In recognition of its wonder and multifaceted nature, the month of May is dedicated to Africa.
Africa Day itself is celebrated on 25 May – this year to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the Organisation of African Unity (now known as the African Union), founded on 25 May 1963. On this day, leaders of 30 of the 32 independent African states signed a founding charter in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and vowed to encourage nation-building through unity and freedom from oppression.
This month, the Language Centre has chosen to highlight the important roles that interpreters have played on the African continent to overcome language barriers – from the professional linguists and praise singers of tribal African societies to the modern-day interpreters who facilitate nation-building and provide access to services by interpreting in national parliaments, conferences, courts and hospitals. And, of course, we also think of the educational interpreters who make it possible for university lectures to be understood in Afrikaans, English, isiXhosa and South African Sign Language.
The practice of interpreting from one language to another on the African continent, as elsewhere, goes back thousands of years.
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In many African societies, the professional linguists or praise singers belonged to a long line of gifted multilingual orators who devised praise songs on important public occasions to celebrate the victories and glorious qualities of the chief and his ancestors.”
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The oral art of West African griots (‘bards’) and Southern African iimbongi (‘praise singers’) continues today, with praise singers acting as modern political commentators.
The hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission from 1996 to 1998 marked the first opportunity for many South Africans to become acquainted with the marvels of simultaneous interpreting in the eleven official languages of South Africa. Interpreters facilitated reconciliation during the hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Since then, they have continued to help to build South Africa as a nation at national and provincial legislatures, municipal council meetings and conferences. Other major employers of interpreters in Africa include the African Union, Pan-African Parliament, UNON (the United Nations Office in Nairobi), SADC (the Southern African development community) and the African Development Bank.
All around the world, sign language interpreters are known for facilitating access to education for Deaf students, but what is less well known is that spoken language interpreters can do the same for hearing students. This way several South African universities make university lectures accessible to students who are not necessarily so comfortable in the language of teaching. At SU, our educational interpreters work in Afrikaans, English, isiXhosa and South African Sign Language.
We celebrate the role interpreting has played over the years to help Africa and its people connect and prosper. At the Language Centre we consider ourselves privileged to be part of that story, and also to be part of the future of Africa – our Africa.
If you’re an interpreter working in Africa, please share your story with us. E-mail us at taalsentrum@sun.ac.za.
Source:
Wallmach, K. 2015. Africa. In Pöchhacker, F. (ed.) Encyclopaedia of Interpreting Studies. London: Routledge.
Blog by Dr Kim Wallmach, Director of the Language Centre
Does your faculty’s language implementation plan call for interpreting in your module? Would you like to use interpreting to meet a pedagogical need, or to create a space for multilingual teaching and learning?
The short video below explains how you can easily make use of real-time online interpreting. Follow this step-by-step guide with clips showing the MS Teams set-up and what it looks like on the extended learning spaces (ELS) system in the classroom to get set up in under seven minutes.
Why is multilingualism important in teaching, learning and assessment?
Teaching and learning in different languages, for example in English, Afrikaans and isiXhosa, as opposed to choosing only one language of teaching and learning, give students the opportunity to approach learning material from different perspectives and to find the way that resonates best with their learning style. It also allows for more voices to be heard authentically and is a critical enabler for students to co-create knowledge in the teaching and learning space.
For more information or to find out whether your module qualifies for interpreting, please contact Juanli Theron or Christine Joubert.
The Language Centre is a vibrant hub for students, staff and clients who require language and communication assistance.
One of our most important jobs is to help students speak university. Although academic language is no-one’s mother tongue, you could get by very well once you’ve learnt its ins and outs.
We assist students to get there, in many different language-related ways:
We present credit-bearing academic literacies modules in seven of the University’s 10 faculties to equip our students for strategic communication – in an academic setting and in their occupation and industry. Modules focus on professional, business and scientific communication, writing skills and skills for academic discourse.
We provide real-time interpreting in lectures – in Afrikaans, English, isiXhosa or South African Sign Language.
We’ve created a safe space to discuss one’s writing with a trained writing consultant at our Writing Lab, as well as opportunities to create writing support groups, take part in writing marathons, or attend workshops on writing research proposals, literature reviews, journal articles or other academic writing.
We’ve established a Reading Lab that offers workshops, consultations and a visual cognitive processing program to optimise reading.
We’ve built a trilingual terminology tool for subject terminology in Afrikaans, English and isiXhosa – try it out here.
The Language Centre also casts its language and communication assistance net wider than the student community:
We offer an editing and translation service in English, Afrikaans and isiXhosa, and we translate into more than 12 other languages. Our services are available to the University, corporate clients and individuals, and we can edit and translate any document – from letters, reports, journal articles and advertisement copy to informed consent forms. In addition, we do transcriptions.
