Elementary School Interpreters are real interpreters.
VRS Interpreters are real interpreters.
Legal Interpreters are real interpreters.
CDIs are real interpreters.
Middle School Interpreters are real interpreters.
VRI Interpreters are real interpreters
Freelance Interpreters are real interpreters
University Interpreters are real interpreters
Pre-K Interpreters are real interpreters.
Mental Health Interpreters are real interpreters.
High School Interpreters are real interpreters.
My original plan was to write one Note to tackle Interpersonal Dynamics: Deaf Client; Hearing Client; and, your Team. But there is a lot to unpack in all these topics! So much that I split it into three.
I get calls and emails and texts (oh my) weekly-all asking the same question:
“What would you do if…”.
The details tend to diverge at that point, but the idea is the same.
What do you do when you don’t know what to do?
I addressed ethics, micro-audism and the interpersonal dynamic that exists between the interpreter and the Deaf Client in previous Notes.
So let’s talk about the interpersonal dynamics between the interpreter and the hearing Client.
How do you, as the interpreter, relate to the other actors in the communication event?
The Hearing Client
Author Douglas Adams wrote a scene in his book Dirk Gentely’s Holistic Detective Agency wherein the reader is given insight into a horse’s opinions on its rider. The author clearly states that it is not a super-intelligent horse or magical in any way. This handsome but quite normal horse formed opinions about its rider because:
It is difficult to be sat on all day, every day, by some other creature, without forming an opinion on them.
But, the author also observes:
On the other hand, it is perfectly possible to sit all day, every day, on top of another creature and not have the slightest thought about them whatsoever.
What’s the point?
People who are Deaf tend to know a great deal about hearing people. However, most hearing people have no idea what it actually means to be Deaf in a hearing world.
That, of course, has never stopped any hearing person from expressing an opinion on the matter. I have heard hearing people expound at length on how, if they were Deaf, they would be “too self-sufficient to demand that someone else provide [them] an interpreter.” (That is an actual quote from an office manager at a medical clinic).
Against my better judgement, because you can’t fix the arrogance of privilege, I responded by quoting the first stanza of Rudyard Kipling’s poem Padgett M.P.
The toad beneath the harrow knows exactly where each tooth-point goes,
But the butterfly upon the road preaches contentment to that toad.
I don’t think she got it.
It is easy for one removed from the struggle to advise quiet acceptance to those who live the struggle every day (by the way, find the poem I quoted. It’s a fantastic exploration of watching someone who loudly expresses an opinion, on a topic about which they know nothing, becoming “educated”).
As a hearing person who has lived, worked and studied the Language and Culture of people who are Deaf, I can safely say that I don’t understand the experience of a person who is Deaf navigating a hearing world day in and day out. I never will.
But, I do know how to interpret between a person who is Deaf and a person who is hearing. I can say without fear of contradiction or false aggrandizement that I am an expert in that area. I can and will speak to hearing Clients with authority about what I, as the expert on communication in the room, need in order to do my job.
I’m not shy about advocating for the things I need in order to do my job (affording effective communication) And I am always professional about it.
It is important to clearly explain what I mean by being “professional.”
I always begin very politely, but, I am direct.
I am clear.
I am firm.
If needed I will be blunt.
But always polite, unless the situation calls on me not to be.
Make no mistake, there is a place for directness to a level that some may mistake for rudeness within the definition of professional discourse.
My measure for when it is time to move past blunt is when a lay person, who knows nothing about my job (outside their uninformed assumptions), attempts to “correct” me on how to do my job (specifically when they assume incorrectly).
I first attempt to educate, then to explain, but, if needed, I will correct their erroneous assumptions without negotiation.
Let me emphasize that again. Never forget that as an interpreter you are the expert regarding interpreting. That is why you are there; they called an expert to facilitate communication because they could not do it without your expertise.
Culture?
That is the purview of the person who is Deaf.
Language?
Definitely defer to the person who is Deaf.
But.
