specialised domains or language combinations for which no teachers with an interpreting
background may be found: for instance, teachers for languages that are not taught in reg-
ular courses, or with self-acquired expertise, such as teachers for specialist areas and new
career fields emerging as a result of societal or technological developments (for example,
remote interpreting, or hybrid modes, such as speech-to-text interpreting, or simultaneous-
consecutive). These individuals will bring a considerable degree of fi rst-hand technical
knowledge to the job, though their lack of insight into practical matters of interpreting
means that they will have to brush up on interpreting-specific knowledge and find a way to
impart their expertise in a way that is suited to the needs of interpreter trainees.
However, there is no such agreement regarding that interpreter educators should be
qualified teachers as well, although voices have long been calling for additional training
in pedagogy, for instance, Corsellis (2001), who advocates for practitioners with teaching
qualifications. Orlando (2019b) considers it the responsibility and task of higher education
418
institutions to ensure their staff have teaching skills, and Pokorn and Mikolič Južnič (2020:
83) believe that ‘teachers should not only have practical experience, but also theoretical
knowledge in order to adequately prepare their students for a professional role as reflective
practitioners’.
Theory-based education is one of the hallmarks of academic teaching, which draws from
research and social contexts and considers professional practice. Here we can agree with
those who call for an academisation and integration of theory in courses for interpreter
teachers, such as Lederer (2007) and Furmanek (2010), who considers the research compo-
nent and being aware of the agency of the interpreter as essential, just like Orlando (2019a,
2019b) and Pokorn and Mikolič Južnič (2020). We too believe that a solid academic educa-
tion of interpreter teachers, whether they teach at universities or in vocational programmes,
is the basis for improving the quality of interpreting programmes and the image of the
interpreter.
Teaching qualifications
Standards for teaching, for example, the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers
(A ITSL 2011), or the UK Teachers’ Standards (Department of Education 2011), all include a
number of core competencies teachers need: subject and curriculum knowledge, an under-
standing of teaching methods, of how learning works and how to assess learning outcomes,
and a commitment to professional development and ongoing improvement of their teach-
ing. While these standards focus on schoolteachers – and, indeed, as Kelly (2008) noted,
the teaching competence of university teachers was long neglected by many universities,
although that is beginning to c hange – the competencies are also reflected in the Standards
and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area (ESG) (2015),
which highlights the role of teachers as essential for a h igh-quality education. Teachers’ core
task in higher education is to strengthen the link between research and education and enable
students in the ‘acquisition of knowledge, competences and skills’: ‘Institutions should assure
themselves of the competence of their teachers’ (2015: 62). The Australian Higher Education
Standards Framework (2015) requires teachers at universities to be qualified in their disci-
pline, to keep abreast of current developments through continuing scholarship or research,
and to have ‘skills in contemporary teaching, learning and assessment principles relevant to
the discipline’ (Commonwealth of Australia 2015).
There are a number of fundamental competencies for teachers on which there is con-
sensus in the literature (for example, Corsellis 2001; Townsley 2011). Pokorn and Mikolič
Južnič (2020) summarise the competencies for teachers (of community interpreters and in-
tercultural mediators) as follows: field competence, interpersonal competence, organisational
competence, instructional competence, and assessment competence. These are competencies
that teachers need regardless of whether they teach in university-based programmes or voca-
tional extramural training contexts.
A sustainable solution would include making the education of educators a part of inter-
preting curricula, for example, as a separate module for interpreter education. Given that
the majority of theory, interpreting strategies, and problem-solving approaches are the same
for all (d ialogue) interpreters, regardless of the institutional setting they interpret in, teacher
education might be built on a joint foundation similarly to the model at Stockholm Univer-
sity described by Englund Dimitrova and Wadensjö (2013). Instead of completely separate
education of PSI teachers, business liaison interpreter teachers, court interpreter teachers,
and so on, all teachers would be familiarised with the same fundamental theoretical and
419
subject-related content and didactic methods, based on the shared features of interpreted
institutional encounters.
Although it is, of course, important to impart the knowledge, skills, and competencies
that are currently in demand, these alone do not suffice. Especially in professions where you
work with and for people, professional competence requires not only competence in the
topics and methods of the profession, but also socio-communicative and individual compe-
tences (emotional skills, empathy, ethical d ecision-making) as well as the capacity to adopt
adequate solutions for diverse contingencies.
Pedagogic action
Focusing on education also means to consider current and dynamic societal, technical, and
professional developments and challenges. Orlando and Gerber (2020) discuss prevalent
challenges for (translation and) interpreting education in the Routledge Handbook of Trans-
lation and Globalization and argue that contemporary education must take into account the
weighty changes and trends that have taken place in the global higher education landscape,
such as the Bologna Process, the status of English as lingua franca, the increased use of new
technologies, and the integration of theory into practice, while at the same time responding
to industry demands. This underscores the importance of pedagogical competence (Orlando
2019a, 2020; Orlando and Gerber 2020; Pokorn, Viezzi and Radanović Felberg 2020). Some
authors even advocate the establishment of a subdiscipline Translation Pedagogy (Piotrowska
and Tyupa 2014), which would position pedagogy as an important element between inter-
preting research and interpreting practice.
Education embeds interpreting in larger structural, political, and action-related contexts.
With critical discourse strategies, it can contribute significantly to shaping the domain as
well as public awareness and the perception of PSI (a nd dialogue interpreting in general) and
future developments. Interpreting is also a discipline in which both teachers and students
represent a large variety of nationalities, languages, and different educational backgrounds.
These different backgrounds and a number of additional factors influence the choice of
course contents (see Patrie 2003, for instance, on learning progression and sequencing of
tasks) and methods, such as teaching and learning cultures and how interpreter students
with a migration background cope with arrival and settling in a new social environment
and what this means for training (Lai and Mulayim 2013: 2 88–89). Mikkelson and Neu-
mann Solow (2002) discuss challenges of teaching for a multilingual group; Pym (2003)
stresses the challenges of heterogeneous learning groups and different learning styles, which
are also mentioned by Moser-Mercer (2007) with particular reference to non-Western
learning styles.
Research provides findings on cognitive, interactive, and social processes, which didac-
tics research converts into strategies that entail the theoretical and practical reflection on
one’s own actions. The different interconnected and interdependent forms of teaching and
learning described in this section are based on critical-constructive didactics (cf. Klaf ki
2007; Kadrić 2011). They are relevant both as a didactic approach in teacher education and
as systematically taught course content for teachers to learn how they can apply them in
their own teaching. In what follows, we discuss four dimensions of holistic teaching and
learning (K adrić 2011: 27–28, building on Ott 2011: 11–16; our translations): (1) subject-
related teaching and learning (aimed at imparting or acquiring subject competence), (2)
methodological-operative teaching and learning (a imed at imparting or acquiring method-
ological competencies), (3) socio-communicative teaching and learning (a imed at imparting
420
or acquiring social competencies), and (4) a ffective-ethical teaching and learning (a imed at
imparting or acquiring individual competencies).
1 S ubject-related teaching and learning as the foundation of education refers mainly to factual
knowledge one acquires. It imparts existing knowledge, initiates discourses, and gen-
erates new knowledge. On the curriculum of interpreter teachers, this might include
didactics, IS, and courses for achieving subject knowledge and specialised language
skills for any of the specialisations they will teach. At the same time, teachers would also
learn how to create teaching material and impart knowledge to their students. In the
literature, we find a number of suggestions for the contents of interpreter education or
joint courses (A ngelelli 2000, 2017; Corsellis 2001; Kadrić 2011, 2019; Townsley 2011;
Englund Dimitrova and Wadensjö 2013) such as, for example, interpreting techniques,
professional ethics, note-taking and memory skills, discourse management skills, or
terminology management. Since Miguélez’ ( 2003) and Patrie’s ( 2003) observation,
that there was a lack of ‘ready-to-use teaching material’ (M iguélez 2003: 46), different
books and manuals have been published, which suggest that there now is a common
ground for teaching and testing (for example, Sawyer 2004; Angelelli and Jacobson
2009; Giambruno 2014 and the Routledge book series Translation Practices Explained).
The development of such material, however, requires not only curricular knowledge
(an understanding of the organisation, principles, and structure of an institution’s or
country’s learning programmes) but also pedagogical competence and subject or field
competence, as Pokorn and Mikolič Južnič (2020) have termed it.
2 Methodological-operative teaching and learning generally refers to competencies and skills
concerning the application of subject-related knowledge. This includes both the meth-
odological approaches and support systems (something that Corsellis 2001 notes is
lacking for teachers after their qualification) and teaching styles, different teaching ap-
proaches and how these are immersed in general adult education pedagogy, as well as
specific didactic principles and approaches. Teachers need to be able to select contents
and graduate them, but also be able to think of adequate methods how to transfer and
impart content to their students. Although an understanding of teaching methods or
instructional competence (Pokorn and Mikolič Južnič 2020) is required for all four di-
mensions of teaching, this specific dimension is perhaps the one where it is most salient.
In interpreter teacher education, skills that might be taught here are how to teach, assess,
and evaluate students. In teaching interpreting students, teachers could focus on the
skills necessary for interpreting and managing interaction. As a form of m ethodological-
operative teaching, theatre-pedagogical approaches in interpreting education or the use
of authentic data were introduced by Bahadır (2009), Kadrić (2011, 2017), Baraldi and
Gavioli (2020), and Pokorn, Viezzi and Radanović Felberg (2020).
Quality assurance and evaluation, which straddle both subject competence (what to
assess and evaluate) and methodological competence (how to assess and evaluate), are also
important elements of teacher education and form the basis for the optimisation of inter-
preter education. The results of quality and evaluation measures will support interpreter
educators in ensuring and improving the quality of their programmes and courses as well
as their teaching. To make best use of quality and evaluation mechanisms, interpreter
teachers require field, organisational, and assessment competence. Quality assurance can
extend to different elements of interpreter education: the quality and design of curric-
ula, recruitment and entrance requirements, forms of assessment, students’ evaluation
and course feedback, inclusion of issues of societal importance (for example, diversity
421
or gender sensitive language), integration of new trends and tools (for example, remote
interpreting or interpreting for accessibility, such as speech-to-text interpreting), and
integration of topics that are specifically relevant in different dialogue interpreting set-
tings (for example, vicarious traumatisation, supervision, self-protection).
Several authors offer concrete suggestions on the assessment and establishment of
systems of accreditation for teachers and trainees, and for the evaluation of teaching
experience (for example, Corsellis 2001; Mikkelson and Neumann Solow 2002; Patrie
2003; Kelly 2005, 2008; Angelelli and Jacobson 2009; Giambruno 2014; Orlando 2019a;
Pokorn, Viezzi and Radanović Felberg 2020). The ongoing evaluation of teaching prac-
tice and professional development are central to ensuring a high quality of education.
3 Socio-communicative teaching and learning aims at addressing skills such as teamwork, an
open attitude to different problems and perspectives, feedback methods, active lis-
tening, dealing with conflicts, m eta-communication, or cooperation. Teaching and
learning interpreting as an action-oriented activity is almost intrinsically defined by
process-orientation and a high degree of independent, reflective, and situated inter-
action. It strengthens cognitive and interactional competencies by complementing
problem solving, logical and analytical thinking with emotional intelligence and socio-
communicative awareness.
Perhaps the most important competence to acquire is the ability to cooperate con-
structively with other people. This interpersonal competence is a requirement for re-
sponsible action in one’s professional environment. In terms of methodology, all forms
of holistic communication are suited for this, such as peer group work, teamwork (for
instance, Lai and Mulayim 2013), or various forms of theatre pedagogy (for example,
Wadensjö 2014, 2017; Kadrić 2017). In interpreter teacher education, this subdimension
could focus on cooperation with other teachers, interaction with students, and conflict
resolution (for example, Mikkelson and Neumann Solow 2002; Pokorn, Viezzi and
Radanović Felberg 2020), and also on how to teach and supervise peer cooperation and
teamwork.
4 Affective-ethical teaching and learning, finally, addresses individual competencies, such as
self-reflective skills, independent and responsible action, or developing specific indi-
vidual interests, to name but a few (Ott 2011: 16). Ethical, as it is used in this respect,
does not only refer to deontological ethics and normative views, as is often the case in
IS when ethical d ecision-making is based on deontological codes, but more broadly to
beliefs we consider right or wrong and how we arrive at such a conclusion (see Pölla-
bauer and Topolovec 2020 on ethics in PSI). This dimension approaches topics with a
focus on individual and societal views, ethics, and politics of interpretation in a way
that is suitable for emancipatory interaction (Vandevelde 2010; Kadrić 2011). A ffective-
ethical teaching and learning can be achieved through teaching formats that take a
holistic view of individuals in their socio-political context including the questions of
interpreting politics. It strengthens the subject-related, methodological-operative, and
socio-communicative competences by adding an individual ethical perspective, which
is needed for reflective, responsible action and ethical decision-making.
ffective-ethical questions are based on subject-related knowledge; they discuss and ques-
A
tion them (for example, actions and structures of public authorities, positioning and role
performance, ethics of the field involved, interpreting ethics) but also deal with very con-
crete matters. International legal guarantees (for example, the European Convention on
Human Rights or the Universal Declaration of Human Rights) are subject-related topics,
422
but their legal and normative provisions can be discussed in a social or personal/individual
context. The concept of the prohibition of discrimination can be approached in an a ffective-
ethical manner by letting participants share their own experiences with discrimination or
hearing about concrete cases of discrimination others have faced (see, for instance, UNHCR
Handbook for Interpreters in Asylum Procedures). Interpreter teachers who themselves often had
to rely on interpreters in their lives are likely to be particularly sensitised to matters of
discrimination and dignity and how they relate to professional ethics. By the same token,
these questions can be approached through the methodological-operative lens, for example,
through staging a roleplay of an interpreting situation where discrimination plays a role to
explore ways of acting in such a situation, or a socio-communicative one, for example, a
simulation with the professions the interpreters will be working with in the future (a lso see
Phelan et al. 2019).
These complex and important topics can be addressed effectively when they are related to
personal experience or applied in a certain social context. Societal issues, professional ethics,
and individual ethics form the basis for initiating new discourse and trying out new action
spaces. Therefore, these four elements of teaching and learning, which include a subject-
related, a methodological-operative, a socio-communicative, and an a ffective-ethical di-
mension, are not separate from each other.
From the aforementioned dimensions of pedagogic action, we can derive the concept of
key qualifications for (d ialogue) interpreting largely: profession-specific and general strate-
gies, professional ethics, skills, and competencies. In other words, teachers know and un-
derstand the relevant subject topics, techniques and tools, and know how to teach them to
others.
Related topics: networks of trust and connected education

