Current Situation And Future Of The Interpreting Profession In China-From The Perspective Of English Learning Popularization

This thesis probes into how the popularization of English learning in China will affect the development of interpreting as a profession. With a thorough review on the history of interpreting studies both in the west and in China, highlighting the main contributors, this study aims at drawing a conclusion about the future development of interpreting profession in China from the perspective of the English learning wave and bilingual education.The history of formal foreign language and translation education in China could be dated back to the Yuan Dynasty when the Mongolians were reigning over this land. Since then, China has witnessed six major foreign language learning waves, greatly propelling social development at significant historic turns. After the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee and Deng Xiaoping's Reform and Opening Up policy in 1978, China has been blessed with amazing economic surging and expansion of diplomatic relations, inevitably bringing about the popularization of English.Though interpreting activities could be dated back to remote antiquity both in the west and in China, its professionalization did not start until the 20th century after the First World War when international conferences started to use simultaneous interpreting. In the past century, the interpreting profession developed well in western countries, setting up regulative bodies, professional code of ethics and well-designed training courses. The AIIC, Association of International Conference Interpreters, is the most well-developed and authoritative one in the interpreting circle whose membership is the highest honor to professional interpreters.The professionalization of interpreting in China has just started in recent years is marked by the Fifth National Conference on Interpreting Practice, Pedagogy, and Research held in November of 2004 in Shanghai International Studies University. The interpreting profession can be categorized into conference interpreting, dialogue interpreting and new forms of interpreting. Conference interpreting can be further categorized into simultaneous, consecutive, and whispered conference interpreting; dialogue interpreting can be sub-categorized into business interpreting and liaison and escort interpreting; new forms of interpreting mainly include television interpreting and video-conferencing interpreting.In the long run, the number of people who can speak comprehensible English will have different impacts on the different categories of interpreting. In the last part, also the most important part, the thesis focuses on discussing the impacts one by one with convincing first-hand interpreting experiences.