About the Workshop

Overview

Professional interpreters are increasingly in demand in international organizations and agencies, law firms, and media networks. In addition to conference interpreting, community interpreting is also on the rise to enable communication in courts, hospitals, educational institutions, government agencies, and conflict zones. In the light of the increasing demand for interpreters stirred by the process of globalization, the need to train interpreters is of particular importance to equip them with the skills required to meet the market needs.

The purpose of this workshop is train those who are interested in gaining a basic knowledge in the field of interpreting. It provides an overview of the fundamentals of interpreting techniques and the different types of interpreting (simultaneous, consecutive, sight, whispering and liaison), and lays the foundation necessary to develop the advanced skills used by professional interpreters.

Structure

• An introduction to consecutive interpreting and note taking;
• Strategies to develop short term memory as well as analyze and process information; 
• An introduction to simultaneous interpreting;
• Strategies to solve linguistic and non-linguistic problems during the interpreting process;
• An introduction to other types of interpreting (whispering, sight and liaison);
• Memory boosting exercises. 

Methodology

Live exercises will be provided by the trainer for participants to watch and be encouraged. Specifically, participants will be trained in a set of two interpreting modes that require much preparing, i.e. consecutive and simultaneous. Boosting exercises will be used to help them develop their memory capacity and sharpness. They will be invited to bring in their own experience as to the dilemmas they have encountered in their careers, if any. The guided practice in this workshop will help them address questions such as:

• Should the interpreter correct or improve the content of original texts?
• In what circumstances should the interpreter refuse work?
• Should the interpreter grant priority to sense or style?
• How should the interpreter prepare for the event?
• What are the responsibilities towards other colleagues?
• How should the interpreter deal with neutrality?
• Should interpreters accept work that lies beyond their competence?
• Should interpreters undercut colleagues by offering lower prices for interpreting services?

Learning Objectives

1. Build/develop the participants’ skills in interpreting;
2. Conduct live interpreting exercises using a variety of texts;
3. Introduce participants to note taking;
4. Conduct short memory boosting exercises. 

Learning Outcomes

1. To learn about essentials of note taking techniques;
2. To raise awareness and exposure to the interpreting environment and importance;
3. To acquire fairly advanced interpreting techniques;
4. To take part in interpreting exercises with a variety of accents;
5. To acquire strategies to develop short term memory and information processing.

Target Participants: The workshop is most suited to those who have a university degree in a language-related field and/or no less than 2 years of experience in translation. Mastering the Arabic and English languages is a prerequisite. 

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