Research findings and, to some extent, education and training programmes in the field of
dialogue interpreting are comparable internationally and influence and cross-fertilise each
other. We believe that strong networks and synergies can lead to faster consolidation.
A central related topic is the need for creating comparable standards and building net-
works of trust. This includes all measures that make the profession visible and increase trust
in it. Standards, of course, play a role in this, with particular emphasis given to the standards
ISO 13611:2014 for community interpreting and ISO 20228:2019 for legal interpreting.
A connection with end users and society can also be forged via professional codes of eth-
ics (see Skaaden, this volume; and Pokorn, Viezzi and Radanović Felberg 2020), networks,
or individual events for end users, especially training workshops on how to work with
interpreters or joint training courses (for example, for providers, students at law clinics and
interpreting students, also see Krystallidou in this volume on interprofessional education). It
would be helpful to have an international platform that represents the profession of dialogue
interpreting at a European or worldwide level in all its facets (like AIIC does for conference
interpreters). That would promote alumni activities, diversity, and visibility, thus creating
equal opportunities.
Another important topic is connectedness, which has become a key concept in higher
education. Initially postulated by Barnett (2016) as 12 dimensions of connections in higher
education, for example, between theory and practice, research and teaching, or academia
and the society at large, connectedness has since been applied to the concept of a Con-
nected Curriculum by Fung (2017), which centres on the idea of ‘learning through research
and enquiry’. Connectedness of educators should be an essential and regular part of their
423
pedagogical experience. Active exchange creates networks and helps to build a sense of
community and belonging in their respective fields.
The existing platforms, networks, and ideas presented in this text (including Australian
Interpreter Trainers’ Network, Nordic Network for Interpreter Trainers, Russian Associa-
tion of Translator and Interpreter Trainers, CIT, and journals like International Journal of Inter-
preter Education, Interpreter and Translator Trainer and others) could help form a broad forum
of a dialogue of interpreter teachers (DIT) and strengthen the existing foundations, make public
service interpreters more visible and better known to a wider community. A global exchange
between interpreter educators may yield findings and results that may become standard in
their national educational contexts and the public. It would also promote mobility in educa-
tion and could contribute to the equalisation of the interpreting professions.
Further reading
Cirillo, Letizia, and Natacha Niemants (eds) (2017) Teaching Dialogue Interpreting. Amsterdam, John
Benjamins.
This collective volume presents a broad overview of diverse aspects of training, written by experts from differ-
ent fields, and also offers a set of resources that are readily useable for different specific training needs.
Pokorn, K. Nike, Maurizio Viezzi, and Tatjana Radanović Felberg (eds) (2020) Teacher Education
for Community Interpreting and Intercultural Mediation: Selected Chapters. Ljubljana, University Press.
https://doi.org/10.4312/9789610604020.
This volume offers an introduction to ways of implementing courses for prospective teachers of community
interpreters and intercultural mediators, in particular for languages of limited diffusion.
Wadensjö, Cecilia (ed) (2013) Training the Trainers: Nordic Seminar on Interpreter Education/Utbildningen
av utbildare: Nordiskt möte om tolkutbildning. Institute for Interpreting and Translation Studies, Stock-
holm University. URL: http://u rn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:su:d iva-90853.
This PDF publication presents the results of the second in a series of Nordic meetings with a focus on training
the trainers of public service interpreters, and also is one of the few publications that present empirical data. The
first was published in Oslo and is not available online.
There are also a number of general education journals (for example, Higher Education Journal, Adult
Education Quarterly) that may be consulted on general topics of adult education.
Related chapters
Chapter 1, General issues about PSI: Institutions, codes, norms and professionalisation by Carmen
Valero-Garcés
thia B. Roy and Jeremy L. Brunson
Chapter 18, Role play as a means of training and testing public service interpreting by Magnus Dahnberg
Chapter 19, Monitoring in dialogue interpreting – cognitive and didactic perspectives by Elisabet Tiselius and
Birgitta Englund Dimitrova
Chapter 20, Blended learning is here to stay! Combining o n-line and on-campus learning in the education of public
service interpreters by Gry Sagli and Hanne Skaaden.
training by Natacha Niemants, Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen and Elisabeth Stokoe
Chapter 23, Interprofessional education… interpreter education: in or and? Taking stock and moving forward by
Demi Krystallidou
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Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey (formerly known as the Monterey Institute
of International Studies) (Vermont, USA) https://w ww.middlebury.edu/institute/.
Polytechnic of Central London (now University of Westminster) https://w ww.westminster.ac.uk/.
RMIT University (in Melbourne, Australia) https://w ww.rmit.edu.au/.
University of Massachusetts Amherst https://w ww.umass.edu/.
Non-academic institutions:
AIIC (International Association of Conference Interpreters) https://a iic.org/.
Cross-Cultural Communications (CCC) (i nternational training agency in the United States for medi-
cal and community interpreting, and cultural competence) https://w ww.cultureandlanguage.net/.
Directorate-General for Interpretation of the European Union https://ec.europa.eu/i nfo/departments/
i nterpretation_en.
428
INDEX
Note: Bold page numbers refer to tables and italic page numbers refer to figures.
AAC see Augmentative and Alternative Atkar, S. 227

