More Speakers |
Invited Speaker: Mariluz Esteban, CNSE, SpainSign Language Associations; as seen by Deaf people Of course it goes without saying that deaf people are the main users of this service, and therefore their opinion must be of importance. Mariluz then took us back to 1976 when CNSE was made up of 17 Federations for the Deaf and 120 Association for the Deaf. ILSE worked in collaboration with CNSE and FILSE was borne. In 2000 CNSE and ILSE agreed to work together to pressure the Ministry of Education to sign the agreement. From this they saw an increase in the number interpreters working in education settings, with deaf students having interpreters with them throughout their educational careers. There is still a need to have more deaf people being seen on TV using sign language and in public institutions. 1970-80’s heralded the start of the first interpreter training programmes, and the Sign Language dictionary was compiled. In 1981 the first course to teach the teachers was established followed by the first Service of Sign Language Interpreters in Spain being set up in 1986. Interpreters today in Spain do have ID cards and this is post qualification (since 1999). 2005 had a project to establish the law around Sign Language in both Catalonian and Spanish Sign. And this was also the normalisation phase that incorporated the legal recognition of Sign Language in Spain. There are 2000 interpreters who are qualified in Spain! However there are only about 40% of these who are currently working due to there being so many. There are more Deaf Interpreters now than ever before, but they are not included in these statistics. Mariluz concluded by saying that interpreters have to recognise their skills, accept their mistakes and ensure they adapt their skills to suit their users. They also, above all, must be confident in what they do. Paper 5: Dr Chris Stone; UKWhose interpreter is she anyway? Interpreting within the community or for the Deaf community. Traditionally deaf people chose those people around them who were bilingual to be their interpreter when they had appointments in the ‘hearing’ world. If the person they were using was not from their family, it would have traditionally been someone else who was from another deaf family, a CODA. When the Occupational Standards were established they continued the hold that hearing people had over deaf people. When someone wanted to become and interpreter they were traditionally from a deaf family and so just attended some short courses. This has now changed dramatically in the UK, we have the IRP (Independent Registration Panel) which oversees the certification of interpreters and it has Deaf people as panel members. Legislation was introduced and changed to allow for more access to interpreters, legislation such as the DDA (Disability Discrimination Act), SENDA (Education) and in 1984 the PACE document (Police and Criminal Act). For his PhD Dr Stone looked at Deaf and Hearing people working as interpreters and what this entailed. He made comparisons to both the Finnish and Estonian models as they had both involved deaf people in interpreter training programmes. Now, he would like to emulate the Canadian model as there is full participation and involvement of deaf people in interpreter training and accreditation. Paper 6: Maya De Wit“Interpreting Services: Money Matters” This presentation looks at the research findings from a European study of where interpreters work, if that country has recognition of its Sign Language, funding provision for interpreters and also the hourly rate of working interpreters. 20% of countries in Europe have no funding from their respective governments for interpreting in employment settings. There is some funding available for educational settings, but this is not a given that it will continue with the child as they move through the education system. In Romania, Portugal, Malta and Italy there is no statutory provision of interpreters for medical settings, this equates to 16%. However, all countries have provision for legal settings, expect in Malta where interpreters are only provided in the court; therefore the deaf client will often get to court on charges that are wrong with incorrect evidence. From the countries investigated, only 50% have recognition of sign language. Maya then moved onto discuss the hourly rate for interpreters and this brought about the most response from the audience. Her findings showed that interpreters in Spain were the best paid, commanding fees of up to €60 per hour. Paper 7: Georgina Major, Rachel McKee & David McKee, New Zealand“Lexical Variation & Interpreting in NZSL” Research findings were presented that detailed the variation found in NZSL (New Zealand Sign Language) and how this was dealt with by interpreters. The study looked at 80 lexical items as produced by 150 signers, data is still being analysed, but Georgina was able to present some preliminary findings. George then gave us a brief overview of the state of sign language and interpreters in New Zealand at the moment; with a population of 4 million people, 5-7000 of who are deaf there are currently approximately 60 interpreters working in NZ. Variations occur due to geographical location (North and South Islands), and also to gender and age. The researchers looked at variations from two focus groups, that of a deaf and a hearing group, each of five participants. The findings could be generalised as saying the hearing/interpreter