Adventures in liaison interpreting

My vision to nurture an association kind of gathering of interpreters working between Japanese and French has bumped onto the wall of reality. Who is an interpreter? Professionals working in the booths are. They don't have to explain and justify. The mostly untrained active interpreter that built up a career trail out of luck, failures and mishaps, hard work and opportunism in the loosely charted territory of out-of-the-booth interpretation realm, this individual takes many shapes and faces. In the tiny world of Japanese-French here in Japan, I pretend to have chartered it plenty enough. I know how it works and how and why it doesn't work for me. I know why the market largely managed by agencies keeps the rare non-Japanese performer out of its loop of assignment. I know the cultural and racial factors that are at the core of this dynamism. I don't even wish to discuss with, cajole, convince anyone who thinks my interpretation of the situation is flawed. It took too long a time to reach the awareness of how things work in that domain. Probably, no, certainly, wanting to try and build an association like gathering was doomed to fail from day one. By sheer lack of members, and by the very fact that out-of-the-booth interpreters come indeed in various shapes and faces. And the more they are "professionalized", the more they have adopted the shut-clam attitude with is endemic in the profession. For what I have seen, the JP-English scene, interpreters there too are nothing less of a bunch of sealed oysters. That's why an association would mostly bring together amateurs, interpreters cum translators cum graphic artists cum dish washers, cum anything you like. Among the 17 or so members, there are 6 who are identifiable and among those 6, 4 who are self-defined as interpreters or interpreters-liaison agents. I have no clue about who are the shut-clam others. They just registered and cannot be referred to by names. Other interpreters never showed up of showed up and never came back after the first meeting. The story goes that they don't want to rub elbows with less mavericks than themselves. They mostly don't want to rub elbows with anyone.

Also, whereas professional in-the-booth interpreters are self-justified to write, glow and ponder about the profession, out-of-the-booth interpreters may seldom carry any interest in their profession that touches on academic, conceptual and other airy aspect of the trade. They make money and a living, or they try to. It's a down to earth job, one day with the client, delivering, getting the dough and sayonara. Lonely wolves we are.

Who would care to discuss about training technics, improvement strategies, computer aided future schemes and the likes? Do butchers care about knives kinetics or angle factors and the trimming of sirloin steaks? My assumption was wrong. Those who came, most of them,were looking in a sense for the opportunity to have a "free hour of conversation with a French national". Not all of them, but as they are starving to converse in French, anything will do.

Iraqi interpreters do not read the Interpreting Journal. Besides the lethal factor, why would the company booths interpreter at yesterday's fair in Tokyo would read or even know, and care about Liaison Interpreting - A Handbook? Mostly nobody. One day sitting at a booth in an international trade fair, the next guiding a group of tourists in Tokyo, doing translations to meet ends, bridging the gap at a business meeting. Who would care about theory when it's about paying the rent? Same goes with drawing a map of the market, current and future map that is. Who cares when you are on the receiving side, waiting for the agency to bestow you a chunk of assignment. Just say "thank you" and bow. Past tentative to start a discussion on the dynamic factors of the market was massively met with blinking question marks in the eyes of the attendant. What I see - too late - as crucial : understanding the scope and span and texture of the professional pool where you are swimming - or drowning - should be a priority. I was wrong on this too. They don't see the point.

Yet, the Internet, the blog, give voice to people out of the academic territories the freedom - except in some corners of the world - to ponder aloud about professional and academic things at will. The academics do not know them, or even if they happen to bump into their tiny realm, they probably scoff at what they peruse. But it doesn't matter. That's why there are still so rare examples like Boothando or Alessio Iacovoni's Weblog. Out-of-the-booth activity gets visible when you read about Iraqi interpreters slaughters or how they try and struggle to find an escape and a safer life in Europe or the USA. The only expression allowed may be to write about one's "adventures in liaison interpreting", which comes head to head with confidentiality rules. Professional gathering was a dream afar.