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Translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in South Africa : focus on court interpreting

The year 1994 was a significant moment in the history of South Africa. The release of Nelson Mandela and the ushering in of a new democracy implied important changes in national policies. Apart from English and Afrikaans, ten other languages, including South African Sign Language, have acquired offi...

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Main Author: Mwepu, Dominique Ngoy
Other Authors: Flechals, Olivier
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: Department of English Language and Literature 2024
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access_status_str Open Access
author Mwepu, Dominique Ngoy
author2 Flechals, Olivier
author_browse Flechals, Olivier
Mwepu, Dominique Ngoy
author_facet Flechals, Olivier
Mwepu, Dominique Ngoy
author_sort Mwepu, Dominique Ngoy
collection Thesis
description The year 1994 was a significant moment in the history of South Africa. The release of Nelson Mandela and the ushering in of a new democracy implied important changes in national policies. Apart from English and Afrikaans, ten other languages, including South African Sign Language, have acquired official status. This linguistic dispensation should allow every citizen access to fair justice and a fuller participation in the democratisation process at all levels. It is obvious that linguistic diversity calls for extensive use of translation and interpreting. This study is located in the field of Applied Language Studies. It investigates the intersection between Language Planning and Translation Studies. The thesis argues that Language Planning needs to devote more attention to the place and role of translation and interpreting. One of the key assumptions of language planning seems to be that speakers of a language community form a monolithic block. nus thesis submits that a better approach should acknowledge that in every language community, there are two major groups: ordinary language speakers and language professionals (translators, interpreters and lexicographers) The second group participates more actively and play a prominent role in corpus planning or corpus development and acquisition planning. The scrutiny of court interpreting shows that interpreters suffer low social and professional status. The low status of these professions and low social attainment of these professionals have a negative effect on African language status planning in general. Therefore, more research is needed for a Language Planning theo~cal model that may address satisfactorily issues of Acquisition, Status and Corpus for both the ordinary language speakers and language professionals. Translation Studies set a distinction between translation and interpreting. This distinction takes into account the differences in mode, processes, techniques, skills, and abilities. However, the ethnographic approach of this thesis highlighted that in South Africa and maybe elsewhere, translation and interpreting differ in status. Most of the definitions do not account for this aspect in distinguishing between the two activities. This gap needs to be filled
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institution University of Cape Town (South Africa)
language eng
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:50:48.921Z
license_str Not specified — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
publishDate 2024
publishDateRange 2024
publishDateSort 2024
publisher Department of English Language and Literature
publisherStr Department of English Language and Literature
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source_str UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
spelling oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/39979 Translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in South Africa : focus on court interpreting Mwepu, Dominique Ngoy Flechals, Olivier English Language and Literature The year 1994 was a significant moment in the history of South Africa. The release of Nelson Mandela and the ushering in of a new democracy implied important changes in national policies. Apart from English and Afrikaans, ten other languages, including South African Sign Language, have acquired official status. This linguistic dispensation should allow every citizen access to fair justice and a fuller participation in the democratisation process at all levels. It is obvious that linguistic diversity calls for extensive use of translation and interpreting. This study is located in the field of Applied Language Studies. It investigates the intersection between Language Planning and Translation Studies. The thesis argues that Language Planning needs to devote more attention to the place and role of translation and interpreting. One of the key assumptions of language planning seems to be that speakers of a language community form a monolithic block. nus thesis submits that a better approach should acknowledge that in every language community, there are two major groups: ordinary language speakers and language professionals (translators, interpreters and lexicographers) The second group participates more actively and play a prominent role in corpus planning or corpus development and acquisition planning. The scrutiny of court interpreting shows that interpreters suffer low social and professional status. The low status of these professions and low social attainment of these professionals have a negative effect on African language status planning in general. Therefore, more research is needed for a Language Planning theo~cal model that may address satisfactorily issues of Acquisition, Status and Corpus for both the ordinary language speakers and language professionals. Translation Studies set a distinction between translation and interpreting. This distinction takes into account the differences in mode, processes, techniques, skills, and abilities. However, the ethnographic approach of this thesis highlighted that in South Africa and maybe elsewhere, translation and interpreting differ in status. Most of the definitions do not account for this aspect in distinguishing between the two activities. This gap needs to be filled 2024-06-20T12:35:12Z 2024-06-20T12:35:12Z 2005 2024-06-20T12:29:14Z Thesis / Dissertation Doctoral PhD http://hdl.handle.net/11427/39979 eng application/pdf Department of English Language and Literature Faculty of Humanities
spellingShingle English Language and Literature
Mwepu, Dominique Ngoy
Translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in South Africa : focus on court interpreting
thesis_degree_str Doctoral
title Translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in South Africa : focus on court interpreting
title_full Translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in South Africa : focus on court interpreting
title_fullStr Translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in South Africa : focus on court interpreting
title_full_unstemmed Translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in South Africa : focus on court interpreting
title_short Translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in South Africa : focus on court interpreting
title_sort translation and interpreting as instruments of language planning in south africa focus on court interpreting
topic English Language and Literature
url http://hdl.handle.net/11427/39979
work_keys_str_mv AT mwepudominiquengoy translationandinterpretingasinstrumentsoflanguageplanninginsouthafricafocusoncourtinterpreting