Communicating Across Cultures: The Role of Language Interpreters

Abstract

“Culture in its broadest sense is cultivated behavior; that is the totality of a person's learned, accumulated experience which is socially transmitted, or more briefly, behavior through social learning.” Therefore, “Culture is communication; communication is culture” (Tamu, 2001). “The collective programming of the mind distinguishing the members of one group or category of people from others”’. (Hofstede, 1997). Using Edward Hall and Hofstede’s theories, the study explores why culture is prominent in language interpreting. What are some prominent cultural norms that appear while language interpreting? How do they influence the effectiveness of the translation? The study conducted interviews of language interpreters and summarized the results to provide answers to the questions above.