Across Languages and Cultures
Volume/Issue:
Accepted Manuscript / Online First
The speaker is being impolite. How is the interpreter interpreting that?
Author:
Caiwen Wang University of Westminster, UK

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https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6610-7244
Online Publication Date:
08 May 2025
Publication Date:
08 May 2025
Article Category:
Research Article
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1556/084.2024.00686
Keywords:
conference interpreters; impoliteness interpreting; interview; retrospections; simultaneous interpreting
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Abstract

Situations in which a source speaker attacks their addressee's face pose a challenge for interpreters, due to the potential controversy or conflicts to which impoliteness is prone from a pragmatic perspective. In this study, I drew upon Bousfield's (2008) linguistic model of impoliteness and analysed a political speech by Nigel Farage, a former UK politician, at the European Parliament to examine how conference interpreters render impoliteness. I also conducted interviews immediately after the experiment to probe interpreters' motivations behind their impoliteness interpreting moves. The analysis of the interpreting data from eighteen participants has evinced that (a) speaker-input impoliteness is predominantly attenuated by interpreters and is seldom strengthened, and (b) for less experienced interpreters, attenuation is consistently the most frequent manoeuvre to interpret impoliteness among the five identified ones. For more experienced interpreters, attenuations decrease in number and close renditions increase, with the latter sometimes surpassing the former. More experienced interpreters also have much less or no omissions or misrepresentations. Analysis of the interview data indicates that (a) attenuations and close renditions are interpreters' intended decisions, and (b) omissions and misrepresentations are forced options. It is hoped that the findings from the current study will contribute to the literature on impoliteness interpreting.

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Cover Across Languages and Cultures
Across Languages and Cultures
Print ISSN:
1585-1923
Online ISSN:
1588-2519

Editor-in-Chief: Krisztina KÁROLY (Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary)

Consulting Editor: Dániel MÁNY  (Semmelweis University, Hungary)

Managing Editor: Réka ESZENYI (Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary)

Founding Editor-in-Chief: Kinga KLAUDY (Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary)

EDITORIAL BOARD

  • Andrew CHESTERMAN (University of Helsinki, Finland)
  • Kirsten MALMKJÆR (University of Leicester, UK)
  • Christiane NORD (University of Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa)
  • Anthony PYM (Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Tarragona, Spain, University of Melbourne, Australia)
  • Mary SNELL-HORNBY (University of Vienna, Austria)
  • Sonja TIRKKONEN-CONDIT (University of Eastern Finland, Joensuu, Finland)

ADVISORY BOARD

  • Mona BAKER (Shanghai International Studies University, China, University of Oslo, Norway)
  • Łucja BIEL (University of Warsaw, Poland)
  • Gloria CORPAS PASTOR (University of Malaga, Spain; University of Wolverhampton, UK)
  • Rodica DIMITRIU (Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza” Iasi, Romania)
  • Birgitta Englund DIMITROVA (Stockholm University, Sweden)
  • Sylvia KALINA (Cologne Technical University, Germany)
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  • Orero PILAR (Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona, Spain)
  • Gábor PRÓSZÉKY (Hungarian Research Institute for Linguistics, Hungary)
  • Alessandra RICCARDI (University of Trieste, Italy)
  • Edina ROBIN (Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary)
  • Myriam SALAMA-CARR (University of Manchester, UK)
  • Mohammad Saleh SANATIFAR (independent researcher, Iran)
  • Sanjun SUN (Beijing Foreign Studies University, China)
  • Anikó SOHÁR (Pázmány Péter Catholic University,  Hungary)
  • Sonia VANDEPITTE (University of Gent, Belgium)
  • Albert VERMES (Eszterházy Károly University, Hungary)
  • Yifan ZHU (Shanghai Jiao Tong Univeristy, China)

Prof. Dr. Krisztina KÁROLY 
School of English and American Studies, Eötvös Loránd University
H-1088 Budapest, Rákóczi út 5., Hungary 
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Across Languages and Cultures
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