
Interpreter's Workshop with Tim Curry
This unique (sometimes funny, sometimes serious) podcast focuses on supporting signed language interpreters in the European countries by creating a place with advice, tips, ideas, feelings and people to come together. Interpreter's Workshop with Tim Curry deals with the fact that many countries do not have education for sign language interpreters. Here we talk to sign language interpreters, teachers, and researchers, to look at the real issues and share ideas for improvement from many countries. Signed language interpreters usually work alone or in small teams. This can create a feeling of uncertainty about our work, our skills and our roles. Here is the place to connect and find certainty. Let me know what you need at https://interpretersworkshop.com/contact/ and TRANSCRIPTS here: https://interpretersworkshop.com/transcripts
Interpreter's Workshop with Tim Curry
IW 144: Spotlight Bruce Cameron Part 2: NO Feeding Unprepared BBC Interpreters
SPOTLIGHT! LOOK AT THAT!
We continue to Spotlight the special work that Scottish sign language interpreter, Bruce Cameron has experienced since 2024 when he started serving the communities through a new medium, the BBC media in the News and UK Parliament broadcasts.
He shares his stories and experience in this specific setting. He details the daily commute, the operations that the interpreters must learn, the teaming skills, the new interpreting skills, and much more. This is part 2 in this 3-part Spotlight on Bruce and his experience.
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IW 144: Spotlight Bruce Cameron Part 2: NO Feeding Unprepared BBC Interpreters
[ROCK INTRO MUSIC STARTS]
00:00:02 Tim
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 Tim
Let's start talking... interpreting.
[ROCK INTRO MUSIC ENDS]
00:00:34 Tim
And now the quotes of the day, the first by Billy Connolly, Scottish actor and comedian,
00:00:43 Tim
“The desire to be a politician should bar you for life from ever being one.”
00:00:49 Tim
And the second by Terry Pratchett, English humorist and author,
00:00:56 Tim
“That's what being alive is, Thing. It's being badly prepared for everything because you only get one chance, Thing.”
00:01:06 Tim
I picked these quotes well for the humor because we're also talking about interpreting in politics.
00:01:14 Tim
And we can't always prepare like we want to.
00:01:18 Bruce
Because we don't know what's going to happen.
00:01:20 Tim
We don't know who might be there, what they might say.
00:01:25 Tim
How do we do it?
00:01:26 Tim
Well, today, Bruce is going to continue telling us about his work with the BBC, how it affects him in real life, his daily commute, his work with the teams and how they handle it practically, logistically.
00:01:43 Tim
And we might talk a little bit about preparation or no preparation.
00:01:47 Tim
So let's get started.
[SHORT TRANSITION MUSIC]
00:01:53 Tim
Do you have a tech person or a director, as it were, telling you when to start? What’s going to happen today, anything like that?
00:02:02 Bruce
Not in the room, but upstairs yeah, up in the, the fancy sci-fi room. [Tim chuckling]
00:02:06 Bruce
Nah, there's some-, there's a name for it, and it'll come back to me.
00:02:10 Bruce
It will come back… in the… there's something… the Deaf…
00:02:12 Bruce
I don’t know.
00:02:13 Bruce
I can't remember what it’s called. [Tim chuckling]
00:02:13 Bruce
But yes, and you see them…
00:02:16 Bruce
In fact, that's another monitor...
00:02:17 Bruce
So that's a monitor that sits above the camera and it's a, it's a composite and it’s got the live clock.
00:02:24 Bruce
So, you know exactly what time it is. And it's got a video webcam link to the room.
00:02:29 Bruce
So, you can actually see them. And it's good because you can sign to them. But we have just to the right underneath the monitors you can see it's a small tally light. And it's basically a… your international viewers might not know this, but back in the olden days, olden days…
00:02:46 Bruce
Harry Wogan, when he presented Blankety Blank, had a microphone. It was basically a microphone on a long stick and that is a long stick with a light on top, and that light flashes.
00:02:56 Bruce
And when that flashes green, you’re on. Get ready, 'cause, you're on air. [Tim: yeah]
00:03:00 Bruce
And then it flashes again, that’s you off.
