Barriers And Skills In Exhibition Interpreting

The international interactions on economic and cultural activities are becoming more frequent than ever before. International exhibitions are now experiencing a tremendous development. However, owing to the differences in both language and culture among domestic and foreign representatives, communicative barriers might emerge. In such cases, interpreters play a vital role in the exhibition.Researchers have studied on how to improve interpreters’ performance on conference, tourism, legal and medical interpreting. However, the related researches concentrated on exhibition interpreting are insufficient and call for further research. In view of this, my research on this topic is conducted.This thesis is based on my escort interpreting experience for the 25th North America High School Educational Exhibition, during which I encountered many barriers. On the basis of analysis of these barriers, the following findings can be obtained:Firstly, the barriers are caused by either linguistic factors or by cultural factors. Linguistic factors include foreign accents, technical terms and the use of grammatical rules. Cultural factors include the comprehension of different social customs and values. Secondly, as for linguistic barriers, they can be overcome through the following ways:learning to be accustomed to different accents; being competent in note-taking and imaging; utilizing on-site materials like exhibition panels, posters, and leaflets; employing translation techniques, namely omission, analogy and transliteration in a flexible way. Thirdly, in order to evade cultural barriers, two aspects should be attached importance to:trying to acquaint yourself with cultural norms of the source language and target language countries, striving to store exhibition background information as much as possible before interpreting.The findings are derived from the analysis of twenty three interpreting examples from this exhibition; it still leaves much room for improvement. It is hoped that this thesis can provide some effective skills for coping with interpreting barriers.