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Model interpreters
Michael Benis conducts a debate on the thorny issue of the community interpreting model
Blind spots and poor communication
One of the most frustrating things for interpreters is the number of well-meaning "experts" who pontificate about what is required of an interpreter when they themselves do not possess any knowledge of a foreign language, never mind any experience of interpreting or how radical and disorientating linguistic and cultural differences can be. And - for the benefit of such experts - having used an interpreter or getting lost on the way to the station on holiday simply do not qualify.
But then cultural and linguistic differences are by definition going to be a blind spot if one is not aware of them. This is something of which most readers of bulletin are aware, since we come across it almost every day of our working lives. We have all tried to educate clients who are unaware of the poor quality of many of the language services on which they depend, and fail to understand that a perfectly adequate text needs to be entirely rewritten to achieve their objectives in another culture. Just as we have all heard of the suitably-impressed client who turned to an interpreter specialising in negotiations in a highly complex technical field and asked "when did you find you had a gift for languages?" but, I suspect, never asked their surgeon "when did you find you had a gift for needlework?".
Some of the blame for this can be laid at our own doors. We need to become better communicators and not just with the outside world, but also amongst ourselves. In some cases our own specialist terminology doesn't make things any easier. I'm thinking here of the use of the word "advocacy skills" in the much-misunderstood community interpreting model.
This article and the debate that forms its core has been designed to find out more about what is really meant by the "Community Interpreting Model" in practise, not least of all because many qualified interpreters with no experience of the model as it is taught have for many years adopted a position that has been as hostile as it is uniformed. The resultant lack of dialogue has meant that our professional associations do not represent an important sector of interpreting and its practitioners and have been unable to benefit from sharing the important body of experience it has acquired. Put together immediately prior to Christmas and imbued with a spirit of goodwill, this article hopes to establish enough common ground to identify a path forwards.
The sound of silence
The general model of "linguistic interpreting" adopted in the public services is that the interpreter should interpret everything that is spoken and only interpret what is spoken. In addition, a certain type of intervention is permitted to provide cultural information that ensures effective understanding by all parties. The interpreter's Court oath distinguishes the two as "interpretation" in the former case and "explanation" in the latter. This is entirely sufficient for police and court interpreting, and indeed provides necessary safeguards. One of the reasons for this is that the process is led by the relevant public servants/legal professionals etc and the client plays a largely passive role apart from providing the information requested.
This situation is in some ways reversed in community interpreting. Let me provide just one short example: when we go into a doctor's surgery and are prescribed a particular medication, the chances are that we may way well inquire what the side-effects of the drug in question are ("Will it make me drowsy?" or "Could it make it difficult for me to work or drive a car?" etc). If the potential side-effects pose a risk for us, we may ask if an alternative treatment is available. But a patient whose first language is not English and who is not familiar with British culture and medical practices may not ask such questions and may not therefore benefit from the same opportunities of choice. Similarly, a hard-pressed doctor may not volunteer this information themselves. In these circumstances a trained community interpreter will intervene to close this linguistic and cultural gap, prompting and thus enabling the service provider (in this case the doctor) to provide our request the relevant information. This can be extremely valuable in community interpreting scenarios since it not only enables the client to achieve a more successful outcome in the individual session, but can also save the service provider (in this case the health service) a considerable sum of money if potential problems are either avoided or spotted earlier.
In other words, achieving successful outcomes in a community interpreting scenario may demand more than ensuring that what is said or expressed in tone and gesture is conveyed accurately, and that all the related information on cultural cues and contextual matters is provided to ensure a full understanding and effective dialogue between the parties. It may also require interventions that enable potentially critical but previously unexpressed matters to be raised.
New uses of the word "advocacy"
Similar problems of silence and a failure of service provision can exist in areas outside interpreting and we indeed find a new use of the word "advocacy" that is designed to overcome these areas of silence for the vulnerable, elderly, people with disabilities and people needing mental health support, for example, as well as black and ethnic minorities. Generally speaking, this advocacy involves interventions, as above, to help ensure that an individual receives the services they need and to which they are entitled, as well as to help the service provider meet their statutory requirements. That said, although the word is entering into increasingly widespread use, not all advocacy organisations are agreed about what advocacy itself entails, although they are all clear that the advocate plays a support role. For example, Action for Advocacy (Advocacy Across London) states "Advocacy is taking action to help people say what they want, secure their rights, represent their interests and obtain services they need.... Advocacy promotes social inclusion, equality and social justice." Similarly, the Aberdeen Advocacy Service states "Advocacy is about helping you to have more control when dealing with health or social care services. We can help you speak up for what you want and make sure your views are heard. We can help you work out what choices you have and explore options with you". (My emphasis in both cases). It is, however, important to note that despite these differences, "advocacy" is in all cases considered to involve the provision of support not advice.
