Daniel Greene

Tag: professionalism

  • Professional conferences and organizations are valuable!

    In response to The Professional Interpreter’s post Are professional conferences and organizations valuable? I replied:

    I think that, in general, professional conferences are great! I don’t go to them all the time—one a year on average—but I always make some valuable personal/professional connections, and I always learn more about how to be better at what I do. For example, at the Conference of Interpreter Trainers in 2010, I met Miako (Villanueva) Rankin. We happened to chat at a lunch table, and now she is one of my master’s thesis committee members. Another example: I attended a Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf regional conference in 1998 and learned some life-changing lessons about participant-presenter interactions that have stayed with me both as a participant and a presenter of workshops.

    I also think it helps to find more than one reason to go to a conference. When I attended the 2006 CIT conference in San Diego, it was a chance to visit my parents and friends in the city I had moved away from two years before. When I attended other conferences, such as the National Association of Black Interpreters (NAOBI), I was there as a presenter but I reveled in the warm welcome I received even though I am not black and I loved the festive atmosphere and cross-cultural exchange.

    A conference is what you make it. If you can network and make friends and/or academic/professional relationships, combine both learning and teaching, and enjoy the city you’re visiting, I think a conference can be a great boon to one’s career.

    P.S. I didn’t put all these links in my comment on The Professional Interpreter; I added them here. 🙂

  • Resources for teaching development of professional practice

    I made this video to fulfill an assignment in Teaching Ethics and Professional Practice at Western Oregon University’s MA in Interpreting Studies program with a concentration in Teaching Interpreting. The assignment was to share the process I went through to find materials to share in classes, in mentoring, or in my own work as an interpreter. Some of these resources were new to me; some of the resources I share in the video are recaps of what I have shared on this blog in the past few weeks. I am sorry I don’t have the time to transcribe and closed-caption the video for those who do not know ASL, but if you read my recent blog posts in addition to what is below, you already know what I was describing in the video. Here are the resources I describe:

    Videos

    United States Courts Federal Judiciary. (2010, September 23.) Nuremberg interpreter recalls historic trials [Video]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvY_1bMAZWY

    Activities

    Watching or participating in professional online discussion forum such as the #IntJC or #EPT Twitter chats (Interpreter Journal Club and Endless Possibilities Talks, respectively). I have participated in both in the past two weeks, and it has been beneficial both to me and them for spoken and signed language interpreters and translators to discuss their work with each other. For more info, see Interpreter joins the #IntJC Twitter form and Notes on “A Conversation with Translators.”

    Websites

    Greene, D. (n.d.) TerpTrans: An ASL-English interpreter/trainer on interpreting, transliterating, and translation. http://terptrans.com

    Shameless plug for my own blog. Many potential and practicing interpreters have found the pages and posts in this blog to be useful, and I am working hard at making it ever more professional and global. Feel free to review it! I’m open to feedback.

    Articles

    Klemenc-Ketis, Z. & Kersnik, J. (2011, August 23). Using movies to teach professionalism to medical students. BMC Medical Education 11(16). Retrieved from http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6920/11/60

  • Interpreting & translation associations around the world

    TerpTrans logoIn graduate school for interpreting studies, we are learning about interpreting and translation associations worldwide, including ASL-English and beyond. It is exciting to broaden one’s horizons. Here are some associations of interpreters and translators, both signed/spoken and spoken/spoken: (more…)

  • Resources for ethics: Ethical wills (ASL video)

    Fulfillment of an assignment in Western Oregon University’s course “Teaching Ethics & Professional Practice” in the Master of Arts in Interpreting Studies program with an emphasis in Teaching Interpreting. Our task was to find resources to help us in assessing our own ethics and teaching ethics to others. My contribution to my cohort’s resource list was three resources about ethical wills:

    Genesis 49: 1–33 and Deuteronomy 32: 46–47
    These Biblical passages are early examples of “ethical wills.” In Genesis, the dying Jaakov (Jacob) lays out for his sons what he sees will “befall” them based on what he thinks about their ethics; also, he expresses his prayers of blessing to his chosen son and the wish that he be buried with his ancestors. In Deuteronomy, the dying Moshe (Moses) instructed the people Israel to observe the commandments and teach them to prolong their lives and the lives of their children in the Promised Land (of Jordan).
    Medieval sourcebook: Jewish ethical wills, 12th & 14th centuries. Internet History Sourcebooks Project. New York: Fordham University. Retrieved from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/jewish-wills.asp
    Here are translated texts of ethical wills given by two dying Jewish men in medieval times. These ethical wills show the ethics they wished their children to embrace in their lives.
    Obama, B. (2009, January 18). A letter to my daughters. Life Legacies. Retrieved from http://life-legacies.com/ethicalwills/samples.html#3
    Ethical wills don’t have to wait until death. They can also be given by people at important junctures in their lives. This ethical will, or legacy letter, was written by Barack Obama to his daughters as he prepared to take the place of President of the United States. (A good time to write a will if ever there was one.) I like this web page because it has five other legacy letters from other people as well.

  • An ASL-English interpreter joins the #IntJC Twitter forum

    If you have never participated in an Interpreting Journal Club forum on Twitter (hashcode #IntJC), I suggest you give it a try. The last forum was on March 31, and it was the first one I ever participated in. They would love to have more signed language interpreters participate with the spoken language interpreters. The next #IntJC forum is tentatively scheduled for April 21st. Follow The Interpreting Journal Club site for updates and archives, such the transcript for the forum on March 31st.

    Here are some of my Tweets and others’ replies: (more…)