Live Simultaneous Interpretation

Live Simultaneous Interpretation

Recently, we completed a live simultaneous interpretation project for an online conference. Simultaneous interpretation [Professional interpretation services given simultaneously for large gatherings (i.e. the speaker and the interpreter speak at the same time)] is quite rare in India, in spite of the rich variety of languages we have – and so is unfortunately the training available for the same in Indian languages!
In an ideal world, a simultaneous interpreter works only for 15-20 minutes at a stretch and then needs a break – hence such work is done in pairs so that there is no interruption in the interpretation provided and the listeners can have complete rendition of all that is being said.
The platform used for this online conference was Zoom, and though it is very reliable and robust, in the 9 language channels (English, Chinese, Japanese, German, French, Russian, Portuguese, Spanish, Korean) for interpretation, no Indian languages were available on their language channel options to listen to the interpretation. So we had to use a make-do option by remembering the codes as follows – Portuguese channel was used for Bangla, French channel was used for Hindi, so on and so forth.
Apart from the unavailability of languages, there were other issues to overcome in online interpretation. Ideally the pair of interpreters are at a single location so that they can work on one channel dedicated to a language. Sadly, due to the Covid situation, it was not possible for the interpreters to work together from one location, and since there were 2 interpreter accounts on Zoom for one language, the technical collaborator had a hard time to make the interpreters work together from different locations.
Initially the interpreters could not see nor hear each other due to technical glitches and therefore had to communicate about halting or continuing, on SMS or phone calls while the project was live, which proved to be a daunting task! Internet speeds and connectivity posed problems too.
Online simultaneous interpretation is still in a very nascent state in India, but it is about time Indian languages get the online representation they deserve considering the number of speakers and users of these languages.