Oikeus työhön, oikeus tulkkiin – entä tulkin oikeus saada tukea?

Authors

• Pirkko Selin-Grönlund

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.61200/mikael.145946

Abstract

The working life in general has changed radically, and so has the work of the deaf. Interpreters are facing new problems: they have to catch the changes of the working life, the languages and discourses which are changing, too. At the same time researchers of expertise question the definition of expertise as a collection of competencies of an individual. Professional development is seen as a social process which leads to collective expertise.

Collective expertise means that the expert never solves the problems alone; it is the co-operation with others that counts. This insight is based on the nature of social reality: all communication is about negotiating meanings. In my MA thesis, the interpreters report several joint efforts of the interlocutors and interpreters which proved to be significant. In the name of quality of interpreting the interpreters invited the interlocutors to cooperate. To accomplish that, the interpreters had to bring their learning processes public. The interlocutors felt responsible to contribute and enhance the communication.

What is remarkable here, nobody was actually in the center controlling the flow of communication. It was knotworking: experts gathered together as making a knot, the responsibilities were distributed and the meanings negotiated.