Skopos-Guided Interpreting:A Practice Report Based On The 2018 Kunming SAP Social Sabbatical Project For Global Engagement Sponsored By The TAE Charitable Foundation

Interpreters are required to accomplish the listening-understanding-presenting trio in an instant manner,having hardly any time for the interpreter to look up the dictionary and ponder over words or expressions or structures to be used.In this sense,interpreting is quite demanding and arduous,which calls for an excellent command of both languages involved,encyclopedic knowledge,accumulated experiences and efficient mastery of theories of translation on the part of the interpreter.An array of theories has been developed to guide both translation and interpretation and some of them are equally applicable to both,with the Skopos theory as one of them.The Skopos theory was first introduced by Hans J.Vermeer which is in the core place of functionalism.The Skopos theory believes that translation and interpretation are cross-cultural communication behaviors,and the purpose of the behaviors determines the process of the entire translation and interpretation,namely,“The purpose decides the methods”.It is in accordance with the Skopos theory that the interpreting task at issue was conducted and the report in hand conceived.This interpreting practice report is based on the 2018 SAP(System,Application and Products)Kunming Social Sabbatical Project for Global Engagement Sponsored by the TAE Charitable Foundation,an event in which the author was involved as a member on the interpreting team.The author most often resorted to the Skopos theory to overcome problems that popped up during the course of interpreting.With the guidance of this theory,together with many others,the author successfully accomplished the interpreting task.This report unfolds itself in five chapters.The first chapter is the bilingual transcription of what was interpreted both ways during the practice.The second chapter is mainly about the task description,divided into the source,the requirements and the expected results of the task.The third chapter describes the interpreting process,from the preparations,implementations to post-interpreting considerations.Major barriers and strategies used during the interpreting process are discussed in the fourth chapter.In the end,the fifth part summarizes the major findings,limitations and future enlightenment from the whole interpreting practice.