srl1.docx

The interpreter: Machine, advocate, or ally? by Charlotte Baker-Shenk with the valuable experiences and insights of Ron Coffey, Sandra Gish, Risa Shaw, and Chuck Snyder This presentation focuses on the realities of "power." My abstract promised that I would talk about power in deaf -hearing relationships and how that relates to various roles of interpreters. It also said this presentation would be a mixture of prophetic critique, personal confession, and unresolved questions. I am quite sure I will keep my promise about the unresolved questions, and I continue to be a true believer in the value of personal confession. You, of course, will be the judges of how prophetic is the critique. Several graduate students in the Teaching Interpreting Program at Western Maryland College helped me prepare for this presentation: Ron Coffey is a second year student; Sandra Gish, Risa Shaw and Chuck Snyder are all proud graduates of the world's only graduate program for teachers of interpretation (!). I have much benefited from very stimulating conversations with these folks and have included some of their insights in this presentation. They will be sharing examples from their own experience at the end of this presentation as well as sharing their own analysis. Part I: Power and the "machine" model This presentation makes two very basic points: 1. That there is no "neutral" position with regards to power. Despite whatever your interpreter education/training program or mentor told you, you do have power and you use it all the time, for better or for worse, and 2. That you/we need to learn to recognize our power and use it responsibly. What is power? Power simply means "the ability to act." You have power when you can make decisions and implement or act on those decisions. There are various tools for obtaining power: money, education, physical attractiveness, knowing the "right people," having personal charisma, being really good at something, etc. Simply being born into the dominant/power "class"

srl1.docx

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