Pre-task Preparation Under The Guidance Of Schema Theory

With international exchanges going more frequently,interpreting service has extended to wider fields and now covers more diversified topics.Interpreters should not only master bilingual knowledge and professional skills,but also familiarize themselves with relevant thematic knowledge and get themselves well prepared before each task.Schemata,a concept put forward by British psychologist Bartlett,are a data structure made up of our long-term accumulated knowledge.Preparation before interpreting is to activate existing schemata and build new ones.During interpreting,when stimulated by new messages,relevant schemata will be activated to facilitate comprehension.Schemata can be divided into linguistic schema,content schema and formal schema,according to which preparation work can be done specifically.This report discusses an interpreting task that the author received from American Broadcasting Company,in which she served as a consecutive interpreter during ABC's interviews with local Chinese in a TV program called Discover China.The author conducted pre-task preparation based on three types of schemata.This report describes the author's preparation in terms of linguistic schema,content schema and formal schema with the aim of studying how to make preparation under the guidance of schema theory and analyzing what are the effects of preparation on interpreting performance.