Anything regarding the process of interpreting is the area of expertise of the interpreter (If you are working with a CDI, and I hope you have had the benefit of that experience, it is amazing, then defer to the CDI). If (when) the hearing Client tries to insert themselves into your area of expertise handle it as the professional you are.
As I’ve said, “professional” doesn’t always mean the same thing as “polite.”
“Respectful” doesn’t always mean the same thing as being “deferential.”
On one occasion for example I had to educate a nurse who kept telling me how to do my job. I went through the steps I listed above, but to no avail. She just kept giving me orders, to the point that it was becoming impossible for me to do my job.
No one prevents me from doing my job.
My job is too important to allow that. So I finally said:
“I think see the problem here. You mistakenly believe that I work for you. Let me assure you, I do not. I’m an independent contractor that the hospital hired for my expertise. If there is an immediate medical emergency I will defer to your expertise, but, right now I have a job to do. You are interfering with my ability to do that job. That will stop.”
And it did.
In the end just keep in mind that the hearing people who hire you tend to come in two types: Those who know how to rely on experts to do the jobs they need done but don’t know how to do themselves, and those who assume that they are naturally an expert in all things and feel the need to direct the work of everyone else.
If you want to reduce problems and arguments during assignments you need to speak and act as the expert you are. Ninety percent of real problems that come up during appointments happen because we didn’t speak up when we felt like we should. The other ten percent happen because we say too much. There is a fine line between professional self-advocacy and arrogance. I find that line lies at the border of “this is what must happen to do my job” and “listen to how much I know.” Finding that line is both a science and an art. Staying on the right side of it is an imperative.
The key for me is asking myself a simple question. “Am I stating clearly to this hearing person what I need to do my job or I’m I arguing with a jerk.”
Never argue with a jerk, even if the jerk obviously wants to argue with you. You don’t have to attend every fight you are invited to.
Be clear, be direct, be professional and when in doubt remember Rule 8!
https://uncledalesrulesforinterpreters.wordpress.com/2017/03/10/rule-8/
This Note has become a bit of an full time job for me. I have not been able to post anything because of my obsession with it.
Sigh.
In the book The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy (read the books. The movies don’t do the story justice!explains that the problem with time travel is not what you would expect it to be. The Guide says:
One of the major problems encountered in time travel is not that of becoming your own father or mother. There is no problem in becoming your own father or mother that a broad-minded and well-adjusted family can’t cope with. There is no problem with changing the course of history—the course of history does not change because it all fits together like a jigsaw. All the important changes have happened before the things they were supposed to change and it all sorts itself out in the end.
The major problem is simply one of grammar, and the main work to consult in this matter is Dr. Dan Streetmentioner’s Time Traveler’s Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations. It will tell you, for instance, how to describe something that was about to happen to you in the past before you avoided it by time-jumping forward two days in order to avoid it. The event will be descibed differently according to whether you are talking about it from the standpoint of your own natural time, from a time in the further future, or a time in the further past and is futher complicated by the possibility of conducting conversations while you are actually traveling from one time to another with the intention of becoming your own mother or father.
Most readers get as far as the Future Semiconditionally Modified Subinverted Plagal Past Subjunctive Intentional before giving up; and in fact in later aditions of the book all pages beyond this point have been left blank to save on printing costs.
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy skips lightly over this tangle of academic abstraction, pausing only to note that the term “Future Perfect” has been abandoned since it was discovered not to be.
Douglas Adams
As with most things in life the Guide gives us insight into the condition of being human-in this instance that the things that are problems are often vastly different (and a little more pedestrian) than the things we assume to be problems.
So it is with interpreting. When we struggle with an interpretation we often look for a much bigger, much more catastrophic reason for our frustration than, we eventually find out, is the ACTUAL, reason for our frustration.
For example. When working from ASL to Spoken English (and almost as often Spoken English to ASL) interpreters who are struggling tend to jump on any idea that incorporates a fatally flawed lack of skill, comprehension, or ability on their own part.
