Challenges in Interpreting English Passive Voice Into Arabic: A Study of Student Performance and Training Needs in Simultaneous Interpretation

This study examines the significant challenges faced by Arabic-speaking student interpreters in rendering English passive voice constructions into Arabic during simultaneous interpretation. Due to structural and functional disparities between the two languages, particularly the rarity of passive constructions and explicit agentive phrases in Arabic, interpreting the English passive voice presents substantial obstacles. The research aims to identify the specific errors committed by interpreting students and the strategies they employ to navigate these linguistic complexities. To achieve these objectives, a mixed-methods approach was adopted. A corpus was compiled from the simultaneous interpretations of 30 interpreting students. Participants were divided into two groups of 15, each tasked with interpreting one of two political speeches delivered by former U.S. President Barack Obama, carefully edited to contain a high density of passive constructions. The interpretations were recorded using the SANAKO Lab 100 system, transcribed, and analyzed both quantitatively and qualitatively using Schjoldager’s (1996) error analysis framework. The findings reveal that students struggled significantly with English passive constructions: most passive sentences were omitted entirely, and only 34% of them were adequately rendered. The most frequent errors included misinterpretations, deletion of the passive voice, unjustified changes, and unjustified omissions. Four primary strategies were identified in the students' renditions: passivization, passive with an agentive phrase, activization, and nominalization. This study contributes to the field of translation and interpreting studies by highlighting a key linguistic barrier in simultaneous interpreting training and offering insights for curriculum development.