Strategies to cope with FSR in interpreting

It is recognized by researchers that FSR is a source of difficulty in both SI and CI.

Researchers have identified several strategies to deal with this difficulty. First of all, Setton and Dawrant (2016b) suggested interpreters approach the speaker directly and

However, Setton and Dawrant acknowledged that this method often a has limited effect, since the speaker may speak fast again after only a short while. Therefore, the

interpreter may need to resort to other strategies when this is the case. For instance, Setton and Dawrant pointed out that the interpreter may react to FSR by speeding up themselves when they deliver the output. Nevertheless, this strategy will also be

difficult to implement if the SR becomes too fast, since it is not possible to increase the output SR indefinitely (Setton & Dawrant, 2016b). When SR becomes too fast, the interpreter would be left with little choice but to use other strategies to try to get as much information as they could.

For instance, Gile (2009) stated that the conference interpreting community generally agree that meaning-based interpreting can provide better quality, since it allows the interpreter to better understand the speaker’s intentions and produce the TL output without having too much linguistic interference from the SL. However, when processing meaning-based segments becomes difficult due to FSR, in order to still be able to render an acceptable amount of information, the interpreter may need to resort to a form-based strategy (Gile, 2009; Massaro & Shlesinger, 1997). This means that the interpreter will be following “the surface form of the source text” when they produce the TL output, instead of detaching themselves from the source text and translating based on the meaning of the source text (Dam, 2001, p. 27). Interpreters would need to take the risk of being less clear and idiomatic, however, if they do form-based

interpreting (Gile, 2009).

When it is difficult to process fuller units due to FSR, another strategy interpreters could use is to try to shorten their EVS in SI, which means to shorten the lag behind the speaker (Chang, 2009). The purpose of this strategy is to alleviate the pressure on the Short-term Memory Effort. This way, interpreters will not have to store too many messages in short-term memory, allowing more mental energy for the other Efforts.

However, it may also be risky to shorten EVS (Chang, 2009), as maintaining a certain length of EVS is a way to guarantee comprehension of the source speech, because interpreters process the source speech by units larger than single words.

Foulke and Sticht (1967) believed that while single words themselves may be intelligible when delivered at a fast pace, the message the words imply may not be comprehensible, since comprehension requires a more complicated processing from the listener, which may be inferred by FSR. Gerver (2002) believed that since interpreting requires the comprehension and analysis of messages instead of perceiving isolated words, a certain length of EVS needs to be maintained to enable the interpreter to process larger grammatical units, which was echoed by Liu (2008). In Barghout, Rosendo and García (2015), it was mentioned that sometimes the interpreters missed information in their TL output when the speech was fast because they followed too closely to the speaker’s sentence structure and clauses. It was possible that the

interpreters did not have enough processing capacity to lag further behind the speaker, listen for a while, and fully understand the messages before producing the target, because the new messages keep on coming (Chang, 2009).

Similar to EVS in SI, ear-pen span (EPS) in CI, which is the lag time that ranges from the interpreter’s perception of a message in the source text and the moment a note is written down to represent that message (Chen, 2017), has also been investigated.

Though no prior studies have studied FSR and EPS in CI, a few studies did discover the correlation between longer EPS and messages that take more time to be understood (Andres, as cited in Setton & Dawrant, 2016b; Setton & Dawrant, 2016a), and the correlation between longer EPS and higher cognitive load (Chen, 2017).

When the speaker goes beyond a certain SR, in order to keep the essentials,

omission is a possible strategy to adopt. While omission has often been viewed as a type of translation error due to cognitive overload (Chiu, 2017), studies have shown that omission can sometimes be a deliberate strategic move. For example, Shlesinger’s study on professional interpreters (2003) revealed that interpreters tend to consciously make the decision of omitting some of the modifiers. The results in Barghout, Rosendo, &

Garcia (2015, p. 328) also suggested that omission might be a “justifiable strategy.” In fact, Barghout, Rosendo, & Garcia argued that based on the main purpose of

interpreting, which is to enable comprehension by the listeners, it is reasonable for interpreters to resort to omission as a strategy in FSR occasions, as long as it does not affect the listeners’ comprehension.

Another way to safeguard the essential points in the source speech is through summarizing. According to Setton and Dawrant (2016b), professional interpreters are equipped with the ability to use fewer words to summarize the message in the source speech. This skill can be a useful strategy when FSR makes it difficult to convey every

message. However, Setton and Dawrant also pointed out that summarizing due to FSR can be very tiring to the interpreting, and often cannot be used over a number of speeches in a row.

If all strategies fail due to an impossibly fast SR, interpreters may need to stop interpreting to avoid the risk of distorting the messages (Setton & Dawrant, 2016b).

Although switching off the microphone in this case is probably better than providing very poor interpreting service, Gile (2009) believed that nowadays clients seldom accept this extreme strategy. Because of this, Gile pointed out that usually interpreters just keep trying their best after informing the listeners that the situation prevents them from delivering good interpreting.