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This book presents a study of interpreter-mediated interaction in
New York City small claims courts, drawing on audio-recorded
arbitration hearings and ethnographic fieldwork. Focusing on the
language use of speakers of Haitian Creole, Polish, Russian, or
Spanish, the study explores how these litigants make use of their
limited proficiency in English, in addition to communicating with
the help of professional court interpreters. Drawing on research on
courtroom interaction, legal interpreting, and conversational
codeswitching, the study explores how the ability of immigrant
litigants to participate in these hearings is impacted by
institutional language practices and underlying language
ideologies, as well as by the approaches of individual arbitrators
and interpreters who vary in their willingness to accommodate to
litigants and share the burden of communication with them.
Litigants are shown to codeswitch between the languages in
interactionally meaningful ways that facilitate communication, but
such bilingual practices are found to be in conflict with court
policies that habitually discourage the use of English and require
litigants to act as monolinguals, using only one language
throughout the entire proceedings. Moreover, the standard
distribution of interpreting modes in the courtroom is shown to
disadvantage litigants who rely on the interpreter, as consecutive
interpreting causes their narrative testimony to be less coherent
and more prone to interruptions, while simultaneous interpreting
often leads to incomplete translation of legal arguments or of
their opponent's testimony. Consequently, the study raises
questions about the relationship between linguistic diversity and
inequality, arguing that the legal system inherently privileges
speakers of English.
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