00:03:03 Bruce
There's a signal there that tells you when you're on and off, but looking on the right-hand side, you see yourself on the, on the screen. If you're on there. You're on.
00:03:13 Tim
Yeah, OK.
00:03:14 Tim
So, how long are you on for?
00:03:17 Bruce
So, … Parliament or news?
00:03:18 Tim
Yes.
00:03:21 Bruce
[chuckles] Parliament varies. Parliament. We… and this is an interesting thing. I’m flexible with co-working and I will go with whatever my, my coworker wants to do.
00:03:30 Bruce
It’s interesting because we will sometimes do 15 minutes slots.
00:03:33 Bruce
We’ll do 15 minutes and we’ll switch.
00:03:35 Bruce
What we find with Parliament especially is that a lot of the statements or the, the questions that come out are probably longer, especially statements and will be longer than 15 minutes.
00:03:46 Bruce
So, you, if you swap over and you start, it's easier just to keep going until the end of that statement's done, and then you can then swap. Some, some of my colleagues the, the especially deaf colleagues want to do 20, 25, half an hour.
00:04:03 Bruce
Because 15 minutes you don't feel like you've got your teeth into the subject. By 20 minutes, it's still quite short… half an hour. For me, I feel the limit hits about 25, 25, 26 minutes roughly, and it's quite specific, but you can feel yourself going, right? [Tim: yeah]
00:04:21 Bruce
And then you know in a couple minutes… The half hour makes it easier for timing because on the hour, half past, on and off.
00:04:28 Bruce
So, I'm quite happy being that flexible and just working. [Tim: yeah]
00:04:33 Bruce
News-wise, news-wise, it's just recently changed. So, we do half hours in the morning so it's on the hour for half an hour. Twice.
00:04:46 Bruce
And then we do some prerecorded programs, as in programs that for the BBC Signed Zone. [Tim: Mm-hmm]
00:04:52 Bruce
So, on the BBC iPlayer there's a signed section and all the programs, not all, but I think a lot.
00:04:59 Bruce
In fact it might be, most of the programs do have BSL on them. [Tim: hmm]
00:05:04 Bruce
And then they lunchtime news is… starts at 10 clock.
00:05:08 Bruce
It runs to 1:36 pm. [Tim: Mm-hmm]
00:05:12 Bruce
You come off for about 9-10 minutes and you go back on for the last 15.
00:05:17 Bruce
However, [Tim chuckles] on Tuesday at 5 to 1:00 pm, we were told that the hour…
00:05:24 Bruce
Sorry, on Friday we were told that 5 to 1:00 pm that we will be on for the full hour. [Tim: Mmm] Purely because news at 1:00 pm for 10 minutes and we were going to cover the funeral of Denis Law, the footballer who died recently who played for Manchester United.
00:05:41 Bruce
He was born in Aberdeen where I'm from, so it was quite nice to be able to do that.
00:05:45 Bruce
And I was asked would I be OK with just doing that, that 50 minutes?
00:05:49 Bruce
And I've interpreted so many funerals, and information, it's, it's not going to be fast-paced. It's going to be, [Tim: Mm-hmm] you know, it's going to be quite repetitive.
00:05:58 Bruce
It’s going to be talking about his experience, his life growing up and that was fine.
00:06:02 Bruce
So, I thought, yeah, no, not a problem.
00:06:03 Bruce
So, I was on, on Tuesday there for the- was it Monday? Tuesday? Can’t remember. The days roll into one. [Tim chuckling]
00:06:10 Bruce
I was, yeah, on for the full hour. So, it was fine.
00:06:13 Bruce
Absolutely fine.
00:06:14 Tim
Yeah. So, you mentioned about Deaf and hearing, working with a deaf team. [Bruce: yes]
00:06:19 Tim
So, you're not actually feeding the Deaf, you're just swapping. [Bruce: yes]
00:06:24 Tim
And you have a deaf interpreter, then a hearing interpreter.
00:06:27 Bruce
Yes. Yep.
