TV Simultaneous Interpreting of Collocations: The Context of Political Speeches

Authors

  • Sukayna Ali

    Department of English language and Literature, The University of Jordan, Amman 11942, Jordan
  • Hanan Al-Jabri

    Department of English language and Literature, The University of Jordan, Amman 11942, Jordan
  • Amer Al-Adwan

    Department of Language, Culture and Communication, Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Doha 2825, Qatar
  • Bayan Al Ammouri

    Department of English language and Literature, The University of Jordan, Amman 11942, Jordan
  • Nadia Naqrash

    Department of European Languages, The University of Jordan, Amman 11942, Jordan

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.30564/fls.v7i5.9266
Received: 28 March 2025 | Revised: 23 April 2025 | Accepted: 25 April 2025 | Published Online: 9 May 2025

Abstract

This paper investigates the interpreting strategies employed by television interpreters when rendering English collocations into Arabic during simultaneous interpretation. The focus is placed on the Arabic interpretations of King Charles III’s political speeches as broadcast by Sky News TV. While some research has addressed the interpretation of collocations, few studies have specifically examined this linguistic feature in the context of English-Arabic simultaneous television interpreting. Moreover, existing research tends to rely on experimental tasks assigned to interpreters rather than analyzing authentic, real-time broadcasts. This study fills a significant gap by examining actual interpreted material drawn from media discourse. Benson’s typology of collocations is adopted to identify and categorize the collocational items in the source texts, while the strategies for dealing with untranslatable collocations are analyzed according to the framework developed by Shakir and Farghal. The results demonstrate that in 58% of the observed instances, interpreters did not provide direct Arabic equivalents for the English collocations. Instead, they applied alternative strategies to render the intended meaning. These strategies include deletion, synonymy, calquing, compensation, generalization, and message abandonment. The paper also explores the contextual and cognitive factors that might influence interpreters’ strategy choices, such as time pressure, lexical availability, and the level of formality in the source text. The study offers new insights into the challenges faced in live TV interpretation and highlights the importance of training interpreters to handle collocational challenges effectively.

Keywords:

Collocations; interpreting strategies; Lexical Collocations; Political Speeches; Simultaneous Interpreting

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How to Cite

Ali, S., Al-Jabri, H., Al-Adwan, A., Al Ammouri, B., & Naqrash, N. (2025). TV Simultaneous Interpreting of Collocations: The Context of Political Speeches. Forum for Linguistic Studies, 7(5), 764–773. https://doi.org/10.30564/fls.v7i5.9266

Issue

Vol. 7 , Iss. 5 (May 2025)

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Article

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Copyright © 2025 Sukayna Ali, Hanan Al-Jabri, Amer Al-Adwan, Bayan Al Ammouri, Nadia Naqrash

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