The Linguist

@Linguist_CIOL FEBRUARY/MARCH The Linguist 17 FEATURES in close and recurrent contact with human tragedy can cause vicarious trauma in the legal interpreter, who may attempt to detach professionally from words that are aimed at destroying someone's self-esteem, or making them fear for their life. This could cause them to water down or omit abusive language, for example by choosing 'he told me I didn't look good' instead of 'bitchy'. In this example, if the interpreter is not familiar with Mexican Spanish they might even miss the euphemism and take the epithet lower or higher on the register scale. A systematic approach Interpreters could benefit from a systematic way to handle insults and swear words. Acquiring the skill to carry out a conscientious analysis should ideally take place during an interpreter's initial training. Preparing them to make accurate choices also reduces the levels of stress caused by not knowing how to deal with a situation. Most forensic linguistics research on insults concerns giving expert testimony in libel and slander cases. 1 The five-step systematic analysis I propose is a language-neutral technique based on Magnus Ljung's cross- cultural linguistic study of swearing; 2 a targeted analysis of Dell Hyme's SPEAKING method; 3 and the use of language-specific corpora. Ljung provides a typology of swearing, comparing English with 24 other languages, while SPEAKING concerns the basic aspects of human communication using language: Setting, Participants, Ends, Acts, Key, Instrumentalities and Genre. 4 The technique consists of an analysis of where and when the utterance was made to determine what the interpreter is dealing with, be it an insult, a joke, a verbal ritual or an innocent interjection. Secondly, the interpreter identifies the topic of the taboo word used in the source culture and matches it to the equivalent taboo topic in the target culture. Thirdly, they decide on the best linguistic equivalent in the target culture. Fourthly, they assess whether gestures or other non-linguistic elements were used, such as volume variation, hesitation and hand gestures. Finally they give their interpretation. As part of their preparation and research, interpreters are advised to use a language- specific corpus to confirm their choices. In Spanish there are more than 20 colloquial variants to describe someone's high level of expertise; the use of chingón will only work in Mexico. In other Latin American countries low-register adjectives such as guay (Spain) and capo (Argentina) may be used. Swear words are a topic of high interest for any language enthusiast. The way each culture describes its taboos in just a few letters, strung together with history and depictions of its environment and hierarchy of values, is fascinating and fun. No wonder Netflix is airing a series on The History of Swearing (hosted by Nicolas Cage). In the field of interpreting, however, dealing with insults is a serious matter that requires a systematic approach and lots of practice. Darinka Mangino runs online training on interpreting insults: d.mangino@aiic.net. Notes 1 See, e.g, Johnson, MC (2007) An Introduction to Forensic Linguistics: Language in evidence, New York: Routledge; Gabriel, Y (1998) 'An Introduction to the Social Psychology of Insults in Organizations'. In Human Relations, 1329-1354 2 Ljung, M (2011) Swearing: A cross-cultural linguistic study, New York: Palgrave Macmillan 3 Gumperz, JJ and Hymes, DH (1972) Directions in Sociolinguistics: The ethnography of communication, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston 4 See cutt.ly/SPEAKING for a practical example © SHUTTERSTOCK

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