The Linguist

20 The Linguist Vol/60 No/6 2021 thelinguist.uberflip.com FEATURES FACE-TO-FACE Networking at CIOL Conference 2020 – the last time members could attend in person After nearly two years of online events, what can we expect from CIOL Conference 2022? Jaquelina Guardamagna talks to Deborah Butler Debbie, can you tell us about the venue CIOL has chosen for the conference? After all the disruption caused by Covid last year, the conference on 11-12 March will be our first opportunity to come together as a profession, so it was important to find a venue that is easily access ble and central – for instance you can get to London from Manchester in less than three hours, and it's close to Heathrow so good for international businesses. Etc.Venues St Paul's has rooms that are large and spacious, creating a great environment for networking and meeting up with other professionals – something we know members have sorely missed during the pandemic. Who are the keynote speakers and what topics will they cover? Paul Hughes, a Fellow member, was first to respond to our call for proposals. After seeing a few video snippets, we quickly identified him as a keynote speaker who could get the conference off to a great start with a talk on mental resilience. Paul is a very experienced speaker who visits schools to enthuse students to take up languages. He has just filmed Celebrity Hunted for Channel 4. This put us on track to line up the rest of the keynotes. We invited CIOL Vice-President Baroness Jean Coussins, as she has so much to talk about regarding her work with government on language education and the future for linguists. Lexicographer Susie Dent, star of Countdown, is a recipient of the CIOL David Crystal Trophy (as is Paul), so we were delighted when she accepted an invitation to speak. At the time of the conference she will be in the middle of a national tour. She will talk about 'Secret Stories of English' in conversation with CEO John Worne. It's always great to have a celebrity join us! Sverker Johansson is an author and linguistics expert, and writes on how we learnt to talk. He was looking for an opportunity to speak to CIOL members and we invited him to conduct this year's Threlford Lecture. What would you say makes a good conference programme? Adding to our previous experience, we hope that the programme reflects feedback from delegates in that we have included a good balance of talks on translation, interpreting, business for freelancers, education, and some ta ks of more general interest to linguists – and we have called on established linguists as well as newcomers presenting for the first time. What do you have planned on translation? We have some intriguing titles, such as 'One Woman's Mille-feuille is Another's Vanilla Slice' (a ta k on the art of food translation by Josephine Murray) and 'Poets, Translators and Bizarre Plots' (the results of literary translation research carried out by Cynthia Stephens). Talks on other specialist fields include translating marketing texts (Katherine Hornsby) and translating science (Maureen Cohen). In 'An Engaging Experience', Emma Gledhill will talk about how language was key to a flagship product in the company she works for – a tech product which depends on translators and software developers working closely together. We were keen to have a ta k on games localisation. Given the current growth in this area, it would be great for linguists to find out how to get into the industry and what skills are needed. I researched and found specialist Silvia Ferrero, who runs her own company, has worked on some interesting projects and has fascinating anecdotes to share. There will also be a panel discussion for mid- and late-career translators led by Karen Stokes, exploring ways to move forward in this profession. What topics can we expect to hear about in the field of interpreting? A presentation by two interpreters on how collaboration has been key to the success of their interpreting assignments (Trinidad Clares Flores and Myriam Garcia Bernabe); a session on public service interpreting in mental health (Nahed Arafat); and a presentation about research on video- mediated interpreting in court (Diana TOGETHER AGAIN

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