A corpus-based investigation of explicitation patterns between professional and student interpreters in Chinese-English consecutive interpreting

Abstract

This paper investigates the influence of interpreters’ expertise on their explicitation patterns in Chinese to English (C-E) consecutive interpreting (CI). An analysis of the performance, notes and retrospection of 12 professional interpreters and 12 student interpreters revealed the following common features: 1) the majority of explicitations are of experiential natureMergeCell 2) most explicitations are for clarificationMergeCell 3) it is common for interpreters to explicitate to make up for competence insufficiency. Additionally, based on differences identified between the two groups, the study revealed the following tendencies: 1) tendency of clarification: professional interpreters tend to clarify the original informationMergeCell 2) tendency of cohesion enhancement: professional interpreters tend to add conjunctive adjuncts to enhance cohesionMergeCell 3) tendency of subjective reinforcement: professionals tend to reinforce the speaker’s attitude by adding attitudinal information or intensifiersMergeCell 4) tendency to use explicitation as a strategy to make up for inadequate interpreting competency: student interpreters tend to explicitate for time-management and gap-filling purposes. This descriptive study of explicitation based on a self-built corpus of professional and student interpreters’ interpreting products may provide insight for interpreter training.