Information Loss In Consecutive Interpretation And Countermeasures

CI is a trans-cultural communicative activity with timely, strict and challenging features. In CI, the major task of the interpreter is the successful transmission of information from the speaker to the listener so as to fulfill the purpose of communication. Faithfulness stands out as the first criterion for interpretation quality, which is followed by linguistic precision and fluency in order of importance. However, in real interpretation, absolute faithfulness in the transmission of information can only be an ideal goal due to the unavoidability of information loss. Therefore, to make interpretation more faithful, it is necessary to do research on information loss. With Gile’s Effort Model as the theoretical pillar, this study employs experiment data to justify the plausibility of theories. With the intention of assisting student interpreters to tackle the problem of information loss in CI, the author categorizes various kinds of information loss, explores the causes that bring about information loss and attempts to put forward relevant strategies to deal with information loss. This thesis, as an empirical study, contrastively investigates the C-E and E-C interpretations carried out by student interpreters and professional interpreters with over three years of interpretation experience and has come to the following conclusions after the analysis of the experiment data by use of SPSS:First, both professional and student interpreters, constrained by their limited attention and energy, will make various degrees of incorrect interpretation and intentional omission in their interpretation. But professional interpreters, compared with student interpreters, transfer more information in interpretation. Secondly, in the assessment of the effect on the interpretation quality by the high information density, it is found that information density influences professional and student interpreters differently. The analysis of the causes of information loss and the strategies to deal with information loss shows that professional interpreters use strategies to handle information loss more frequently and more effectively than student interpreters. While professional interpreters’linguistic competence hardly brings about any information loss, student interpreters’linguistic proficiency still needs improving to reduce information loss.Meanwhile, CI is also a research field that can be employed to explore the interpretation quality difference between professional and student interpreters. This is because in interpreting practice, the acquisition of CI precedes that of SI. Some bilinguals who have taken special training in interpretation have also been engaged in some simple CI. Therefore, comparatively speaking, CI, compared with SI, is less difficult for student interpreters. That is the reason why this thesis conducts the comparative study in CI between professional and student interpreters.