00:06:27 Tim
Back and forth are you… Do you feed each other once in a while?
00:06:31 Bruce
No, actually. No.
00:06:33 Bruce
I'm just trying to think if we have done. No. We- my experience so far, no, because there's the captions that are…
00:06:40 Bruce
I initially thought (if I’m being honest) during COVID [Tim: Mm-hmm] when we watched the deaf interpreters, I thought that they were being fed. Not realizing that they were taking the, a live feed from captions and not just…
00:06:54 Bruce
Don’t think, don’t think they are the actual captions that appear on TV. They might be. Actually, they probably will be, but these are done in a different format, so it's…
00:07:02 Bruce
They're not just two lines you're probably seeing about 10 lines of big text, constantly scrolling up screen. [Tim: yeah]
00:07:09 Bruce
So, there's no feeding whatsoever. However, especially for other live events that, there will be. I think sometimes. I didn't do them.
00:07:18 Bruce
I didn't do Glastonbury.
00:07:20 Bruce
But you do have deaf performers.
00:07:24 Bruce
Deaf interpreters doing the songs for Glastonbury and there's some…
00:07:28 Bruce
I think sometimes you would feed, even the hearing interpreters were getting fed bits and pieces because the environment was completely different. [Tim: right]
00:07:36 Bruce
But for Parliament and the news, no. It's just either audio or scripted or from the, from the actual autocue. [Tim: Mm-hmm, yeah]
[ROCK TRANSITION MUSIC STARTS]
00:07:46 Tim
A big thank you to everyone who shares this podcast with a colleague and friend. If you want to support the show even more, check out the show notes for links to Buy Me A Coffee.
00:07:56 Tim
Because it's very embarrassing to fall asleep during an interview.
00:08:00 Tim
Thank you.
00:08:01 Tim
Let's go back.
[ROCK TRANSITION MUSIC ENDS]
00:08:02 Tim
Let's take a break from the work itself for a moment and look at the practicalities of you working in London but living in Glasgow.
00:08:11 Bruce
Mm-hmm.
00:08:12 Tim
How does your normal commute to work look?
00:08:16 Bruce
I've not had an issue.
00:08:18 Bruce
I have actually, I have had an issue. It's not…
00:08:20 Bruce
It's not an issue that really has bothered me, but the… I would say the issues that I've had are purely, purely “Bruce issues”. [Tim chuckling]
00:08:31 Bruce
Now, they, they are, they are issues that I caused by myself by being completely unprepared. [Tim: ahh]
00:08:38 Bruce
And I think if anybody knows me, I think a lot of your listeners don't, which is a good thing actually, [Tim laughing] but I'm probably the least prepared person ever. [Tim: yeah]
00:08:47 Bruce
And you know… [Tim: yeah, yeah]
00:08:48 Bruce
I, I, you know… [sighs]
00:08:50 Bruce
“Failure to prepare is…” uhh… whatever that is, I, I,… [Tim laughing]
00:08:55 Bruce
So… [slightly chuckles]
00:08:57 Bruce
I leave everything to the last minute.
00:08:59 Bruce
I, I, for example, I've never had an issue getting to London until Sunday just passed, [Tim: yeah] which I didn't realise.
00:09:08 Bruce
Well, I did realise it. And I thought, “OK, it'll be fine. It'll be fine.” I, I read on the Saturday that the trains were on strike from Glasgow. [Tim: Mmm]
00:09:18 Bruce
I thought, “That's OK, I'll still manage to get down. It’s not a problem.”
00:09:22 Tim
But you didn't actually prepare for it, you just thought that.
00:09:25 Bruce
No.
00:09:26 Bruce
Yeah, yeah, I thought, “I'll sort out tomorrow.” [Tim: OK]
00:09:28 Bruce
So, I need to get down on Sunday.
00:09:30 Bruce
As long as I'm in London before 6:30 AM on Monday morning, it's fine. That's… [Tim chuckles]
00:09:38 Bruce
So about 12:00 on Sunday, I thought right, let's have a look at the trains because the trains are every hour on the half hour from Glasgow.