While this approach carries with it metric tons of self-deprecating, unhelpful reasoning it is also infused with two “benefits” for the interpreter’s tortured soul.
First, it’s “analysis-proof.”
In law there’s a concept called being “judgment proof.” It means if you sue me for $100 million and win, but if I don’t have a bank account or a car or a house or any real property worth any value or insurance, then it really doesn’t matter if you sue me for $10, $20 or $30 million-you’re never going to see a dime; because I just don’t have it and there is no way I ever will.
The idea of being “Analysis-proof” follows similar logic. You can give me feedback or mentoring or instruction or support all you want, but if the problem is a fatal flaw inside of me, meaning my interpreter account is empty, then no amount of analysis will EVER result improved performance.
This dovetails into the second “benefit” or what I called the “why bother” mindset.
This second issue, the “why bother” mindset, logically and commonly-but not ubiquitously-follows on the heels of being “analysis-proof” (but it can exist independently as a stand alone self-defeating self-view).
It mentally flows like this:
If the issues that I have to overcome are so vast or too much or feel like they stem from a fundamental flaw inside of me, maybe I have an underdeveloped interpreter gene, then no amount of work will ever help me get better, so why should I bother putting more effort into building my skills beyond where they are right now. Perhaps I should just be happy with what I have and not try to challenge myself.
That self-view is attractive to the tired and frustrated because it can be applied to so many areas of our lives that we see as too hard to deal with.
If you are reading this and feel like it speaks directly to you (“is Uncle Dale watching me?”*) you are not alone. Every interpreter feels these frustrations at one time or another and grabs at these “answers”.
However, like time travel, when we feel like we’ve hit these walls it is often a result of looking well beyond the mark, at huge seemingly unsolvable issues (becoming your own parent) instead of stepping back and looking for the actual issue, because the actual issue seems so simple it’s almost silly (grammar).
In my experience for example what many interpreters see as an unresolvable issue turns out to be a simple Rhythm Trap.
The Rhythm Trap
Hearing interpreters, have you ever walked passed a room and heard a voice drifting from inside and thought to yourself, “that is an interpreter working from ASL to Spoken English (or if you are one of my students, “that is an interpreter working from Deaf to Hearing” Grin)?
You know the sound. Maybe you can hear it in your head right now.
Like some kind of interpreter 12 Step Program hearing interpreters all should all be able to admit in public that some version of the words, “like butter on a bald monkey” have spilled unbidden out of our mouths.
We have all, at some strange moment, realized we were humming along to a song in our heads to the beat of word-sign-word-sign-word-sign…
Deaf Community?
CDIs?
You know this obnoxious interpretive dance move, you’ve seen it over and over.
Why do we do that? What’s wrong with us?
It’s not about skill. It’s not about ability. Most importantly it’s not a fundamental catastrophic flaw in you.
It’s a conflict in the differential rhythms of the source and target languages.
Seriously. It’s usually just an issue of rhythm.
Think of it like this, the human brain loves patterns. It seeks them out.
I have found many different competing theories for why this is so, from it being a genetically coded survival trait requiring our brains to reduce anything deemed necessary to live to a set of simple, easily repeated steps (I was tempted to get into Necessity Breeds Simplicity here, then I remembered, I already did that! https://uncledalesrulesforinterpreters.wordpress.com/?s=Simplicity+)
So, your brain loves patterns. But, as with most languages, the rhythm structures of ASL and English are not even close to each other. Think of a person from India who learned English as a second language. Their use of English words are often impeccable but native English speakers may have a hard time following their speech patterns at first because they put the English words in the rhythm of their native language; to us it’s too fast and the intonation is too subtle. This is a difference between the rhythms of the two languages.
Now look at a native user of ASL:
Not even close the the rhythm of spoken English.
This is not the first time I’ve discussed this fact. It goes all the way back to the beginning. Rule 5 to be exact:
https://uncledalesrulesforinterpreters.wordpress.com/2017/03/09/rule-5/
So, as a hearing interpreter your brain sees ASL, recognizes it as a language you understand, knows at a subconscious level that it’s not the rhythm of spoken English you are comfortable with-so your brain forces it into a pattern it likes; 4/4 Time with a back beat (think of the Beatles).
