When pauses become disfluencies a comparative study of huflis student interpreters english vietnamese versus vietnamese english interpreting performances

HUE UNIVERSITY UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH - - GRADUATE THESIS WHEN PAUSES BECOME DISFLUENCIES: A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF HUFLIS STUDENT INTERPRETERS' ENGLISH-VIETNAMESE VERSUS VIETNAMESE-ENGLISH INTERPRETING PERFORMANCES MAJOR: ENGLISH Student: NGUYEN NGOC HUNG Supervisor: HOANG THI LINH GIANG, PHD Hue, 4/2023 ĐẠI HỌC HUẾ TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ KHOA TIẾNG ANH - - KHÓA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP KHI VIỆC NGỪNG, NGẮT GIỮA CHỪNG KHIẾN BẢN DỊCH BỚT TRÔI CHẢY: NGHIÊN CỨU SO SÁNH VỀ PHẦN THỂ HIỆN CỦA SINH VIÊN HUFLIS KHI PHIÊN DỊCH TỪ TIẾNG ANH SANG TIẾNG VIỆT VÀ TIẾNG VIỆT SANG TIẾNG ANH NGÀNH NGÔN NGỮ ANH Sinh viên thực hiện: NGUYỄN NGỌC HƯNG Giảng viên hướng dẫn: TS HOÀNG THỊ LINH GIANG Huế, 4/2023 LỜI CAM ĐOAN Tôi xin cam đoan kết đạt khoá luận sản phẩm riêng cá nhân, không chép lại người khác Tất tài liệu tham khảo có xuất xứ rõ ràng trích dẫn hợp pháp Huế, ngày 17 tháng năm 2017 Sinh viên thực i ABSTRACT Fluency is one of the key components one must master in interpreting, given it is a cognitively demanding activity Interpreting students are generally cognizant of the need to improve fluency to perform better at their tasks but a lot of them fail to grasp it, and thus they have encountered multiple obstacles while seeking to ensure high-quality delivery A common phenomenon that interferes with student interpreters’ fluency is pauses during their performances for several reasons As a result, the purpose of this study is to present an overview of pauses made by Hue University of Foreign Languages and International Studies (HUFLIS) student interpreters, including how frequently they occur, their influence on output, and their causes Audio recordings of 36 students’ EnglishVietnamese interpretations and semi-structured interviews were the data sources for this study Participants recorded their interpretations after listening to one of the speeches, for a total of two speeches to render and record Five students attended an interview about what they believed triggered their pauses whilst rendering the target speeches The study's findings revealed that students tended to interpret from English (the A language) to Vietnamese (the B language) with more and longer salient pauses overall Also, all HUFLIS interpreting students paused whilst taking the interpreting tests for various reasons, including issues related to memorization, notes, anxiety, and difficulties when coming across new words/structures Based on the findings, this study discusses the implications, limitations, and suggestions for further research ii TĨM TẮT NGHIÊN CỨU Phiên dịch ln hoạt động tư đòi hỏi nhiều yếu tố để thành thạo, số trơi chảy đến từ người dịch Tuy nhiên, lại khái niệm nhiều sinh viên phiên dịch có biết đến lại khơng hồn tồn hiểu rõ mà gặp nhiều cản trở việc đảm bảo chất lượng dịch Điều giải thích sinh viên có xu hướng ngừng, nghỉ q trình phiên dịch, điều nhiều nguyên nhân khác gây nên Từ đó, nghiên cứu thực với mục đích đưa nhìn tổng thể việc ngừng nghỉ phiên dịch sinh viên HUFLIS, bao gồm tần suất sinh viên ngừng, nghỉ phiên dịch, tác động việc ngừng nghỉ đến dịch lý điều lại xảy Cơng cụ nghiên cứu bao gồm ghi âm vấn bán cấu trúc Những người tham gia dịch ghi lại dịch sau giảng viên nói xong hồn chỉnh, tổng cộng sinh viên cần làm hai thế, Anh-Việt Việt-Anh Sau sinh viên vấn nguyên nhân