00:09:48 Bruce
OH! That’s right. They’re on strike.
00:09:49 Bruce
So, what's, what route are they taking?
00:09:50 Bruce
Are we taking ScotRail to that…? No, no, no.
00:09:55 Bruce
I thought Oh! I now need to get to Edinburgh from Glasgow, which is an hour away in the train. And then there's only a train... I basically need to leave now which is at lunchtime to get there today.
00:10:07 Bruce
Any later and I’m not going to manage. I thought, Right, OK, let's have a look at the flights…
00:10:10 Bruce
Because flights that, they're… [Tim: hmm] The flights, the cheapest flight I could find, one way was 305 lbs. [Tim chuckles]
00:10:18 Bruce
So, a return flight was going to cost me £587.00 which I would never get that expenses back at all, so that's not going to happen. I thought, right, OK. [Tim chuckling]
00:10:28 Bruce
So, train it was! So, up until Sunday there travel down has been great.
00:10:35 Bruce
It's been fantastic. Getting to London has not been an issue.
00:10:38 Bruce
It's… The train is a four-and-a-half-hour journey, and I, sometimes, I'm quite happy just to chill, switch off, listen to various podcasts, [Tim: hmm] you know, including yours, including this one.
00:10:51 Bruce
I won't listen to my own voice, to be honest.
00:10:54 Bruce
4 1/2 hours and it's nice. It’s a nice relaxed journey down. [Tim: Mmm]
00:11:00 Bruce
Flight-wise is quicker.
00:11:04 Bruce
By, only by an hour and a half, door to door.
00:11:06 Tim
Wow.
00:11:07 Bruce
Because you know you need to be there an hour and a half beforehand two hours maybe. And then you get to Heathrow, and Heathrow to the hotel is fine.
00:11:16 Bruce
That's not an issue.
00:11:17 Bruce
It's just more relaxing on the train. You can get up, you can walk about. So yeah, the commute down is fine. Coming home?
00:11:25 Bruce
People leaving London to come home and that's going home to on that line, Manchester, Birmingham, Preston, all that route, that’s, it’s, it's a bit more challenging.
00:11:36 Bruce
So, sometimes you kind of think, “OH! I forgot about this. I forgot about going home.” [Tim: hmm]
00:11:41 Bruce
You know, but you know, it's, it's usually fine.
00:11:44 Bruce
The reason for the train journeys is because I think I've discovered a little hack which seems to be working so far is I can't book return flights from Glasgow to London and back.
00:11:58 Bruce
Purely, because I don't know what time I'll be finished on the finish day. Parliament can overrun. [Tim: Yeah]
00:12:05 Bruce
So, if you're doing Parliament, you say we'll finish by 3:00. It might be 5 o'clock, 6 o’clock.
00:12:10 Bruce
You can't book a flight home. [Tim: Mm-hmm] If you're doing news. You're finished at 2:00.
00:12:14 Bruce
Yeah, you can.
00:12:16 Bruce
So that's why the train for me was a relaxed option. I say relaxed…
00:12:20 Bruce
It's only relaxing if you get a seat, but it's always happened so far.
00:12:24 Tim
You mentioned days.
00:12:25 Tim
Are you only working Mondays and Tuesdays then?
00:12:28 Bruce
No, it's, umm, it varies.
00:12:30 Bruce
At the moment it's aiming for about four days a month.
00:12:33 Tim
Oh, OK.
00:12:34 Bruce
So, there's been occasions where the four days a month have been the last...
00:12:39 Bruce
So, it's two days one week, two days the following week. [Tim: Mm-hmm] There has been occasion where it's been two days at the end of the month, and in the follow month it's two days at the beginning of the month.
00:12:48 Bruce
So, you're basically in London for four weeks in a row. [Tim: Yeah, yeah] So, which, which I think pleases the kids, to be honest. [Tim laughing]
00:12:57 Bruce
I think they're happy that dad's away.
00:13:01 Bruce
Which, well, pleases me.
00:13:03 Bruce
You know, I, I get a break for two nights which is quite nice.