Communication (AAC) audience design 109
Acosta, S. 97 Augmentative and Alternative Communication
active participation 48, 49, 192 (AAC) 99–100
Agar, M. 325
agency: active participation 48–50; attribution Babcock, L. 317
48; conditions 51–52; definition 47; issues Bachtin, M. 1
52–53; literature 47–48; mediation 50–51; Bahadir, S. 421
position 47; theoretical considerations 46 Baixauli-Olmos, L. 21
Aguirre, E. 23 Baker, M. 108
Alaggia, R. 228 Baldwin, N. 227
ambiguity 8; describe situations 37; Baraldi, C. 49, 67, 80, 194, 198, 345, 421
ethnographic fieldwork 37–38; goals 38; Barker, R. 245
multilingual encounter 34–36; narratives 37; Barnett, R. 423
negotiating impartiality 40–41; outsider vs. Barron, A. 115, 117
a co-participant 36; quantitative quality 38; Barry, A.E. 97
questions 37; witness 38–40 Barsky, R.F. 71, 141, 144, 147, 365
American Sign Language (ASL) 282, 287, 416 Bartkowiak-Theron, I. 180
Anderson, E. 394 Bateman, A. 346
andragogy 280 Benhaddou, H. 19
anecdotal evidence 184, 216, 386 Berk-Seligson, S. 23, 66, 79, 128, 133, 135
Angelelli, C.V. 47, 67, 196, 201 Bernstein, B. 142
Angermeyer, P.S. 80, 130, 132, 133, 180 Berthold, S. 227, 228
Anker, D. 141 Beukes, J. 197
annotations 76, 78, 81, 83 Bevilacqua, G. 209
ASL see American Sign Language (ASL) bimodality 243
Asquith, N.L. 180 Blanchet, P. 19
asylum interviews: adjudication procedures 141; blended learning (BL) 12, 325; academic
data-driven research 142–143; discourse- interest 327; challenges 327–328; cost-
analytical approach 144–145; ethnographic effectiveness 328; definition 326; education
research 143–144; fieldwork 143–144; 327; innovations in technology 326–327;
interpreter-mediated 145; issues 146–149; observable behavior 330; on-campus learning
limitation of research 145–146; literature 141; activities 334–337; on-line/on-campus
model-based studies 142; multimodal data activities 331–332; pedagogical reasons
145; policy 142; research 149–150 329–330; principles 330–331; roleplays
429
Index
334–337; synchronous text-only-chats 156–158; showing documents 166–170; turn-

