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Given the necessary requirements an interpreter has to meet, we can see that interpreting is one of the most exhausting activity because of the intellectual effort required.
Thus, the International Association of Conference Interpreters sets a maximum of six hours per day for interpretation, divided into two sessions (morning and afternoon). The break between sessions must be one and a half hour.
What additional difficulties can an interpreter encounter?
1. High level of concentration necessary to interpret the immediate nature of the interventions, requiring the interpreter experience and deep knowledge of the topics being discussed.
2. Lack of notes: The consequences for professional interpreters are that when they arrive in the room and want to take notes (an essential thing in consecutive or bilateral interpretation), the judge tells them that it is forbidden to take notes. The consecutive interpretation, due to the immense amount of data and the speed of intervention, always requires the taking of notes that the interpreter uses to make a speech and to reproduce it as accurately as possible in the other language.
3. Voice quality of the speaker or interlocutor (accent, diction and clarity, intonation).
4. Speed spoken by the speaker or interlocutor.
5. Poor expression of the interlocutor or speaker: lack of order of words, inconsistency in phrases, etc.
6. Difficulty or technical nature of the issue in question.
7. The sound quality of the room.
It should be borne in mind that the purpose of a translation, whether oral or written, is that the recipient receiving the message fully understands it as if he had received it directly into his native language and if the interpreter understood the situation, is an additional guarantee of linguistic exchange quality.
If you want to find out about the qualities of a good interpreter, check out our article on this topic: What are the qualities of a good interpreter?
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