This book provides cognitive-cum-linguistic analyses of political speeches simultaneously translated from English into Arabic and vice versa. It focuses on how media interpreters, especially TV ones, cognitively address the source texts in the process of translating them in real time.

Exploring the Cognitive Processes of Simultaneous Interpreting: English — Arabic — English Dynamics approaches English-Arabic-English simultaneous interpreting from a cognitive-cum-linguistic vantage point. Amr M. El-Zawawy focuses on how media interpreters, especially on TV, cognitively address the source texts in the process of translating them in real time. The corpora used — simultaneous interpretations of televised political speeches — and the rigorous methodology applied attest to the variety and depth of the analyses carried out, and the examples given attest to the linguistic and cognitive processes that interpreters perform in order to communicate meaning. This book will be an invaluable asset to any student and researcher of translation, particularly of simultaneous interpreting. The book also provides significant insights into the underexplored questions of the difficulties of simultaneously translating Arabic, a language spoken by around 420 million people today.

Simultaneous interpretation is among the most complex of human cognitive/linguistic activities. This study, which will interest practitioners and trainers as well as linguists, draws more on linguistics-based theories of cognition in communication (cognitive semantics and pragmatics) than on the traditional information-processing approaches of cognitive psychology, and shows SI to be a valuable source of data on language and cognition.Starting from semantic representations of input and output in samples of professional SI from Chinese and German into English, the analysis explains the classic phenomena – anticipation, restoration of the implicit-explicit balance, and communicative re-packaging (‘re-ostension’) of the discourse – in terms of an intermediate cognitive model in working memory, allowing a more unitary view of resource management in the SI task. Relevance-theoretic analysis of the input discourse reveals rich pragmatic information guiding the construction of the appropriate contexts and the speaker’s underlying intentionalities. The course of meaning assembly is reconstructed in annotated synchronised transcripts.

This book examines conference-level simultaneous interpreting from a signed language into a spoken language, drawing on Auslan (Australian Sign Language)-to-English simultaneous interpretation data to explore the skills, knowledge, strategies, and cognitive abilities needed for effective interpretations in this language direction. As simultaneous interpreting from a spoken language into a signed language is the widely accepted norm within the field of signed language interpreting, to date little has been written on simultaneous interpreting in the other language direction. In an attempt to bridge this gap, Wang conducts microanalysis of an experimental corpus of Auslan-to-English simultaneous interpretations in a mock conference setting to investigate different dimensions of quality assessment, interpreting strategies, cognitive load, and the interpreting process itself. The focus on conference-level simultaneous interpreting not only allows for insights into the impact of signed language variation on the signed-to-spoken language simultaneous interpreting process but also sheds light on the unique demands of conference settings such as the requirement of using a formal register. Acting as a bridge between spoken language interpreting studies and signed language interpreting studies and highlighting implications for future research on simultaneous interpreting of other language combinations (spoken and signed), this book will be of interest to scholars in translation and interpreting studies as well as active practitioners in these fields.

"Research examines the components that enable interpreters to perform successfully"--

This groundbreaking work offers a comprehensive account of brain-based research on translation and interpreting. First, the volume introduces the methodological and conceptual pillars of psychobiological approaches vis-à-vis those of other cognitive frameworks. Next, it systematizes neuropsychological, neuroscientific, and behavioral evidence on key topics, including the lateralization of networks subserving cross-linguistic processes; their relation with other linguistic mechanisms; the functional organization and temporal dynamics of the circuits engaged by different translation directions, processing levels, and source-language units; the system’s susceptibility to training-induced plasticity; and the outward correlates of its main operations. Lastly, the book discusses the field’s accomplishments, strengths, weaknesses, and requirements. Its authoritative yet picturesque, didactic style renders it accessible to researchers in cognitive translatology, bilingualism, and neurolinguistics, as well as teachers and practitioners in related areas. Succinctly, this piece establishes a much-needed platform for translation and interpreting studies to fruitfully interact with cognitive neuroscience.

This book addresses eye movements and gestures as markers of language comprehension and production in interpreting as the "visible embodiment" of cognitive processing in simultaneous and consecutive interpreting. It discusses conference interpreting as a complex, multimodal activity where language processing is not restricted to auditory perception and oral production, highlighting the complexity of interpreting and exploring possible strategies that can be used by professional interpreters and students to make their work easier and more accurate.