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Top1. Background
Self-interpretation in courtroom contexts is an intriguing area of study which appears rather underexplored. Most studies that have been undertaken in court interpretation, have primarily focused on proceedings involving an interpreter communicating for and on behalf of a litigant. In many of these studies, scholars have mainly concentrated on issues of power asymmetries and disproportionateness as well as pervasive meaning inaccuracies punctuating such legal exchanges. The emotional, legal, or social consequences of such renditions have been highlighted in various studies (Edwards 1995; Hale 2004; González, Vásquez, and Mikkelson 2012; Elsrud 2014; Namakula 2014; Owiti 2016; Berk-Seligson 2017; Mikkelson 2017; Stone 2018). Studies that have relied on insights from sociolinguistics, especially bilingualism and language contact, characteristically create an impression of having swayed most analyses to focus only on sociolinguistic issues to the extent of obscuring (self-)interpretation. Self-interpretation, in this context, entails situations where bilingual persons end up testifying in the second language (L2) (Gumperz 1982; Auer 1998; Heller 2003; Cashman 2005; Fuller 2007; Roberts 2007; Gardner-Chloros 2007), though their verbalized renditions and their intended meanings and/or understandings are always at variance. The intricacies and complexities impacting on meaning rendition in legal and judicial contexts have been an object of study in other studies demonstrating that interpretation, as a strategy of comprehending and expressing meaning, is a challenging task even for trained judicial officers (Farber & Rienmerink, 2019; Mlundi, 2020). Yet judicial officers, at least in the Kenyan context, consciously or otherwise aware of the pitfalls of self-interpretation, encourage lay litigants to self-interpret their testimony.
Self-interpretation, which is analogous to self-translation, is the process and the product of rendering ideas, facts, thoughts, and meanings originally conceptualized in one language—Language 1, and then rendered, especially verbally into another language – Language 2, by the originator of the original conceptualization. It is, as such understood and presumed to be an act of self-interpretation of source—ideas, facts, thoughts, and meanings—herein referred to as “speech”, whose trace is implicit and can be recognized through the notion of interference. The conceptualization of speech mapping as such, actually takes place in the self-interpreter’s mind, whereby the self-interpreter recalls mentally mapped speech in their preferred or their first language (L1)—Ekegusii or English in this study – and renders it verbally and in an ad hoc manner into the court negotiated and preferred language, L2—Kiswahili – before the court. The twin tasks in a bilingual proceeding are condensed into one as they are carried out simultaneously by one person – the litigant.
It is important to note that in multilingual contexts, such as Kenya, one’s sense of self and therefore, manner of expression, is habitually torn between the dynamics of multilingualism or bilingualism. Yet, given that understandings and meanings rendered in self-interpretations may be culturally influenced or constrained, bilingualism cannot be presumed to be the same thing as biculturalism, nor multilingualism is the same thing as multiculturalism. It is equally true that one’s first language plays a role in a person’s approach to life as well as ways of thinking and conceptualizing things—ideas, facts, thoughts, and meanings—which logically impact how testimony is rendered in courtroom contexts. Testimony as presented in court is ideally derived from observed events, actions, or from recounting things witnessed, testimony is given through a litigant’s perception of experiences. It, therefore, follows that culture or to be more precise, cultural predispositions, inform and structure testimony and its presentation.