Adapt or Perish: How Forced Transition to Remote Simultaneous Interpreting during the COVID-19 Pandemic Affected Interpreters’ Professional Practices

Abstract

This article discusses the results of a survey carried out among 132 simultaneous interpreters with Polish as their working language, summarising their professional experience during the first 10 months of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the context of the forced transition to the remote mode of simultaneous interpreting and the related technical and organisational challenges, this survey captured the early experience of working remotely (mostly from home), as well as the adaptations necessitated by the new situation in terms of changes in working modalities and tools, particularly in the home environment. The article also presents the surveyed interpreters’ expectations regarding the role and place of remote simultaneous interpreting in their future professional practices.

Keywords

• remote simultaneous interpreting
• RSI
• interpreters
• COVID-19 pandemic
• technological turn
• professional practices