Résumés
Abstract
This paper examines how participants in an interpreter-mediated televised interview communicate involvement in a shared event. It takes as a case in point an interview where Michail Gorbachev, accompanied by his interpreter Pavel Palazchenko, appear on the ALL TALK show, hosted by the BBC journalist Clive Anderson. Detailed analysis of the interview demonstrates how the interpreter’s physical presence helps shape a shared image of him as someone “just translating.” It is suggested, that the efficiency by which his translation work is communicated, apart from owing to the interpreter’s fluency in English and Russian, is due to the others’ communicative behaviour. While addressing one another as conversational partners and interacting with the studio audience and the viewer, they cast him variably as sharing and not fully sharing their ongoing exchange. Moreover, his efficiency as interpreter is shown to be a result of his ability to anticipate grammatical and pragmatic features of turn composition. Overall, the study demonstrates how detailed analyses of real-life interpreter-mediated interaction can assist in explaining and teasing apart the illusive “invisibility” of interpreters.
Keywords/Mots-Clés:
- dialogue interpreting,
- media interpreting,
- talk-show interviews,
- invisibility,
- communicative wiggle room
Résumé
Cet article examine comment les participants à une interview télévisée assistée par un interprète signalent leur engagement dans un événement partagé. Un exemple est fourni par l’interview où Mikhaïl Gorbatchev, accompagné de son interprète Pavel Palazchenko, intervient dans le ALL TALK show, animé par le journaliste de la BBC Clive Anderson. Une analyse fouillée de l’interview montre comment la présence physique de l’interprète aide à modeler une image partagée de sa personne en tant que « simple interprète ». L’analyse montre que l’efficacité de son travail de traduction est due non seulement à sa parfaite connaissance de l’anglais et du russe mais aussi au comportement communicatif des autres. Tout en discutant ensemble comme des partenaires de conversation et interagissant avec l’auditoire du studio et le téléspectateur, ils lui attribuent à la fois un rôle de participant et de non-participant à leurs échanges. De plus, son efficacité d’interprète semble résulter de sa capacité à anticiper les dispositifs grammaticaux et pragmatiques de la composition des tours de paroles. Plus généralement, cette étude montre comment des analyses détaillées en temps réel des interactions assistées par un interprète peuvent aider à démêler et mieux comprendre l’invisibilité illusoire de l’interprète.
Parties annexes
References
- Anderson, R. B. W. (1976): “Perspectives on the Role of Interpreter,” in Brislin, R. W. (ed.), Translation: Applications and Research, New York, Gardner Press, pp. 208–228.
- Angelelli, C. (2004): Re-visiting the role of the Interpreter: a study of conference, court and medical interpreters in Canada, Mexico and the United States, Amsterdam and Philadelphia, John Benjamins.
- Apfelbaum, B. (2004): Gesprächsdynamik in Dolmetsch-Interaktionen: Eine empirische Untersuchung von Situationen internationaler Fachkommunikation unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Arbeitssprachen Deutsch, Englisch, Französisch und Spanisch, Radolfzell, Verlag für Gesprächsforschung.
- Aronsson, K. (1991): “Facework and Control in Multi-Party Talk: a Paediatric Case Study,” in Marková, I. and K. Foppa (eds.), Asymmetries in Dialogue, Hemel Hempstead, Harvester Wheatsheaf, pp. 49–74.
- Banfi, E., Gavioli, L., Guardiano, C. and M. Vedovelli (eds.) (2006): Problemi e fenomeni di mediazione interlinguistica e interculturale, Guerra Edizioni, Perugia.
- Bjelic, D. I. (1999): “‘Frenching’ the ‘Real’ and Praxeological Therapy: An Ethnomethodological Clarification of the New French Theory of Media,” in Jalbert, P. L. (ed.), Media Studies: Ethnomethodological Approaches, Lanham, University Press of America, pp. 231–257.
- Berk-Seligson, S. (1990): The Bilingual Courtroom, Chicago, The University of Chicago Press.
- Bockgård, G. (2004): Syntax som social resurs, dissertation, Department of Scandinavian Languages, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
- Bolden, G. B. (2000): “Towards understanding practices of medical interpreters’ involvement in history taking,” Discourse Studies 2-4, pp. 387–419.
- Chiaro, D. (2002): “Linguistic Mediation on Italian Television: when the Interpreter is not an Interpreter: A Case Study,” in Garzone, G. and M. Viezzi (eds.), Interpreting in the 21st Century. Challenges and Opportunities, Amsterdam and Philadelphia, John Benjamins, pp. 215-225.
- Davidson, B. (2000): “The interpreter as institutional gatekeeper: The social-linguistic role of interpreters in Spanish-English medical discourse,” Journal of Sociolinguistics 4/3, pp. 379-405.
- Davidson, B. (2002): “A model for the construction of conversational common ground in interpreted discourse,” Journal of Pragmatics 34, pp. 1273-1300.