These definitions of advocacy naturally cause some opponents of the community interpreting model to enquire why it is necessary for the interpreter to play an advocacy role when community advocates are able to do so. There are two answers to this question. Firstly, that there are practically no trained bilingual advocates, while monolingual advocates are by definition unable to act effectively when linguistic and cultural barriers are present. Secondly there is the issue of cost. Sussex Interpreting Services, for example, ran a very successful pilot project in conjunction with Sure Start to provide trained bilingual Community Advocates in an area of Brighton, but lack of funding terminated the initiative after little more than a year. In short, this is not an option that's on the table, especially when many consider the community interpreting model to be an equally valid yet more cost-effective solution.
Laying the table for debate
A series of clear questions are thus emerging, with the core issue being whether the community interpreting model is able to provide for this type of intervention without compromising confidentiality and impartiality. Related questions are of course what we mean by community interpreting as distinct from public service interpreting in general, and secondly what we mean by "advocacy skills" (or perhaps more appropriately "cultural mediation") in the community interpreting model. Underlying this is the recognition that different interpreting techniques and models are required in different scenarios, including within given areas such as liaison and conference interpreting as well as public service interpreting.
Bulletin has created this article as a forum for a brief debate between the many qualified parties involved in public service and community interpreting in the hope that we can perhaps achieve a consensus regarding the various different public service interpreting scenarios and the interpreting models that are most desirable within them. So, having now delineated the field, or laid the table for this debate, that's quite enough from me. The all-star cast that has kindly agreed to be involved consists of Jan Cambridge, Chair of the National Register of Public Service Interpreters (NRPSI), Martin Campbell of the Brighton and Hove Council Primary Care Trust (NHS), Helen Cottington of the Mary Ward Centre in London, which provides training in community interpreting, Ann Hayes, National Community Interpreting Project Manager of the Workers' Educational Association, one of the UK's largest providers of adult education, Henry Pavlovich, Director and Chief Executive of the Institute of Linguists, Shahreen Shebli, Manager of Sussex Interpreting Services (SIS), a charity providing community interpreting services in Sussex, and last but not least, Alan Wheatley, General Secretary of the Institute of Translators and Interpreters.
Nomenclature
The participants views on nomenclature were revealing, in that generally speaking everyone agreed that nomenclature was causing problems, although it doesn't appear those problems have yet been entirely resolved.
The main nomenclature-related issues were which areas of interpreting were covered by the Community Interpreting ("advocacy") and Public Service Interpreting ("linguistic") models and the differences between those models themselves.
Coverage
Jan Cambridge largely took the terms "Community Interpreting" and "Public Service Interpreting" to be synonymous, and pointed out that the latter had in fact been coined to avoid any confusion between community interpreting and the official languages of the European Community:
"The term "public service Interpreting" arose when the profession began to emerge as a discrete branch of Interpreting, just as the then European Community was beginning to impact on British society. The result in this country was that people perceived ‘community interpreting’ as referring to the EC (as in ‘Community Directive’, ‘Community Policy’) and therefore only to EC languages (6, at the time). The term public service interpreting was coined to be more inclusive and less confusing."
Ann Hayes definition of community interpreting, on the other hand, was more selective, focusing on the access of linguistic minorities to education, health, housing and social services:
"I see Community Interpreting as "interpreting in general" in that I've known this model to be the usual model available to people from the linguistic minorities I've worked with over the last several years where clients have been accessing education, health, housing and social services."
Helen Cottington, also made a similar distinction in areas of coverage:
"Community Interpreting is public service interpreting in the sense that it is concerned with interpreting for members of the community in a public services setting (excluding police and court interpreting where the "linguistic model" is clearly the appropriate model to use.)"
These distinctions were a useful starting point, suggesting that any differences to emerge between the two models could result from the "Public Service Interpreting" model being intended to cover a wider range of Interpreting contexts and scenarios, whereas the "Community Interpreting" model might be more closely focused on a related set of contexts and scenarios.
Interpreting models - learning from Henry Ford
The nomenclature used for the different interpreting models themselves proved to be no less problematic.
Jan rightly objected to the label "linguistic model" as being rather absurd:
" Since both groups of interpreters work in similar areas, I don't think these labels are particularly helpful. I think this article is useful because the whole area of nomenclature needs sorting out. Confusing the customers is bad for business. In that regard, I find the term "linguistic model" especially unhelpful. It seems to have been coined (though I don't know who by) to describe the Impartial Model, but is a tautologous and completely inaccurate way to talk about any interpreting model. By definition any model of interpreting, including in signed languages, is "linguistic" since it deals in language."
