Undicesimo convegno annuale EFNIL Translation and Interpretation in Europe

Presentazione

Lietuviu Kalbos Institutas / Institute of the Lithuanian Language e Valstybine Lietuviu Kalbos Komisija / State Commission for the Lithuanian Language 

L'undicesimo convegno dell'EFNIL affronterà la questione dell'importanza della traduzione e dell'interpretariato fra le 23 lingue ufficiali dell'Unione Europea.

Riportiamo il testo della presentazione del convegno:
 

«Europe is not "lost in translation"; it lives in and by translation and interpretation. As Europe has been multilingual since antiquity, there has always been a demand for interpretation and translation to make communication between the various linguistic communities possible. The interpretes of ancient Rome translated Greek texts into Latin. From the late Middle Ages on, the Greek and Latin versions of the Bible were translated into the various vernacular languages of Europe. Translations of the Bible and other classical texts became thus influential in the development of the modern European standard languages. Cultural and commercial exchange between the developed nations has always depended on translation and interpretation. Philosophical concepts, scientific discoveries and political ideas were exchanged and spread over Europe through translations of the relevant texts. The great works of literature in the national languages were received in translation by speakers of other languages and thus inspired the writers in these languages. And they still do. Much of what each of us reads today was not originally written in our own language but has been translated from another.

Nowadays the need for translation and interpretation is even greater than in the past. The lowering or removal of borders between most European countries, the mobility of people, the spread of mass media and the use of modern communication devices have led to an enormous increase in the contacts between people of different native languages and consequently to an increased demand for linguistic mediation, that is, interpretation and translation. This holds especially true for an extreme case of multilingual contact, the institutions of the European Union, where people speaking more than twenty-three native languages need to communicate on all matters of EU business.

Since its foundation in its earliest political form in 1956, the European Union has thought of itself as multilingual. The ruling made by the first six member states, that their national languages should all be official languages of the community, holds good now for the present twenty-seven member countries of the Union with their twenty-three official languages. As no one can master so many languages, the bodies of the EU maintain extensive interpretation and translation services in order to secure communication between their officials and the representatives of the various member states.

EFNIL, the network of the central language institutions of all states of the European Union and several other European countries, promotes the preservation and further development of European linguistic diversity as a basis of the cultural and social diversity of the continent. Since translation and interpretation are a means to overcome the practical linguistic barriers of multilingualism and also to preserve the linguistic diversity of Europe, EFNIL is extremely interested in these two cultural practices. Although translation and interpretation proper do not belong to the core business of the member institutions of EFNIL, each of them is aware of the fact that the languages they are mainly concerned with are being used for translation and interpretation and are thus also influenced by these linguistic activities».