Interpretation and stress

Abstract

Changes in interpreting modesInterpreting is a young profession which has developed during this century.The different interpreting modes -consecutive, simultaneous and now, during the 90s, the possibility of remote interpreting -testify to the great changes taking place in all sectors of human activities and how globalization is affecting our lives at the political, economic, social, cultural and environmental levels. From consecutive to simultaneous interpretingConsecutive interpreting was the first form of professional interpreting.It first developed and was used during and after World War I, especially during the Peace Conference of Paris and thereafter within the League of Nations.Even though the first technology for simultaneous interpreting developed by the end of the 20s, it was only at the Nuremburg trials that the simultaneous mode was put into practice as it proved necessary to cope with interpreting from and into four languages.Had it not been an absolute necessity, brought about by specific circumstances, simultaneous interpreting would not have spread the way it did, within the United Nations first and thence to other international institutions.To begin with, many interpreters were opposed to the new system.The most common objection was that the simultaneous interpreter was forced, like a parrot, to translate the sequence of words as they were heard, excluding the possibility of understanding or remembering what was interpreted, la traduction simultanée, affirmait-on dans les années cinquante, [...], contrairement à l'interprétation consécutive, [...] n'offre aucune possibilité de compréhension et ne laisse aucun souvenir de ce qui a été dit (Lederer 1981: 19).This idea proved wrong and since then, simultaneous interpreting has become the most usual form of interpreting, while consecutive has shown its temporal limits, almost doubling working times with two languages and tripling and quadrupling them with the addition of one or more languages.

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