“We tried interpreting for a bit but it didn’t work.”

“Yeah, we went back to just English at our events as we weren’t attracting an audience in other languages.”

“People got tired, so we decided just to go back to the old ways.”

As a consultant interpreter, I sometimes hear these responses when I talk about interpreting in church. I even heard them occasionally when I was specialising in the events sector. It seems that, for some people at least, the results of interpreting can be a bit disappointing. Why might that be and what do we need to do to change things?

When interpreting doesn’t seem to work

Everyone wants an easy solution. We want to plug in the device and have it work. We want to open an app and instantly be more organised, efficient, and creative.

That often happens when churches or events want to become multilingual. They get some people in the church or they contact an interpreting agency or platform and then any issues around language are supposed to disappear.

Then, when people still look confused or the church still isn’t managing to integrate people who speak different languages, frustration sets in. Isn’t this supposed to work first time? Aren’t people supposed to be reached in every language? What’s happening?

Interpreting is not a Plug-in Service

Part of the issue is that the massive growth in interpreting technology that can just plug into your existing event or service has hidden the complexity of what happens to an event when it has interpreting. In the olden days, when interpreting either meant having another person up on stage or hiring a team of people to install expensive booths, everyone could see the interpreting.

Interpreting that was visible was often interpreting that was noticed. People who noticed interpreting might say hi to the interpreters, drop off their sermon or speech notes, or even have a nice chat at coffee break. People saw the booths or the interpreters and were often amenable to doing their part to making the interpreting work.

Now, interpreting can often be forgotten. Since we can arrange interpreting easily, we can often forget that interpreters need preparatory documents and information. Worse, we can think that hiring interpreters is enough in itself to finally break all language barriers. But that’s not how it works.

Integrating Interpreting

Interpreting works best when it is integrated into everything an organisation does. Interpreted events or church services come with translated announcements or maps or guides. The interpreted web feed has a link to information in several languages. There are follow-up materials and more content available in every language that has interpreting.

Interpreting delivers in the moment; translation and specially created content keep things moving.

On top of that, for interpreting to work in the long-term, interpreters need support, time off, training, and to feel part of the church or organisation as a whole. Pastoral care is needed. Peer support is arranged and the equipment and technologies used are monitored regularly to make sure they are ergonomic and working as they should.

When interpreting is delivered alongside other services and when interpreters are well cared for and continually trained and developed, interpreting delivers again and again and again. Interpreting doesn’t work on its own, but when it is part of a wider strategy, it really does work.