IW 126: InterpreTips: Interpreter, Interpret Thyself

To be or not to be true to yourself! That is the topic today.

How do we do what we do and be our authentic selves? Are we hiding behind the interpretation or suppressing who we are? Are we changing ourselves for the better?

We need to self-reflect and interpret who we are on a regular basis to assess how we are doing personally, and professionally. This not only ensures we improve our skills in the profession, but also reminds us of who we are and to give ourselves permission to let go of the situations we find ourselves in when interpreting.

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Transcript

IW 126: InterpreTips: Interpreter, Interpret Thyself

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[ROCK INTRO MUSIC STARTS]

00:00:02 Tim [ONLY TIM IS SPEAKING IN THIS EPISODE]

Good morning, good evening, good afternoon. Wherever you are, this is the Interpreter's Workshop podcast. I'm Tim Curry, your host. Here we talk everything sign language interpreting the ins, the outs, the ups, the downs, the sideways of interpreting. If you're a student, a new interpreter, experienced interpreter, this is the place for you. If you want to know more, go to interpretersworkshop.com.

00:00:28 

Let's start talking... interpreting.

[ROCK INTRO MUSIC ENDS]

00:00:35

And now the quote of the day by William Shakespeare, spoken by Polonius in Hamlet.

00:00:44

“To thine own self be true.”

00:00:47

The meaning of this phrase is one should be true to their own principles with who they are. That one should not try to please other people by changing what they believe or how they behave, or acting differently than they normally would. If you believe that is the meaning of “To thine own self be true”, Hmm. Can an interpreter do this?

00:01:12

Can we be true to ourselves who we are, what we believe, how we behave when we are interpreting someone else's intentions, someone else's beliefs, someone else's goals, attitudes, behaviors, thoughts? Umm…

00:01:3/0

Interpreter, interpret yourself.

00:01:32

Let's get started.

[SHORT TRANSITION MUSIC]

00:01:39

There's a lot of buzz over the last few years, a lot of discussion about the topic of being authentic, transparent.

00:01:48

But what does that mean for an interpreter?

00:01:51

In our daily work, how can we be authentic? How can we be transparent when we have to remember that we are being professional, ethical, impartial, keeping confidentiality, not giving advice from our own opinions or perspectives, trying to respect the clients that we're working with, and their points of views, their beliefs, their behaviors, not judging, being able to express their authentic message to the other person. And at times those people are being nontransparent. 

00:02:32

They're trying to hide their true feelings or trying to hide their real goals, where they're trying to persuade someone to do something that they normally wouldn't do, all of those things can affect how we somehow try to be authentic or transparent. It's a conflict.

00:02:52

Especially if we don't agree with the message that someone else is saying or we know that it's a lie, or we know that it's probably trying to manipulate someone, such as in a courtroom or a sales pitch or a teacher somehow is teaching something that's not quite right…

00:03:12

…or they're teaching something that you disagree with. Perhaps you're interpreting in a religious setting that you're not actually a member of. We've all done it. We've all worked in areas where our opinion does not necessarily agree with the opinion of those in the group.

00:03:30

Certainly whenever someone is being autistic, they're being discriminatory or they're throwing up barriers for the deaf community, we don't agree with that, but are we keeping it impartial or are we showing our true feelings, our true attitude about that?

00:03:50

Should we keep our feelings hidden when we disagree with someone who's speaking, whether they're Deaf or hearing? How do you handle the situation when you completely disagree with what's being said? Do you continue to do your job, your work? I would go back to my very first no, my very second… [chuckles]

00:04:09

…episode 1, Not 0. Episode 1, I talk about “Mom, it's going to be OK.” When she found out what I do as an interpreter, she wanted to make sure that I was not going to be saying the bad words that people might sometimes say those curse words or cuss words, as we say, because that's not the way I was raised.

00:04:33

And I told her that I had to interpret what the person said. Otherwise, no one else would know what they had said. All clients have the right to know someone else's expressions so they can decide on their own whether or not they think these are true or not true or the person’s character is showing.

00:04:58

Everyone has the right to know what was truly said so they can make their own judgments, their own decisions. On many things. It affects the dialogue, it affects the discourse, the dynamic exchange between the two parties.

