TRANSCRIPTS IN ONLINE WORKSHOPS
In my experience, we can say that transcribing what the workshop leader is explaining orally is very useful for a large varied group of people, including some of us who have hearing difficulties, foreign language understanding difficulties, etc.
But above all it is a great resource for people involved in interpreting work. Interpreters are the bridge among different groups and cultures that otherwise could keep on separated and not being able to understand each other.
Many times we interpreters rely on transcribing, to be able to interpret the words that are strange to us in the leader's language.
Often, instead of stopping and asking the leader to repeat a phrase or use a simpler vocabulary, we can understand what she is saying thanks to transcribing, especially when we, interpreters, are on interpreting channels and do not have a direct or fast way to stop and advise the leader that she has forgotten us and our people.
WHAT TO TRANSCRIPT
We should be able to write down everything that the leader is explaining, because that would be a sign that the leader is understanding that she is addressing a group of people who do not speak her own language and that there are people who need to read what she says in order to be able follow her and receive all the information she is sharing with the rest of the workshop.
In order to write down everything the leader says, she should be aware that she needs to speak a little bit more slowly than usual (do not forget that usually living under capitalism pressure and oppression we speak faster than we would without that oppression). That is the same amount of awareness that she should have for the interpreters, no more.
Remember while typing to push the RETURN button often, so that your translations go fast to the close captions and people (interpreters above of all) can read it fast. PRESS THE KEY RETURN as often as you remember so that people can read short sentences and not long paragraphs. Long written paragraphs are not useful. We cannot follow them and the leader at the same time.
WHO SHOULD TRANSCRIBE (OR INTERPRET)
When the writer, like the interpreter, is skilled in practice (and this is usually a condition to be fulfilled by the volunteer people who volunteer to interpret and transcribe) then the leader can function properly and everything flows, at a different pace, at a more inclusive and manageable pace for all minds. Everyone benefits from this, including the leader, because she can reach everyone. This is a big pleasure.
ABBREVIATIONS?
If the writer has to use abbreviations, the resource ceases to be functional because many of the people who do not understand the leader's language (generally English) do not understand abbreviations either. Abbreviations need an even bigger effort to be understood and make you stop to think about the meaning of it. But in those moments, you (as an interpreter or as a reader of the transcriptions) do not have that time. This is a fact.
If the leader makes the effort to speak a little more slowly than usual, then there is no need for abbreviations.
Abbreviations are a good indicator that the speed of speech is not in line with the speed of writing -which is pretty similar to the speed of the interpreter - and the leader should take this point into account. Something that I have observed is that people who interpret fluently and people who write fluently, need a similar amount of time to translate (to oral=interpreting, or to writing=transcribing) the same idea of the leader, as I have observed during this 8 months on line.
HOW LONG TO TRANSCRIBE OR INTERPRET?
I have also been able to observe that every twenty minutes we stop because it is the approximate time that a mind can work highly concentrated on a specific task that requires maximum attention, without generating any pressure or distress. Some people can go longer, but also sometimes it is due to different kind of distresses (I am the best on this task and I want to make it clear, I have to prove my…, I want to reclaim my group’s invisibility identity here, I must do it well and longer than... )
After those twenty minutes of work, the group offers the interpreter and the typist attention for a minute so that they can discharge, because they have been working not only for the people who do not speak the same language of the leader of the workshop, but have worked for the union and mutual collaboration of the whole group, so that all the minds are lined up with the work we all have to do together.
After this minute of discharging, the total group maintains a minute of silence with everyone's presence there, in silence (I have explained the value of this minute before) which is very necessary. And when resources (time, human awareness) are available, a third or fourth minute can come to stretch, keep the eyes away from the screen...