- Englund Dimitrova, B. (1997): “Degree of Interpreter Responsibility in the Interaction Process in Community Interpreting,” in Carr, S., Roberts, R., Dufour, A. and D. Steyn (eds.) The Critical Link: Interpreters in the Community, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, John Benjamins, pp. 147-164.
- Erickson, F. (2001): “Co-membership and wiggle room: Some implications of the study of talk for the development of social theory,” in Coupland, N., Sarangi, S. and C. N. Candlin, (eds.), Sociolinguistics and Social Theory, London/New York, Longmans, pp. 152-181.
- Frishberg, N. (1990 [1986]): Interpreting: An introduction (revised edition), Silver Springs (Maryland), RID Publications.
- Goodwin, C. (1986): “Audience Diversity, Participation and Interpretation,” Text 6-3, pp. 283-316.
- Goodwin, M. H. (1990): He-Said-She-Said: Talk as Social Organization among Black Children, Bloomington, Indiana University Press.
- Goffman, E. (1990 [1959]): The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England, Penguine Books.
- Goffman, E. (1981): Forms of Talk, Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press.
- Heritage, J. (1984): “A change of state token and aspects of its sequential placement,” in Maxwell Atkinson, J. and J. Heritage (eds.), Structures of social action, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp. 299-345.
- Heritage, J. and D. Greatbatch (1991): “On the institutional character of Institutional Talk: The Case of News Interviews,” in Boden, D. and D. H. Zimmerman (eds.), Talk and Social Structure, Cambridge, Polity Press, pp. 93-137.
- Keith, H. A. (1984): “Liaison Interpreting: an Exercise in Linguistic Interaction,” in Wilss, W. and G. Thome (eds.), Die Theorie des Übersetzens und ihr Aufschlußwert für die Übersetzungs- und Dolmetschdidaktik – Translation Theory and its Implementation in the Teaching of Translating and Interpreting, Tübingen, Gunter Narr, pp. 308-317.
- Knapp-Potthoff, A. and K. Knapp (1986): “Interweaving Two Discourses – The Difficult Task of the Non-Professional Interpreter,” in House, J. and S. Blum-Kulka (eds.), Interlingual and Intercultural Communication, Tübingen, Gunter Narr, pp. 151-168.
- Linell, P. (1998): Approaching Dialogue: Talk, Interaction and Contexts in Dialogical Perspectives, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, John Benjamins.
- Linell, P. (2005): The Written Language Bias in Linguistics: Its nature, origins, and transformations, London, Routledge.
- Lerner, G. H. (1989): “Notes on overlap management in conversation: The case of delayed completion,” Western Journal of Speech Communication 53, pp. 167-177.
- Mack, G. (2002): “New Perspectives and Challenges for Interpretation: The Example of Television,” in Garzone, G. and M. Viezzi (eds.), Interpreting in the 21st Century: Challenges and Opportunities, Amsterdam and Philadelphia, John Benjamins, pp. 203-213.
- Mason, I. (1999) (ed.): The Translator 5-2, special issue on Dialogue Interpreting, pp.147-160.
- Metzger, M. (1999): Sign Language Interpreting: Deconstructing the Myth of Neutrality, Washington, Gallaudet University Press.
- Orletti, F. (ed.) (1994): Fra conversazione e discorso: l’analisi dell’interazione verbale, Roma, La Nuova Italia Scientifica.
- Roy, C. B. (2000): Interpreting as a Discourse Process, New York, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
- Sacks, H., Schegloff, E. A. and G. Jefferson (1974): “A simplest systematics for the organization of turn taking for conversation,” Language 50, p. 696-735.
- Stranieri Sergio, F. (1998): “Notes on cultural mediation,” The Interpreters’ Newsletter 8, Università degli Studi di Trieste, SSLMIT, pp. 151-168.
- Stranieri Sergio, F. (1999): “The Interpreter on the (Talk) Show – Interaction and Participation Frameworks,” The Translator 5-2, pp. 303-326.
- Wadensjö, C. (1992): Interpreting as Interaction – On dialogue interpreting in immigration hearings and medical encounters, dissertation, Linköping Studies in Arts and Science 83, Linköping, Department of Communication Studies.
- Wadensjö, C. (1998): Interpreting as Interaction, London/New York, Longman.
- Wadensjö, C. (2000): “Co-constructing Yeltsin – Explorations of an Interpreter-Mediated Political Interview,” in Olohan, M. (ed.), Intercultural Faultlines, Manchester, St Jerome, pp. 233-252.
- Wadensjö, C. (2004): “Dialogue interpreting: A monologising practice in a dialogically organised world,” Target – International Journal of Translation Studies 16-1, pp. 105–124.
- Wadensjö, C. (2006): Le dinamiche dell’interpretazione dialogica e la negoziazione della personhood, in Banfi, E., Gavioli, L., Guardiano, C. and M. Vedovelli (eds.), Problemi e fenomeni di mediazione interlinguistica e interculturale, Guerra Edizioni, Perugia, pp. 13-34.