Simultaneous Interpretation

Imagine you are at a conference and a foreign speaker is on stage; moreover, they give a lot of information, including technical terms in their speech. You do not know the speaker’s language well enough to understand an entire medical presentation. However, when you go to such conferences, you are given a headset, and you can listen and understand what the speaker is saying through this headset. Of course, the voice you hear does not belong to the speaker, and the words do not come out of their mouth; however, the important thing is that you listen and understand what they are saying in your own language simultaneously. Another example is when you turn on a foreign television channel, and a politician is on the screen. Still, the voice you hear is not the politician’s, and the language they speak is different. Behind the process in these two examples, translators are listening to the speaker with headphones from inside a soundproof cabin and translating simultaneously into a microphone. This type of translation is called simultaneous translation.

How is Simultaneous Translation Done?

To do simultaneous translation, the translator must have a good command of both the target and the source language, but this is not enough. A simultaneous translator must also have a solid grasp of the subject they are translating; knowing the meaning of terms in the target language alone is not sufficient for successful simultaneous translation. In addition, the simultaneous interpreter must be very familiar with the topic; otherwise, they will not be able to do a complete translation, no matter how well they know the language.

Simultane çeviri yapabilmek için çevirmenin hem hedef hem de kaynak dile hâkim olması gerekir ancak bu, yeterli değildir. Bir simultane çevirmen, çeviri yaptığı konuya da hâkim olmalıdır: yalnızca terimlerin karşılığını hedef dilde bilmek, başarılı bir eş zamanlı çeviri için yeterli değildir. Ayrıca simultane çevirmenin gündeme de hâkim olması gerekir, aksi takdirde ne kadar iyi dil bilirse bilsin, tam bir çeviri yapamayacaktır.

Simultaneous Translation Usage Areas

• News channels
• Conferences
• Conventions
• Seminars
• Symposiums
• International diplomatic negotiations