00:13:07 Bruce
In fact, in fact…
00:13:08 Bruce
I love them dearly, but they, you know… [Tim chuckles] They're coming up for teenagers now.
00:13:13 Bruce
It's, it's, [Tim: yeah]
00:13:15 Bruce
They do… I think they talk to me more when I’m away than they do when I'm here. [Tim: Mm-hmm]
00:13:19 Bruce
So that's, that's nice.
00:13:20 Bruce
It's something that, they're at that age which, which helps.
00:13:24 Bruce
And the fact that I'm near a makeup shop, any kind of makeup shop, “Dad, Dad, can you get this? Can you get that?”
00:13:29 Bruce
Yeah. It's fine. Yeah.
00:13:30 Tim
Yeah. So, I noticed you didn't… You kind of glossed over not talking about how your wife feels about all of that?
00:13:37 Tim
But, uh…
00:13:38 Bruce
Yeah, she's all right with it just now.
00:13:39 Bruce
Yeah, I think…
00:13:41 Bruce
Where issues crop up is where she has to work away.
00:13:45 Bruce
Just on Monday there I went down to Sunday to work Monday, Tuesday. Home on Tuesday, she had to go to her office in London on Monday afternoon, Tuesday, and back on Wednesday. So…
00:13:56 Bruce
When we were talking, …Wait. It turns out she's only 20 minutes along the road from where I am. [Tim laughing: Oh!]
00:14:02 Bruce
She’s just outside London.
00:14:03 Bruce
So, it was like… Obviously we can't meet up because I've got to get up at 5:00 in the morning and she's probably at some fancy “do” until 2:00 in the morning. So that's yeah…
00:14:13 Bruce
But anyway, so far, it's been fine.
00:14:15 Bruce
And I suppose we're lucky in the sense, being an Aberdonian, I could have easily, I think, when I was younger gone into offshore work, working in oil rigs, [Tim: Mm-hmm] which means two weeks, - two weeks away, two weeks home or more 4 weeks away, four weeks home.
00:14:31 Bruce
And I, ahh, that's not for me.
00:14:33 Bruce
Two nights? Yeah, that's alright.
00:14:35 Bruce
It's only twice a month, it's, it's fine.
00:14:37 Bruce
Absolutely fine.
00:14:38 Tim
Yeah.
[ROCK TRANSITION MUSIC STARTS]
00:14:39 Tim
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00:14:43 Tim
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00:14:45 Tim
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00:14:59 Tim
Thank you. Let's go back.
[ROCK TRANSITION MUSIC ENDS]
00:15:03 Tim
Let's go back to the actual work of interpreting there at the studio. [Bruce: hmm] How much prep do you get?
00:15:09 Tim
You get any materials beforehand, or the headlines of the news or the topic of the day at the UK parliament?
00:15:16 Bruce
Yes, we get access to the papers for Parliament the day before, but what we don't get, what we don't get… We get a list of questions that are going to be asked.
00:15:25 Bruce
So, there's a list of questions that you can see.
00:15:28 Bruce
There's gonna be 20 odd questions that may be asked and then there'll be, sometimes, most of times, there will be a statement by Ministerial department, but you will only find out half an hour before it goes live. [Tim: Mm-hmm]
00:15:42 Bruce
There'll be an urgent question from an opposition MP, which you will only get half an hour beforehand.
00:15:48 Bruce
So prep time is next to zero, to be honest. [Tim: Mm-hmm]
00:15:54 Bruce
And I think how to prepare for it. And this is maybe why I now start listening to politics. You know, I listening to politic podcasts. I watch Parliament live. If I'm working in between jobs, if I'm working online at home, I will have a window open with Parliament on in the background. The aim of it is…
00:16:12 Bruce
And I will watch the BSL version, not, not to see what my colleagues are doing, just to listen to the language. And if I hear language, I go, I've absolutely no idea what that means, because, because politicians are politicians. [Tim: Mm-hmm]
00:16:25 Bruce
I think, how did my colleague cope with that?
00:16:28 Tim
Yeah.
00:16:29 Bruce
It's, it's impressive.