Voila, that weird interpreter cadence we all recognize is born. That cadence becomes the central thing upon which your brain attaches its focus. If the cadence is compromised by a concept that cannot be produced accurately within the comfortable cadence confusion ensues.
Not actual confusion as in the interpreter doesn’t understand the meaning. Confusion as in the meaning the interpreter understands does not fit in the rhythm that the interpreter’s brain has established. The rhythmic conflict causes the interpreter to second guess their understanding instead of seeing the flaw as a result their processing and production.
“Good to know,” you say. “What do I do about it?”
Ah. That’s the fun part.
Start with prosody.
https://uncledalesrulesforinterpreters.wordpress.com/2017/05/18/note-from-uncle-dale-prosody/
Figure out how the person for whom you are interpreting “makes themselves understood.” How do they show the beginning of an idea and the end of an idea. Figure out how they separate concepts that should be separated and connect propositions that must be connected. That is ALWAYS the first step.
Once you’ve got their discourse down, summarize in your head what happens in-between the beginning of an idea and the end of that idea. Then do the same with the next and the next…
A true summary is what you’d get if you threw the concept in a pot and boiled it down for 8 days.
The essence of the concept without the frills.
If you produced nothing but this idea the Client would have the required information (but none of it will be pretty).
Got it?
Now apply Uncle Dale’s Model of Interpreting to your summary.
Understand it in language A, say it in language B.
The Uncle Dale Model of Interpreting.
If you are working from ASL to Spoken English then understand it in Deaf and say it in Hearing.
If you are working from Spoken English to ASL the understand it in Hearing and say it in Deaf.
As needed apply the tool I gave you in the Note about necessity breeding simplicity I posted above.
If you pay attention to the meaning and not the form you can escape the Rhythm Trap.
Seems so simple.
For many of us it seems too simple.
That’s the problem. Big, insurmountable issues are often mentally and emotionally easier to deal with. If they are to big to fix we don’t need to try to fix them and we can tell ourselves to just be happy where we are.
But.
Big, insurmountable issues are rare.
Most of the time we look well beyond the actual issue because we believe the problem that has caused us so much frustration can’t be that simple.
But quite often, it is.
Let’s be honest. Simple solutions beg to be implemented. If the issue CAN be addressed we are honor bound to try to fix it. That means we have to practice. We HAVE to put the work in.
Yuck.
Maybe, we think, it would be better if there was just a flaw inside of us that we can’t fix because, well, that seems easier, less labor intensive.
Here is the most important part. Pay attention. Ready?
You can do this.
There is nothing “wrong” with your brain or your abilities. The issue is nothing that a well adjusted interpreter can’t work through.
It’s all just a matter of seeing the steps you need to take and then taking them.
You’ll be fine. Just work the process.
UD
*I’m not.
One of my favorite Notes!
This weekend I will be presenting at Colorado RID
I will give two workshops on Saturday:
Leaving Literal Translation Behind; and,
Ask Me Anything: Interpreting in Civil/Criminal Legal Settings
I will present Ask Me Anything: Interpreting in Civil/Criminal Legal Settings again on Sunday
(I may even try to look in on the student conference on Thursday 😋)
I am so very excited that CRID is partnering with DOVE for this conference. https://www.deafdove.org
I work with a sister organization, Sego Lily Center for Abused Deaf, here in Utah as often as I can. I cannot say enough good things about these organizations. They deserve our time and treasure and I am thrilled to do anything I can to support DOVE’s great work.
http://www.coloradorid.org/crid-conference-2019.html
Thank you for the invite CRID! Can’t wait to see you all there!
Interpreters sometimes get stuck in moments of error.
They set up a little research camp in that moment, and stay to more fully examine the mistake.
Sooner or later it requires permanent mental structures to house all the energy needed to roll the mistake over and over in your mind.