sinh viên cho làm cho thân phải ngừng, nghỉ phiên dịch Kết nghiên cứu cho thấy tất sinh viên phiên dịch HUFLIS ngừng, nghỉ phiên dịch họ đưa lý trí nhớ, ghi chú, lo âu khó khăn gặp từ/cấu trúc Ngoài ra, tác động mặt sư phạm, giới hạn đề xuất cho nghiên cứu sau thảo luận kỹ lưỡng cuối nghiên cứu iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I want to sincerely thank my supervisor, Dr Linh Giang, for her enthusiastic and wholehearted support and her sheer dedication I would never have been able to complete my graduation thesis if it were not for her I also want to express my gratitude towards the students who consented to take part in the interview as their responses were tremendously beneficial to my study iv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS HUFLIS: Hue University of Foreign Languages and International Studies CI: Consecutive interpreting WM: working memory FP: Filled pause UP: Unfilled pause v LIST OF TABLES Table Descriptive Statistics of Salient Pauses in E-V vs V-E interpretations (N=33) 31 Table Students’ E-V versus V-E interpreting performance: Comparing pauses32 Table Motivations for pauses in Consecutive Interpretation 33 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure Average pause durations of individual students (seconds per minute) (Participants 1-18) 27 Figure Average pause durations of individual students (seconds per minute) (Participants 19-36) 28 Figure Average durations of salient pauses of individual students (seconds per minute) (Participants 1-18) 29 Figure Average durations of salient pauses of individual students (seconds per minute) (Participants 19-36) 30 vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ii TÓM TẮT NGHIÊN CỨU iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT iv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS v LIST OF TABLES vi LIST OF FIGURES .vii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background of the study 1.2 Rationale 1.3 Aims of the study 1.4 Scope of the study .4 1.5 Significance of the study 1.6 Thesis Overview CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 What is consecutive interpreting 2.2 What are pauses in consecutive interpreting? 2.2.1 Definition of pauses 2.2.2 Types of Pauses 2.2.3 Impacts of pauses on interpreting performance 10 2.3 What makes interpreters pause during their CI performance? 11 2.3.1 Working Memory 11 2.3.2 Note-taking 12 2.3.3 Anxiety 12 2.3.4 Unfamiliar vocabulary in source speech 13 2.4 Previous studies on pauses in interpreting 14 2.4.1 Previous studies on pauses in interpreting 14 2.4.2 Summary 17 2.4.3 Research gaps 17 viii Students need to comprehend the significance of understanding pauses since fluency is one of the criteria used to assess the quality of delivery, and pauses and fluency are closely related Understanding this will enable student interpreters to effectively handle pauses for the benefit of their interpretation and increase their comfort level when doing so Furthermore, students should stop being reluctant to try their hardest when practising in class and ought to stop being hesitant to let their lecturer and classmates watch and remark so they may learn valuable things It is incapable of being removed by itself As well as actively learning about pauses, students should actively inquire about them from professors Students should also feel free to raise any questions to which they want the answer when studying pauses in class Students will better comprehend the subject matter if they this 5.3 Limitations of the Study Constraints on the methodology have led to