00:16:30 Bruce
It really is impressive, and you know my hat goes off to the whole team and how they cope with it. And it's, it's, it's brilliant and I'm learning how to say I've only been doing it for a year.
00:16:40 Bruce
I'm still…
00:16:41 Bruce
I'm still a baby.
00:16:42 Bruce
Watching these experienced men and women [Tim: yeah] doing their stuff, it's fabulous. And it's worth watching how they cope with language that isn't normal language [Tim: Mm-hmm] especially in Parliament, news is different.
00:16:59 Bruce
I'll arrive just before 6:00 in the morning and switch the TV on - news channel.
00:17:05 Bruce
What usually happens is that they will roll and repeat the stories.
00:17:10 Bruce
So, you'll usually get the same stories appearing from 6:00… from 6:00 to half six, and then business news is 6:30 to 7:00, and then they will roll the same, similar stories from 7:00 to half past.
00:17:23 Bruce
But they will go live to… This week, they will go live to Jerusalem. They will go live to Gaza.
00:17:29 Bruce
So that was the topics this week. [Tim: yeah]
00:17:32 Bruce
So, because they've gone live, that's a new part they've, they've thrown in.
00:17:36 Bruce
So, you, you can only prepare for what you think might come up.
00:17:40 Bruce
You know the funeral. Denis Law’s funeral, we only got 2 minutes, 3 minutes notice about that.
00:17:44 Bruce
Right, so I'm now going, “Right. He played for Huddersfield. He grew up in Aberdeen. (Luckily, I'm from Aberdeen.) He played for Manchester City, played in Italy for Torino. He played Manchester United.” So, all these things and they were speaking to former players.
00:17:59 Bruce
So, it then became, but I need to know about football here.
00:18:03 Bruce
But what can you learn in a few minutes before going live? Nothing. [Tim: Right]
00:18:08 Bruce
So, you have to be prepared for the unprepared. Sometimes I think it's easier to not be prepared.
00:18:14 Bruce
Because you just have to deal with what comes in front of you.
00:18:16 Bruce
But sometimes I think I'm not preparing, but I think maybe subconsciously I am. By, by the things I watch. [Tim: Mm-hmm] And it's just by taking it in, just by watching stuff, not even saying, “What would I sign for that?”
00:18:28 Bruce
Just listening to the language and thinking, and it's so important don't fix on the language. And there's a couple of guys, Eddie, who's a seasoned professional and I respect dearly and love his, his input, who's been on the news for years, years, and years.
00:18:44 Bruce
He asked if he could do a bit of a, not a critique, but more of an observation of me.
00:18:50 Bruce
And would I like feedback and I’m like of course absolutely.
00:18:53 Bruce
And his feedback from the Parliament and the feedback he gave me was so insightful, so beautifully critical. It was like, “Do you realise…?”
00:19:03 Bruce
And actually, I do realise I do that. I don't know why I do that. [Tim: yeah]
00:19:08 Bruce
[He] explained it to me, and I went, yeah. And then… Certain signs that we do, you know, we think, “Why did I… Why do I sign that?”
00:19:16 Bruce
Because I hear the word.
00:19:17 Bruce
For example, “It's now time to do this.” Right?
00:19:19 Bruce
So, the word time. I do it and a lot of other people do do it as well, and I see it.
00:19:25 Bruce
You just point to your watch.
00:19:26 Bruce
But that's not the right time.
00:19:28 Bruce
It's not the right time and it's just a habit thing that I've developed. [Tim: Mm-hmm]
00:19:32
It was pointed out.
00:19:33 Bruce
I don't do it anymore.
00:19:35 Bruce
I’ve now, I've completely dropped, and I will only point to my wristwatch if it's actually to do with what time of day it is. [Tim: yeah]
00:19:43 Bruce
An hour, two hours, it’s 6 o'clock.
00:19:46 Bruce
So, we think now is the right time, but that's not your watch.
00:19:49 Bruce
So, I did it since I was...three years old, four years old.
00:19:53 Bruce
And at 51 I was still doing it until somebody pointed it out and I was like, “I, I need more of this.”
