Live Text Access.
Training for real time intralingual subtitlers.
Unit 5. Respeaking.
Element 1. Psycho-cognitive skills.
Remember full sentences while lagging behind.
Created by SSML and Velotype.
On completion of this training sequence,
you will be able to repeat or reformulate the source text
while listening to it,
remember full sentences while lagging behind,
activate exit strategies while respeaking
if you realize the speaker is challenging.
This is the agenda of this presentation.
I will first recall the skills of the respeaker.
Then, I will concentrate on the memory system,
which is at the basis of respeaking and simultaneous interpreting,
a mental activity very close to real time subtitling.
I will finally focus on the inferencing and memorizing strategies,
that you will be requested to practice along the course
to develop, reinforce and finally maintain this skill
in two different contexts: verbatim and sensatim subtitling.
Section 1 – The challenging speaker.
As you have seen,
a respeaker has to do many things at the same time.
In Element 1, LO1, we have dealt with Psycho-cognitive skills,
meaning all those skills related to being able
to listen and speak at the same time,
which is the first set of skills a respeaker has to possess.
In particular,
for a respeaker to be able and become a professional in the field,
he or she has also to train a good short-term memory
to be able and process as many concepts as possible,
and to apply exit strategies or solutions
to any problem one may encounter in the subtitling process.
While you can only develop these competences
by the time and thanks to ad hoc exercises,
you may be interested in knowing how memory and short-term memory work.
Before, it is important to recall.
That is what we are going to see in the next section.
In this Element, Element 2,
we will deal with memory and the memory system.
Section 2 – Memory.
As we know,
in any multitasking process which involves
doing two things at the same time,
two main types of strategies are involved in respeaking:
The first is understanding,
aimed at comprehending the source text.
The second is respeaking,
aimed at making the most out of understanding
under stressful conditions
and with a reduced processing capacity than usual.
In this, memory is crucial.
But what is memory and how does its system work?
Memory is commonly described as a system
for simultaneous storage and processing.
Several studies have attempted to investigate this aspect
belonging to interpreter’s and respeaker’s ability.
While several different models of memory have been proposed,
the stage model of memory is often used
to explain the basic structure and function of memory.
Initially,
proposed in 1968 by Richard Atkinson and Richard Shiffrin,
this theory outlines three separate stages of memory:
sensory memory, short-term memory and long-term memory.
Sensory memory is the earliest stage of memory.
During this stage,
sensory information from the environment is stored
for a very brief period of time,
generally for no longer than a half-second for visual information
and 3 or 4 seconds for auditory information.
We attend to only certain aspects of this sensory memory,
allowing some of this information to pass into the next stage:
short-term memory.
Short-term memory stores information for approximately 20-30 seconds.
It is also known as Working Memory,
which refers to the processes that are used
to temporarily store, organize and manipulate information.
In the next slide, we will focus on STM as a crucial system
for the simultaneous interpreter and for the respeaker.
Long-term memory refers to the continuing storage of information.
This information is largely outside of our awareness
but can be called into working memory to be used when needed.
Working memory is key in interpreting and respeaking,
due to the operation of several factors including:
the time interval between the moment the original speech is heard
and the moment its processing for comprehension is finished;
the time interval between
the moment the message to be respoken or interpreted is determined
and the completion of its formulation;
tactical moves which are used, for instance,
if a speech segment is unclear to the interpreter or respeaker
because of bad sound quality, a strong accent,
unclear logic or errors in the source text itself.
We will now see
how the working memory system is structured.
I will refer to the model put forward
by Baddeley & Hitch in 1974.
Initially,
Baddeley and Hitch conceptualized a system
involving three main components of WM.
This model included an attentional system known as the central executive,
which is responsible for controlling and coordinating the flow of information
from the two subordinate systems.
These systems are the visuo-spatial scratch pad
which processes visual and spatial information,
and the phonological loop which manages verbal information.
In turn, the phonological loop consists of a phonological store
where information is held for about 2 seconds
before it begins to decay.
The second component is a rehearsal process
that refreshes information in the store via sub-vocal articulation.
The central executive is considered as the most important aspect of WM.
It is a regulatory mechanism that controls information flow in WM,
information retrieval from other memory systems
and information storage and processing in WM.