All the while the text has moved on and suddenly the interpreter realizes they are well and truly lost.
So they run after the text.
But don’t worry. They come back to the mistake on vacation, at about two-thirty the next morning, wide awake, in their bed.
But you don’t need to. Just remember this simple Rule:
If you’ve learned from a mistake you don’t need to dwell on it.
Just a friendly reminder:
Translator: doesn’t need pants.
Interpreter: probably needs pants.
Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.
Thank you Zac Chlew
Saturday, September 7, 2019, I was honored to be present at UAD’s annual conference in Ogden, Utah.
My workshop was an overview of Federal laws. I present it like each applicable law (the ADA, 501, 504, the ACA and IDEA) or Title thereof (ADA Titles I, II and III) are separate countries and we are all taking a tour and learning the culture and language of each.
This workshop is designed to be presented in a gym or large conference room and it takes six hours (two sessions of three hours each). I map the “laws/countries” out on the floor and the participants physically travel from one “law/country” to the next while we discuss the similarities and differences in each law/country’s history, language, culture, and customs.
It’s a big undertaking.
As you can imagine I’ve only been asked to do the full presentation a few times but each time has been amazing (I am thinking of organizing one for a Saturday in early November at the Utah Community Center for the Deaf and filming some of it so people or groups who are interested can see how it works). The first time I did it I had souvenirs from the different “laws/countries” the participants visited.
Like I said, it’s labor intensive for me to do the full tour and to do it right, but it’s worth it.
Usually I am asked to give a less involved version of it in a 2-3 hour time slot. It’s still a fantastic workshop but I sometimes feel like the participants are taking a tour by bullet-train!
In the 2-3 hour version the attendees stay in one place and I move (if you look at the top of the projector screen you can see one of our “stops” marked out.
This time I had just a little over an hour-so I really had to strip it down. Luckily, Jared Allebest’s presentation covered many of the details I had to edit out for time.
I was thrilled UAD asked me to present because the venue was a little bit of a homecoming for me. The conference room where I gave my presentation was right down the hall from my former office at The Utah Schools for the Deaf and Blind.
Back in the 1990’s I was the lead mentor for all of the interpreters working within the USDB system.
By the way, Jared Allebest, the guy I mentioned before, is an attorney who is Deaf here in Utah.
Yes. Utah has two attorneys who are fluent in ASL! (I’m just kidding. Utah actually has FOUR attorneys who are fluent in ASL. Two of us who are solo practitioners, one who works the for state in the juvenile court system and one who works with a firm in southern Utah-it’s kind of an embarrassment of wealth I will admit that).
My next two scheduled presentations will be on October 12, 2019 through Zaboosh on-line trainings. You can get more info here:
https://zaboosh.com/collections/frontpage/products/what-works-october-2019-conference
And
The Colorado RID Conference, October 18-20, 2019, details here:
http://www.coloradorid.org/crid-conference-2019.html
I’d love to meet you so if you see me don’t hesitate to come up to say hi!
It’s Saturday night! I’m feeling rebellious and wild. I may just go to a movie and LEAVE MY CELLPHONE IN THE CAR SO NO REFERRAL AGENCIES CAN TEXT ME! WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
(Though we both know I probably won’t…)
My original plan was to write one Note to tackle Interpersonal Dynamics: Deaf Client; Hearing Client; and, Team. But there is a lot to unpack in all these topics! So much that I split it into three.
I get calls and emails and texts (oh my) weekly-all asking the same question:
“What would you do if…”.
The details tend to diverge at that point, but the idea is the same.
What do you do when you don’t know what to do?
I addressed ethics and micro-audism in previous Notes. So let’s talk about interpersonal dynamics.
How do you, as the interpreter, relate to the other actors in the communication event?
The Deaf Client
There are all kinds of discussions to be had on this topic but the most interesting question I have been asked recently is:
What do I do if the Deaf Client doesn’t seem to like me?
The short answer to this is, “your job.”
Do your job and do it damn well. You are not the hearing world hospitality coordinator. There is no requirement that the Deaf Client likes you.
