Topic 5: perception and understanding of messages in interpreting

5.1. Sense Perception and Understanding

At the very beginning we find it expedient to give definitions of the terms “perception” and “understanding” as instruments inherent in the process of interpreting, as we assume that there is a certain difference between these two notions.

The term “perception” means mental interpretation (here the term “interpretation” means „сприйняття“, „ментальна обробка“, „пepцепція повідомлення“) of physical sensations produced by the stimuli from the external world or, in other words, – recognition of language signs using interpreter's sensations, such as “hearing” the phonic substance of the SL sign and ability to find a substitute for it in the TL.

The term “understanding” means mental grasp or comprehension of the SL sign, which presumes that interpreter has some knowledge of what the sign means, what the nature of the notion or process denoted by the sign is, what its “sense” is, i.e. what actually stands behind this sign.

Consecutive and simultaneous interpreting is a process of continuous perceiving and comprehending the semantic structure of messages, “unpacking” their sense. This is conditioned by the fact that the interpreter seeks to render the sense of “complete” thoughts of the speaker. In real life verbal communication, phonemes (sounds) make up words, words make up the syntagmatic structure (syntax) of speech messages from which the whole of the orally produced text is constructed. Thus efforts of the interpreter are aimed at looking for sense of the messages perceived, which enables him to comprehend the communicative intent of the message and convey it correctly. Interpreters do not render the “dictionary meanings” of language signs, but select from a variety of these meanings the sense which is appropriate for the particular utterance and which is generated in speech in a particular discourse, in the communicative situation of the interpretation session.

Thus “sense” of a language sign is a meaning conveyed, i.e. selected from a range of meanings of a sign (a word, a phrase or a complete utterance) with reference to the subject field of interpreting. An interpreter, having comprehended senses of signs, transforms them into objects of real world, thus creating in his mind the “picture of the world” reflected in the oral message – an indispensable element of oral communication and, consequently starts interpreting. Comprehension of the sense of the utterance is the stage, which “triggers” the start of translation and if comprehension of sense is inadequate, the operational memory of interpreter becomes overloaded and translation is performed in a word–for–word mode, which is far from being perfect.

5.2. The “Inner Speech” of the Interpreter

In the process of perception and understanding the sense of the SL messages there is another mechanism – the so–called “inner speech” of the interpreter, which functions as an intermediary language between the SL message and its rendering into the TL.

Practice shows that this mechanism is subconsciously always “present” in interpreting and is confined first to “translation” of the SL message into the inner speech of the interpreter and only then – to rendering the message by the appropriate means of the TL. In other words, it means that, having perceived the SL message, the interpreter “unpacks” its sense by “translating” the message first from the source language into the source language (“what did the speaker have in mind?”) by “browsing” through a set of synonyms and choosing the appropriate one and selecting the necessary translation transformation. Having done that, the interpreter “fills in” his inner speech by the material of the TL (“what and how I would say this as an interpreter”).

It means that interpreting undergoes three stages before the translated message is actually pronounced by the interpreter:

PERCEPTION OF THE SL MESSAGE

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CONVERSION INTO THE “INNER SPEECH” AND UNDERSTANDING THE SENSE

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CHOOSING THE OPTION IN THE TL

Let's illustrate the above considerations by example of the speech of Mr B.Oliynyk at the Plenary Session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg (1999):

І все ж змушений зазначити, щo y висновках шановних доповідачів та в Резолюції та Рекомендаціях відчувається певна незбалансованість у позитивах та негативах. Останнім надається, як на мене, перевага за рахунок перших.

These utterances, if converted into the “inner speech” of the interpreter and then “materialized” in Ukrainian, may obtain the following form:

Я все ж змушений зазначити, що у висновках шановних доповідачів та в Резолюції та Рекомендаціях Асамблеї відчувається брак збалансованості між позитивними та негативними оцінками ситуації в Україні. Негативні оцінки, як на мене, переважають над позитивними.

After such conversion the interpreter finally understands the sense of all message and is in a position to start interpreting which may result in the following product:

And still I have to underscore that there is a certain imbalance between positive and negative assessments of the situation in Ukraine in the conclusion by highly esteemed Reporters and in the Resolution and Recommendations of the Assembly. To my mind, negative assessments prevail over the positive ones.

It's worth mentioning that in interpreting the Ukrainian message into English certain expansion of semantic content is observed, i.e. a number of additional words (marked by underlining) is used for the listener (recipient) to understand the message better.