92974 - English Language (C Language) For Interpreters

Learning outcomes

This course develops advanced English-language competence in contexts relevant to simultaneous and consecutive interpreting, with a focus on both linguistic analysis and cognitive-linguistic strategies. By the end of the course students will:

• Master key linguistic, discursive, and pragmatic concepts relevant to interpreting.
• Acquire the analytical tools to examine the structure, function, and textual/discursive organization of English across modalities.
• Comprehend and produce oral discourse (and selected written texts) across diverse genres and communicative situations, especially those found in interpreting contexts.
• Demonstrate spontaneous, fluent, and accurate spoken English, particularly under cognitive pressure typical of real-time interpreting.
• Apply insights from applied linguistics, psycholinguistics, and pragmatics to enhance comprehension, memory, reformulation, and delivery—core skills in interpreting.
• Critically evaluate interpreting performance using evidence-based frameworks, and reflect on strategies to improve cognitive and linguistic agility.

Course contents

Topics include:

1. Lexico-grammatical structures in English: Their role in interpretation and reformulation (Usage-based cognitive linguistics and construction grammar).
2. Cognitive processing in interpreting: Introduction to working memory, listening effort, and information chunking (based on psycholinguistic models).
3. Pragmatics and speech acts: Understanding and interpreting reference; informational structure; implicature, politeness, hedging, modality, and indirectness.
4. Discourse and genre analysis: Identifying macro- and micro-structures in news interviews, speeches, talk shows, and debates.
5. Evidence-based interpreting strategies: Incorporating findings from corpus-based interpreting studies, cognitive interpreting studies; pragmatic analysis.
6. Performance-focused speaking activities: Summarising, paraphrasing, reformulating, adapting, debating, and presenting under time pressure.

Students will engage in:

• Close reading and critical analysis of authentic English texts and multimodal discourse.
• Oral summaries and on-the-spot reformulations of spoken and written content.
• Pronunciation, intonation, and prosodic control sessions informed by phonetic research.
• Corpus-based observation of frequent interpreting challenges and successful strategies.

 

Readings/Bibliography

Required books:

Hilpert, M. (2014). Construction Grammar and its application to English. Edinburgh University Press.

Warren, P. (2014). Introducing Psycholinguistics. Cambridge University Press.

Recommended books

Gillies, A. (2024). Conference Interpreting. A student's practical book. Routledge

Culpeper, J., Kerswill, P., Wodak, R., McEnery, T., Katamba, F. (Eds.) (2018). English Language. Description, variation and context. Bloomsbury.

Additional texts (articles, multimedia) will be made available on the Virtuale platform during the course of the semester.

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