Open AccessInside Iranian Freelance Simultaneous Conference Interpreters’ Experience: A thematic Analysis of Narratives
Author(s) -
Mehrnoosh Fakharzadeh,
Simin Kazemi
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
hikma
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.114
H-Index - 2
eISSN - 2445-4559
pISSN - 1579-9794
DOI - 10.21071/hikma.v19i2.12603
Subject(s) - interpreter , narrative , interpretation (philosophy) , thematic analysis , context (archaeology) , perception , qualitative research , quality (philosophy) , psychology , public relations , sociology , linguistics , political science , computer science , history , social science , epistemology , philosophy , archaeology , neuroscience , programming language
Although several studies have examined translators' and interpreters' experience in various contexts, relatively few studies have attempted to explore the freelance simultaneous conference interpreters' experience in the Iranian context. In this country, the increasing number of international conferences is creating a demand for quality conference interpretation. In this study, we used qualitative analysis of narratives to delve into the experience of eight freelance simultaneous conference interpreters in Iran to realize their perception of their job and the impact of contextual factors on the quality of their experience as well as that of interpretation. Three themes, namely job-finding experience, on-the-job-experience, and the locus of the problems were extracted from eleven sub-themes. Overall, the narratives characterized interpreting in Iran as a non-professional occupation that amounts to an ad hoc event, language brokering, and ability-oriented task. The findings can raise some critical considerations for stakeholders involved in the field of translation and interpretation studies as well as practitioners.