group thought that variations were something that were not covered in their training and would like to see more in their practicum. The Deaf group thought that variation was not a problem and that is something they don’t worry about, however if the interpreter used a sign that they recognised as a variation but was contextually incorrect they would point this out. As an aside though the researchers thought that if this happened during the interpreted event and they didn’t take the new sign on, this was, perhaps, due to competing cognitive processes. If you would like further information on this study contact Georgina at: george.major@vuw.ac.nz Paper 8: Emiko Ichikawa, Japan“Health Problems of Sign Language Interpreters in Japan” From a study in 2005 in which 1,376 questionnaires were sent out with and amazing 1,214 respondents and from previous cases, Emiko was able to present some really interesting information about how interpreting brings with it some known and associated health issues. In Japan, Interpreters are not classified as regular workers, and as such are not afforded the benefits of being regular workers. This means that they are expected to work in poor conditions with little or no access to medical care. Illness associated with the joints in the arms and shoulders, and Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI) are some common problems faced by interpreters across the world. “63% of interpreters are forced to give up work for the following reasons:
Emiko concluded by saying that we need to take preventative methods to protect our health, and in saying this they have compiled a DVD with some useful stretching exercises to follow. Paper 9: Selman Hoti and Susan Emerson, Kosovo“The beginnings of the Kosovo ITP and the impact of international trainers.” Kosovo is located in South East Europe and has around 2 million inhabitants. There are no official statistics kept on the number of deaf people, so there is an estimation of around 50,000 deaf people there. In 1999 1 million people were forced to leave because of the war. After the war there were no interpreter services and so this saw the majority of interpreting work being conducted by CODA’s who had no formal training. In 2001 the Finnish Association for the Deaf came along and did some research and found that there were 2 untrained interpreters working out there, with no formal training programmes to go to. In 2006 we saw that only 2% of the Deaf community were using interpreters in Kosovo, so we set about rectifying this and in 2005 we set up the first ITP (Interpreter Training Programme) which had 14 students learning 10 modules in weekend training blocks. Dr Jemina Napier was able to come over and provide some intensive training for our first cohort of students. Then the newly formed Interpreter Working Group compiled the Code of Conduct which explained how to work with an interpreter as we wanted to educate the wider deaf and hearing community. The length of the course was something else we looked at, and we looked to Serbia to see what they were doing. We want the ITP to rollout from 2007-8 to have more students onboard. Susan felt that one of the main challenges for her working as an international advisor was that she didn’t speak Albanian so she had to rely on Selman to interpret for her. She states that we have to remember we only go there to advise the local trainers as it is they who will have to continue with the work once we have gone. If you want any further information you can contact Selman and Susan: selman_hoti@hotmail.com – Selman slemerson87@hotmail.com – Susan Paper 10: Caron Hawkings and John Walker, UK“Mentoring: International Applications” John is a trained Mentor in the S/ASLI programme and trains would be mentors, he also works in University of Sussex and is a Deaf Interpreter. Caron is a London based interpreters and has trained at Bristol University for 10 years. She has a Post Graduate Diploma in BSL/English Interpreting and has been a trained mentor for the past 2 years, John was her trainer. So what is mentoring? Here are some common understandings;
There are thought to be 4 groups of mentee’s;
Generally the position of the mentor is to work at the cognitive and meta cognitive level to unravel the common saying ‘I am a bad interpreter’. We are able to expand on this and find out the aim of the interpreter in saying this, is if for sympathy, to illicit compliments or do the really believe they are bad. However when we do look at this relationship we have to be mindful of some issues such as;
If you want any further information on how to set-up a Mentoring programme you can contact John and Caron direct: Caron – caron@interpreter.org.uk John – Chereme@mac.com Invited Speaker: Jose Luis Brieva, Columbia & Margarita Rodriguez, CanadaJose and Margarita spoke about the past, present and future of interpreters in Columbia. There has been an ITP for the last 3 years in Columbia and this has incorporated Deafblind interpreters as well. Interpreters are currently provided in the following settings:
However although things have come on greatly for deaf people with the provision of interpreters there is still a need of an interpreting association and both Jose and Margarita would like to see them working with their international colleagues. Interpreters at Play
|
| MEDIA TEAM |
| David Wolfenden, Gill Wood, Nicole Montagna, Ana Peidro, Karl Llorca, Susan Emerson, Felipe Mendez, Toñi Romero |
