Composición y estructura de los paseriformes palustres nidificantes más representativos en el Prat.

During the first Critical Link conference, Roberts (1997) expressed some doubts as to how interpreters could adopt various roles in an IME. Since then, research has demonstrated that the interpreter’s role is in fact a fluid notion. For instance, when discussing which role to adopt, Niska (2002) argues that his pyramid represents the fact that the interpreter’s role is not static, but rather is fluid as the

51 interpreter can move from one role to another. The idea that the interpreter does not play only one role, but that she adopts various roles within an IME has been supported by various scholars. For instance, Pöchhacker (2008b, p. 13) argues that the interpreter does not adopt one role in an IME, but she can be “posited along a continuum of active involvement and intervention, ranging from the least active, such as a neutral messenger, to the most involved, such as a negotiator.” It seems that the various role labels discussed in Sections 1.1 and 1.2 above form a continuum along which the interpreter can adopt many roles depending on how involved and visible she is as an interactive person.

Defining the role as a continuum where the interpreter is more or less active is argued by other scholars. For instance, in her study, Bot (2009) identifies a continuum (Figure 2 below) which contains three main roles.

In her study, Bot lists several role labels defining the role of the interpreter within an IME, and she argues that:

As each of the models considered involved varying degrees of

“interactiveness” or “machines”, a continuum could be constructed. In practice, the interpreter and the professional user move along this

continuum within one assignment, adopting different positions that depend on the immediate communicative context and on their own (normative) ideas about how to behave. (Bot, 2009, p. 121)

According to Bot, the interpreter as a machine and the interpreter as an interactive participant are role labels located at the opposite ends of the spectrum, which concurs with Pöchhacker (2008b)’s findings. She acknowledges that the

interpreter’s role is changing throughout one assignment, based on the following two criteria: (1) the communicative need arising from the context, and (2) the interpreter’s own perception of their professional role. Such an approach reflects Niska’s pyramid where the conduit model is situated at the opposite end of the advocate, and the interpreter is more or less visible in her own right as a

participant in the IME. Interestingly, she argues that although her study focuses on Translation machine Interactive interpreter Interpreter as participant

52 psychotherapeutic IMEs, her continuum could be applied to other contexts where an interpreter is present, with the exception of the legal sphere. She states that:

In different institutional settings, there will be different normative

judgements about these positions. In police interviews, court settings and other adversarial situations, the position of the interpreter as participant is very restricted – interpreters will try to steer away from the participant end of the continuum and try to stay as close as possible to the translation machine end. In the healthcare, however, the interactive position is often preferred and the interpreter as participant is allowed. (Bot, 2009, p. 122) According to Bot, the court interpreter adopts an approach that is closer to the translation machine ideology, unlike in a medical setting. However, such a stance contradicts Hale (2008)’s model above, as in her observations, the court

interpreter adopts a more interactive approach, and no reference to the conduit model is made. Bot (2009)’s continuum and Niska (2002)’s pyramid both

demonstrate that the notion of role is fluid and that interpreters can adopt various role labels within one IME. However, their models could be misleading in the sense that, although the interpreter can change her role, it could be inferred that the transition from one role to another is done gradually.

In a similar line of thought Mason substitutes the notion of role by that of

positioning in order to “reflect the constantly evolving nature of interaction among participants in interpreter-mediated encounters” (Mason, 2009, p.53). The term ‘positioning’ refers to the possibility of moving from one role to the other,

depending on the IME’s specific situational requirements. Furthermore, adding to Bot (2009)’s view, that the interpreter’s role depends on the communicative needs and the interpreter’s perception of her own role, he argues that “by their

conversational moves, participants position themselves and others and are, in turn, positioned by others’ moves” (Mason, 2009, p. 53). Interestingly, he

describes positioning as being a reflexive action executed by the interpreter, which is also influenced by the other participants’ perceptions.

Overall, it appears that the interpreter can adopt various roles within one IME, which depends on the communicative needs, the interpreter’s perception of her role, and the other participants’ perception. However, findings on the fluidity of the court interpreter’s role seem to be inconclusive, as some studies argue that her role is in fact quite close to that of the conduit model, whereas others demonstrate

53 that her role is as fluid as in other contexts. The next sub-section examines the extent to which research on the interpreter’s role translates into practice through interpreters’ codes of conduct.