Reflexivity

As a teacher myself, I loved interpreting another professor today.
Professor: “Since class began, I have received over 100 emails and have answered almost every single one individually. You have told me about your personal life – going to weddings, car breakdowns, your commute time, how many hours that you work, that you have to get up too early in the morning, how late you go to bed. I know so much about you.”
“Let me tell you a little about myself.” (At which point my team interpreter looked me in the eye and signed OMG, “Oh my god”, and I thought, “Yep, here we go!”)
The professor continued: “I work sixty-five hours a week on payroll: time counted by the clock. I commute fourteen hours a week. I work another sixteen hours a week grading homework, this is not on the clock. I get up at five a.m.; I go to bed at one in the morning.”
He did not say, “Stop whining!” but really, after that, was it necessary?

Life is demanding.
Education asks much.
Many students go through the motions – to get a job, to earn the credit, for a grade – but how many really want to learn?
These are the ones who keep us teaching.
(I am thrilled to have several motivated learners in my intensive summer session online course, yippee!)

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Online teaching began Monday, as did interpreting for Physics 101. Ha! (I’m in heaven.)
The physics definition of dynamics is “the effect that forces have on motion.”
I have been wrangling some “force” onto my students use of the online discussion technology (an asynchronous “bulletin board” type of software). Of course I am curious what “motions” will be effected by my language-based exertions. In which “direction” will the students move? Compliance? Competition? Resistance? OH the JOYS of HUMAN INTERACTION!
The first “lecture” was made available to them yesterday morning. I’m going to post them here, too, to see what (if anything) gets sparked in and/or out of the class.

Introduction and Immersion

~ “Lecture” One ~
What is “interpersonal communication”? Can we communicate, interpersonally, through written text coded into bits of electronic data and spirited across cyberspace? Is writing to each other, and reading each other’s words, substantially different than speaking and listening to one another? If you are deaf: is it different to watch someone signing than it is to read letters on a computer screen? How much does it matter to type on a keyboard instead of moving your face and hands in order to tell someone what you think?
The study of any subject requires establishing a boundary that distinguishes and sets the subject apart from other subjects. The terms of the label can be broken down into three components:
1) inter-
2) personal
3) communication.
Which of these three words (or parts of a word) seems most important? Does one or the other establish the focus for thinking and learning?
As I consider how to teach a course on interpersonal communication in an online environment where I will probably never meet any of you, nor any of you each other, I have to question my usual style. Normally, I teach this course based on the assumption that the most effective learning comes through personal application. Effective learning, in my mind, is when students realize that the concepts we study are not just abstract terms “out there.” Instead, the vocabulary, theories, philosophies, similarities, and differences that we will explore in this course are descriptive categories that describe our own behaviors. Once we have a sense of how our own interpersonal communication functions, this provides a base to comprehend on a deep level the ways in which other people use interpersonal communication differently than ourselves: sometimes to accomplish goals or values that are not the same as ours, sometimes to accomplish the same tasks that we want but through alternative strategies.
Differences of interpersonal communication can be attributed to a range of factors, including culture, gender, the environment, life stage, personal or situational elements outside of the immediate communicative event, even levels of linguistic fluency. I, myself, am not convinced that written communication is necessarily “less” or even substantially “different” than what can be accomplished in a face-to-face interaction, however I do think communicating via the written word requires a particular set of skills, including literacy, imagination, focus, and fluency. I separate “literacy” and “fluency” because if one is going to be effective communicating via text, one must read carefully for the meaning of the writer (literacy), and one must deliberately consider your choice of words and phrasing (diction) to minimize confusion for readers (fluency).
We will devote serious attention to the concept of “meaning” &emdash; which is not as transparent as we (Americans, especially) are taught to think. First, though, I want to distinguish “interpersonal” communication from mass communication, and notice the ways in which what we are doing here in this online class is more like small group communication (which has elements of both interpersonal and mass communication).
The most basic factor distinguishing mass and interpersonal communication is audience. Is quantity the clearest difference? Interpersonal is between persons, discrete individuals; whereas mass communication is directed to a large audience, including &emdash; obviously &emdash; more than one person who are obscured or blended in some way (usually via a medium, such as television, radio, the movies) into an indistinguishable mass. A second important factor defining mass communication from interpersonal communication is the presence or absence of anonymity. Interpersonal communication can be more “public” in the sense that you “show” yourself to another human being, you become known and mis/understood in a direct relationship. Mass communication, although witnessed by many, can &emdash; paradoxically &emdash; be more “private” in the sense that audience responses may not be revealed (and producers of mass media often work in teams, or behind the mask of a pseudonym or persona).
What we have in this class is a group of a few dozen people, who are
a) anonymous in the sense that we won’t meet in personal physical space (unless someone coordinates an extracurricular event),
b) communicating directly with a teacher and peers,
c) while witnessing and being witnessed in these interactions by each other, and
d) potentially engaged by each other in surprising and unpredictable as well as standard and typical ways.
What kind of a conversation will we build together?

