A Study On Discourse Markers Of Student Interpreters In Chinese To English Simultaneous Interpreting

As a device to prompt and guide the audience to understand the speaker’s intentions,discourse markers can help the listener to obtain information and maintain focused in order to realize effective communication.In recent years,discourse markers have attracted the attention of many researchers.However,most researchers focus on relevance theory or a certain group of or several discourse markers,yet the discourse markers in simultaneous interpreting have not been studied.Therefore,10 second-year graduate students from Graduate School of Translation and Interpretation of Beijing Foreign Studies University are selected to analyze the discourse markers used in Chinese to English simultaneous interpreting,and to explore the pattern of the discourse markers in simultaneous interpreting and their meta-pragmatic functions.The thesis summarized the pattern of their usage,and proposed some strategies for using discourse markers.Through a quantitative analysis of the transcriptions of the 10 participants,together with interviews,the study found that although the student interpreters learned little about discourse marker,and some understanding was partial,the actual use of the discourse markers generally achieved their due functions,with some misuses and abuses accompanied.Participants used logical discourse markers the most and relatively few filling discourse markers.This study aims to draw student interpreters’ attention to discourse markers and to deepen their understanding of discourse markers.Through appropriate usage of discourse markers,student interpreters can sort out the logic and save energy and finally improve the quality of their interpretation.