CURSO ACADÉMICO 2011 – 2012

2.1 The European Parliament as a source of naturalistic data

Before the day and age of the Internet, naturalistic data on simultaneous interpreting was difficult to obtain. While a single speech with its interpretation could have been recorded from TV, the best way to compile a large corpus of such data was to actually work as an interpreter at a given conference and ask everyone involved (organisers, speakers and interpreting colleagues) for permission to record material and use it for scientific analysis (as described, for example, by Pöchhacker 1994, extensively analysing material from the 36th World Congress of the International Council for Small Business held in Vienna in June 1991). Certainly, this constituted a major hurdle for observational research, firstly, because not every researcher is an active interpreter, and secondly, because not always permission to record the proceedings can be obtained – be it for the reasons of confidentiality or the negative attitude of interpreters, many of whom feel vulnerable to possible criticism involved in analysing their output (see, e.g., Gile 2000). Even if all the relevant consents are granted, the researcher may meet with obstacles of a technical nature that make the recording process very difficult (as reported, among others, by Diriker 2004: 56–59). Last but not least, the knowledge that their interpretations would be used in research might, to some extent, influence the interpreters to behave differently than they would in other circumstances (on the researcher’s possible interference, see, e.g., Schjoldager 1995 and Diriker 2004: 52).

Since the advent of the Internet, observational research has been becoming easier as more and more interpretations are available on-line. For example, nowadays, in order to study TV interpreting, the researcher does not have to know the exact timing of events that will be broadcast and to program recording equipment in advance: the relevant

speeches together with their interpretations can often be downloaded even some time later from websites of TV channels. Similarly, many conferences have their own websites with live streaming as well as the possibility to download some speeches as audio or video files after the conference (although not always both the source text and the interpretation are available). As far as on-line interpreting data are concerned, however, the website of the European Parliament must be considered a real treasure for interpreting research, not comparable to any other source of naturalistic material.

As already stated in the previous chapter, the European Parliament can be regarded as the most multilingual of all the EU institutions, since it operates on the daily basis with 24 working languages.¹ It needs about 100,000 interpreter days per year (European Parliament 2013). We certainly should remember that in fact most interpreting assignments take place outside the plenary and without the full language regime, but it is exactly the plenary sessions that act as

“the icon of multilingual European democracy” (Kent 2014: 163) and receive the lion’s share of attention from scholars engaged in interpreting research.

The head of the Directorate-General for Interpretation and Conferences Olga Cosmidou (2013: 129) paints an idyllic picture of the European Parliament as “a temple of multilingualism” and “the exact opposite of the Tower of Babel, where people spoke different languages but did not understand each other – it is the ‘anti-Babel’;

it is lively, interesting, and fascinating” (p. 130). In principle, all the plenary speeches can be watched via the website of the EP, either in real time or afterwards (with rare exceptions due to some technical problems). At the time when the majority of data for this study was downloaded (2014), original speeches delivered since January 2008 were available together with their interpretations into all the other working

1 This number does not include sign languages. During the parliamentary term 2009–2014, seven interpreters for the Hungarian Sign Language were employed additionally, to meet the needs of the deaf MEP from Hungary, Ádám Kósa (see Kent 2014: 41). As he was also elected for the next term 2014–2019, the Hungarian Sign Language continues to be used in the European Parliament. Another deaf MEP elected for the 2014–2019 term is Helga Stevens from Belgium, who is a native speaker of the Flemish Sign Language, but also fluent in British and American Sign Languages (as she states in an interview of 3 October 2014, available at http://www.

europeanvoice.com/video/interview-with-helga-stevens/). The practical arrangements for sign language interpreting are slightly different than for spoken languages, of course, as the interpreters do not sit in booths and do not make use of the typical equipment.

2.1 The European Parliament as a source of naturalistic data 4545 languages at the time of their delivery.² This makes for seven years’

worth of interpreting material by the end of 2014, with new material being added with each parliamentary session. Of course, the videos are not published for the sake of researchers, but rather so that European citizens can exercise democratic control over their elected representatives.

