Cultural translation and the interpretation of Covid-19 risks among London's migrant communities

应对新冠肺炎危机的关键措施之一是改变个人行为。社交疏远、洗手或佩戴口罩/面罩的成功，都有赖于社区个别成员采取这些措施。这种行为的改变有赖于有关新冠肺炎的准确、可靠和可访问的信息，以及社区所有成员对与新冠肺炎相关的风险的良好理解。为此，语言和对文化的理解都是至关重要的。该项目将在伦敦不同语言社区中调查与新冠肺炎有关的公共卫生话语，重点是非洲和亚洲的语言。伦敦是一个高度多语种的社区--伦敦的小学里有200多种语言。伦敦的多语种和多元文化社区可以获得并依赖几种语言的关于新冠肺炎的话语和信息。由英国媒体、政府机构、地方当局等以英语提供的信息，加上以社区语言提供的信息，以及来自英国以外的官方渠道和社交媒体的信息。因此，伦敦的移民、少数民族和少数族裔社区参与了来自不同来源的新冠肺炎信息的翻译和解释，并往往采用了不同的视角，这将有助于他们对这场灾难的理解和行为反应。当前的项目将调查有关新冠肺炎及其相关风险的信息是如何流动的，并被翻译成伦敦的一系列语言，如标准阿拉伯语、阿尔及利亚阿拉伯语、汉语、印地语、印度尼西亚语、日语、韩语、波斯语、旁遮普语、土耳其语、乌尔都语、斯瓦希里语和约鲁巴语。我们的目标是了解伦敦移民/族裔/少数族裔社区是如何接受有关新冠肺炎的信息的，以及这些信息及其文化背景如何影响他们在这种环境下的反应和日常做法。例如，在伦敦说日语的人可以访问至少两份免费的社区报纸，日本大使馆向注册的日本公民发送了鲍里斯·约翰逊介绍第一次封锁和各种新冠肺炎相关信息的关键演讲的翻译。因此，英国内部对解决新冠肺炎危机的看法与外部视角形成了鲜明对比，后者往往批评英国的做法。为了理解这些多语言和多文化的话语，该项目将调查五个关键问题：(1)伦敦的多语言和多元文化社区如何解释和翻译他们从不同来源收到的信息，包括来自他们本国和当地社区的信息，以及这对他们对新冠肺炎的理解和他们的社会行为有何影响；(2)不同的文化在多大程度上影响了社区的理解。语言和社会背景及其文化翻译过程(3)一些社区由于不理解相关的公共卫生建议而在多大程度上面临感染或传播新冠肺炎的风险(4)如何为伦敦不同的语言和文化社区更好地传达或翻译有关新冠肺炎的信息(5)今后可以从这次流行病中吸取哪些教训来进行公共卫生交流该项目将利用伦敦索萨大学与公共机构和社区代表合作的广泛的语言和文化专业知识。它将收集、记录和综合伦敦多语种社区成员的个人账户、在伦敦发布的目标语言信息以及社区成员可从其(历史上的)母国、其政府和社交媒体上获得的信息。

One of the key responses to the Covid-19 crisis is change in individuals' behaviour. The success of social distancing, hand-washing, or the wearing of masks/face coverings all depend on individual members of the community adopting these measures. This change of behaviour relies on accurate, reliable and accessible information about Covid-19 and a good understanding of risks associated with Covid-19 among all members of the community. For this, language and understanding of culture are both crucial. This project will investigate public health discourses related to Covid-19 among linguistically diverse communities in London, focussing on languages of Africa and Asia. London is a highly multilingual community - there are more than 200 languages spoken in London's primary schools. London's multilingual and multicultural communities have access to, and rely on, discourses and information about Covid-19 in several languages. Information provided in English by UK media, government agencies, local authorities etc, is augmented by information provided in the community language and from outside of the UK from official channels as well as social media. London's migrant, ethnic, and minority communities are thus engaged in translating and interpreting Covid-19 information from different sources and often adopting a variety of perspectives, and this will inform their understanding of and their behavioural response to the pandemic.The current project will investigate how information about Covid-19 and associated risks flows and is translated in a range of London's diverse linguistic repertoire of languages such as Standard Arabic, Algerian Arabic, Chinese, Hindi, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Persian, Punjabi, Turkish, Urdu, Swahili, and Yoruba. Our goal is to understand how London's migrant/ethnic/minority communities receive information about Covid-19 and how that information and its cultural context impact on their reactions and everyday practice in this environment. For example, Japanese speakers in London have access to at least two free community newspapers and the Japanese embassy sent translations of Boris Johnson's key speech introducing the first lock-down and various Covid-19 related information to registered Japanese citizens. The UK-internal perspective on addressing the Covid-19 crisis is thus contrasted with external perspectives, which are often critical of the UK's approach. In order to understand these multilingual and multicultural discourses, the project will investigate five key questions: (1) How London's multilingual and multicultural communities interpret and translate the information they receive from different sources, including information from their home countries and their local communities, and how this impacts on their understanding of Covid-19 and their social behaviour(2) To what extent communities' understanding is coloured by their different cultural, linguistic and social backgrounds and their processes of cultural translation(3) To what extent some communities are at higher risk of contracting or transmitting Covid-19 because they do not understand relevant public health advice(4) How information about Covid-19 can be better communicated or translated for London's diverse linguistic and cultural communities (5) What lessons can be learned from this pandemic for public health communication in the futureThe project will draw on the extensive language and cultural expertise at SOAS University of London in collaboration with public agencies and community representatives. It will collect, document, and synthesize individual accounts from multilingual community members in London, information in the target languages published in London, and information available to community members from their (historical) home countries, their governments and on social media.