330, 332–334; technological innovation taking 159–162; video links 162–166
328–329 contemporary migration 35
Blommaert, J. 65, 66, 68, 150 contextualisation cues 71, 146
Boéri, J. 418 convention on the rights of people with
Boivin, I. 198 disabilities (CRPD) 277
Bolden, G. 66, 197 Conversation Analysis 208, 211
Bot, H. 67 Conversation Analytic Role-Play Method
Bourdieu, P. 142, 364 (CARM) 342; activities 346; observing
Bradford, T.J. 300 vs. participating 345; PSI interpreters 342;
Braun, S. 80, 92 recordings 346–347; role-played simulations
Braun, V. 185 vs. actual encounters 343–345; setting-
briefing-interaction-debriefing (BID) 210, 222 specific training path 348–351, 348–351;
Brown, P. 144 student-interpreters 342; trainables/trainees
Burke, J. 115 355, 355–357; video technology 351–355,
352–355; workshops 345–346, 347, 347
Camayd-Freixas, E. 21 conversation-analytic approach 80
CARM see Conversation Analytic Role-Play Cooke, M. 129, 131
Method (CARM) coordination 47
CCIE see Commission of Collegiate Interpreter corpus-linguistic methodologies: annotations
Education (CCIE) 83; bilingual police interrogations 79–80;
Centre for Dementia Research (CEDER) 211 conversation-analytic approach 80; data
Chand, A. 32, 227 collections 81; epistemological considerations
Chen, X. 97 76–79; foreign language 80; language of
Cherny, L. 329 utterance 83–84; metadata 81–82; qualitative
Chesterman, A. 145, 310 and quantitative methods 80; question-answer
Cheung, A.K.F. 129, 134 sequences 79; transcription 82–83; translation
Chinese-English bilingual court system 129 84–85; translation style 81
chuchotage 127 Corsellis, A. 18, 19, 24, 25, 418
chunking 145, 159–162, 170 court interpreting 125; agentless passives 129;
Church, A. 346 audio-recorded data 128; bilingual 129;
Cirillo, L. 201, 301 courtroom interaction 130; inquisitorial
CIT see Conference of Interpreter Trainers proceedings 127; intertextuality 134–135;
(CIT) judicial settings 126; language boundaries
Clarke, V. 185 130–132; participant roles 132–134, 133;
Clayman, S. 50 permeability 130–132; person deixis 132–134,
closed role plays 295, 297, 306, 344 133; regulations 127; reported speech 128
co-constructive contributions 5 Crezee, I. 387–390
code of ethics 21–24, 95, 227, 228, 262, 263, crisis translation 116–117
266, 388, 402 critical discourse analysis (CDA) 65, 144, 279
co-diagnostician 48, 266, 272, 273 crowdsourcing translation 94; issues 95–96;
cognitive disorders 114, 150, 208, 216 question-answer medium 95; volunteer
Commission of Collegiate Interpreter Education translators 94
(CCIE) 281 CRPD see convention on the rights of people
communication promoter 3 with disabilities (CRPD)
communicative breakdown 146 cultural assumptions 109; analysis 67–72;
communicative disorders 208 interaction 60; issues 67; unexpected 146
community interpreting 17, 24, 261, 262, 423 cultural mediation 22, 90, 268, 269
community translation 94, 106 cultural mediators 23, 150, 193, 266, 270
computer-assisted interpreter training 327
computer-mediated (CM) elements 337 Dahlvik, J. 141, 143
conduit metaphor 2–3 Dahnberg, M. 298
conference interpreting 25, 64, 77, 128, 193, Danou, G. 201
262, 309, 366, 415, 418 data-based/evidence-based research 91, 96, 147,
Conference of Interpreter Trainers (CIT) 416 180, 184, 222
consecutive interpreting: courtroom 156; data collections 77, 78, 81, 85
institutional settings 158–159; rendition data-sessions 211, 373
430
Index
Davidson, B. 49, 67 Felix Fernandez, L. 24