Nevertheless, as a side effect, interpreting research has been provided with a very valuable source of naturalistic data. The speeches can be watched on-line or downloaded; the latter option is useful if we need to have a single video with two audio tracks representing the original and the interpretation into a particular language (e.g., to examine ear-voice span). A simple method of creating such a video is described by Liontou (2013).

The database, available at http://www.europarl.europa.eu/ep-live/en /plenary, has many obvious advantages (see also Monti et al. 2005 and Bendazolli 2010). First of all, we must consider its sheer size. In the years 2005 to 2012, the number of working days with plenary sessions ranged from 50 to 65 per year (full-day or half-day sittings).

On average, plenary speeches total about 430 hours per year.³ As to the share of official languages spoken in plenary, Table 3 reproduced from a 2013 report prepared by the Committee on Budgetary Control

Table 3. Languages spoken in the plenary over the period of 3.5 years, from September 2009 until February 2013 (European Parliament 2013)

Language Minutes Share

[%] Language Minutes Share

[%]

English 26,979 29.1 Slovak 1,573 1.7

German 12,556 13.6 Swedish 1,338 1.4

French 8,841 9.5 Finnish 1,108 1.2

Italian 7,908 8.5 Danish 805 0.9

Polish 7,115 7.7 Bulgarian 612 0.7

Spanish 5,357 5.8 Lithuanian 476 0.5

Greek 4,528 4.9 Slovene 450 0.5

Romanian 2,831 3.1 Gaelic 265 0.3

Hungarian 2,596 2.8 Latvian 239 0.3

Dutch 2,570 2.8 Maltese 195 0.2

Portuguese 2,495 2.7 Estonian 109 0.1

Czech 1,651 1.8 To t a l 92,597 100.0

2 Under Rule 182 of the European Parliament’s Rules of Procedure, the plenary debates should always remain on the website during the current and the next parliamentary term and be preserved in the records afterwards.

3 Calculated on the basis of the data in Table 3.

of the European Parliament should give us a good idea (although due to its timeframe, it still does not include the newest official language, Croatian). Not surprisingly, English is dominating, but still its share is less than one third (which is very modest in comparison with the share of English as the source language for translation at the DGT, already mentioned in the previous chapter: 81% in 2013). Smaller member states obviously have fewer MEPs, but even so, the data suggest that certain nationalities (e.g., the Nordic ones) are more likely to choose a language different than their mother tongue as their means of expression.

During each plenary session about 1,000 interpreters are on hand to cover all the official languages. The range of topics includes all the fields regulated by EU legislation and is therefore very wide. Some speeches (e.g., those celebrating important anniversaries, awards, etc.) are more general and some are strictly technical. Their length varies from one sentence to 20–30 minutes, with most of the speeches falling between 2 and 6 minutes.

Secondly, as a source of data, the database is truly egalitarian. The website can be accessed with equal ease by seasoned researchers as well as complete beginners, for instance students looking for material for a BA thesis in interpreting studies. It can be used for large-scale research projects and very small case studies, like Bartłomiejczyk (2012), which focuses on a single interpreter’s interventions in just one short speech. With egalitarianism also goes transparency, as everybody can access the source and target texts analysed by a particular scholar and check the plausibility of his/her results and conclusions.

Thirdly, the database is searchable according to a few useful criteria, including date, speaker and keyword. However, not all the search criteria that might be important for interpreting research are available;

for example, it is not possible to search for speeches in a particular length range or originally delivered in a given language, not to mention parameters such as speaking speed.

Fourthly, as speeches and their interpretations are routinely recorded and placed on-line, the observation does not exert any influence which could change the processes involved. Both speakers and interpreters might certainly realise that their output can undergo some scholarly scrutiny, but they are in no position to predict either which material will be selected or what research questions will be put forward.

Observational research of this kind does not require any co-operation on the part of the subjects or the physical presence of the researcher in Strasbourg or Brussels. Certainly, product analysis might also be supplemented with some valuable process data obtained from the

2.1 The European Parliament as a source of naturalistic data 47 interpreters involved, for exemple, interviews or retrospective protocols (as, e.g., in Monacelli 2009 or Kajzer-Wietrzny 2013), but this is hardly obligatory and in many cases even not necessary. Moreover, in order to obtain process data, the interpreters would have to be informed in advance that their output would be scrutinised.