The model allows for both storage and manipulation of information.
This memory model was revised by Baddeley in 2000
to include an ‘episodic buffer’,
a multidimensional storage and processing component
assumed to provide a temporary store of limited capacity
that is capable of integrating information
from the subsidiary systems with that of LTM.
It is assumed to be important for the chunking of information in STM.
Buddley proposes that the buffer is a mechanism
for recalling the gist of a message rather than verbatim information.
Now, we have said that memory is a system
for simultaneous storage and processing of the discourse.
To help the respeaker or interpreter in his or her understanding
and accurately convey the message,
the WM is crucial in carrying out all the processes
during the respeaking or interpreting task,
as the respeaker or interpreter retains what he or she has just heard,
in order to convey the message to the audience.
About this,
the following slide explains how spoken language is understood,
based on the strategic model of discourse comprehension.
The strategic model of discourse comprehension,
developed by van Dijk and Kintsch in 1983,
explains how spoken language is understood.
By adapting it,
it is possible to claim
that a respeaker understands the source text
by adopting the following strategies: form strategies, content strategies,
textual strategies, procedural strategies and general knowledge strategies.
Form strategies are related to understanding
the words and grammar of the source text
from sounds and grammar elements.
Content strategies capitalise on form strategies
to understand the meaning of a text.
Textual strategies contextualise this content.
Procedural strategies relate
the ongoing comprehension of the source text
to other texts similar to the one which is heard.
Finally,
general knowledge strategies allow to more easily understand
how the source text related to the rest of the world.
After having strategically understood the ST,
the respeaker adopts production strategies to come to the TT.
By adapting the model
proposed by Kohn e Kalina in 1996 for simultaneous interpreting,
it has been said that in respeaking contexts
professionals follow some strategies,
as highlighted in Element 1, LO1.
Within the production strategies an interpreter or respeaker has to master
the following are strongly supported by the memory.
There is inferencing,
whereby the respeaker anticipates linguistic elements.
This means that the interpreter needs to attentively follow the text
if he or she wants to anticipate some element
in order to close the sentence in the shortest time possible.
There is memorising,
whereby the respeaker postpones linguistic material.
This means to retrieve full sentences while laggind behind
because of several reasons.
Then, as we have expalined in Element 1 LO1,
among the production strategies are also editing strategies,
either before going on air or while being on air
either avoiding possible mistakes through synonymy or paraphrase
or by correcting mistakes before thay are aired.
Finally,
exit strategies or 3 Gs are those strategies
which are adopted in extreme conditions to compensate for information loss.
This can be done through generalisation strategies,
whereby the respeaker uses more general synonyms
or repeats previously mentioned content.
Another exit strategy is the gordian knot strategy,
also called cut and knit strategy,
whereby the respeaker omits bits of a sentence
but manages to produce
a grammatically correct and coherent sentence.
The last exit strategy, called Garwood strategy,
is named after my simultaneous interpreting teacher,
who used to repeat this all the time.
Section 3 – Memory Strategies.
In order to deal with the complex process of respeaking as a whole,
a professional has to implement strategic moves realtime,
and memory is paramount while working as a supportive system.
While you can only develop this competence by the time
and thanks to ad hoc exercises,
you may be interested in understanding the rationale behind it,
through some examples of strategies, as a way to develop it.
In particular, we will focus on omissions, compression or condensation
and expansion or addition.
An aspect which can lead the respeaker to omit
a section or a sentence of the source text
depends on how fast the speaker is.
Here is an example of omission taken from the press conference
on the appointment of the city of London for the Olympic Games.
The pace of the speech is very fast.
When one of the members, Dame Tanni Grey Thompson takes the floor,
he starts speaking much too fast, by saying these words:
“I feel very proud to be a British athlete and a Paralympian.
There is not another country in the world with so much attention
to Paralympian athletes as the UK,
both in terms of financial support and of media coverage".
In this case, his way of speaking is too fast.
This is confusing for the respeaker
who cannot retain the whole sentence on his memory,
thus deciding to omit some portions of the source text.
He writes:
"I feel very proud to be a British athlete and a Paralympian.
Both in terms of financial support and of media coverage".
