A Report On Interpreting For A Drug-Related Interrogation In Terms Of Interpreter’s Subjectivity

This report is based on an interrogation interpreting practice conducted by the author on December 4,2018 in the Shadong Police Station in Baiyun District,Guangzhou.It describes the uniqueness of this interpreting practice and the problems and challenges encountered by the author during the process,especially the subjectivity of the interpreter and its effect on interrogation interpreting.In this case,for the sake of confidentiality,the interpreting task had a sudden change in terms of subject,duration,and place of work after the start of the task,which posed a great challenge to the author.In the absence of knowledge reserves of legal terminology,the fluency and professionality of the interpreter’s output was tested.In this practice report,the author describes the whole process of interpreting practice,which is divided into two parts: pre-task preparation and interpreting practice.In the case study,based on the relevant research and literature review,the author describes the interpreter’s subjectivity from four aspects,namely representative of both the police and suspect,flexibility of word-choice,arrangement of information and reconciliation of cultural differences.The analysis shows that in the process of interrogation interpreting,under the influence of certain factors,the interpreters will make unconventional output out of their own consideration.In order to make interpreters more capable of meeting the needs of interrogation interpreting,training programs from multiple perspectives should be provided to those interpreters,so that they can give full play to their subjectivity and promote the efficient interrogation process.