Last but not least, to set off the fact that much interpreting research is carried out on interpreting students and therefore cannot claim to reflect the professional practice (see, e.g., Shlesinger 1998: 2), any study based on material from this database is undoubtedly carried out on well-qualified professionals working in homogeneous and relatively predictable conditions. All EP interpreters, whether they are staff or freelance,⁴ have to undergo a strict selection procedure, checking both their interpreting skills and their background knowledge about the European Union. All the interpreters have to pass accreditation tests to become eligible for recruitment, and those wishing to be permanently employed participate in open competitions for available posts.⁵ Moreover, considerable experience in interpreting other EP meetings is needed before an interpreter actually begins to interpret plenary sessions: “interpreters get to work in EP plenary meetings only after they have been recommended by their head of booth as being ready for plenary assignments, which as a rule happens only after several years” (Duflou 2014: 131).

The interpreters’ working conditions and workload are governed by a set of precise rules defining, for example, the minimum conditions to be met by the booths. However, it is rather surprising that, as pointed out by Apostolou (2013: 104), there is no specific code of professional ethics applying to interpreters working for EU institutions (although many of them may be members of professional associations which possess their own codes, such as AIIC).

4 In 2011, 52.26% of interpreting services were provided by staff interpreters, and 47.74% by freelance interpreters (European Parliament 2013).

5 As pointed out by Duflou (2014: 92), “Quality standards are maintained […] by strictly controlling access to employment for interpreters (through staff competitions and ACI accreditation tests).” The pass rate of accreditation tests is around 30%, and of competitions even lower – 20–25% (p. 117). Within DG INTE, as she further explains, the accreditation tests are treated as the main tool for quality control, whereas ongoing quality monitoring by heads of Language Units and senior staff interpreters is seen rather as a formality “intended only to confirm that an interpreter is performing adequately and only in rare cases to report serious shortcomings and deal with them”

(p. 92). On the other hand, in the interviews Duflou conducted with EU interpreters, the accreditation tests were often described using the “driving license metaphor,” that is, the interpreters treated them as a proof of meeting some minimum standards and a basis for further extensive on-the-job learning.

Admittedly, analysing material in whose recording the researcher did not participate has also its disadvantages. For example, without specialist software it is sometimes difficult to determine whether or not two interpretations were delivered by the same interpreter. There is also no possibility to know whether the interpreter had the transcript of a particular speech in advance and, if that was the case, how much time was available for preparation. Another very important question is which language version was the actual source text for a particular interpretation. As already explained in the previous chapter, due to the steep rise in the number of official languages, many language combinations are handled in relay, which means that the interpreter is not listening to the original speech, but to an interpretation delivered by a colleague from a different booth who knows the source language.

For interpretations from some “widely used” languages, like English, German or French, we can, however, safely assume that they are done directly from the original. In case of doubt, information as to which interpretations were direct and which relay can be obtained from the head of the relevant language unit (personal communication from Rita Cappelli).

In addition, the EP website also offers a database of verbatim reports in all the official languages (available at http://www.europarl.

europa.eu/plenary/en/debates.html). Each speech is put on record in the original language. However, it must be noted that in spite of their name, the reports are not, in fact, word-for-word, that is, the texts are normally smoothed out to remove, for example, contractions (such as don’t or gonna), false starts and unfinished sentences, the syntax is also sometimes changed to more standard (see also Monti at al.

2005). In spite of this, the verbatim report constitutes a good basis for transcription of a source text, as putting back all the “imperfections”

omitted by the verbatim reporter certainly takes much less time and effort than transcribing the source text from scratch. There is also the convenient possibility to search the database, and not only according to keywords, but also to any word contained in the text, which may prove very useful for some research (see Bartłomiejczyk forthcoming).