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My stance vis-a-vis the UMass Amherst administration’s decision to grant an honorary degree to President Bush’s ex-chief-of-staff, Andrew Card, was pre-established before the event was known. I was hired to interpret the graduate commencement ceremony at least a month before the decision about Card was announced.
I witnessed the swell of protest activity from a distance, observing. I did sign the petition, but my active participation was constrained by my paid role, by my work. Of course, I could have done many things, and probably could have “gotten away” with many things – but to do so would have compromised the deep commitment of professional interpreters to provide linguistic accessibility in the most impartial way possible.
Still – the challenge of how consumed some quality planning time between my teammate and me. We were fortunate to be aware of the scope of the planned protest and thus were able to strategize effectively. It so transpired, therefore, that my partner interpreted what she could make out of speech concerning Card, and I interpreted the protesters chanting. A satisfactory, ethical, and impartial arrangement. In fact, the protest was so loud and persistent that audience members watching the American Sign Language interpretation were probably the only ones to glean even a tiny bit of the content of the speech! An overcompensation, therefore, on behalf of professional duty.
Meanwhile, I must say that the moment of outburst was extraordinary. The “automatic” mode of interpreting everything I hear was well upon me, so the sound catapulted me into motion. I had to pause to assess what my teammate was doing (no need to duplicate)…when she shifted from the protest to the actual speech (physically walking over to the podium to be able to hear and – presumedly – read along with the speaker), I rose again to interpret the chants.
The discipline and coordination of the protestors was impressive. The administration reversed the order (as listed in the program book) of honorary degrees and everyone simply held their ground, waiting patiently and giving due respect to Tisato Kajiyama, a UMass alum and President of Kyusho University, Japan. As Provost Charlena Seymore began the announcement of the next degree, the silence in the Mullins Center was palpable. When she uttered Andrew Card’s name the place erupted. Noise exploded throughout and people burst out of their chairs waving banners and signs.
The video by Traprock on YouTube captures the somber mood of the event and the displeasure of graduate students and faculty. News coverage includes a photo of the audience dotted with yellow protest signs. An online petition garnered 1721 signatures (as of today), in addition to hundreds of physical signatures from on campus. Much of the organizing for the protest was done by the Northampton Committee To Stop the War in Iraq, which reports that at least 125 newspapers carried the story, a local television story aired a news segment (search for “Andrew Card”) which captures the visual moment of disruption and includes an interview clip from UMass Communication Department alumni Dr. Garnet Butchart, and also plugs the Traprock video.

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“Plans are now beginning laid out to increase project collaborations, where appropriate, between the ICDP and the IODP.”
Details are at the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program. Note:
“The evaluation of the relative importance of anthropogenic versus natural forces in controlling climatic and environmental change.”
Just remember:

No road is too long with good company.
…..Turkish proverb

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I had to ask my partner in crime about this. Strong Minor Bridge The Brilliant explains:
“Ordibehesht is a month in the Persian calendar, and 1386 is the current year (2007 in our Gregorian era). And Ordibehesht overlaps parts of our April and May. Ordibehesht ends on May 21 – so that’s “the end of Ordibehesht 1386.”
Yes, I’m still trying to get to Iran and isn’t it cool they use a solar calendar?