However,
the reader of the subtitles has the impressions
that something is being omitted,
but the logics behind the whole sentence is still maintained.
In this case,
this strategy really helps the respeaker.
Important to say is also the fact
that the question of omission intimately concerns
the question of quality, as well as context.
If an omission is considered unquestionably valid,
then this is surely because “high quality” is not the same thing
as rendering everything in the source text.
In fact, false starts, hesitations,
and unnecessary repetitions are routinely omitted,
basically since such improvements in the quality of discourse are seen
as part of the respeaker’s service function.
The strategy of omission can be divided into two different kind.
Semantic omissions occur when losing some words which are important
for the whole understanding of the discourse,
and that the audience cannot get from the rest of the context.
The non-semantic omissions occur when the respeaker automatically deletes
some parts of the spoken text,
for example: "you see" or "it’s, it’s it’s very interesting…",
where "it's" is repeated many times,
and redundant words.
These cases mainly happen
when the respeaker has to cut something in the speech,
not to overcharge his or her working-memory.
In this cases,
omissions go to the benefit both of the memory load of the respeaker
and to the benefit of the cognitive load of the audience.
Here are some examples.
In example 1,
the source text says: "Thank you, James, for…" etcetera.
The target text says: "Thank you for…" etcetera.
In example 2, source text says:
"We determine, as a council, three priorities".
The target text says: "We determined three priorities".
In this case, omission helps the respeaker
in his or her cognitive load
without losing the meaning of the whole sentence.
Compression is a strategy
that overlaps with omission, in a certain way.
In fact, compression and omission have something in common.
Compression happens
when the original meaning is rendered by the respeaker
in a more general and concise way,
deleting what is repetitive or redundant.
Omission is used when the respeaker omits incomprehensible input,
unnecessarily repetitive, redundant, un-important, or unacceptable utterances.
Therefore, the application of one of them may entail
the employment of the other.
In particular,
condensation strategy facilitates working under time pressure,
while conveying complete information.
It consists in formulating concise and synthetic utterances
and deleting superfluous words.
In the example that follows, the source text reads:
“The setup program results in an update of the registry”.
The target text says:
“The setup program updates the registry”.
In the target text a strong verb is used by the respeaker.
The verb is “to update”,
instead of its nominalized variant in the source text,
that is the “update of the registry”.
This way of facilitating the sentence
helps the respeaker retain the right information
by relieving the cognitive load on the working memory.
Expansion represents a strategy
in which the respeaker has to trust his or her memory system
in terms of retention of information.
The respeaker adds information or expands the source discourse,
so as to better convey or clarify the message
and avoid unclear information in the target discourse.
As we have already examined in the previous example,
respeakers tend to stick to the source text as much as possible,
and to omit something only in cases of false starts,
hesitations, unnecessary repetitions or prolix and redundant ritual wording.
Also, a respeaker can omit something
when in trouble with the fast pace of the speaker.
In this framework, one could think
that there is no much room for expansions in the respeaking process,
intended as addition of information
or clarification of particularly difficult concepts.
However, expansions sometimes are necessary
in order to retrieve previous information or to clarify not very clear concepts.
Here is an example of expansion at a sentence level.
The source text says:
“Gunmen have settled a ferocious battle with police”.
The target text says:
“Reports say that people have started to fight with the police”.
In this case, not only the respeaker introduces a hedging
which is not present in the original text,
but he also simplifies the lexis of the source text,
without weakening the language at the level of the sentence.
Summary.
In this LO2, we have introduced the main competence of the respeaker,
the psycho-cognitive skill of memory.
In particular, we have dealt with two important aspects,
a theoretical one that is the memory divided into sensory memory,
long-term memory and short-term memory or working memory,
and a more practical one,
on the inferencing and memorising strategies
used by the respeaker.
In the case of inferencing strategies,
the respeaker recovers lost or incomprehensible information
on the basis of the speech context and his or her general knowledge,
or he anticipates lexico-grammar or conceptual elements.
In the case of memorising strategies,
the respeaker postpones lexico-grammar or conceptual elements.
One way to go for that is trying to semi-automatise
these actions.
To do so, memorising is the exercise to start with
together with inferencing.
In the homework session, we will see how to do this in practice.