We provide an interpreting service at meetings or conferences. We work in Afrikaans, English, isiXhosa and German, but you could speak to us about other language combinations too.
We offer language courses aimed at individuals or groups who would like to learn isiXhosa or Afrikaans, or prepare themselves for the International English Language Testing System(IELTS) exam, or who wish to gain the skills to teach English as a foreign language (TEFL).
We also present superbly crafted corporate communication short courses through our Comms Lab. Think: effective office documentation, report writing, writing for the media, or crafting confident presentations, to name but a few possibilities.
For us, language creates a transformational space that has the power to change lives, inform policy and unite people. If one of our services or courses appeals to you, speak to us at taalsentrum@sun.ac.za or 021 808 2176.
If you’ve already cast an eye over this year’s Woordfees guide – as has many a Woordfees follower – you may well have come across the Language Centre’s advertisement and tips on how to ask the way in Xhosa. The page concludes with the motto “Great things happen when you work with us”. And the Woordfees is indeed working with us again this year – to make sure that simultaneous interpretation is at the ready for the hubbub that is the discourse series.
The Woordfees kicks off on 5 March this year and, other than events for theatre, writers and music, various sessions will also be held where the speakers will be encouraging the audience to join in the discussions. And to enrich these opportunities for communication, Language Centre interpreters will be at several of these sessions to interpret – free of charge – (mainly) into English or Afrikaans.
Eduard de Kock, one of the Language Centre’s interpreters, remembers when this initiative was started in 2018: “It was such a fascinating and exciting request. There was a series of discussions that took place every day in a tent in front of Wilgenhof. We had to find a picnic bench, hand out interpreting equipment and then interpret all that interesting and quite emotional testimony – and resist the urge not to become involved ourselves! Interpreting for the Woordfees has become an opportunity that I really look forward to.”
Interpreting won’t be happening at all the discourse sessions because of logistical reasons, but chances are that you’ll come across an interpreter somewhere sometime. Look out for people with a toolbox, usually close to the stage, and typically with a huge grin. Come and say hi – and do make use of this free service. Happy Woordfees!
Sanet de Jager, a Language Centre interpreter, took part in the University’s mobility project, through which SU students and staff can participate in exchange programmes for international exposure. Sanet spent three months at the University of Bologna in Italy, and we recently caught up with her and asked her to tell us a bit more.
How did it all happen? “I first heard about the exchange from our director, Dr Kim Wallmach, at an Interpreting Service research portfolio meeting. I applied for the Erasmus+ exchange with the International Office and a month later, in May 2019, I found myself in a country steeped in history, where a wealth of research has been done, and where one-euro espressos abound. My role in the exchange was two-fold: I went in my capacity as interpreter at the Language Centre (LC) to make valuable connections and exchange knowledge on best practice, and I went in my capacity as student to do research for my master’s in translation. My research involves a case study on the differences in intonation between interpreted and normal speech.”
Where were you based? “The Department of Interpreting and Translation (DIT) of the University of Bologna is located in the Romanesque town of Forlì about an hour’s train ride from Bologna. That was the place I called home. Chatting to my coordinator Prof Mariachiara Russo, it became clear that ‘language politics’ is not a phenomenon unique to South Africa. The University often receives exchange students and as a result teaches some of its classes in English – a cause for raised eyebrows in a country that encourages mother-tongue access to education for its citizens.”
What did you do there? “Dr Wallmach and I had the privilege of sharing with them in a presentation on how Stellenbosch University (SU) tackles the issue of multilingualism and how the LC offers multidimensional solutions to language challenges, with one such solution being educational interpreting. I spoke about the day-to-day activities of an educational interpreter, sharing our quality assessment measures, our training, scheduling, and up-to-date research on the role of the interpreter. The DIT seemed particularly interested in our Interpreting Service, so much so that Prof Russo visited SU at the end of July to experience educational interpreting at first-hand and to investigate the potential of starting an interpreting pilot project at the University of Bologna from within the DIT.”
And your studies? Are you happy with your progress? “Prof Russo is a professor at the DIT and has published extensively on aptitude testing for interpreting, among other things. I enjoyed speaking to her and Prof Motoko Ueyama, a researcher on second-language intonation, about my MA research, investigating the implications of intonation on the quality of the interpreting product and how sentence-level intonation affects comprehension and information structuring. I have already completed my data collection in the form of recordings among my own colleagues, and I have recorded and incorporated the contributions of Profs Russo and Ueyama. Coupled with my three months’ hands-on experience of drinking coffee like an Italian, I believe I’m well on my way to finding answers to my research questions and establishing new universals in interpreting.”
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The Language Centre is a vibrant hub for students, staff and clients who require language and communication assistance.