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Olivier set up an online forum for Research in Interpreting Studies: Resources for researchers working in the field of interpreting studies. Let’s see if it goes anywhere – feel free to join!

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We were welcomed to the country by a member of an Aboriginal group native to the Parramatta area, the Darug. She shared some of her story, sang a song and then was joined by a cousin she called brother for a duet (guitar and didgeridoo). He finished with a solo called “The Hitchhiker,” leaving us in the cab of a tractor-trailer truck driving into the sunset.
The speakers were all passionate about the need for quality and high standards in community interpreting, as well as the need for adequate funding and training. Sandra Hale, Chair of this Critical Link Congress (which has drawn more than 500 delegates, the largest in history) made a nice parallel between the Critical Link and Parramatta. This is the first time the conference has been held in the southern hemisphere, and Parramatta is where the landmark first reconciliation conference the Darug and European settlers was held in 1805.
Professor John Ingleson provided a stellar local idiom: “teaching my grandmother to suck eggs.” This morning I met Catherine, a New Zealand Sign Language interpreter, who explained the phrase means teaching someone something obvious, that they already well know how to do. Who would have guessed! (By the way, New Zealand Sign Language became an official national language of the country nearly one year ago: historic!)
The keynote given by Stepan Kerkyasharian was informative and compelling, particularly on the themes of quality of interpretation, adequate funding, and concerns of ethics. In particular, he spoke passionately about interpreter neutrality: that we are “not the guardians of the interests of one party or the other.” This is in some contrast to Christopher’s talk yesterday about minority language users desire to know that interpreters are working “on behalf of the community” instead of merely in the service of interpreting.
I was interested that both Australian speakers’ first comments were in honor of the indigenous people of the land. I’ve not experienced such recognition in the US unless at an event of, by, and for American Indians or at certain progressive lesbian events. Neat!
I walked to the Opening Ceremony at The Roxy with (Spanish-English interpreters) Nancy, Carmen, Elizabeth and Ron (the token husband). After snarfing down an orange juice and some canapes, I turned in: an early evening.

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Claudia Angelelli asked this during the workshop “Program quality in interpreter education.” I like it.
According to the list of participants, there are people here from more than thirty countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, Denmark, England/UK, Finland, France, Iran, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Malaysia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Solomon Islands, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, and the US. Who knows how many languages!
Sydney reminds me of two places, in different ways: first, Hawai’i &emdash; the feel of the air, perhaps a faint olfactory recognition, and the presence of palm trees; second, Istanbul &emdash; riding the train and looking out on blue sky and the curve of coast along the bay. Walking along a broad pedestrian way toward the conference hotel this morning, I recalled Brussels, even Madrid. Of course there are distinctions, but my American sensibilities take in the similarity of pace and priorities in contrast with the hurry-burry hustle-bustle never-slow-down-and-take-a-break rush of typical days in the States.
I went to the wrong room for the pre-conference (!) but it was fortuitous in one regard: a discursive theme around shifting from linguistic (information-based) transmission-type interpreting to more something else appears to be underway. For instance, Angelelli discussed how interpreting training programs tend to do well in three areas: information-processing, linguistics, and professional conduct; while not yet doing well in the areas of interpersonal communication, setting-specific features, and socio-cultural factors in the intercultural communication process. This was also a theme of the pre-conference (I caught the last half): “Beyond the linguistic conduit” by Izabel Arocha, one of whose final recommendations is that interpreter training programs need to implement “a practice framework instead of a linguist framework.”
After lunch (where Helena instigated a last-minute move from the Rockabilly to the Quake, she’s also responsible for hooking me up with “the young man” in Marsden), I caught the last ten minutes of Christopher Stone’s presentation on “Collective notions of quality of Interpreting: Insights from the British deaf community.” As usual he was crisp in delivery and sharp with time management, not to mention being a strong ally. Chris fielded some complicated questions very well, discussing how much more of a “global identity” deaf persons have with deaf people from other parts of the world, and how the UK is fortunate to have so many well-traveled deaf people who can generally establish some level of communication with deaf refugees with unfamiliar signing.
The main point of Christopher’s talk was on consumer choice in selecting interpreters (and how this has been diminished by processes of institutionalization – governmental legislation). Jemina Napier (who presented in the first workshop with Angelelli and others), noted the frequency of this emphasis on consumer perception of interpreting services through the conference program.
Hanneke Bot in her presentation, “Quality in interpreting as a shared responsibility,” presented a fascinating comparison of three interpreters with different styles in a mental health setting. Her point is to illustrate how necessary it is for the users of interpreting services to participate in repair and be knowledgeable of and responsive to the characteristics of an interpreted situation. She listed four things all USERS need to be aware of and act upon:
1. management of turn-taking
2. the equivalency problem (she quotes Pollard, 2005:265 – a great quote I’ve seen before about consumers responding to the choices (judgment) of the interpreter, not to any “original” utterance)
3. encourage the interpreter to ask questions (!!!)
4. ask questions and use repair
The main source of communication breakdown was lack of repair – an element that is common to all language-based interaction: even without an interpreter we misspeak, repeat ourselves, add, clarify, and alter things we’ve said. This should be an integral part of the interpreting process that everyone present, users and interpreters, need to exercise. (Good stuff, Maynard!)
Meanwhile, I’ve seen some LSF (French Sign Language) which seemed almost comprehensible (!) and met a few deaf women and interpreters from Canada (some using ASL as well). I’ve watched some BSL and Auslan from a distance &emdash; that two-handed alphabet really throws me off.

