Translation, interpreting and the British humanitarian response to asylum seeker and refugee arrivals since the 1940s

该项目探讨了1940年代以来在英国选定的寻求庇护者和难民群体在早期接收和重新安置阶段笔译和口译的战略重要性，特别提到了非国家行为者。它试图调查在这一时期人道主义活动日益“技术化”以及对移徙和语言多样性的态度发生变化的背景下，服务部门如何适应有限的语言能力这一总体问题。具体地说，它将1)调查政府和选定的慈善机构自20世纪40年代以来在支持语言和文化上不同的难民和寻求庇护者群体方面的关系；2)跟踪土著和社区群体语言规定的发展；3)探索政府和民间社会话语中对语言多样化的态度转变，4)在两个以城市为基础的案例研究中引发个人和组织对语言规定的体验。该项目追踪英国公共服务笔译和口译的演变，并以文化研究理论家将其称为“表达”的过程为基础(Slack 1996)。这被理解为一个国家向其他国家伸出援手，鼓励特定类型的社会参与作为回报的方式。随着难民和庇护流动的加速并变得“超级多样化”(Vertovec 2007)，以及社区的定居，表达过程也发生了变化，需要注意笔译和口译在其中所起的作用。本项目突出了人道主义行动、非国家行为者和表达之间的相互联系，以补充翻译研究、城市多种语言和非国家人道主义这一新兴领域的研究。该项目的多学科团队将在为期两年的项目中进行一系列案例研究，并对政策、议会和媒体话语进行基于语料库的分析。它促进了一种基于最近关于城市多种语言的研究的认识论方法，在这种方法中，语言规定的评估方式以当地实践社区和积累的知识和经验为基础，以交际活动为中心(Gaiser和Matras 2017)。第一组案例研究旨在突出选定的志愿部门组织在接收和重新安置自1940年代以来卷入重大难民事件的个人方面处理语言和文化多样性的方式。国家档案馆的档案研究将深入了解组织方法所依据的原则，并辅之以选定的地方历史档案馆的研究，以探索接待中心和营地的实地做法。第二套以城市为基础的案例研究(莱斯特和利物浦)将阐明市政一级出现语言规定的方式，以及有机发展起来的社区协会网络，以补充“自上而下”的规定和/或开发独立的支助来源。莱斯特之所以被选中，是因为它在20世纪70年代初收容来自乌干达的新移民方面发挥了作用，而在20世纪70年代和80年代，利物浦则因为与越南难民的联系而被选中。这两个社区的语言多样性对这一项目特别感兴趣，因为它将把重点放在地方一级对需求作出反应的灵活性水平上。为期两年的项目将产生一系列有利于一系列学术学科的传统学术成果，包括专题讨论会、网站资源、口述历史证词和期刊文章。该项目还将通过与难民社区团体、慈善机构和补充学校共同组织的研讨会和活动，吸引非学术受益者。

This project explores the strategic importance of translation and interpreting in the early reception and resettlement phases of selected groups of asylum seekers and refugees in England since the 1940s, with specific reference to non-state actors. It seeks to investigate the overall question of how limited language proficiency has been accommodated in services, against the backdrop of increasingly 'technologised' humanitarian activity and changes in attitude to migration and linguistic diversity over the period. Specifically it will 1) investigate the relationship between the government and selected charities in supporting linguistically and culturally diverse groups of refugees and asylum seekers since the 1940s; 2) trace the development of language provisions by indigenous and community-based groups; 3) explore attitudinal shifts to linguistic diversity in government and civil society discourse, and 4) elicit personal and organisational experiences of language provisions in two city-based case studies.The project traces the evolution of public service translation and interpreting in Britain and is anchored around the processes of what theorists of cultural studies term 'articulation' (Slack 1996). This is understood as the ways in which a state reaches out to others to encourage particular types of social engagement in return. As refugee and asylum movements have accelerated and become 'superdiverse' (Vertovec 2007), and communities have settled, processes of articulation have also evolved, warranting attention to the role played by translation and interpreting therein. Interconnections between humanitarian action, non-state actors and articulation are foregrounded in this project in ways that complement research in translation studies, urban multilingualism and the emerging field of non-state humanitarianism. The project's multidisciplinary team will conduct a set of case studies over the two-year project, and a corpus-based analysis of policy, parliamentary and media discourses. It promotes an epistemological approach based on recent research on urban multilingualism in which language provisions are evaluated in ways that are anchored around local communities of practice and accumulated knowledge and experience, with the communicative event at the centre (Gaiser and Matras 2017). The first set of case studies is designed to bring to prominence the ways in which selected voluntary sector organisations handled linguistic and cultural diversity in relation to the reception and resettlement of individuals caught up in major refugee events since the 1940s. Archival research at the national archives will yield insight into the principles that underpinned organizational approaches, complemented by research at selected local historical archives to explore practices on the ground in reception centres and camps.A second set of city-based case studies (Leicester and Liverpool) will shed light on the ways in which language provisions emerged at the municipal level, and the networks of community associations that grew organically to complement 'top down' provisions and/or develop independent sources of support. Leicester has been selected due to the role it played in accommodating new arrivals from Uganda in the early 1970s and Liverpool for its connection to Vietnamese refugees in the 1970s and 1980s. The linguistic heterogeneity of the communities in both cases is of particular interest to this project since it will focus attention on the level of flexibility at the local level to respond to need.The two-year project will lead to a series of traditional academic outputs of benefit to a range of academic disciplines and include a symposium, website resources, oral history testimonies and journal articles. The project will also engage with non-academic beneficiaries through workshops and events that are co-organised with refugee community groups, charities, and supplementary schools.