the present study's limitations The sample size was comparatively small to make statistically significant findings To get reliable results, it is critical to perform studies with a big enough sample size as it will affect how accurate the results are The ability to find more generalized conclusions and more prevalent themes in the causes of pauses amongst student interpreters was hampered since the sample size of the interviewees was small The second limitation to be acknowledged is the fact that the quantitative data collected from students’ video-taped interpretations via Flipgrid were based on only one interpreting test, one from Vietnamese into English and one from English into Vietnamese interpretation This one-shot approach to data collection may not fully capture student interpreters’ performance and pauses when conducting CI practice in either direction The findings, and subsequent conclusions, should therefore be taken with some caution 43 5.4 Suggestions for Future Research In the future, it should be better to invite more respondents for the interview to have more responses and identify common themes that can speak for the general population Accordingly, one might address the limitations of the present study and further 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Câu 2: Anh/chị có để ý đến việc thân ngừng, ngắt trình làm kiểm tra phiên dịch khơng ạ? Câu 3: Anh/chị chia sẻ thêm tần suất độ dài lần anh/chị nghĩ ngừng, ngắt lúc phiên dịch không ạ? Câu 4: Theo anh/chị, làm kiểm tra, anh/chị ngừng, ngắt nhiều dịch tiếng Anh sang tiếng Việt hay dịch tiếng Việt sang tiếng Anh ạ? Và sao? Câu 5: Theo anh/chị, nguyên nhân làm cho anh/chị ngừng, ngắt phiên dịch ạ? Câu 6: Anh/chị giải thích rõ anh/chị lại cho nguyên nhân anh/chị nêu lại làm anh/chị ngừng, ngắt phiên dịch ạ? Câu 7: Theo anh/chị, nguyên nhân làm cho anh/chị ngừng, ngắt phiên dịch có thay đổi làm kiểm tra dịch từ tiếng Việt sang tiếng Anh so với từ tiếng Anh sang tiếng Việt khơng ạ? Và sao? Câu 8: Anh/chị có thắc mắc hay muốn chia sẻ thêm điều liên quan đến việc ngừng, ngắt phiên dịch sau làm kiểm tra không ạ? 53 Appendix Average durations of pauses of individual students (seconds per minute) Vietnamese-English English-Vietnamese interpretation interpretation (s.p.m) (s.p.m) S1 16.24 16.98 S2 7.14 21.34 S3 19.66 18.96 S4 33.41 31.81 S5 24.23 16.60 S6 10.68 21.83 S7 11.41 10.36 S8 24.26 30.03 S9 12.98 14.56 S10 11.46 34.57 S11 23.39 26.15 S12 15.58 17.10 S13 14.24 13.47 S14 14.27 23.64 S15 9.52 8.37 S16 22.72 17.98 S17 12.36 14.54 Subject 54 S18 10.93 6.16 S19 24.02 26.58 S20 12.56 26.79 S21 9.48 12.99 S22 14.5 21.49 S23 17.24 16.39 S24 11.73 23.14 S25 10.72 9.25 S26 20.57 16.48 S27 6.49 5.61 S28 5.89 7.76 S29 14.76 10.88 S30 15.23 22.94 S31 13.04 20.47 S32 18.67 25.62 S33 8.4 16.60 S34 16.13 13.12 S35 13.39 14.37 S36 8.64 7.35 Mean 14.89 17.84 55 Appendix Average durations of salient pauses of individual students (seconds per minute) Vietnamese-English English-Vietnamese Mean Mean (Salient pauses only) (Salient pauses only) (s.p.m) (s.p.m) S1 5.66 3.64 S2 0.00 1.52 S3 2.67 6.36 S4 9.49 9.37 S5 6.39 7.01 S6 2.02 11.8 S7 0.57 1.07 S8 12.10 15.17 S9 1.74 2.3 S10 0.00 21.33 S11 14.85 10.91 S12 3.41 7.17 S13 6.40 5.01 S14 3.65 10.11 S15 0.31 1.5 S16 5.40 4.35 Subject 56 S17 4.28 3.67 S18 2.29 1.78 S19 8.08 14.93 S20 2.49 15.53 S21 3.63 4.86 S22 1.62 11.4 S23 4.12 5.76 S24 3.89 17.1 S25 0.41 1.8 S26 10.91 7.68 S27 1.06 0.84 S28 0.00 1.93 S29 2.89 3.77 S30 3.08 7.06 S31 2.69 7.05 S32 7.70 11.46 S33 1.33 6.38 S34 6.03 3.59 S35 1.83 3.46 S36 1.86 0.93 Mean 4.02 6.93 57