ATA Interpreters Division

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Preparing to Interpret at a Conference: Lessons Learned from a Healthcare and Court Interpreter

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By Liz Essary   During my training as a conference interpreter, some of the most important advice I got was this: Don’t crush your listener with a wall of sound.  But what does that mean? It took me a while to figure it out. Rather than parroting a word-for-word monotone (and likely meaningless) rendition of what the speaker’s saying, you must process the message … [Read more...]

A Tale of Two Fields: Doing Research on Interpreting

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By Deborah Giustini For most interpreters, whether they work in healthcare, media, asylums, international conferences, business meetings and so forth, the very idea of research – and doing research – on interpreting may be nebulous. The life of interpreters is a notably practical, hands-on and real-time occupation, and our training focuses mainly on acquiring the necessary … [Read more...]

United Nations: The Language Competitive Examination (LCE)

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  By Maha El-Metwally To become a staff interpreter at the United Nations, one must pass the Language Competitive Examination (LCE). This exam has always had a low pass rate that seldom exceeded 20%. With many staff interpreters retiring by 2018, a shortage of qualified interpreters in certain language combinations exists and needs to be addressed. This led the UN to … [Read more...]

The Trials and Tribulations of a Community Interpreter: Conference Interpreting, here we go! – Part 2

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By Pency Tsai   Here it is! Part 2 of “The Bird’s” venture into conference interpreting. We would love to hear from you on your own experiences delving into other venues of interpreting, so don’t forget to leave your comment.   Read Part 1 here Conference interpreting is an altogether different kind of beast.  I still remember my first attempt at … [Read more...]