Davies, B. 66 feminist theorists 35
Davies, C. 37 Fischman, Y. 227, 228
Davis, J.E. 244 fixed-sentence/phrase-based translation tools 99;
deaf interpreters (DI) 150, 286 see also phrasebook apps
Dean, R.K. 254 footing 155
Defrancq, B. 134 formative assessment 293, 303, 390
dementia 207; BID 222; clinical tools 219–220; formulation 50, 54, 57–59, 198, 232, 295
clinician training 210; cognitive assessments Francis, D. 344
220–221; data 210–211; interpreter-mediated Freeth, D. 387
assessment 211–219; issues 210; linguistic Fung, D. 423
and educational bias 219–220; MMSE 209; Furmanek, O. 198, 201, 293, 417, 418, 419
screening for immigrants 208; training
clinicians 221–222; transcriptions 211–212 Gallez, E. 131
denotational signs 146 García, I. 106, 110, 111
Dew, K.N. 101 gatekeepers 228, 236–238
dialogical theory 1, 293 Gavioli, L. 47, 48, 53, 67, 80, 197, 198, 199,
dialogue interpreting 309; acts/events 310–311; 345, 421
coordination 318; describing monitoring Gentile, A. 330
315–316; monitoring 311–312, 316–318; Gentile, P. 25, 26
monolingual conversation monitor 314–315; gently-spoken proposal 65
practice and education 318–320; self- Gerber, L. 420
monitoring 312–313; speech production Gibbons, J. 134
313–314 Giddens, A. 48, 142, 269
Dimitrova, E. 417, 419 Gigliotti, G. 117
directly interpreted approach 267 Goffman, E. 132, 144, 269
discourse mapping 282–283 Gómez Díez, I. 141, 144, 146, 148, 149
dissemination methods 115–116 Goodin, R.E. 177
domestic abuse-related interpreting 185 Goodwin, C. 314, 316, 318, 368
Dominelli, L. 33 Graham, C.R. 326, 337
Doornbos, N. 141, 143, 146, 147 Grbić, N. 263
Dragsted, B. 317 Grice, H.P. 72
Dysart-Gale, D. 21 Gricean pragmatics 72
Grimen, H. 263, 331
Ehrensberger-Dow, M. 311 Gutt, E.-A. 70, 72
electronic corpora 81
embedded negotiation 52–53, 57–59 HABABY 100
entextualisation process 147 Haith-Cooper, M. 97, 99
epistemic vulnerability 178–179 Hale, S. 23, 66, 129, 243, 263
Erlenkamp, S. 278 Hammick, M. 394
Erving, G. 3, 5 Hansen, A.L. 246
ethics 21–24, 95, 227, 228, 262, 263, 266, 388, 402 Hansen, G. 317
EULITA see European Legal Interpreters and Hanson, T.A. 317
Translators Association (EULITA) Harré, R. 66
European Legal Interpreters and Translators Harrington, F.J. 246
Association (EULITA) 21 Harrison, C. 387–389
Eva, N.S. 129 Haviland, J.B. 130, 131, 135
experiential-dialogic approach 335 healthcare: conduits vs. humans 195;
explicit coordination 4, 47 coordinating medical talk 196–197; cultures
vs. people 193–194; educational and
face-to-face encounters 77 professionalisation issues 200–201; epistemic
false fluency situations 230 accessibility 199–200; interactional construct
Fanshel, D. 342 197–199; patients participation 192–193;
Farini, F. 198 perceived by participants 194–195; practices
Fehr, B. 346 and mechanisms 196; providing humane care
Felberg, R. 418, 420, 421 200–201; territories of knowledge 199–200;
Feldberg, T. 19, 194 VOM/VOL 195–196
431
Index
Hean, S. 392 aspect 264; professions 265; public service

Heritage, J. 48, 50, 59 setting 265; role fluidity 263; theory
Herring, S. 330, 332 of practice 264; trust 271–272; young
Herring, S.C. 330 occupation 263
Hervais-Adelman, A. 317 interpreting: cognitive 310, 315, 316, 320;
Hlavac, J. 387–389 definitions 3–4; empirical research 4–6;
Hsieh, E. 194, 195, 201, 391 features of talk 5; human intensity 6; public
Hughes, M.T. 390 (see public sector); services involved 6; subjects 5
Hughes, T. 283 interpreting-as-activity 158
human-machine interaction 89–91 Interprofessional Collaborative Competency
Humphreys, C. 227 Attainment Survey (ICCAS) 393
interprofessional education (IPE) 383; barriers
ICCAS see Interprofessional Collaborative 393–394; characteristics 385; complexity
Competency Attainment Survey (ICCAS) 391–392; education 390–391; effectiveness
identities of non-participation 64 384; evaluation/outcomes 389, 393;
identities of participation 64 facilitators 390, 393–394; identifying and
IEPS see Interdisciplinary Education Perception relying 392; intended learning goals 388–389;
Scale (IEPS) interpreting 385–387; learning objectives
IEPs see interpreter education programs (IEPs) 387–388; professional practice 384; role of
impartiality 35 theory 389–390
implicit coordinating moves 4 intertextuality 134–135
implicit coordination 47
implied readers 109 Jacquemet, M. 141, 143, 146, 147, 365
inclusion criteria 37 Jefferson, G. 51
individual-individual relationship 18 Jenney, A. 228
Inghilleri, M. 1, 21, 47, 64, 142, 264, 268, 269, Johnson, C.R. 178
270, 272, 279, 365 Jones, R.K. 33
inquisitorial proceedings 127 judiciary interpreting 125
institution-individual relationship 18
institutional adaptation 19 Kadrić, M. 336, 421
institutional contexts: application process 23; K ӓ lin, W. 141
challenges 19–20; code of ethics 21–24; cope Karl, R.A. 180
with challenges 20–21; healthcare setting 23, Katrin, K. 227
24; standards 21–24; types 18–19 Kaufert, J.M. 77
institutional encounters 11, 17, 18, 261, 271, Kelly, D. 110, 415, 419
325, 420 Kennedy, G. 76
institutional ethnography 143 Kermit, P.S. 245
institutional power 19, 65 Kern, D. 390
intelligible choices 48 Keselman, O. 141, 144, 148
interactive power 65 Kherbiche, L. 149
intercultural mediators 52, 109, 419 Khoong, E.C. 97, 98, 101
Interdisciplinary Education Perception Scale Killman, J. 150
(IEPS) 393 Kirsch, D. 311
International Organisation for Migration Knapp, K. 77
(IOM) 140 Knapp-Potthoff, A. 77
interpret the situation 6 knowledgeable agent 142
interpreter education programs (IEPs) 278 Ko, L. 107
interpreter-mediated asylum interviews 145 Kolb, W. 141, 144, 149
interpreter-mediated conversation 4 Koolage, W. 77
interpreter-mediated interactions 59 Koskinen, T. 114, 116
interpreters professionalization 261; accuracy Kriz, K. 32
266–268; achieved competence 265; cultural Krystallidou, D. 19, 300, 388–390
agent 264; education 272–273; ethics and Kwai Hang, N. 129
role 268–270; exercises discretion 264,
265, 266–268; functional specificity 266; Labov, W. 342
identification 262; knowledge base 263; laissez-faire capitalism 63
occupational role 270–271; performative Lang, R. 77
432
Index
Langdon, W.H. 209 Mather, S.M. 246