Until July 2011, except for being written down, each speech was translated into all the other official languages (which took up to four months). In 2011, the Bureau of the European Parliament decided to limit translation of verbatim reports to English only, with a view to cost reduction. This move was widely criticised as going against the principle of multilingualism by favouring one language over all the others. Finally, on 20 November 2012, amendments to the EP’s Rules of Procedure were voted through to the effect that verbatim reports

49 2.2 Input for interpreting: Some characteristics…

would be published as multilingual documents containing all the contributions only in their original languages. This change does not, in fact, have detrimental effect on interpreting research, as written translations obviously differ a lot from interpretations of the same text and therefore cannot serve as a basis for transcription of interpretations.

However, it may put some additional burden on interpreters, who must realise that now the only option for citizens wishing to consult a speech in a language they do not understand is to watch the relevant video and rely on the simultaneous interpretation, in spite of the disclaimer stating that it does not constitute the authentic record of proceedings.

MEPs also have the possibility to ask for an extract they are interested in to be translated in writing into any of the official languages.

Having elaborated on the usefulness of the widely accessible on-line databases, which are the primary sources tapped for my own research described in this monograph and elsewhere (Bartłomiejczyk forthcoming), I must also mention EP interpreters themselves as valuable providers of data for interpreting research. The frequently deplored unwillingness of professional interpreters to participate in research seems to be contradicted or at least put to question as regards this particular group by studies analysing material obtained directly from EP interpreters and involving a high degree of cooperation with researchers.

Some studies are based on introspective material from interviews or questionnaires (Kent 2009; 2014; Van Dam and Zethsen 2013; Duflou 2014), some even on input obtained in experimental conditions (Kajzer-Wietrzny 2012; 2013). Occasionally, freelance interpreters working for EU institutions engage in research more deeply than just in the role of participants, thus becoming informed “practisearchers” (Vuorikoski 2004; Duflou 2014).

2.2 Input for interpreting: Some characteristics of EP plenary discourse

Plenary sessions account for only a part of the workload of EP interpreters and constitute a quite different, more formal and more demanding setting than, for example, meetings of political groups or committee meetings, which, for any given topic, take place at earlier stages of the legislative process. Marzocchi (1998: 69) describes them as “[t]he apex of an interpreter’s work at the EP, both in terms of peer recognition and in terms of effort.” A detailed analysis of speeches produced by Members of the European Parliament and other speakers

taking the floor during plenary sessions lies outside the scope of this book; however, I would like to provide some information on those aspects that may have a very direct influence on interpreting.

First of all, it must be pointed out that the plenary sessions are highly organised events. The detailed agenda (available to the interpreters) is drawn up in advance by the Conference of Presidents of the political groups.⁶ Each sitting is chaired by the President of the European Parliament or one of 14 Vice-presidents, who always opens and closes the sitting and gives the floor to subsequent speakers. The chairing President is therefore the person who manages the turn-taking, because no microphone will be turned on unless authorised by him/

her.⁷ If the speaker departs from the subject or exceeds his/her allotted speaking time, the President may call him/her to order or even signal to the technician to turn off this speaker’s microphone. It is also the President’s role to admonish speakers who deliver their contributions too fast for the interpreters (see Bartłomiejczyk forthcoming for more details).

Most of the speakers are Members of the European Parliament, but the sittings are also attended by representatives of the European Commission and the European Council, who often make declarations or respond to questions put by Members. In fact, in one of the debates analysed by Beaton (2007: 103), whose research will be discussed more extensively later in this chapter, as much as 25% of the speaking time was taken up by the Council and 23% – by the Commission, which is by no means untypical. The floor is also often given to invited guests from outside the EU institutions, such as visiting heads of state (e.g., Joe Biden in 2010), religious leaders (e.g., Pope Francis in 2014) or laureates of the Sakharov Prize (e.g., Malala Yousefzai in 2013). The guest may sometimes speak in other language than the 24 official languages, which inevitably necessitates relay interpreting.

As compared to other EP meetings, plenary sessions are considered particularly demanding (and therefore normally not entrusted to novice interpreters) due not only to the media exposure and wider public

6 “In the hemicycle/Plenary meetings, interpreters are provided with the program

6 “In the hemicycle/Plenary meetings, interpreters are provided with the program