00:05:14

So, I have an obligation as an interpreter to allow for that to happen through my interpretation.

00:05:21

So that means that I'm being authentic and transparent about the source messages, not necessarily about myself. Or do I sometimes show my own opinions, my own feelings when I'm interpreting? And why would I do that? And why would I not do that?

00:05:42

Let's talk about that, in a minute. How we can or cannot show authenticity, transparency from ourselves.

[SHORT TRANSITION MUSIC]

00:05:57

Not being able to show our true selves all the time, not being able to pick the speakers that completely agree with what we say all the time can cause difficulties for us as interpreters.

00:06:13

It causes some emotional baggage that we as interpreters try to get rid of. Try to alleviate so that we continue doing our jobs as well as having a personal life that is without stress or less stress, that's probably better.

00:06:30

And the difficulties with this come from the age-old questions that we talk about, those ethical dilemmas, those moral conflicts, the conflicts that we have between ethics and morals, professionalism and beliefs. 

00:06:49

We have professionalism or professional ethics that says we should act and behave according to our codes of ethics, the professions, norms and standards of our conduct when we are actually doing the job of interpreting. These also govern how we interact with the clients, how we conduct our business.

00:07:12

And during our work, we sometimes have those moral dilemmas where sometimes our morals contradict what the ethics say, because the ethics listed in the codes are not as flexible as real life.

00:07:29

Those demands that we have in our job change with so many variables, and yet our morals are very similar to the rigidity of ethics or the flexibility of real life, each of us have a belief or a norm or philosophy that we follow that this is something I don't cross or this is something that I will never do. But then there are some things in real life that happen that conflict with that, and we sometimes have to make a decision what we do.

00:08:02

Because our personal belief conflicts with the ethical code or the professional conduct that I should adhere to while working, and that's connected to how authentic we are to ourselves. How transparent we are to the clients.

00:08:22

I've been talking about extremes, ethical boundaries that we would not cross.

00:08:29

But there are little things that we do every single day in an assignment.

00:08:36

That we cross the line that we kind of hide how we feel.

00:08:42

Sometimes clients talk to us about an opinion of theirs about this or that, and we find ourselves not giving our opinion, just kind of nodding or saying, “Ohh, I see what you mean. Yeah. Yeah”. That type of non-committal expression means that…

00:09:02

For them, they might perceive it as we are in agreement with what they're saying, because we're trying to be impartial. We're trying to respect their own view. We're trying to not interfere or give them stress in their situation, allowing them to trust us that we will impart what they're saying, what they believe. And I believe [chuckles at “believe”] that we should do that.

00:09:28

I believe that we should respect our clients in that environment. That's what we're doing as an interpreter is respecting their views, showing their views, expressing their views in the other language so that everyone understands each other through their eyes, to the best of our ability.

00:09:48

But what that does to us as an interpreter is it hides our true selves. It means that we are hidden our true beliefs because we don't want to affect the outcome. We don't want to affect the situation. We don't want to make someone else's decision about another person or another person's beliefs for them. We want them to make the decision by what the person has said and what they see, not how we feel.

00:10:19

But that means are we being authentic to ourselves? Are we being transparent and truthful?

00:10:25

Can we truly convey someone else's goals and intentions and beliefs in the message if we don't agree with that?

00:10:35

If we don't agree with their intention or their belief, can we?

[ROCK TRANISTION MUSIC STARTS]

00:10:41

Wow, this is some deep philosophical ramblings. I mean, thoughts. Why don't you go grab yourself another coffee? And while you're at it, click on the links in the show notes and Buy Me A Coffee too. See what I did there? Thank you for supporting the show.

[ROCK TRANISTION MUSIC ENDS]

00:10:58

Now let's go back to the discussion of does interpreting actually change who we are. When we're not authentic or transparent? While we're working, at least openly, does the act of hiding ourselves that way change our own perceptions of what we believe or what we feel is correct to show, to express?

00:11:23

Hiding our own ethical, moral thoughts or beliefs, does that suppress them to a level that we start to change our belief or make them less important to us?

00:11:37

Does it cause us to think outside of our own boundaries and borders and become more flexible?

00:11:44

How does it affect us?

