92969 - English Language (Language B) For Interpreters

Learning outcomes

This course develops advanced English-language competence in contexts relevant to simultaneous and consecutive interpreting.

The course is designed to enhance interpreting students’ English-language proficiency and discourse skills through the integration of linguistic analysis, pragmatics, cognitive interpreting studies, and evidence-based practice. It focuses on the analysis and production of oral discourse relevant to different interpreting scenarios (media, legal, political, scientific), helping students develop fluency, register control, and summarization techniques, all rooted in theoretical and empirical findings in interpreting studies.

Course contents

Key topics include:

1. Referential pragmatics in English: definite expressions, deixis, anaphora, referring expressions and context, referring expressions and accessibility, referring expressions and common ground

2. Informational pragmatics in English: informational background and informational foreground;

3. Pragmatic acts: Understanding and interpreting implicature, politeness, hedging, modality,  indirectness.

4. Discourse and genre analysis: Identifying macro- and micro-structures in news interviews, speeches, legal discourse, talk shows, and debates.

Teaching methods

Task-based learning: Centered around interpreter-relevant discourse and real-world interpreting scenarios. Evidence-based exercises: Activities designed from research findings (e.g., chunking exercises based on cognitive load studies). Simulation: Presentations, mini-debates, and real-time summarizing of audio-visual materials. Self-reflection and peer-feedback: Informed by interpreting quality criteria (Chevalier & Gile, 2015).

Assessment methods

Midterm Presentation

5-minute oral summary + slides (max 2) of a chosen article (800–1000 words).  Article and slides submitted 2 weeks in advance.

33% of the course grade

Final Oral Summary Exam

3–5 minute video summary in English. No consecutive technique or note-taking allowed.

67%

Note: Final mark may be turned down once. Both exams must be re-taken if the final mark is declined.

Teaching tools

• Multimodal materials: Quality journalistic videos, podcasts, and authentic speech events (e.g., TED Talks, court proceedings, news panels).

• Corpora: Excerpts from interpreting corpora such as EPIC (European Parliament Interpreting Corpus). 

• Digital tools: Speech analysis (e.g., Praat), automatic transcription, slide software.

Office hours

See the website of Giulia Bencini