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For instance, carefully looking at the travel zones to be sure that the week pass I bought (for all trains, ferries, and buses) actually goes all the way out to my hotel! (Not quite, argh! Seems the only way to upgrade it is to go all the way back to the airport!???!) So, my six a.m. decision-making after a twenty-two hour journey is not so hot. :-/
Going on the SBS tour, however, was an excellent idea. They broadcast in sixty-eight languages, which puts them in a class by themselves. They use the phrase “mini-UN”: perhaps this is true in terms of written translation? Yet, it seemed to me that the daily production of so many different language group voices is much closer to the language regime of the European Parliament. SBS does television and radio, with radio described as “the mother of the organization” and subtitling as “the key” to delivering the organization’s charter, which is to “bring the world to Australia.”
Two aspects of the visit captured me: the parallels between subtitling and sign language interpretation, and meeting with Francis Lee, Head of the Cantonese Program for SBS Radio (Sydney).
I have never thought deeply about subtitling as a craft. What struck me today is the challenge of coordinating the written text with the rest of the visual imagery. For instance, coordinating chunks of text with the matching scene is similar to what sign language interpreters do by minimizing visual noise and identifying speakers. Additionally, there are huge challenges in timing and the need to manage – even weed out – various sound inputs: such as overlaps in speaking (turn-taking dynamics), recomposition to work within differential time constraints (it takes longer to read text than to hear speech; just as simultaneous interpreting requires processing time), and having to create sense (meaning) even when speakers utter something extemporaneously that actually doesn’t make sense (all interpreters must do this, not just sign language interpreters).
The SBS also does closed-captioning &emdash; only in English &emdash; for the Australian Deaf Community. I wanted to ask if they combine closed-captioning with subtitling but the moment did not arise. The presentation was educational concerning the intent to be verbatim and neither give more information than the average non-deaf television watcher would receive nor less; to be cautious of condescension but aware of cues that would be obvious to a hearing (non-deaf) person but not accessible at the same time to a deaf person, such as recognizing George W. Bush’s voice before an image of him appeared visually.
After tea, I tagged along with a few folk who work into Arabic, including Arda (English, Armenian, and Arabic), to check out the Arabic language group’s desk for radio. As luck would have it, there was no one there. Most of the group went downstairs to subtitling but, on a whim, I joined Diana to visit the Cantonese and Mandarin desk. What a happy turn of events! Francis has been fulltime at SBS for fourteen years, prior to that he was an engineer. He entertained my attempt to link homomorphisms to repeating dynamics in social interaction, “That is very abstract!” he said, smiling. Guilty as charged! I picked up a copy of his bilingual (Chinese/English) book on “English Idioms: under the lucky stars”, which I am eager to read and share with a few friends (yes, George, I’m talking about you!)
Diana (who doesn’t need business cards because she already has so much work with Mandarin!) spent most of the time talking with Martin (?), after awhile Francis introduced me to Jennifer, a part-timer. I learned from her that access to spoken language as well as signed language interpretation appears to be a widespread practice in Australia, although underused either because people do not realize the service is available or “trust their friends more.” Seems that the law is much more progressive here than in the US or even most European countries, as she said interpreters are not only available for court proceedings, but also medical (“even private doctors”) and educational (if parents want to find out how their children are doing in school, for instance). Anyway, Jennifer said of Francis, “Life comes your way,” while talking about how he manages to pull in subs when he needs them. I like that saying. The Cantonese desk runs nine, hour-long television show per week. They draw most of their material from English sources and create the shows themselves. The shows are done live with some pre-recorded segments.
I met some nice “Critical Link” people during and just after, including Emmanuelle (researching pragmatics in court interpreting), Gaëlle (an administrative type, hmmmm!), and Helena (who I’ll have to tease next time). Arda introduced me to Micaela (?) over tea; we had an interesting talk about Sign Languages). By the way and talk about serendipity! &emdash; the folks at SBS had placed stacks of two volumes near the cakes and cookies for our perusal: their annual report and (go figure!) a report, Connecting Diversity, by Ien Ang and Greg Noble (who was also at the Crossroads conference)! (There are two more co-authors, Jeff Brand and Jason Sternberg.) I glanced through it already and it looks sharp &emdash; high production value (not surprising) and fascinating information on media use across language groups and generations in Australia.
I like when these things happen!

