CHINESE-ITALIAN SIMULTANEOUS INTERPRETING MOD.1

The course aims at perfecting students’ simultaneous and consecutive interpreting skills, with specific concerns to their fluency and consistency in performing. Throughout the course, the students will be exposed to a wide range of text genres and speaking styles, covering the following topics: political discourse, economics, international fora and Italian and Chinese institutions. Students will also focus on the particular characteristics of the Chinese language, such as dealing with numbers, accents and Chinese proverbs.

1. Knowledge and comprehension – at the end of the course, students acquire extensive know-how in relation to the interpreting and processing of a complex speech in both Chinese and Italian, and master consecutive interpreting note-taking techniques applied to the Chinese language.
2. Ability to apply know-how and comprehension – students will develop comparative abilities with regard to both Italian and Chinese cultures, in order to interpret from and into each language to the best of their abilities, keeping in mind their audience.
3. Autonomy of evaluation – in order to develop critical skills of evaluation, students through self-study develop evaluation and critical analysis skills. They shall also be called upon to organize and manage small working groups for which they offer their feedback both in relation to the organization itself and to the interpreter’s performance.
4. Communication skills – since all the work carried out by students is oral, students are called to pay great attention to the communicative role an interpreter plays and to focus on all the aspects connected with public speaking.
5. Learning skills – the course aims at offering students the necessary tools - such as note-taking and simultaneous interpreting strategies - in order for them to deal with real professional settings.

To access the course, it is required to have a level of oral and written Chinese language proficiency not lower than HSK4 (level B2 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages - CEFR). It is also essential to have a perfect knowledge of the Italian language, a rich vocabulary and oral and written expression skills.

Through the course, students will strengthen their linguistic, expressive and communicative skills in both Chinese and Italian languages. They will also achieve good mastery of both consecutive and simultaneous interpreting skills in both directions. Building on the skills developed during the first year, students will strengthen their simultaneous and consecutive interpreting skills throughout the course thanks to the analysis and preparation of texts and speeches prior to class. Students aim at being able to interpret complex texts by the end of the year.

The teaching material will be provided from time to time mostly as electronic files, trying to minimize the use of paper materials.

Recommended texts:

- Caterina Falbo, Mariachiara Russo, Francesco Straniero Sergio "Interpretazione simultanea e consecutiva: problemi teorici e metodologie didattiche" Hoepli, Milano, 1999
- The didactic materials will be uploaded on the MOODLE platform.

The exam will consist of a simultaneous interpretation test from Chinese into Italian. During the examination, students will be asked to demonstrate their ability to prepare adequately for a short mock conference in which they will be asked to interpret a speech (which text will recorded or read out loud by a mother tongue lecturer) by using the techniques perfected during the lessons.
The criteria according to which students will be assessed are the following:
accuracy in content delivery (25%);
correct use of language (25%);
ability to apply the interpretation strategies learned (25%);
fluid and dynamic speech delivery (25%)

The course will be mainly focused on simultaneous interpretation exercises of real speeches of political-economic, general and technical nature. The speeches to be interpreted will consist of a selection of recordings and video extracts from conferences or other public meetings chosen by the professor.
With regard to the teaching methods adopted, the students will carry out various exercises aimed at improving their performance. In particular, it will be essential that the teacher and the students themselves give their feedback on the communicative aspects of the speeches produced during the exercises (register, style, prosody, disfluencies, etc.). Students are asked to take part in mock conferences organized by the lecturer to simulate real-interpreting life settings.

Italian

All the course related materials such as presentations, texts, audio and video files or links will be available on the Moodle platform in the dedicated area and/or the Facebook group

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