IW 104: InterpreTips: Jack of All or One: Generalist or Specialist
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00:00:02 Only TIM speaks in this episode
Good morning, good evening, good afternoon. Wherever you are, this is the Interpreter's Workshop podcast. I'm Tim Curry, your host. Here we talk everything sign language interpreting the ins, the outs, the ups, the downs, the sideways of interpreting. If you're a student, a new interpreter, experienced interpreter, this is the place for you. If you want to know more, go tointerpretersworkshop.com.
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Let's start talking... interpreting.
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And now the quotes of the day.
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The first is by Napoleon Hill, one of the first self-help American authors, “The Jack of all Trades seldom is good at any. Concentrate all of your efforts on one definite, chief aim.”
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And the second quote by Viktor Vicsek, a Serbian born creative artist known for projection mapping.
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“A Jack of all trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.”
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Today we talk about a generalist interpreter compared to a specialist interpreter. Sign language interpreters have started off in the generalist category, but today and over the last several years we've been trying to separate our skill sets into specialized domains.
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Today, let's look at the differences, the pros and cons of a generalist or a specialist sign language interpreter. And the quotes have already told you that some people think there are positive and negatives with both perspectives.
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Let's get started.
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So, let's start with some definitions. A generalist sign language interpreter in this context means someone who works in the community in a variety of settings locations and with a variety of clients. They have a skill set which a generalist would have the basic foundation of interpreting.
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They need to have a foundation in the interpreting process, a foundation of fluency in at least one sign language, and one spoken language. They need to have an understanding of day-to-day schemas, such as medical visits, visits to government offices, tax offices, insurance, meetings at businesses, meetings for work, the daily life that everyone needs for interpreters, the community or the public sector. But that means that they do need to master at least a comprehensive understanding of the cultural norms for those settings, those schemas that they have to work in regularly.
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And that is on top of mastering the interpreting process, mastering the language fluencies, mastering the managing of a discourse, the communication between the two languages.
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All of that does take a mastery of skill sets.
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It also takes the skill sets of professional behavior, business practice, cultural norms, and all of those soft skills that are in the middle of all of that.
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And as a generalist sign language interpreter overtime your understanding and comprehension of each of these domains goes from the basic comprehension of, of living experience that you have gone through in your life to experiencing these schemas as an interpreter.
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Understanding how your behavior, your professionalism, your understanding of the discourse, and your management of the discourse changes things about the schema and how it's different when there is an interpreter present. That skill set can be learned over time. It can be understood on a basic level through education, and even better through a mentorship or supervision.
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So even at a generalist sign language interpreter can become a better master of these skill sets, and yet still not have the expertise for all of the domains or any one particular domain. Because if we look at medical visits, I know there are.
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Others who are much more capable of understanding the vocabulary or the concept of a certain disease or surgery procedure than me because I definitely do not have a background in any medical field.
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The only biology class I've ever taken in my life was microbiology at the university level, and yet I can interpret medical visits and have because I've taught myself in preparations and through observing other interpreters.
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As a generalist, I have also experienced the domain of educational interpreting for higher education and from kindergarten to secondary education.
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However, within that domain, other interpreters looked at me as the specialist in the science domains. In particular, there were some schools in the US when I would substitute for a day or two at certain schools, the interpreters would change the schedule around.
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So that I took all of the astronomy classes, physics classes, math classes.
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Because they knew that I have an astrophysics degree, and therefore I would understand the concepts more readily than they. Does that make me the specialist sign language interpreter in that moment, perhaps. But I often wondered if it was because they didn't like interpreting for those teachers.
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Hmm, I doubt that was it. I did see them drinking more coffee than I got though. Huh.
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That experience I can do because I have experienced it and because I have higher education degrees, including pedagogy. That education, those experiences allow me to understand the educational process at all levels, but I'm still not specialized in that.
