On agency, witnessing and surviving: Interpreters in situations of violent conflict

Interpreters have long played a key role in situations of violent conflict. From military field operations to humanitarian and diplomatic activities, interpreters have “a direct or indirect impact on how a war is waged and on how it is remembered�?. This chapter focuses on interpreter agency in conflict zones and its presentation in the public domain. It is designed to support better understanding of the complexities and contingencies of interpreter mediation in these situations and the way in which these are conveyed to a wider audience. A growing body of literature has emerged in translation and interpreting studies in recent decades on the theme of translation and conflict, particularly violent conflict. Ill-informed institutional approaches to planning language support provisions are frequently highlighted in the literature on translation and interpreting in conflict zones. The data include interpreter memoirs, interviews and blogs, military memoirs and other publicly available media reports, as well as fictionalised accounts of conflicts in the Middle East.