language mediation 59 Mayfield, K. 188
language other than English (LOTE) 387 McCarthy, M. 231
language-discordant interpersonal healthcare McKenzie-Mohr, D. 117
communication 89; crowdsourcing mediation 7–8, 22, 50–51, 109, 245, 268
translation 94; issues 93–94 Meeuwesen, L. 193
languages of limited diffusion (LLDs) 366 Mellinger, C.D. 317
Laster, K. 2 memory interpreters 222
Lave, J. 64 Merlini, R. 150
Laver, J.D. 313, 314, 316 meta-ethical principles 21
Leanza, Y. 5, 194, 195, 198 meta-language 2
Lederer, M. 418, 419 metadata 81–82
Lee, J. 129, 142, 145, 147 Meyer, B. 80, 83
legal interpreting 128 Michaelian, K. 311
legal settings: asylum court 162; courtroom micro-linguistic level 63
interpreting 156; footing 155; institutional Migrationsskolan 210, 222
settings 158–159; interaction analysis 155; Miguélez, G-D. 421
multilingual talk 156; multimodality 166; Mikkelson, H. 17, 18, 25, 261, 420
pragmatic force 155; radical respecification Mikolič, J. 414, 419, 421
156; rendition 156–158; showing documents Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) 209
166–170; turn-taking 159–162; video links minority-language-speaking clients 20
162–166 Mishler, E.G. 195, 198
Lesch, H. 107, 109 MMSE see Mini Mental State Examination
Leung, E. 134 (MMSE)
Leuven-Zwart, K.M. 145 modified renditions 49
Levelt, W.J. 313, 316 moment-by-moment interaction 47
Levinson, S.C. 144 Monikowski, C. 279, 282
Licoppe, C. 141, 145, 149 monitor model 312
Linell, P. 344 Monnier, M.A. 141
linguistic meaning 72 monolingual talk 6
linguistic paranoia 135 monologic interpreting 193
linguistic vulnerability 183 Monteoliva-García, E. 180
Lippi-Green, R. 19 Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA)
LLDs see languages of limited diffusion (LLDs) 210–211
Llewellyn-Jones, P. 23 Monzo-Nebot, E. 19, 20
longitudinal design 37 Moreno-Rivero, J. 24
LOTE see language other than English (LOTE) Morris, R. 126, 135
Lovel, H. 100 Moser-Mercer, B. 420
MT see machine translation (MT)
M ӓӓtt ӓ, S. 1, 178, 179 Müller, F.E. 80
machine translation (MT) 89, 96; English- multi-layered quality assurance framework
speaking patients 97; generic 96; issues 98–99; 111–112
maternity services 97; speech-to-speech 96; multifaceted theoretical concept 311–312
speech-to-text 96 multilingual encounter 34–36
Mackenzie, C. 177, 178 multilingualism 20
Madlon-Kay, D. 196 Multimodal Interaction Analysis 208
Maiter, S. 228 multimodality 166
Malli, K. 24
de Manuel, J. 328, 329 Napier, J. 244, 245, 246, 281
Marais, K. 108 narrative inequalities 147
Marianacci, A. 387–390 neo-liberal economics 63
Marschark, M. 244, 246 Neumann Solow, S. 420
Marszalenko, J.E. 135 Ng, E.N.S. 132, 135
Martí, I.A. 194 Nguyen-Lu, N. 96
Martin, A. 194 Niemants, N. 78, 201, 344, 346
Maryns, K. 67, 131, 141, 144, 147, 148, 150 non-adversarial proceedings 127
Mason, I 67, 71, 72, 145, 194 non-collaborating 49
433
Index
non-functional tool 33 practitioner trainers 418