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I had the most phenomenal conversation with a team interpreter recently, which carried into revelations during my next working gig with another peer.
The topic was the moving around (while interpreting) instead of sitting-in-one-place experiment that I’ve been doing for the past year and a half. I was able to do this with a very experienced interpreter who had never done it before: she discussed her resistance to standing and following the turn-taking of non-deaf interlocutors, while acknowledging that at least one source of her resistance was never having done it before, admitting, “this is not a good reason not to do it!”
Before she agreed to do it, she asked the opinion of the deaf interlocutor, who responded, “it would be nice” for us to physically move to be near the actual speaker. We did note some periodic confusion as the deaf person looked to see which one of us was “on”, especially when the turn-taking jumped from one side of the room to the other. (My team and I experimented with moving together, in order to preserve the ability to whisperfeed, but wound up dividing the room: one of us sticking more-or-less to one half-circle and the other one to the other half-circle of participants.) My own guess is that
a) this is a matter of the deaf person’s visual practice and breaking old habits (of looking to a stationary, fixed location for the interpretation) and/or
b) an area for skills development in the team to indicate when the teams switch (because this occurs more frequently than the standard 20-30 minute blocks of time).
What this means is that both members of the team really are “on” all the time, and feeding does not happen in the usual way. (Getting support from one’s team has been the most common complaint from colleagues that have tried this style with me). An effect of all of this is an actual shift in the philosophy of communication governing the delivery of interpreting services. Instead of privileging the transmission model – which insists that accuracy of message is the highest value (hence, why a team is necessary to monitor and “guarantee the accuracy of the message”); physically moving to follow the flow of the actual turn-taking privileges the identity-enactment model of communication, described by James W. Carey as “the ritual model.” (Much more detail: Communication as Culture.)
My teammate was not only game to try out this new system, but thoughtful about what this change did to our work as a team. She concluded, “it changes the distribution of tasks in the team.” Later that week, I worked with another interpreter who was reluctant to change. As I watched her sit and work, I realized I have not actually been in this situation for some time (all my other teammates and the interlocutors involved have been willing to humor me, smile). My ideas about how sitting (as the interpreter in an interactive group) stops the flow were completely confirmed, especially after having considered how the functions change from the mode of sitting close for backup and moving around to physically mirror the dynamics of the communication process.
I will need to do some focused research to confirm my hunch, but my mind jumped to what seems to me an inevitable conclusion: by fixing a stationary location for communication to be filtered through (sitting in one place to interpret many different voices), sign language interpreters establish a visual object of worship. The deaf gaze is restricted, confined to the narrow (sacred?) space established by the interpreter’s management of the communication process.
This is power.

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