NCJ Number
142720
Date Published
1991
Length
656 pages
Annotation
This book synthesizes the evolving knowledge in the field of court interpreters, who serve non-English-speaking defendants; sets professional standards for court interpreters; and discusses the theoretical and practical issues involved in court interpreting.
Abstract
The first unit presents the history of court interpretation from a language-policy perspective; an overview of interpretation case law highlights the inequities experienced by language minorities, particularly Hispanics, in the American court system. Unit 2 provides an overview of the U.S. legal system and the interrelationship between the judicial, legislative, and executive branches of the United States Government. Unit 3 focuses on the effective use of interpreter services. It defines the role of the interpreter, including that of expert witness and officer of the court. It also discusses preferred modes of interpretation within specified settings and implications for legal and quasi-legal settings outside the courtroom. Unit 4 addresses the court administration of interpreter services and presents recommended strategies, policies, and practices that are intended to ameliorate management and use problems and to facilitate standardization of policy. Recruitment, inservice training, and assignment of both certified and uncertified interpreters are addressed in this unit. Unit 5 concentrates on the handling of the complexities of language that an interpreter must grasp and analyzes the features of legal language that describe the register of courtroom English as measured by readability analysis, word frequency, and various syntactic analyses. Remaining units consider court interpretation theory and practice, practical considerations and tasks, professional issues, and the future of court interpreting. Appended supplementary information; indexes of legal citations, names, and subjects; and a 600-item bibliography