non-governmental organisations (NGOs) Pratt, K. 330, 332, 335
94, 110 preliminary negotiation 52, 53–57
non-involvement 49, 187, 386 prima vista interpretation 299
non-professional translation 106–107 professional role plays 299
non-renditions 49 professional service 106
non-verbal communication 169 professional vulnerability 185, 187
Nonaka, A. 230 professionalisation model 18, 20, 22, 24–26
normative vulnerability 177–178 Prunč, E. 19, 147, 264, 270
PSI see public service interpreting (PSI)
occupational therapist 213–219 PST see public service translation (PST)
Ochs, E. 198 psychological vulnerability 186
ODIMEDI platform 367, 374–378, 375–377 public sector: interpreters experience 7; lack of
on-campus activities 325 availability 6; participation 7
on-campus learning activities 334–337 public service/institutions 20, 42, 43, 282
on-line community 331 public service interpreting (PSI): common
one-time presentation 3 name 17; corpora (see corpus-linguistic
open role plays 296–297 methodologies); institution-driven 17;
Orlando, M. 415, 417, 418, 419, 420 institutional contexts 18 (see also institutional
Oslo Metropolitan University (OsloMet) 326 contexts); mediation 7–8; TIS 17–18; training
OsloMet see Oslo Metropolitan University the trainers 416
(OsloMet) public service providers 399; contexts 402–403,
Osman, G. 330, 332 409; course content 405; issues 399–401;
Ozolins, U. 17, 109, 111, 116, 126, 243, 403, 409 pedagogical approach 406; responsibilities
401–402, 406–407; skills training 401, 404,
Palloff, R.M. 330, 332, 335 407–409; training 403–404
Panayiotou, A. 100 public service translation (PST) 106;
Parry, R. 347 accessibility 114–115; consultation 113;
Parsons, T. 269 crisis translation 116–117; dissemination
Pasquandrea, S. 80 media 115–116; functionalist approach
paternalistic 134 113; high/low stakes 111; inter-
Patrie, C. 421 professional level 112; investigation areas
Pawson, R. 393 118; language appropriateness 113; non-
pedagogic discourse 142 professional 110–111; post-translation stage
Penn, C. 51 113–114; quality 111–112; social marketing
perceived vulnerability 186 117; social role 107; socialisation 110; societal
personas 109 level 112; training 110; translation approach
phrasebook apps 99; AAC 99–100; healthcare 109; translation stage 112–113; translator
communication 99, 101; issues 100; pre- agency 107–109; translator’s awareness 112
loaded phrases 99 Puumala, E. 178, 179
Piller, I. 63, 71–73 Pym, A. 66, 110, 111, 178, 420
pinning 288
Pöchhacker, F. 22, 50, 67, 263, 268, 310, 416 Radicioni, M. 301
Pokorn, K. 414, 419, 421 Raymond, G. 48
Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) 179 re-entextualisation 66
Pöllabauer, S. 67, 141, 144, 147–149, 226, 228, Readiness for Interprofessional Learning Scale
262, 279 (RIPLS) 393
Pollard, R.Q. 254 Rebecca, K.J. 228, 234
Pollock, S. 230 recruitment process 37
Pomerantz, A. 346 Reddy, M.J. 2
Pomeroy, E. 230 Reeves, S. 387
positioning 47 reflexive coordination 49–50, 57
postcolonial migration 34–36, 42 Reide, P. 96
Powell, R. 129 reproducing knowledge 49
power asymmetries 34 research-based professionalism 46
powerless speech 129 Richland, J.B. 135
practisearchers 418 Rienzner, M. 141, 143
434
Index
RIPLS see Readiness for Interprofessional turn-taking 246; visual accessibility 246;
Learning Scale (RIPLS) visual orientation 248–249
Risku, H. 311 sign language interpreting (SLI) 64, 140, 277;
RMIT see Royal Melbourne Institute of andragogy 280; crowded curricula 285–286;
Technology (RMIT) deaf interpreters 286; discourse mapping
Robyn, C. 72 282–283; educational preparation 278–279;
Rodriguez, J.A. 101 financial viability 286; identity, power,
role plays 283–284, 292; blended learning social justice 279–280; innovative curricula
334–337; closed 295; continued professional 281–282; post-COVID-19 288; practicum
development 293; fellow students 284–285; professional level 278; program
301–302; individual objectives 303–304; guidelines 280–281; role plays 283–284;
instructions for participants 295; issues 294; sociological issues 285; teaching 288; VMI
open 296–297; participants 299; primary 286–288
participants 299–301; professional 299; Sigrid, B.S. 245
professional knowledge 302–303; role cards situated learning 281, 283, 293
296–298; scripts 295–296; semi-professional situational vulnerability 177–178
299; setups 306; simulation 293; situated Sivunen, N. 150
learning 293; skills 294; spoken and written Skaaden, H. 18, 19, 22, 194, 201, 263
language 298–299; teachers/assessors 301; Skivenes, M. 32, 227
trainers/assessors 304–306 Skutnabb-Kangas, T. 19
Rosenberg, B.A. 92 SLI see sign language interpreting (SLI)
Rosenberg, E. 198 Smith, E. 196
Rousseau, C. 141 Smith, M.B. 244
Roy, B. 246 Sneed, K. 316
Roy, C. 67 social care 225; activity types 226;
Roy, C.B. 2, 11 confidentiality issues 230; double roles
Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology 230–234; establishment of rapport 234–236;
(RMIT) 417 false fluency situations 230; gatekeepers 228,
research method 34 236–238; issues 228–229; language policy
Rueda-Acedo, A. 110 227; literature 226–228; monolingual 232;
Runcieman, A.J. 23 professional interpreters 229–230
Russell, S.R. 282 social encounter 3, 4
social interaction 3, 22
Saenz, T.I. 209 socially-situated interaction 178, 278, 334
Sanders, M. 35, 36 social marketing 117
Sandrelli, A. 328, 329 social pragmatics: identity 64; literature 66–67;
Sasso, A. 24 opposite effect 66; positioning 65; power 65;
Sawrikar, P. 227 re-entextualisation 66; voice 66; web-based
Scheffer, T. 141, 143, 146, 149 sources 72
Schildkamp, K. 303 socialisation 110
Schipper, K. 116 societal function 273
Schön, D.A. 334 Somers, H. 100
scripts 146, 295–296 source-centered interpreting 133, 133
self-training digital tool 367 Spencer-Oatey, H. 69
semi-professional role plays 299 Sperber, D. 70, 72
Shaw, C. 345 spoken language interpreting 176
Shlesinger, M. 77 spontaneous spoken interaction 4
short message service (SMS) communications 94 spotlighting 288
sign-language 242; bilingual support 250–251; Staton, B. 19
definition 243; ethnographic projects 245; Stokoe, E. 342, 344, 345
excerpts and analysis 247; norms 243–244; Stone, C. 283
Norwegian research 253–254; participation summative assessment 293
246; physical learning environment 249–250; Suojanen, T. 114, 116
quality and translation style 245–246; roles super-diverse societies 33
and responsibility 246–247; social learning Sutherlin, G. 95
environment 251–252; talk tempo 247–248; Sutton, J. 311
textbooks and anthologies 244–245; synchronous text-only-chats 330, 332–334
435
Index
Taibi, M. 109, 111, 112, 116 TRP see transition-relevant places (TRP)
Taira, B.R. 97 Tryuk, M. 142
talk tempo 247–248 Tseng, J. 18
target-centered interpreting 133, 133 Tužinská, H. 142
Tate, G 5 Tuominen, T. 114, 116
Taylor, V.L. 2 Turner, A.M. 97, 98, 99, 100
teacher education 415–416; affective-ethical Turner, G. 5
teaching and learning 422–423; language Tyulenev, S. 112
combinations 418; methodological-operative
teaching and learning 421–422; pedagogic UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) 140
action 420–421; qualifications 417, 419–420; United Nations High Commissioner for
sample curriculum 418; skills 419; socio- Refugees (UNHCR) 95
communicative teaching and learning 422; user-centered translation 109
subject-related teaching and learning 421;
training formats 417; trust 423–424 Van De Mieroop, D. 209
teacher training 414; see also teacher education van der Kleij, S. 141, 145
Tebble, H. 302 Van Hove, L. 209
technology-assisted approaches 89 Verliefde, S. 134
technology-mediated modalities 91–94 Veyrier, C-A. 141, 145, 149
telephone-based interpreting 91 video relay services (VRS) 287
testing interpreting skills 293 video-mediated interpreting (VMI) 92–94,
The Interpreter Project 37 286–288
Thomas, P.A. 390 video/audio-recorded interactions 4–5
Thomassen, G. 246 Viezzi, M. 421
three-way telephone links 92 Virtual Learning Environments (VLE) 329
Thunqvist, D. 344 visual orientation 243, 248–249
Thwala, Z. 197 VLE see Virtual Learning Environments (VLE)
Tilley, N. 393 VMI see video-mediated interpreting (VMI)
Tillman, M. 145, 148 voice 66
Timarová, S. 317 voice of medicine (VoM) 195–196
Tipton, R. 142, 176, 198, 201, 269, 293 voice of the lifeworld (VoL) 195–196
Tirkkonen-Condit, S. 312 VoL see voice of the lifeworld (VoL)
TIS see Translation and Interpreting VoM see voice of medicine (VoM)
Studies (TIS) VRS see video relay services (VRS)
Tiselius, E. 316 vulnerability 175; conceptualising 175;
Tomozeiu, D. 109 corporeal 175; criminal justice system
Toury, G. 310, 312, 316 179–184; discursive (re-) construction
Townsley, B. 418 184–188; epistemic 178–179; linguistic
training interpreters: asylum context 364–365; 183; normative 177–178; perceived 186;
asylum context, France 365–367; diversified sets professional 185, 187; psychological 186;
of data 362–363; fieldwork observations 367; relational approaches 178; situational
in-person training 367–368, 368; interactions 177–178; theoretical debates 176
and participants 363–364; objectives 367; vulnerable subject 188
ODIMEDI platform 367, 374–378, 375–377;
organization of participation 368–370, 370; Wadensjö, C. 3–5, 8, 17, 22, 48, 50, 65, 66,
rule-breaking 371–373; training sessions 78–80, 84, 132, 133, 144, 145, 193, 197, 243,
373–374 262, 265, 267, 269, 270, 273, 309, 314, 318,
transcriptions 82–83, 211–213 400, 417, 419
transidiomacity 143 Wallace, M. 19, 20
transidiomatic 147 Washbourne, K. 118
transition-relevant places (TRP) 156 Watermeyer, J. 51, 197
translanguaging 132 Way, C. 108, 109
translation 84–85 Wenger, E. 64, 66, 73
Translation and Interpreting Studies (TIS) 17–18 Westlake, D. 33, 228, 234
translation machines 1 Wilson, D. 70, 72
translator agency 107–109 window of opportunity 231
translators 64 Winston, E.A. 244, 245, 246, 279, 282
436
Index
witness interpretation 127 Xing, J. 69

