Coping with non-verbal communication in public service interpreting with Chinese immigrants

XIXth Biennial Conference of the European Association for Chinese Studies

Paris, September 4th - 8th 2012

Coping with non-verbal
communication in public service
interpreting with Chinese immigrants
Mireia Vargas-Urpi
Translation and Interpreting
Department
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Previous research

1. Dimensions of Non-Verbal Communication (NVC)


Proxemics

Haptics

Physical Appearance

Kinesics

Paralanguage or Vocalics

Chronemics

Coping with non-verbal communication in public
service interpreting with Chinese immigrants

Previous research
2. NVC in the framework of intercultural communication

Harmony within the group Conflict avoidance

Collectivism Face-work strategies
High hierarchy
to avoid losing mianzi

High-context communication Indirect and implicit
communication

Important role of
Non-verbal communication


Previous research
Dimension Non-verbal cue Meaning / function as stated
in previous research
Kinesics Smile To reestablish harmony / to avoid showing
( 赔笑，苦笑，微笑） negative feelings / to show engagement in
a conversation

Lack of eye contact To show respect or active listening ( 听话 )

Gaze ( 注视 ) To show attention

Haptics Lack of physical contact

Vocalics (Long) silences between To show active listening ( 听话 )
turns
Scarce overlapping
Scarce reactive tokens
(嗯 ) To show active listening ( 听话 ) / to show
agreement

Objective and research questions

Studies focusing on interactions between Chinese
and Mediterranean or Latin cultures are scarce →
Shed some light onto the role of NVC between these
particular cultures


NVC is crucial in face-to-face interactions, such as
the ones taking place nowadays in Public Service
Interpreting, but to what extent are interpreters
aware of that? How do they cope with NVC
differences?

Method

Qualitative research

20 interviews to public service
interpreters and intercultural
mediators working for the Chinese
immigrants living in Catalonia

Interviews were transcribed and analysed by means of
Atlas.ti and basing on qualitative content analysis and
discourse analysis


Sample


15 women + 5 men

12 Chinese

Second generation immigrants (7)

Students (5)

8 non-Chinese

Catalan (5) and Spanish (1)

European (1) and Latin American (1)


Analysis – overall perception
1. How do you think NVC influences communication
with the Chinese?

a) 5 interviewees - “it is not so important”

b) 9 interviewees - “Chinese are rather inexpressive so
NVC is not really important”

Differences in kinesics or vocalics


Analysis – overall perception

c) 12 interviewees admit that there are some non-
verbal cues that need to be explained and some even
pinpoint some of them:


smile (6)

lack of eye contact (6)

lack of contact when greeting (3)


Example 1 – differences in vocalics
[INF18, 31:56,male, Latin American interpreter]
A ver, tú estás hablando conmigo y yo te puedo hacer alguna señal para decirte que yo
te estoy entendiendo. ¡Ellos no! Ellos se quedan así [quietos], sin moverse. Pero
entonces, tú no sabes si tu mensaje está llegando o no. Claro, la otra persona, sea
un juez o un policía, le puede estar echando la bronca, le puede estar diciendo lo
que sea, o estar haciendo una pregunta o un interrogatorio, y el chino está así
[quieto, inmóvil]. Interesante... ¿no?

For instance, you’re talking to me and maybe I’ll do some sign to let you know
I’m understanding you. ¡They won’t! They just keep like this [still], without
moving. But, then, you don’t know if they are getting your message or not.
Of course, the other person, either a judge or a police, may be scolding
him/her, or may be telling him/her whatever, or may be asking him/her
something, or doing an interrogation, and the Chinese may be like this [still].


Example 2 – differences in the meaning of
a smile
[INF17, 30:73, female, Taiwanese mediator]
El problema mayor, el gesto que causa mayor problema, y no logro aún explicar bien,
es la risa, la sonrisa. Es que había un caso de un trabajador social, que ¡se enfadó
tanto, por una sonrisa! Iba a llamar a la policía, en serio, en la entrevista. Decía: “¡Se
ríe! ¡Encima, se ríe!”, y quería llamar a la policía. Bueno, es que pueden llegar a
tener una reacción bastante fuerte, por la sonrisa de los chinos. Pero yo también me
noto que no... ¡es que una sonrisa de un chino puede significar muchas cosas! [...]

The biggest problem, the gesture that causes biggest problems and I still cannot
explain it ok is the laugh, the smile. Once, there was a social worker who got
so angry because of a smile! He even wanted to call the police, really, during
the interview. He was saying: “He’s laughing! He’s even laughing!” and he
wanted to call the police. Well, they may have really strong reactions to a
Chinese smile. But I also notice that... a Chinese smile can mean so many
things! [...]

Decoding the Chinese smile

赔笑 (péixiào) – compensating smile (Bi,
1998; Sales Salvador, 2003; Sun, 2010)

苦笑 (kûxiào) – bitter smile (Sun, 2010)

微笑 (wëixiào) – gentle smile (Yang,
2007)

Both 赔笑 and 苦笑 require some kind of mediation
by the interpreter to avoid misunderstanding


Example 3 – lack of eye contact

[INF5, 37:101; female, Catalan mediator]
“Com a molt, quan fem mediacions, que molts autòctons diuen «Porque encima, pasa
por mi lado, y ¡no levanta ni la cabeza! ¡Ni me mira a la cara!», no? I llavors els hi
expliques: «Bueno, no es que baje la cabeza, es que en realidad es como un signo
de... como de respeto, porque no habla el idioma, como de vergüenza, que no
quiere enfrentarse...».”

Maybe, when we are mediating, it happens that many local people say: “Well,
on top of that, he passes by and he does not even raise his head! He does not
even look at me!”, you know. And then, you have to tell them: “Well, it’s not
that he bows his head, in fact, it’s like a sign of... a kind of respect, because
he doesn’t speak your language, it’s like he’s feeling embarrassed, as if he
doesn’t want to confront you...”


Decoding Chinese lack of eye contact
Lack of eye contact also
requires some kind of
mediation by the interpreter

[INF20, 34:68; female, Chinese mediator]
“[P]erò sí que hi ha alguns xinesos que quan parlen amb la gent, no els miren. Llavors
jo els aviso, els dic que a Espanya, això és senyal de falta d’educació. Els dic que
quan parlen amb els altres, els han de mirar, els aviso.”

But, actually, there are some Chinese who don’t look at other people
when talking to them. Then, I warn them, I tell them that in Spain,
this means lack of politeness. I tell them that when they talk to other
people, they have to look at them, I warn them.

Conclusions


Non-verbal communication can play an important
role in face-to-face interactions and is used as a face-
work strategy (mianzi) by the Chinese.

Most interpreters and mediators show some kind of
awareness.

Differences in NVC can actually be the source of
misunderstanding as the examples have shown.


Conclusions

Mediation in this kind of situations
should be recognised and accepted as a
function even for interpreters in legal
settings – and, therefore, included in PSI
courses.

Other kinds of mediation should be
enhanced in order to help develop
intercultural skills in both public service
providers and Chinese users (leaflets,
talks, etc.).

Thanks!
Gràcies!
¡Gracias!
Merci!
谢谢！

mireia.vargas@uab.cat

http://pagines.uab.cat/mireia_vu/

Coping with non-verbal communication in public service interpreting with Chinese immigrants

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