Whose job?

Stand back all you Deaf professionals out there because interpreters will be more “hands on” and less neutral.

A fair comment or an unjust leap in the dark?  Well, being a user of an interpreter myself, talking with interpreters, and talking with others users, I detect a whiff of change in the air.  That interpreters are questioning the current code of ethics is welcome:  it does not serve many Deaf people, nor does it acknowledge the true reality of the situation as it is for many interpreters.

However, what alarms me is the seemingly ever-increasing pressure for interpreters to become a “part of a team” with the Deaf person.  Speaking as a Deaf professional who truly believes in the concept of equality, this is not a development that I view with equanimity.  Equality is a harsh taskmaster – it devolves onto us responsibilities as well as rights.  The carrying out of responsibilities is what marks skilled people out from the mediocre, and if interpreters are allowed to “hide” Deaf people behind their skills, then the concept of equality disappears.

Let me give you a very practical example. Not too long ago, I was commissioned to facilitate a group of seventeen European disabled people.  In the group there were several who did not have English as a first language, one who was deafened and used a speech-to-text screen, a blind person with severely limited vision.  I opened the proceedings by asking for ground rules.  The deafened person requested that everyone who spoke should preclude their utterance with their name as she could not see who spoke.  I stated that I would point at people to make clear who was speaking and asked that no offence be taken if this was unacceptable in their own culture.  Throughout the session, whenever I pointed my voice-over did not say the name.  I was asked afterwards if the voice-over should have stated the name each time to which my response was unequivocal – absolutely not.

The discussion did not stop there.  My position as I articulated it was simple.  I am the facilitator and it is entirely up to me to decide how to conduct the proceedings and if the blind person decides he feels that I am discriminatory in my handling of the session then that is my responsibility to correct or at least apologise for.  That to me is equality as I would be no different from a hearing facilitator who does not name people in managing the process.  It is not for the voice-over to add a voice to my “pointing”.

I welcomed the discussion as it enabled me to rethink how I could have managed the session better – I could have, for example, ensured that there were labels on the desk and I could have added the names to my pointing for the voice-over to follow.  But this is still my responsibility as facilitator.

There were also further issues throughout the weekend.  One was when I saw an interpreter waving his hand at the Deaf Chair of the proceedings to draw attention to someone speaking.  Another was when I was endeavouring to speak to some staff; an interpreter came up and asked what I needed to say.  The third was when I was told an interpreter had deliberately added some information to a submission by a Deaf person.

My view is that these interventions are intrusive.  However, having said that if the Deaf person that the interpreter is working for knowingly welcomes and desires such interventions, then that is a matter for the two people to negotiate.  And for me that is the crux of the matter – the ability to negotiate.  I can negotiate with the interpreter so that I do not have these interventions, or at least make my displeasure very firmly known.  But what of many Deaf people?  Are they able to negotiate?

Interpreters are in a extremely powerful position.  They can use their power to enable communication to happen or to control the communication.  Deafworks did a small-scale research project on interpreters and some of the findings from hospitals and surgeries informed us that they were finding problems with community interpreters acting as advocates.  An important point is that many community interpreters are from the same community as the patient.  The advocacy work sometimes overrides the interpretation to the annoyance of the medical staff who want to deal directly with the patient.  There seems to be no mechanism to assess and review the validity of the intervention and certainly, the patient’s wishes do not seem to be prominent.

Sounds familiar?  Many Deaf people were indeed disempowered by the Missioners who decided many matters during the “interpreting” for the Deaf person.  The legacy is still to be seen with many Deaf people are unwilling or afraid to manage their own lives.  Are interpreters then to be the new “Missioners” intervening for the good of the Deaf person and ultimately disabling them?

Let us be clear. There is a desperate need for advocacy for many less able Deaf People who are bewildered  by the way systems work, by the myriad choices open to them and sometimes by the very difficult decisions (life or death) that have to be made.  Interpreters are indeed placed often in an impossible satiation – can they stand idly by watching a Deaf person struggle?  No decent human being could watch someone make a disastrous decision knowing that it was wrong without feeling a very strong impulse to intervene. And this where the code of ethics fails all of us.

For these reasons I am in favour of change, but I also feel that some external checks and balances need to be built in. Not every interpreter should be allowed, for example, to work in interpreting/advocacy situations. There are some who would be unable to restrain their impulse to intervene even if this disadvantages the Deaf person. Others who would be engaged in such work should have regular training and monitoring. There needs to be more trained Deaf people involved in the interpreting process as advocates, monitors and as relay interpreters.

For those who conduct themselves in the current neutral style, we need greater attention as how the process is negotiated. For example, it is patently absurd that the interpreter should justify voicing-over the exchanges between a Deaf Chair and a Deaf advisor in a meeting in the name of “environmental interpreting” and to refuse to negotiate with the Deaf people involved. One wonders if the interpreter would have been so insistent if the two people were hearing either because they probably could not hear the exchanges or because it is an accepted hearing convention. I would term this oppressive behaviour especially as the interpreter refused to accept the request to desist from the Deaf people involved.

I would like to see greater acceptance from interpreters that there is a contract between them and the contractor.  Some interpreters insist on interpreting for both sides even when the contractor has been the Deaf person who may want to use their own voice.  The wishes of the contractor in this case have been made clear and these should be respected.  In cases where this is less clear, the interpreter should be required to say to whom they are responsible so if there is dissatisfaction, the contractor can be informed and the contract scrutinised.

In conclusion, I have to say I am unhappy at some of the level of discussion and the lack of training for both Deaf people (users and providers) and interpreters. If we are not careful, we will create a new code of ethics that does not safeguard the truly vulnerable and powerless, while muddled thinking may chip away at those of us who try to negotiate for what we are contracting for. The end result well be a corps of people who are powerful in communication situations and unaccountable to no-one. We may as well call them “Missioners”.

Paul Redfern is a freelance writer and a polemicist.