On the other hand, Jan's own preferred nomenclature is not without problems of its own. I can imagine interpreters in many fields objecting to a model that describes itself as "the impartial model", as if it was somehow more impartial than others. Maybe we should follow Henry Ford's example on this one and just refer to Model A and Model B (and C and D).
Following years of misunderstanding, the Community Interpreting training organisations were particularly sensitive to the drawbacks of the term "advocacy" which was inherited from healthcare contexts.
Ann Hayes stated:
"To some extent these distinctions are unhelpful. We are all engaged in helping non-English-speakers access services. There can be a misconception that Community Interpreting is something else, ranging from advocacy to advice giving or to supplanting public services, and it is none of these things."
She went on to explain:
"So-called "advocacy skills" are not taught on the Community Interpreting course; training time is spent on appropriate intervention skills and making sure the Community Interpreter knows the difference between the role of a Community Interpreter and an advocate. There are separate courses for bilingual advocates."
This was echoed by Helen Cottington:
"'Intervention skills' is the term now used in place of ‘advocacy skills’ to help overcome the confusion with advocates as a different profession".
Shahreen Shebli identified a further need for precision, rejecting the idea that there were two simple models, but rather a range of different techniques that need to be tailored to different requirements:
"Personally, I think these two terms are misleading. " Community Interpreting", I believe, relates to a model of Interpreting, whilst "Public Service Interpreting" refers to the context. This clarity in definition is required as the reality is that different agencies actually employ different models, depending on the context of the session. SIS interpreters employ a range of interpreting models (sometimes" Community Interpreting"/sometimes "linguistic" interpreting) which are dictated by the area in which they are Interpreting."
Intervention - a matter of needs and outcomes?
Having thus exorcised the spectre of advocacy, our panel were free to explore what the practical differences between these models actually consist in, with the discussion centring on what type of intervention, if any, is desirable. Shahreen stated her own position and provided an example:
"I think intervention is completely appropriate and dictated by the necessity that client needs are not ring fenced into one particular area. For clients to receive holistic, joined-up services, the community interpreting model is necessary and appropriate. The reality is that communication barriers exist, compounded by lack of appropriate services and inability of many statutory bodies to fulfil adequately their equal opportunities policies in practice.
Here's an example from within SIS: SIS was contracted to provide interpreting to the local Sure Start government initiative. Nationally, the range of Sure Start initiatives differed. Locally, Sure Start had core services (such as Sure Start health visitors and midwives who had additional duties in their role over the normal remit). Sure Start also commissioned fairly specialised services, such as "parenting classes", a "Fresh Ideas project focused on healthy eating" a "Mobile Toy Library" etc. A health visitor visiting a Sure Start client would not necessarily automatically give information about these services as part of their role. SIS community interpreters had a legitimate role as part of the community interpreting model SIS employs to prompt the health visitor or midwife to give this information. If the health visitor or midwife gave this information automatically, then obviously the SIS interpreter would have restricted themselves to a "linguistic model". I think this example demonstrates that flexibility is required from just employing a "linguistic model"."
Jan's comment on this both agreed that such intervention was desirable and, indeed, explained that an interpreter on the National Register of Public Service Interpreters (NRPSI) would be authorised to act in the same way by their own code of conduct. In fact, as the debate progressed it emerged that there we many similarities between the "Community Interpreting" model and "Public Service" (or "impartial") model as taught for the Diploma in Public Service Interpreting (DPSI).
Anne Hayes was keen to emphasise this after discussing her own history with the community interpreting model:
"I worked with refugees for many years. I'm not bilingual and my perspective is that of a service user of interpreters in employment/education advice interviews and in the NVQ assessment situation, assessing trainee welfare housing and careers advisers dealing with clients who sometimes did not speak English. When I started working with refugees in 1994, I was unaware of any difference in interpreting models and rarely used interpreters as most clients I met spoke good English. The model of interviewing used in my (English-language) advice scenarios would be parallel to a Community Interpreting model, e.g. making clients aware of options, and probing for any extra information that might help. When non-English-speaking clients brought a non-trained bilingual friend to interpret, these people interpreted and often took offence at my questions regarding income, benefits, disability - questions essential to the interview. I understood this to be the normal way with interpreting situations and took pains to reiterate my intentions, and put the whole experience down to the restrictions of using interpreters, where the interpreter seemed to be centre-stage rather than the client.
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First published in ITI Bulletin, 2004. |
