Interpreting Techniques by A Tour Guide in North Sumatra on Tourism Attractions

Abstract

The aims of this study are (1) to analyze interpreting techniques applied in the interpreting performance by a tour guide, (2) to analyze the implementation of interpreting activities, (3) to explain the reasons of using certain techniques in two tourism attractions. This descriptive-qualitative research is an embedded- case study and oriented to interpreting product. The data consists of utterances selected from the transcription of the interpreting performance. The source language is in Indonesian and the target language is in English. Data of this research were collected with document analysis, interviews, and analyzed using a interactive data analysis. The findings of this study show the followings. First, there are seven interpreting techniques were applied by the tour guide in consecutive and liaison interpreting mode. At the ancient tombs of Raja Sidabutar the techniques include Summarizing and Recapitulation (64.1%), Specification (5.1%), combination of Explanation and Summarizing (7.69%), combination of Summarizing and Specification techniques (2.6%), combination of Reformulation and Summarizing techniques (5.1%), Reformulation technique (2.6%) and Omission technique (10.3%). In Siwaluh Jabu house, the techniques include Recapitulation Summarizing technique (71.42%), and Explanation technique (28.66%). The interaction model of the liaison interpreting in Siwaluh Jabu house consists of four parties with three different languages; Indonesian, English, and Greek. Summarizing technique has the highest frequency of the occurrence (71.42%). This dominant technique was applied in order to clarify what is unclear because of the speaker.