Events and What's On

Inaugural Lecture - Professor Isabelle Perez, School of Management and Languages

Thursday, April 29, 2010

Public Service Interpreting Research: an effective vehicle for public engagement in a multilingual and multicultural society

This lecture will highlight the significance and relevance of scholarship activities in the area of Public Service Interpreting. Examples from a number of projects and activities will illustrate the challenges of multilingual/multicultural societies in the 21st century and the ways in which PSI research highlights and addresses these. The scale of the problems which this lecture addresses is most readily illustrated with the finding that over one hundred languages are used in combination with English in Public Service exchanges in Scotland alone.

A central issue in this context is the implementation of the growing body of legislation on access to public services: How can we ensure that adequate Translation, Interpreting and
Communication Support service provision is in place, and that adequate monitoring of service quality and therefore equitable access across language barriers is guaranteed?

The lecture will demonstrate that answers to the above issues cannot be provided by one group in isolation. Public service policy decision makers, professional interpreters, interpreting research scholars and members of the linguistic communities all have a part to play in contributing to effective policies, however ultimately these can only be the product of effective sharing of information and good practice. The adjustment of public service policies or the creation of guidelines for interpreter]mediated situations will serve as examples to demonstrate this and the need for a multi]pronged approach will be further illustrated with projects highlighting successful engagement between university scholars, practitioners and public service providers.