To What Extent Does The Provision Of Interpreters In Public Services

To What Extent Does The Provision Of Interpreters In Public Services To What Extent Does The Provision Of Interpreters In Public Services In Britain Act As A Barrier To â€" Essay Example > @2011IntroductionInterpreters are translators of speech or spoken language with the aim of getting rid of the communication barriers between the communicators and none communicators of a certain language. This is effective in cases where foreigners are involved. They may not be conversant with the language as well operations of organization or nation hence the need for someone to guide and explain everything to them. Interpreters are trained depending on the areas of specialization. There are many sectors of public services in Britain which requires some professional interpreters to ensure that all the members of the public can access the services, for example, hospitals, solicitors, police and social services. These interpreters however have some negative impacts on the members of the public that they serve. The study below considers ways through which the provision of interpreters of public services in Britain acts as a barrier to integration of minority speakers. Interpreters o f public services in BritainMostly the work of the interpreters entails face to face communication as the professional interprets things to the clients. This is done through the context of arrival interviews or casework interviews whereby the interested individual is expected to book in advance. Both cases require provision of simultaneous translation of information or activities. With the advancement in technology, everything is turning to be online as people struggle to make things easier. Telephone interpreting is becoming very common in Britain especially in legal, health and local government (Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons, 2004). The interpreters are required to have knowledge of all the languages used in the local communities as well as those that are internationally accepted like English. However some of the languages especially those used by people in the most marginalized areas are overlooked. The official language like English is the common used and accepte d especially in the professional fields like medicine and schools thus the minority speakers may not have equal opportunities to access the services because of the communication barrier. The public institutions make the languages used by the majority of the people the sole medium of public communication the minority language speakers feel isolated and not recognized in the society where they belong. The speakers of some of the minority languages personally complain when they object to the monolingual policy in reference to their own interests either as individuals or as a group. The less educated are the most affected because they may not be bale to access the information or services offered in the public institutions due to the communication barrier. The main complain is that the monolingual policies do not recognize the legitimate interests that they have in the struggle to accommodate their language. They also join hands to express their impersonal complains concerning the isola tion of the entire group. It is the interest of each member of the social group to have their cultural activities maintained like the indigenous language (Ostarhild, 2002). Provision of the interpreters in the public services shows that the state is encouraging monolingualism in which English is the language which is likely to be favored since it is considered as the national language in Britain. Instead of supporting and encouraging the locals to use their languages they discourage them by using English in most of the public offices even those located in the interior parts thus creating communication barriers between the locals and the professionals. There are some sensitive issues like in the health sector which the individuals may not be comfortable with the involvement of the third party as the interpreter since they are a bit confidential. Therefore, the affected ends up not accessing the required health services because of the fear of sharing their personal information to mo re people. The senior politicians are so keen on ensuring that the immigrants learn the majority languages so as to easily communicate to most of the people. This ends up stigmatizing the languages of the minority speakers because they are also forced to neglect their original languages and adapt those used by the major societies. The commitment of the government of the state to the process of monolingualism is reflected by designating only English language to be official and demanding all the workers to learn and consider using this language. Mostly these leaders prefer privileging their own languages for the material benefits of their social groups if identified as the major and superior groups in the state thus have some benefits over the other groups in the competition for the resources and other opportunities (Roda, 2000).