(Posting this with Andreas permission) I had a two-hour, no holds barred video chat this afternoon with Andrea K. Smith, who wrote that controversial commentary that I posted yesterday. We went back and forth on a million topics, and it was a pleasure chatting with her. Did I agree with her on everything? Absolutely not. She didn’t agree with me, either, and that’s perfectly okay. I was impressed with her demeanor and willingness to tackle some of the hard questions I asked. Andrea did say that she benefited from all the comments, even as harsh as they were at times (and she said she already knew the response would be harsh, and that she has very thick skin). She added she wasn’t coming from a hurt place (I asked that); rather, her commentary was written with sadness based on sentiments she has heard from many of her colleagues. She stated a few things I thought were significant: * She believes she probably has similar opinions with most of the commenters, but how we (and she) present the opinions is the challenge. She recognizes that the tone of her post came across as angry and accusatory, and that wasn’t her intention, although she did want to “rip the cord” and basically shake up things a bit. She has been deluged with emails from interpreters who share her sentiments about the perceived anger brewing in the community, especially among “anti-interpreter” people. I asked why she singled out Deaf people, and she said she wasn’t; that she was directly referring to people who were anti-interpreters. I also told her that I had gotten videos, emails, messages, and in-person comments about her essay, and that they were pretty much upset by her portrayal of them as angry; that she was doing exactly what she accused people of doing. She understood. * I pointed out that the anger she identified wasn’t necessarily anger, but more of a response to centuries of oppression, thousands of “bad” interpreters, and a lack of involvement of deaf people in discourse. And that this probably also stemmed from how the interpreter profession had completely run full speed ahead in its professionalization and dialogue, while deaf people were left behind. One example someone pointed out to me is how all this discussion has taken place in written English as opposed to videos. We discussed the possibility of her having her commentary presented in ASL so that people could see her tone and intentions. I asked if she had received any videos as part of her feedback, and she said she had not. I explained that this probably was because her comments were presented in English and not in ASL, and therefore it wasn’t accessible to the very people she was commenting about. She agreed and would like to explore ways to provide videos on her website. * I talked a lot about how interpreters have many years of professional training (well, they’re supposed to, anyway), while deaf people typically get absolutely no training in how to work with interpreters. * Andrea -emphasized- that her commentary was NOT a knee-jerk commentary like many assumed. Rather, it was written with a lot of thought, a lot of dialogue with other interpreters who are so frustrated with all the negativity within the community and are ready to leave the profession/community. I pointed out that such people had the luxury of leaving the community if they wanted to, while Deaf people didn’t—and that is a crucial difference in why many are so territorial about the community. That, and even if an interpreter works 60-80 hours a week like she says she does, being Deaf is a 24-hour experience. She added in a follow-up email, “I feel that interpreters’ experience about interpreting should not be dismissed because we are living it intensely for upwards of 40-80 hours a week. And that’s just billing hours. That doesn’t include the time we invest to have these conversations, watch blogs, attend trainings, read professional literature, etc. I would hope that a good dialogue could look something like an interpreter being recognized for their skills in the interpreting task and their knowledge about the field -in concert- with a healthy feedback mechanism from the Deaf community that improves the quality of interpreted interactions. That was, and is, an interesting dialogue for me. I should note that the great majority of feedback I got to Andrea’s writing was from interpreters who are equally credentialed and experienced, and they were outraged (to put it mildly) at her comments. * She said she has been reading comments, but hesitant to respond to most because she doesn’t want to appear defensive. She did point out that she had apologized on The Interpreter Guild’s page about the tone of her comments, and that she stood by what she wrote. She also expressed appreciation for Peter Chengs post about tone. However, if people don’t like what she says, then she asks that she be given feedback on how to rephrase, rather than calling her names. We discussed the importance of developing solutions, and I asked her what action/solutions she had in mind, since she emphasized the importance of accompanying suggestions/feedback with action steps. A summary of her suggestions, all of which I agree with: - Keep sharing stories. - Don’t invalidate her experiences. Rather, understand them. - Take action instead of just complaining. - Take care in how things are said. - Remember that interpreters are humans, too. There were a lot of other things we talked about, but I think this is enough for now. :)
Posted on: Wed, 31 Dec 2014 02:07:54 +0000
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