WM see working memory
(WM) Yentis, S. 96
Wolf, M. 107 Ylikomi, R. 178, 179
Woll, A. 404 Young, I.M. 35
word-for-word interpreting 2
working memory (WM) 317 Zimanyi, K. 23
437

The Routledge Handbook of Public Service Interpreting

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THE ROUTLEDGE HANDBOOK OF

PUBLIC SERVICE INTERPRETING

The Routledge Handbook of Public Service Interpreting provides a comprehensive overview of

Laura Gavioli is a Professor of English language and ­English-​­Italian translation at the

Cecilia Wadensjö is a Professor of Interpreting and Translation Studies at Stockholm Uni-

List of contributors viii

1 General issues about public service interpreting: institutions, codes,

2 The ambiguity of interpreting: ethnographic interviews with public

3 Agency in and for mediating in public service interpreting 46

4 Cultural assumptions, positioning and power: towards a Social

5 ­Corpus-​­based studies of public service interpreting 76

6 Technology use in ­language-​­discordant interpersonal healthcare

7 Public service translation: critical issues and future directions 106

8 Public service interpreting in ­court: ­face-­​­­to-​­face interaction 125

9 Research on i­­ nterpreter-​­​­​­mediated asylum interviews 140

10 Consecutive interpreting and multimodal sequences 155

11 Vulnerable encounters? Investigating vulnerability in ­interpreter-​

12 Public service interpreting in healthcare 192

13 Challenges and remedies for ­interpreter-​­mediated dementia assessments 207

14 Public service interpreting in social care 225

15 A shared responsibility for facilitating inclusion in school settings

16 ‘­Interpreter’s mistake’: ​­why should other professions care about the

17 Training sign language interpreters for public service interpreting 277

19 Monitoring in dialogue interpreting: cognitive and didactic perspectives 309

20 Blended learning is here to stay! Combining o ­ n-​­line and ­on-​­campus

21 The conversation analytic role-play method: how authentic data meet

22 Training interpreters in asylum settings: the REMILAS project 362

23 Interprofessional education … interpreter education, in or and:

24 Training public service providers in how to communicate via interpreter 399

25 Education and training of public service interpreter teachers 414

Khetam Al Sharou is a Researcher at the University of Antwerp and an Honorary Research

Philipp Sebastian Angermeyer is an Associate Professor in Linguistics at York University

Claudio Baraldi is a Professor of Sociology of Cultural and Communicative Processes at

Antoon Cox is a Professor in Multilingual and Intercultural Communication at Vrije Uni-

London. His research focuses on interpersonal communication in stressful multilingual

Birgitta Englund Dimitrova is a Professor Emerita of Translation Studies at Stockholm

Tatjana R. Felberg is an Associate Professor of interpreting in the public sector at

Kristina Gustafsson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Social Work, Lin-

Jessica Pedersen Belisle Hansen is an Associate Professor at Østfold University College,

Koen Kerremans is an Associate Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (­VUB). He is currently

Christian Licoppe is interested in conversation analysis and multimodal interaction anal-

Bernd Meyer is a linguist by training and Professor of Intercultural Communication at the

Natacha Niemants is an Associate Professor at the University of Bologna (­Interpreting

Cynthia B. Roy holds a PhD in Sociolinguistics. She is a former professor of Interpreting

Gry Sagli is employed as an Associate Professor at O ­ sloMet – ​­Oslo Metropolitan Univer-

Hanne Skaaden is a Professor in the Department of International Studies and Interpreting

Sigrid Slettebakk Berge is an Associate Professor in Pedagogy at Norwegian University

Elizabeth Stokoe is a Professor of Social Interaction at Loughborough University, UK.

Mustapha Taibi is an Associate Professor in Interpreting and Translation at Western Syd-

Özlem Temizöz is a Researcher at the University of Surrey. Özlem’s research is on lan-

Rebecca Tipton is a Lecturer in Interpreting and Translation Studies at the University of

Elisabet Tiselius is an Associate Professor at Stockholm University, accredited to the EU,

Véronique Traverso is a ­ time Researcher at the National Center for Scientific

Carmen ­Valero-​­Garcés is a Full Professor of Translation and Interpreting at the Univer-

Dorien Van De Mieroop is a Professor of Linguistics at KU Leuven, Belgium. Her main

What is ‘­the conduit metaphor’?

Interpreting is a form of Translation in which a first and final rendition in another

In Pöchhacker’s definition, translation is written with a capital T and refers to translation

The significance of empirical studies

Interpreting as a resource for improving communication

Laura Gavioli is a Professor of English language and English-Italian translation at the

5 Corpus-based studies of public service interpreting 76

6 Technology use in language-discordant interpersonal healthcare

8 Public service interpreting in court: face-to-face interaction 125

9 Research on i nterpreter-mediated asylum interviews 140

11 Vulnerable encounters? Investigating vulnerability in interpreter-

13 Challenges and remedies for interpreter-mediated dementia assessments 207

16 ‘Interpreter’s mistake’: why should other professions care about the

20 Blended learning is here to stay! Combining o n-line and on-campus

Koen Kerremans is an Associate Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). He is currently

Natacha Niemants is an Associate Professor at the University of Bologna (Interpreting

Gry Sagli is employed as an Associate Professor at O sloMet – Oslo Metropolitan Univer-

Véronique Traverso is a time Researcher at the National Center for Scientific

Carmen Valero-Garcés is a Full Professor of Translation and Interpreting at the Univer-

What is ‘the conduit metaphor’?

with mental disorders in general, in c ross-cultural encounters where familiarity of sounds,

never considered communication a problem. As Wallace and Monzó-Nebot (2019) note,

In line with the above, other problems found in the institution-

In other words, to understand how interpreter-mediated interaction works, we need to

EULITA (2016) Letter of Support to APTIJ Complaint by EULITA.

32 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-4

Ethnographic interviews – methodological considerations

We all stared at her; we didn’t understand. The w omen – there

46 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-5

and straightforward, ignoring the complex nature of spoken, interpreter-mediated interac-

of a particular language). Interpreters have access to contextualisation cues (ostension) but

76 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-7

Literature review: some examples of corpus-based PSI-studies

PSI-related annotations: language of utterance

PSI-related annotations: translation status

in Australia highlighted a wide range of likes and dislikes as well as c ommunication-and

Real-time crowdsourcing translation and interpreting

communities to translate, categorise and geolocate messages in real-time” (Munro 2013:

Fixed-sentence and phrase-based translation tools

v ideo-mediated communication, but access to professional healthcare interpreters continues

106 DOI: 10.4324/9780429298202-9

While notions of ‘non-critical’, ‘low-stakes’ or ‘low-r isk’ may be operationally useful to

Level 1 – Societal level

Level 2 – Inter-professional level

i Selection of translators: recruitment of trained and/or certified translators, where avail-

Level 3 – Translation stage

Level 4 – Post-translation stage

ISMA (2017), “Social marketing definition”. URL: https://w ww.i-socialmarketing.org/social-marketing-