00:11:46

Does it make us less truthful to ourselves, less honest to our clients? Does it make us more respectful, or is it respecting others when we're holding back our own thoughts, our own beliefs? Is that truly impartial?

00:12:04

Very deep philosophical thoughts today, huh? What do you think? Do you hide your thoughts? Can you be impartial and not hide your thoughts? Is the act of hiding our thoughts actually making them feel stronger about their own beliefs or less confident in what they believe because we're not fully supporting them or we're not fully disagreeing with them.

00:12:32

Does that make us influencing or impartial?

00:12:36

It is said that not acting is acting, not speaking out, not making a decision is a decision.

00:12:48

How do we be true to ourselves, authentic to ourselves? How do we interpret who we are when we're constantly hiding our thoughts or suppressing our thoughts? Or are we?

00:13:01

Do you agree with me? Do you disagree? Are you showing your thoughts all the time? Do you have your idea, your emotion out on your sleeve on your face so that everyone knows? Maybe it's in your tone of voice. We do sometimes say when something taboo or something shocking is said, we sometimes point to the speaker and say, “It was the speaker, not me.” So sometimes we do show that right. Hmm. How do we handle this?

[SHORT TRANSITION MUSIC]

00:13:36

Handling these dilemmas about being authentic to yourself, transparent to the clients, or transparent to yourself. I think it's inherent in being an interpreter that we must suppress our own feelings, our own beliefs, to be able to do our job correctly and authentically for the clients.

00:13:57

That's where the trust comes in. That trust must be there even if we disagree with them. Even if we don't believe what they're saying, we still have to express it with that same feeling and intention.

00:14:13

If you remember when Sharon Neumann Solow was asked about how she gets through those difficult moments of an interpreting situation, she mentioned that she flushes things out. She had to remember that this situation is not her. It's not happening to her.

00:14:34

It's not her situation, so think of that for yourself. This situation is not me. I am not these people. It's not happening to me. I am not doing it. I am not saying it. Those are wise words to remember.

00:14:52

To allow yourself to get rid of all of those behaviors, beliefs, opinions out of you every time you're done with that work.

[SHORT TRANSITION MUSIC]

[ROCK EXIT MUSIC STARTS]

00:15:07

When we're talking to the clients, we are respectful and communicating in a way that is agreeable but not agreeing necessarily, which means we are open to listening. We are open to having the small talk when needed, because that helps gain trust...

00:15:28

…gain the respect that we are professionals, and we are handling the situation professionally. Being able to talk with someone without bringing our own baggage, our own emotions, our own beliefs to the situation, we are invited into their lives, not ours, and allowing them to have the exchange that they want to have in order to meet their goals, their intentions.

00:15:54

And then you can do some exercises when you leave that place. Talk to yourself. Tell yourself this was not me. Or you can argue with them out loud. Talking to yourself, having the argument with that other opinion and voicing your opinion. Or you can journal. You can write it down.

00:16:14

Or you can ask a colleague to sit down and debate those issues, or have a group session, a small community that you get together with regularly and talk about the practice, talk about what you need to talk about.

00:16:28

Go back to the friends, the group, the colleagues that you do agree with and talk about those issues, but not bringing your work with you.

00:16:41

But just reaffirming who you are. Maybe you've changed, maybe you haven't, but you need to interpret yourself. Interpret who you are, what you feel, and what you would do.

00:16:57

Every day we change, that's the 100% thing that happens, is change. There will always be a change, prices will go up, our taste buds will change. We may not like coffee anymore. OK, I wasn't being authentic or transparent there.

00:17:17

But we may not like sweets anymore. Chocolate, even. Things change.

00:17:25

[chuckles] I heard a few of you say, “No, that's not true. No, no, no, no. Chocolate’s always here to stay.” And that's fine, as long as there are no strawberries, I will be happy.

00:17:36

Be true to yourself, but remember, you don't always have to show yourself to our clients. We're not there for that. We're there to be human, but to let them be them. So, until your next assignment, keep calm.

00:17:56

Keep hiding behind the interpretation. [chuckles]

00:17:59

I'll see you next week. Take care now.

[ROCK EXIT MUSIC ENDS AT 00:18:39]