00:20:00 Bruce
Somebody else to observe, and be critical in a positive way because it's the only way that I will learn. [Tim: Mm-hmm]
00:20:08 Bruce
Well, I, I don't know.
00:20:09 Bruce
I, I'm so open to being told, “Do you realize you do this?”
00:20:14 Bruce
I’m like, “Actually, no, I don't.” [Tim: yeah]
00:20:17 Bruce
Even if I record myself and watch myself…
00:20:19 Bruce
You don't criticize yourself in a way that, that, “Well, that's fine. It must make sense”, where actually think of something different.
00:20:26 Bruce
And now, since it's been pointed out, I've, I've stopped doing it.
00:20:29 Bruce
In fact, the day after he said it, I went to point to my wrist. I went “NO”, and my finger went somewhere else. [Tim laughing]
00:20:38 Bruce
[chuckling] You get annoyed, annoyed with yourself thinking, “Don’t sign that, again!” [Tim chuckling: yeah]
00:20:44 Bruce
So, the team are fantastic, the team are very, very open to discussions and for me, I'm extremely open to being told. “Bruce, come on.” [Tim: Yeah]
[SHORT TRANSITION MUSIC]
[ROCK EXIT MUSIC STARTS]
00:20:59 Tim
What a fun way to step into someone else’s situation. Learning about every little detail of the technology, the logistics, how they work together, how they prepare and don't prepare, even just learning about his commute.
00:21:14 Tim
How many of us do a four-hour commute?
00:21:18 Tim
Let's talk about these things: the technology, the logistics, the commute, and preparation.
00:21:23 Tim
The technology is pretty amazing how they can have a live feed of the captioning, basically a teleprompter in front of the camera, being able to see all of the different monitors giving the information many things that the interpreter has to constantly monitor and see the information to make those minute decisions, while at the same time working live for very hard topics, news and politics.
00:21:54
It's a skill set.
00:21:56 Tim
It's a skill set that makes it hard to prepare for, and I think he found what we all know is that preparing for some things is not only difficult, but sometimes long term, watching the news, understanding the politics of the day, using your commute or your downtime wisely.
00:22:20 Tim
So that you can prepare and learn the vocabulary. Learn the rhythm of how these particular people speak.
00:22:28 Tim
And that is his preparation, long term preparation to be able to change and adapt on the fly using the technology, the monitors, the captioning. It sounds like a beautiful circus for the art that we call interpreting.
00:22:44 Tim
I don't know about you, but while listening to Bruce, explain all of this…
00:22:49 Tim
It got me thinking about all the situations that I have done over a long period and how I adapted my interpreting skills differently to match that situation.
00:23:01 Tim
Some skills for that situation are not appropriate for other situations. I don't have to use them, but what it does is it puts more tools in my toolkit as an interpreter, so that when another situation comes up that's similar to it, I'm ready.
00:23:17 Tim
It's part of our ongoing professional development. And lastly, there are two things I would like to point out.
00:23:25 Tim
It's great to see deaf interpreters working on their own, not dependent on a hearing interpreter feeding them.
00:23:34 Tim
And seeing a hearing interpreter utilize the same skills by accessing the captioning in the same way that the deaf interpreter does, enhancing their own work and the last bit that Bruce commented on is something we should all take to heart.
00:23:52 Tim
We all have skills or habits that we should get rid of, habits that we may not see, may not recognize, may not even understand that they might be bad, and having a team work with us. Give us feedback.
00:24:07 Tim
Critical thinking feedback can help us develop and enhance our own interpretations.
00:24:14 Tim
So, work with others, be with others, very similar to being in the IW Community. Just thought I'd put that out there: The IW Community, check the show notes.
00:24:25 Tim
Next week we meet with Bruce again to finish this conversation. This Spotlight on one aspect of his professional life.
00:24:34 Tim
Until then, keep calm. Keep interpreting with no preparation. Wait, no…um,…
00:24:42 Tim
…with long-term preparation.
00:24:45 Tim
I'll see you next week.
00:24:46 Tim
Take care now.
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