Experiences of CALD women, service providers and community interpreters in

domestic violence service settings in Australia: A need for specialisation?

Olga Garcia-Caro

Level of awareness of professionals responding to Violence against Women = effectiveness of the right to redress for women

(European Women’s Lobby 2001: 12)

CALD Women victims of DV

Service Provider

s: trained in DV

Community Interpreters:

NO DV training in Australia

Effectivness?

What is Domestic Violence?

‘the basis of men’s control over women’

(Mooney 2000: 89)

DV

Up to 70%

Women

experience mal

e violenc

e (UN Women

2013:

11)

CALD WOMEN AND DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

CALD women migrants, refugees or students:

• Little financial security• Limited social networks• Minimal understanding of social and justice systems• Community and family pressure• Lack of knowledge of their rights• Little English skills

Barriers = increased vulnerability

(Allimant 2005; Taylor & Putt 2007; Allimant & Ostapiej-Piatkowski 2011)

Language barrier

‘Communication is, perhaps, an immigrant woman’s most immediate barrier to leaving an abusive relationship’ (Alison Auerbach in Nancy K. Lemon 2006: 28)

‘it is immense when services cannot or do not deal with it effectively’ (Allimant & Ostapiej-Piatkowski 2011: 9)

Interpreting Practice Australia

• Leader in the interpreting profession (Ozolins 1991; Chesher 1997)

• Most advanced country in Community Interpreting (Bancroft 2005: 9)

• Generalist accreditation system (NAATI)• Generalist Code of Ethics • Formal pre-service training not compulsory

Australia

Gov. policy: no mention of specialised training for interpreters in DV issues

Language service providers: No specialised training required.

Australia

Confidentiality: usually interpreter checks client identity

Professional detachment and strict role boundaries

UN WOMEN RECOMMENDATIONS

• Specialised training in domestic violence, sexual assault and child abuse.

• Testing and monitoring interpreters.

• Interpreters actively explain and inform victims of legal matters.

• Licence for interpreters in DV settings

• Standard of conduct in DV settings (UN WOMEN 2013)

Key areas of academic literature

• Cald women and domestic violence, language barrier and interpreters

• Community Interpreting – Neutrality: ongoing debate– Training: Generalisation vs Specialisation

Cald Women, domestic violence and language barrier

• Additional obstacle: language barrier (Menjivar & Salcido 2002; Grealy et al 2008; inTouch 2011; Toledano Buendía & Fernández Pérez 2012; Naredo 2013)

• Language barrier linked to guarantee the right to information (Antón 2013)

• Issues: accessibility, gender, confidentiality and quality (McRobbie & Jupp 1993; Pardy 1995; IWDVS 2006)

Call on the interpreting field to improve the sensitivity of interpreters (WLS 1994)

Interpreting issues still a significant problem, ‘women ultimately gave up on their attempts to access legal services’ (WLS 2007: 23)

Women still experience difficulties when communicating through interpreters, it is a priority to rigorously train interpreters in family violence. (inTouch 2011)

Community Interpreting

• Research: a neglected area in Community Interpreting

• No links between findings, the little training available and practice

• Gap: almost no research in accessing voices of CALD participants in interpreted encounters.

(Sandra Hale 2007)

Myth of the neutral interpreter (Wadesnjö 1992, 1998; Roy 1996; Hale 2004)

• Role beyond the interpreting activity (Angelelli 2004; Ortega Herráez et al 2009)

• Neutrality and invisibility: a ‘result of professionalization’ (Metzger 2000:21)

and fomented in training programs and professional associations (Angelelli 2004)

• Message transfer views due to lack of trust in interpreters’ competency (Antón 2011)

• Visibility = recognition and accountability (Inghilleri 2012)

• Current Codes of Ethics = ‘remain morally blameless, without resposibility’ (Inghilleri 2012)

• Interpreters’ Codes of Ethics more ‘deontological’ than ‘ethical’ (de Manuel Jerez 2009)

Training: Generalisation vs Specialisation• ‘[l]ack of compulsory requirement of pre-service

formal training’ (Sandra Hale 2007:138)

• Australia’s generalist model: challenge for interpreters working in different settings (Uldis Ozolins 2009)

• Less developed in regards to specialisation (María Isabel Abril Martí 2005: 262)

• Paradox: lack of specialist training (Toledano Buendía & Fernández Pérez 2012)

• Call for specialisation to work with victims of DV (Naredo 2012)

Research Project

• Cald women victims DV: in-depth interviews

• DV service providers: Focus groups

• Interpreters: Online survey and in-depth interviews

Language service system • Availability:

• Telephone Interpreting• Limited number of

onsite interpreters• One interpreter = victim

and perpetrator• Same interpreter for

ongoing sessions• Matching dialects,

region, religion.• Lack of female

interpreters

Direct interpreter contact

• Interpreting competency • Legal terminology and

justice system• Language skills

• Ethical issues• Confidentiality• Unethical behaviour• Accuracy and

completeness

Role of the interpreter

• Initiative in providing cultural education and other information

• Non-verbal communication

• Managing conversation and turns

• Empathy and sensitivity

• Respect

Specialist training in DV interpreting = useful and necessary in Australia, including: • Language skills• Interpreting skills• Ethics• Specialist terminology• Legal procedures and operation of the Australian justice system• Victim’s rights and victims safety• Resources and functioning of social services• Counselling, social work and health service• Police responses and procedures • Dealing with disclosures• Concept and dynamics of DV• Gender equality, roles and stereotypes • Role of the interpreter

Cooperation-dialogue

Interpreting field

Language service systemProfessionals

working in DV

Thank you

olga.garcia-caro@rmit.edu.au