"Does anybody here speak Finnish?" Linguistic first aid and emerging translational spaces on the Finnish-Russian Allegro train. Issue 3 (2nd September 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Probirskaja, Svetlana
• Is Part Of: Translation studies. Volume 10:Issue 3(2017)
• Page Start: 231
• Page End: 246
• Publication Date: 2017-09-02
• Subjects: Translational spaces -- multilingualism -- train -- ad hoc interpreting -- translation from below -- metrolingualism; Translating and interpreting -- Periodicals; 418.0205
• DOI: 10.1080/14781700.2017.1289861
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1478-1700

Abstract

ABSRACT: The object of this study is the Allegro train that shuttles between St Petersburg, Russia and Helsinki, Finland. It is an international, cross-border train on which the passengers, personnel and border officials coming from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds interact in a multilingual, mobile environment. I study the translational spaces of the Allegro in a top-down direction (the officially established multilingual policy as it appears in the organizational documentation and in the train's spatial repertoire) and in a bottom-up direction (the real, on-the-ground translational practices as they appear through observation and interviews with passengers, train personnel and officials). Translational spaces of the Allegro emerge, on the one hand, from the multilingual spatial repertoire of the train, and, on the other hand, from the spontaneous ad hoc interpreting self-administered by participants.