That thought is often WAY too much for some interpreters to handle. The idea that-gasp-someone may not like you plagues some interpreters to the point of eyes-wide-open-in-the-middle-of-the-night distraction. But here is the hard truth, nobody has to like you all the time, not your significant other, not your mother, not a stranger on the street and certainly not the Deaf Client.
The Deaf Client does not have to like you. They just have to trust your skills.
I have discussed this before so I ask you to indulge my saying this again, but it is important. There is a level of ambivalence that always exist between the Deaf Client and the interpreter. This cognitive dissonance is factory installed in the Interpreter/Deaf Client interpersonal dynamic.
Deaf Clients, no matter what relationship they may have with you as a person, tend to greet your work with both appreciation and frustration (it is entirely possible to hold two varied feelings about the same thing with no contradiction). In other words, it’s fine to feel conflicted without any conflict.
Why? Well. Think of it this way:
Imagine that, in order to breathe, you must employ the services of a person who touches the end of your nose, a person who is specifically trained and endorsed to do so-a Certified Nose Toucher.
Now, it may not be that you can’t breathe without the CNT, but in order to breathe effectively, and specifically at times of stress or when breathing effectively is vital, the services of a professional, certified “Nose Toucher” is needed (can’t do it for yourself, oh and you have horrible memories of the education system trying to teach you to touch your nose with your elbow, and everyone seems to have a suggestion of installing dubious microchips in your nose, but I digress).
So, how would you feel toward the “Nose Toucher?”
You would of course appreciate the CNT each and every time you took a clear and effective breath. But, you would also resent the fact that you had to depend on this other person for something so basic as breathing, resent that the world, as it is, forces this reality.
You would surely be angry each time someone talked to the CNT instead of you, as if you were unable to think instead of breathe.
Out of necessity you will spend a great deal of time with a CNT and so you may develop a relationship of sorts-maybe outside of the realm of “nose touching.” That relationship may even develop into a friendship (but that can lead to problems of its own. A blurry line between friend and professional can be dangerous).
Of course sometimes you will be assigned a CNT that you just do not like. That’s a whole new level of frustration.
In the end no matter how much you appreciate the work of the professional, Certified, “Nose Toucher” and despite perhaps liking some of the CNTs, they are people you MUST be with, not people you choose to be with. Every time they do their job you are grateful for it and at the same time reminded of the fact that you are inescapably dependent on them.
Appreciation and frustration.
Sometimes the frustration wins and you want to go into the bathroom all alone-just accepting that you will choke. Sometimes you would rather just choke.
I have had newly certified former students mention in passing that a Deaf Client (don’t worry-I taught them not to mention names or details) left the appointment without saying goodbye or thank you.
“Did you get paid?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“Then you’re fine. You can expect to get paid or get a thank you, you will sometimes get both, but you should never expect both.”
In the interests of full disclosure I did not come upon this zen attitude all at once or even overnight. I grew up with raging ADHD in an era where that was not well understood. I was tested in school over and over without conclusive results. It was finally determined that I was clinically obnoxious and they just went with it. I learned that many people were willing to remind me that I can be irritating.
But I’m not irritating or obnoxious. I’m funny, I’m excited and I’m interested in many things (often at the same time) they are irritated by me and I am under no obligation to change me-but I should change my behavior in situations where it would not be appropriate to be… well… too much like me (but again, I digress).
There are many Deaf Clients who request me but I know for a fact don’t like me. They request the skills not the person.
On the other hand I have shown up to appointments to interpret for friends who are Deaf and been told, “not you, not today.”
I know that there are a thousand possible reasons that this Deaf Client wants an interpreter other than me for this appointment, and, luckily, every single one of these reasons is none of my business.
In the end it doesn’t matter in the slightest who you and this person who is Deaf are to each other out in the world, friend or foe or neutral, in here you are the Interpreter they are the Client and the dynamic needs be no more complicated than that.
Uncle Dale's Rules for Interpreters 