How to become Interpreters and Translator in 2024

Interpreters and Translator Interpret oral or sign language, or translate written text from one language into another.

Interpreters and Translator is Also Know as

In different settings, Interpreters and Translator is titled as

  • American Sign Language Interpreter (ASL Interpreter)
  • Court Interpreter
  • Educational Interpreter
  • Interpreter
  • Linguist
  • Medical Interpreter
  • Sign Language Interpreter
  • Spanish Interpreter
  • Spanish Translator
  • Translator

Education and Training of Interpreters and Translator

Interpreters and Translator is categorized in Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed

Experience Required for Interpreters and Translator

A considerable amount of work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is needed for these occupations. For example, an accountant must complete four years of college and work for several years in accounting to be considered qualified.

Education Required for Interpreters and Translator

Most of these occupations require a four-year bachelor's degree, but some do not.

Degrees Related to Interpreters and Translator

Training Required for Interpreters and Translator

Employees in these occupations usually need several years of work-related experience, on-the-job training, and/or vocational training.

Related Ocuupations

Some Ocuupations related to Interpreters and Translator in different industries are

What Do Interpreters and Translator do?

  • Follow ethical codes that protect the confidentiality of information.
  • Identify and resolve conflicts related to the meanings of words, concepts, practices, or behaviors.
  • Translate messages simultaneously or consecutively into specified languages, orally or by using hand signs, maintaining message content, context, and style as much as possible.
  • Proofread, edit, and revise translated materials.
  • Check translations of technical terms and terminology to ensure that they are accurate and remain consistent throughout translation revisions.
  • Read written materials, such as legal documents, scientific works, or news reports, and rewrite material into specified languages.
  • Refer to reference materials, such as dictionaries, lexicons, encyclopedias, and computerized terminology banks, as needed to ensure translation accuracy.
  • Compile terminology and information to be used in translations, including technical terms such as those for legal or medical material.
  • Adapt translations to students' cognitive and grade levels, collaborating with educational team members as necessary.
  • Listen to speakers' statements to determine meanings and to prepare translations, using electronic listening systems as necessary.
  • Check original texts or confer with authors to ensure that translations retain the content, meaning, and feeling of the original material.
  • Compile information on content and context of information to be translated and on intended audience.
  • Discuss translation requirements with clients and determine any fees to be charged for services provided.
  • Adapt software and accompanying technical documents to another language and culture.
  • Educate students, parents, staff, and teachers about the roles and functions of educational interpreters.
  • Train and supervise other translators or interpreters.
  • Travel with or guide tourists who speak another language.

Qualities of Good Interpreters and Translator

  • Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
  • Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
  • Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
  • Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
  • Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
  • Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
  • Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
  • Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
  • Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
  • Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
  • Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
  • Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
  • Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
  • Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
  • Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
  • Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
  • Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
  • Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
  • Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
  • Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
  • Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
  • Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
  • Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
  • Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
  • Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
  • Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
  • Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
  • Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
  • Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
  • Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
  • Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
  • Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
  • Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
  • Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
  • Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
  • Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
  • Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
  • Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
  • Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
  • Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
  • Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
  • Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
  • Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
  • Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
  • Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
  • Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
  • Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
  • Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
  • Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
  • Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
  • Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.

Tools Used by Interpreters and Translator

  • Compact binoculars
  • Desktop computers
  • Digital audio recorders
  • FM transmission equipment
  • Headsets
  • Infrared transmission equipment
  • Interpreter consoles
  • Laptop computers
  • Personal computers
  • Portable calculators
  • Tablet computers
  • Tie clip microphones

Technology Skills required for Interpreters and Translator

  • AceTools.biz Ace Translator
  • Adapt It
  • AmoK Translator
  • Ashkon Translation Pad
  • Babylon Online Translator
  • DocTranslate
  • Electronic dictionaries
  • ExcelTrans Translator
  • Extensible hypertext markup language XHTML
  • Google Translate Client
  • HunterSoft Business Translator
  • Hypertext markup language HTML
  • Intrado SchoolMessenger
  • jalada GmbH Just Translate
  • Language Engineering Corporation Translate Pro
  • Lingoes
  • Microsoft Access
  • Microsoft Excel
  • Microsoft Office software
  • Microsoft Outlook
  • Microsoft PowerPoint
  • Microsoft Word
  • OmegaT
  • Smart Link Corporation ImTranslator
  • Stormdance CatsCradle
  • Voice over internet protocol VoIP system software
  • Web browser software