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But I understand how students learn, the basic levels of development of a student, and how that can affect the interpretation process and the discourse itself. But I still would not think of myself as a specialized educational interpreter.
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Hmm. Well, let's look at specializations.
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A specialist sign language interpreter would specialize in certain domains 1-2 or multiple, or perhaps sub domains of a domain, a category within a category. It gets confusing really fast, doesn't it? So, let's talk about some of the domains, medical or healthcare…
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The sciences, which would have multiple sub domains within that which healthcare would actually fit under since they are also science,s conference interpreting politics, higher education, elementary education, artistic interpreting and the list can go on and on.
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Does a specialized interpreter need to have a degree in that specialization? I would say not. It would be amazing if they did, but that would be very impractical for the profession as a whole to have a requirement that the interpreter needs to have the same degree as the client.
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But rather than need to have ongoing education courses focused on the specifics of that specialization, the vocabulary, the culture for that setting, how other professionals in that setting communicate with each other, the acronyms they're using, all of those nuances about this schema they need to learn.
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They need to have, as part of the tools in their tool belt. They need to know the names of the people involved, names of medication, names of procedures and what those procedures mean, what conflicts that medicine might have with another medicine. Many of those nuances that a generalist interpreter does not necessarily have or understand without experience.
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And we can apply those thoughts to any of the sciences, including higher education, where the interpreter needs to understand how academics in that field discuss things, how they interact with each other, understand the politics and interactions and communication styles within that institution and the domain within that institution.
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And in this instance, as a specialist sign language interpreter, [in] most of these domains the interpreter needs to have a degree at the appropriate level, not necessarily a degree in the same field, but a degree at the university level to understand what the higher education culture is about.
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Artistic interpretation. This is one that's very difficult. This involves the skill set for the interpreter. That includes creativity and a very high fluency in both languages.
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Many generalist sign language interpreters do not have the fluency in both languages to be able to capture the meaning in a song or in a play without proper study and proper preparaaa-, prepa-ra-, papapara-? …without proper preparation for each of the gigs.
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One tip I would give anyone who wants to do artistic interpretation when it comes to songs is after you've given the interpretation with the recording of you (and you've all heard it) watch your interpretation, without the music, the sound is completely turned off.
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What does it look like you actually signed? Does it make sense? Does it give the same feeling or a similar feeling as the song imparts to hearing people?
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One specialization is called conference interpreters. Unfortunately, this definition can be confusing. In some countries it's thought of as those who only do international conferences with multiple interpreters, but this term comes from the spoken language interpreting field.
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Because in their definition, this specialization means it's high stress and very intense communication. There may be multiple teams of interpreters within booths with headsets on, and microphones and interpreting into multiple languages simultaneously with very little time to interact with the clients involved, in fact…
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…because you are in a booth. That's very high stress and very intense work. With sign language interpreters, conference interpreting the definition can vary. Because yes, in international settings we would be working with multiple interpreters, multiple teams of interpreters with multiple languages, and it too would be highly stressful and intense work.
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Whereas within the country of your native languages, when it's only one spoken language and one signed language, the structure is different. You're interpreting for a lecture, a presentation to an audience, but the only languages that are being interpreted are the ones that you are doing.
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And you're up on stage or on platform in front with the presenters.
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And that type of conference interpreting I have done as a generalist multiple times, workshops, seminars, even university lectures where you're up in front and you're the only team of interpreters there, you and your colleague interpreting for this presentation, I would not necessarily term that as conference interpreter specialization as it were.
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However, conference interpreting does take a different level of professionalism and, and practical work that one-on-one conversations do not need.
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It is more intensive and more stressful as well.
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So being a specialist sign language interpreter means that you train and practice for a specific field or a specific context, and sometimes even specific groups.
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But both the generalist and the specialist sign language interpreter need to have the basic foundations of interpreting professional practice professional ethics to do the job.
