Bøger udgivet af European Forum of Sign Language Interpreters

The purpose of "Assessment Guidelines" is to present a set of possible types of assessment which are in use throughout Europe when assessing learning outcomes within educational programmes. The efsli "Learning Outcomes for Graduates of a Three Year Sign Language Interpreting Programme", served as a basis for the discussion in the Dublin workshops and provided the point of reference for the present guidelines. However, while these guidelines are pitched at a three-year undergraduate course, it is our hope that this document will also function as a point of reference and resource to those who may be working outside of that framework.This document is divided into two parts; general recommendations and specific assessment tools. A glossary of terms has also been included to provide definitions of core terminology used.

Currently, the availability and quality of sign language interpreting training programmes throughout Europe is inconsistent. In many of the member countries formal training programmes have yet to be established and the existing programmes vary greatly in terms of length, educational level and learning outcomes. This hinders Deaf people's right to access because the quality of the interpreting services cannot be guaranteed. In 2011 the European Forum of Sign Language Interpreters (efsli) launched a consultation process involving more than one hundred sign language interpreters and trainers from across Europe with the aim of agreeing and defining the minimum skills expected of a graduate interpreter. The result of this two-year process is the publication of Learning Outcomes for Graduates of a Three Year Sign Language Interpreting Training Programme, which will be launched in December 2013 at an event at the European Parliament hosted by MEPs Ádám Kósa and Werner Kuhn in December 2013. The Learning Outcomes are intended to be relevant to all signed language interpreters, regardless of hearing status. The Learning Outcomes are divided into eight domains of knowledge; (1) Signed Language/s and Sign Linguistics, (2)Spoken and/or Written Languages, (3) Interpreting, (4) Deaf Communities and Deaf Culture, (5) Ethics and Decision Making, (6)Interpreting for Specific Populations, (7) Interpreting in Specific Settings and (8) Professional Knowledge. All of the learning outcomes are designed as descriptors of the minimal level of competence for entry to the profession and are predicated on the following notional conditions: that students are following a course of study that is of three years duration and that the majority of students have no or little signed language competence at entry. It is important to note that this is intended merely as a reference framework which represents the minimal threshold competencies that interpreter trainers and practitioners from across Europe believe are required for practice. This publication marks a milestone in the construction of a united Europe while recognising and preserving language and cultural diversity, as well as social and educational traditions. It also supports the principle of the free movement of people by laying the foundations of training standards for sign language interpreters and quality services for Deaf citizens across the entire Union. It is of crucial importance that Deaf EU citizens are able to move through Europe by accessing quality interpreting services. This document is, then, an historic breakthrough. The book is accompanied by the Assessment Guidelines for Sign Language Interpreting Training Programmes, which outlines and advises on how to assess the achievement of the learning outcomes contained in the main document, and will be available via Amazon very soon.

This volume comprises seven papers that were presented at the efsli Annual Conference in Vienna, Austria from 14th-16th September 2012. After 20 years of interpreting professionalism in Europe, reflection on the status of sign language interpreters (SLIs) and their influence on the interactions of the people they work for in the different languages is urgently needed in times of change in the Deaf and hearing communities. The link between research and practice needs to be tightened to support the changing dynamics in the tripartite communication between deaf and hearing consumer(s) and interpreters and that is exactly what we saw at the 2012 Conference. The authors, each in their own way, all pay attention to new insights into these changes and bring forth discussions of what the new knowledge actually implies for the interpreting professional. These insights may come from deaf or hearing consumers or from practising SLIs, and are brought forward through different techniques and methods. But all papers contribute to a deeper knowledge about our profession and pave the way for new research, and thus to good, and ultimately best, practice in the field. Two abstracts of the presentations that were not submitted to these proceedings are included as well.

This volume contains the contributions delivered at the efsli (European Forum of Sign Language Interpreters) Annual Conference held in Vietri sul Mare, Italy, on 16th-18th September 2011. The volume represents the interesting and novel discussions from many of the questions raised by sight translation on the one hand and by the emerging figure of the Deaf translator on the other. More than one contributor underline the need of further discussion on sight translation when one of the two languages involved is a sign language. Specific questions are raised by the visual modality of sign languages and by the fact that these languages do not have a written form. At the same time, many authors observe that the best potential translators, particularly in the case of sight translation, are Deaf translators because of their native knowledge of their respective sign languages. Being a native signer does not however suffice, as in the case of translation into any language. The need for a specific training, in sign language translation, is pointed out by almost every contributor. The experiences they report also show that the situation in the status of training and working conditions of Deaf and hearing sign language translators is different in the various countries represented in the volume. The positive experiences collated in these proceedings can therefore also count as a model for those countries that are yet to develop service provision in sign language translation, in order to achieve full access to information and education for the Deaf communities in any country. All presenters and contributors to this volume have made the 2011 edition of the efsli conference a very useful and enriching opportunity to deepen the knowledge about the specific properties of translation into sign language and the skills required to professionals working in this relatively new domain. The need for specific training, repeatedly pointed out in the papers, will hopefully inspire those who are in charge of the translation and interpreting programmes in sign languages across Europe and beyond.