Bridging the Gap!!

How do we get interpreters certified and how do we get people to recognize certification and how do we train people for certification? These are the questions that been plaguing the country for years and the deaf community is so fed up of the fight. They are hanging in there though for the distance and we do hope that the fight will soon turn into cooperative effort between Govt. and NGO’s to create the needed human resource for the deaf to be able to access life. The ASLI has taken a big step forward recently with the completion of the Interpreting ‘Bridge’ Course. The idea is to involve at the first level, the best of the signers in India and the ones who can actually communicate with the deaf being CODA’s or siblings of the deaf. The 10 day intensive full time course is aimed at giving these signers the knowledge of interpreting theory and coping strategies enabling them to do better as interpreters and avoid the trap of being in the helper mode which s rather common. The idea would be that at the end of the course they would be far more efficient as interpreters than they were before.

The course is being put up to the Rehabilitation Council of India for review and accreditation. The Course will be similar to the one we did way back in 1999 in Chennai as an Orientation course for interpreters. This one is far better and is actually going to be a fore runner of the longer 3 months certificate course that ASLI would like to develop.

The idea of using deaf community terps as trainers is unique and the ASLI trainers are even now seeking out deaf and hearing terps with family who are deaf or who have long time association with the deaf community.

ASLI setting up training!

The ASLI has now set in motion a dynamic new idea to increase the awareness of interpreting and interpreters in the country. I was at the world conference of Interpreters in Segovia in 2007 and remember listening to talks by various individuals about how the “professional interpreter” was emerging as a ‘delinked’ individual in some ways in certain societies. The most impressive of these speakers was Dr. Chris Stone of the English ASLI, a brilliant interpreter and academic. He was talking about how the deaf community as an integrated unit needs to include interpreters and the interpreters themselves need to be involved at different levels and interfaces with the deaf community instead of coming in – doing a job – and leaving. This makes for a divide between terps and deafies and this is to be avoided. I remember sharing a question at the time. I was amazed or rather aghast at what he said. We in India are praying and preparing and advocating and fighting for the “professional interpreter” and trying to get out of the “helper mode” and he was talking about deaf community linkage and trust. I said we have 10 million deaf in India and very few interpreters. How do we do this? His answer was even more amazing, he said “Well Arun we are going to be watching you and seeing how you are going to resolve the issues cuz we need to find out how to do this.” This from a person of Dr. Stone’s stature just goes to show how the more you know the more unassuming we need to become. My respect for him increased greatly at that time from his simple humble answer. I am glad to say that the first step of my journey in setting up interpreting in India was validated at that time. The actual nuts and bolts of giving India interpreters took longer and now 3 years later we are halfway there with a website for amateur interpreters and a small membership organisation.