An Empirical Study On The Impact Of Indian Accent On Consecutive Interpreting

Nowadays,English has become the preferred language in international conferences.Speakers who speak accented English have made interpreters confront with non-standard English,thus interpreters,according to Gile?s Effort Model,are forced to devote considerable capacity to the Listening and Analysis Effort,slowing down production or leading to substantial loss of information.This thesis aims to explore the correlation between Indian accent and the consecutive interpreting quality and how the former affects the latter.To improve the interpreting quality,the empirical study on the impact of accent on consecutive interpreting is of great significance and the strategies to cope with that are critically needed among interpreters.Guided by Daniel Gile’s Effort Model,this thesis conducted an empirical study,using a combination of quantitative and qualitative analysis to examine the impact of Indian accent on English-Chinese consecutive interpreting.Subjects were divided into 2 groups: Group A and Group B.Variable-controlling approach was applied to this experiment.When exploring the correlation between interpreting quality and all sorts of factors,by controlling other variables,the author obtains a single correlation between interpreting quality and accent.The materials for the two groups are the same,and so are the length and speed of the audio,with the intention of highlighting the impact of the accent on interpreting quality.The material used for Group A is a recorded live speech from an Indian ambassador,while that for Group B is a recorded audio in standard English,read by a foreign teacher whose mother tongue is English and unaccented.The author recorded,transcribed and scored the interpretations of the groups and then conducted data and text analysis.Findings are as follows:The average score of Group A is 64.95,in clear comparison with that of Group B?s 81.68.The median and mode value of Group A are 64 and 63,while those of Group B are 83.5 and 88.The range value of Group B is 18,compared to that of group A(40).The variance of Group A reaches 97.71,compared to 32.8 of Group B.Data shows that:1)There is a negative correlation between the speaker’s accent and the interpreter’s interpreting quality.The heavier the accent,the worse the quality.2)Accent affects consecutive interpreting in both direct way and indirect way:Accents directly affects Listening and Analysis Effort,thus influencing interpreting quality;Accent has an indirect effect on other Efforts since interpreters do not reasonably allocate their energy,thus affecting interpreting quality.3)Accent affects consecutive interpreting through other perspectives such as intensifying the interpreter?s psychological burden.It is hoped that this study will be of certain benefit to interpreting learners to adjust their practicing methods,thus improving their listening comprehension.The study is also intended to provide new perspectives for the teaching of interpreting.