Recommendations for Future Research

While this study has limitations, it is hoped that it can serve as a basis for further study in glossary for interpreting purposes. For example, it is recommended that the survey be replicated on larger and different populations to supplement or complement

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this present study. Of course, the questionnaire is subject to constant revision in order to be relevant.

Studies could also be undertaken to examine the relationship between glossary making and the interpreter’s actual performance. As Jiang (2013) suggested, thorough glossary preparations do not necessarily guarantee interpreting excellence.

Quantitative methods could be used, for example, to evaluate the degree of coverage of the glossary in an interpreting assignment and determine whether terminological needs could be adequately satisfied with glossary compilation (as in Gile, 2002). This will potentially make preparation more efficient and targeted. The short-term and long-term effects of glossary preparation could also be assessed.

Another interesting venue of investigation might be to further explore the differences of glossary use for the consecutive and simultaneous modes of

interpreting. While Jiang’s study (2013) addressed only the simultaneous mode, the present study sought to provide a general evaluation of some potential differences.

Still, more research is needed to elucidate the process and establish a procedure of glossary practice for both modes, from how a glossary is built to how it is consulted at work, if it is indeed used on site. Future researchers, for example, can investigate whether building a glossary is a purpose-driven endeavor—that is, whether different interpreting modes would influence the interpreter’s options for glossary making and use.

The present study also points to a new possibility of future research in student-initiated learning. As glossary building was student-initiated mostly on the part of the

subjects, it would be worthwhile to examine other learning activities of similar nature and their efficacies. In addition to glossary building, what else would students do outside of the classroom to foster interpreting competency? Students’ deliberate

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practice or extracurricular reading, for example, would be a promising aspect of inquiry.

Corpus studies could also be applied to glossary for interpreting purposes. From a pedagogical point a view, is it possible to build corpora representative of various fields using frequency and range criteria (Frazer, 2007)? Such a cornucopia of terminological entries might be beneficial to students by saving them time on preparation. The details of such corpora (e.g. content, arrangement, and usage) will have to be examined in great detail, but before that, a platform for glossary exchange could perhaps be a good starting point:

S14: I hope that there could be a platform where everyone could

exchange glossaries. We used to make glossaries ourselves. There are so many interpreting students in Taiwan, and they all use a glossary for classes. If there is a platform where we could upload glossaries for various domains, it will be much faster to build a glossary. When you encounter an unfamiliar field, you would know which direction to go when preparing. The platform would greatly benefit interpreting students in Taiwan.

In a similar vein, a promising line of inquiry is to examine the interpreter’s glossary in a broader framework of terminology and database management. The glossaries produced by each of the subjects of the study appear to be independent products, but the sum of one’s glossary collection could potentially be greater than its parts. Therefore, it would be of interest to explore how interpreters manage all their glossary entries during their career, and, as glossary use has been shown to be a widespread practice, how interpreters cross-reference across multiple glossaries to

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facilitate preparation. After all, glossary entries that scatter here and there may not hold as much value as those that are purposefully curated and managed to become useful information.

The above potential facets of exploration will have to be operationalized before being subject to scientific investigation. The researcher hopes that the findings from this study are intriguing enough to generate future research on glossary for

interpreting purposes and to restore its due place in interpreting studies.

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