ABSTRACT
Interpreting is a profession dating back to ancient times, enabling direct communication when people do not share the same language. Interpreters facilitate international relations and trade, assist migrants during integration, and help citizens access health, legal, and social services, thus substantiating language rights essential for enjoying all other rights. Providing high-quality interpreting services requires broad knowledge, considerable expertise, sound ethical principles, cognitive flexibility, and psycho-physical resilience. Like other professionals, interpreters face occupational hazards that are often underestimated, regardless of their working mode, modality, or setting. The COVID-19 pandemic and technological advances have posed further challenges to their occupational health and wellbeing, particularly following the booming of distance interpreting and AI-based technologies, which can involve poor sound conditions and demanding multitasking. Although there are research findings on specific aspects and observations based on individual experience, there is not a comprehensive overview of this complex topic’s multiple facets. This book offers an extensive overview of interpreters’ occupational health and safety issues, including prevention strategies and suggestions to promote wellbeing, resulting from cross-disciplinary collaboration between interpreting researchers and occupational health specialists to help practicing interpreters take care of and protect their health.