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If you're now wondering whether you're a journalist or a specialist, why not share this episode with a friend and discuss it? Click on the links in the show notes to support and share. Thank you. Now let's go back.
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So we've talked about the generalist and the specialist definitions, so now let's compare the two a little bit more. The first thing that's different between a generalist and a specialist category of interpreter.
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Would be that they may be working with different types of clients.
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As a specialist, you would probably be focused on clients who are experts in their field, who are working in that field and therefore have a higher knowledge of this domain than the general population. Therefore, you need to understand what they mean through the vocabulary that they are using, and the way they communicate with their colleagues.
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That means also, as a specialist, you should have at least a high level of education that matches the minimum for this field to understand the communication styles of these participants.
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The preparation between a generalist and a specialist can actually be exactly the same. Like I mentioned earlier, at conferences, both would need to prepare for the presentations that would be there. They both need to understand how a conference works, the agenda, how to behave as a professional.
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However, the specialist would also be preparing not only for their team and clients, but with multiple teams, multiple languages with different technology perhaps, to be able to hear and understand the language that they are working in from the multiple languages that are there. Conference level interpreting internationally tends to be of a higher vocabulary and a higher authority that means either academic or politically higher.
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On a generalist level, working with the general population, having an understanding of communication at multiple levels of fluency, of the language of educational levels, all of that is also a skill set. The diversity within the generalist domains is widespread because you're working with a diverse population of clients.
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So, while being a Jack of all trades can seem a negative thing because you're only understanding a little bit of everything, you still have to be flexible enough to handle multiple situations, multiple clients, multiple nuances in the use of languages.
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As a specialist interpreter, you work hard to understand that field to know that field inside and out to be a Jack of one thing.
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A master of one, which means you have already mastered the basic foundations of the interpreting field to be able to then layer upon layer the domains and sub domains of your specialization. There's a place for both a generalist interpreter and a specialist interpreter.
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Both do the same job, but the experiences are different to some degree. Some of the knowledge and education that goes into it is different, and yet both need to have ongoing education. The generalist because they need to be up to date on many different domains to understand what has changed from a day-to-day basis for all of the schemas that they work in.
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As a specialist, each field changes drastically over time. Just think of technology working in the tech field as an interpreter, you have to be on top of things quickly.
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And yet you can't be on top of all things whether you work for the general population or a specific domain.
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Hmm, does that mean then that the pay structure should be different, if you're a specialized interpreter? If you're a conference interpreter compared to a community generalist sign language interpreter, should the pay be the same? Should it be different?
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Does one require more education, more formal education, or more day-to-day education? Hmm, I think that's a topic for another episode. What should we get paid and why? Based on what?
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Hmm. And then we have to think about the transitions between a generalist and a specialist.
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There are clients who are also changing from a general field to a specific field, perhaps in higher education they are going from a general education to a specific field and therefore the interpreter needs to be specialized in the field as the deaf client transitions.
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Right now, there is a huge talk in Canada and in the US about a shortage of ASL interpreters, and there are many reasons for it, one of which is because there are so many new professional deaf clients working in many fields and therefore, they need some specialized sign language interpreters… and there aren't enough.
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So…
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Generally speaking, [slightly chuckles] a generalist and a specialist are both sign language interpreters. There are some differences in both categories. What are you? Do you consider yourself a specialist in a certain domain or a generalist as a master of many?
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Well, let's end this with a quote by Richie Norton, a business coach and best-selling author.
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“Jack of all trades or master of one. If you're a master of one, you'll soon be a master of none. Times are a changin’. Be a Jack of all trades or better master of many.”
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Our job is changing constantly, rapidly. The field has changed, has gone more technical, more online, more highly skilled because our clients are also becoming more professional in many different domains, many different fields throughout the world.
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I think it's time for us to develop higher, to match what is demanded of us… and we can talk about pay later.
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So, until next time, keep calm. Keep mastering …interpreting. I'll see you next week. Take care now.
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