An Interpreter of the RF Ministry of Foreign Affairs visits the Caspian Higher School of Interpreting and Translation

On November 26-28, the Caspian Higher School of Interpreting and Translation welcomed Andrey Zavarukhin, Attaché of the Linguistic Support Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, who gave an interpretation master class for our MA students.
The expert spoke about peculiarities of the work of interpreter at the highest level, niceties and difficulties that can appear during the performance. The interpretation at the Foreign Ministry level is not the easiest thing to do since it implies strict requirements to rendering the content and main ideas. Fortunately, there are various techniques that help improve the quality of interpretation, and Andrey Zavarukhin shared these very techniques with our students: he explained how sheets for taking notes should be arranged, how to take notes and use compression and generalization in order not to lose information that is of great importance in diplomacy. He also paid attention to the importance of correct interpretation of names of international organizations, agreements and resolutions, titles and personal names, as diplomatic interpretation should be highly accurate.
Of course, much attention was paid to practical training. Guided by our experienced guest, the students practised simultaneous and consecutive interpreting from English into Russian and from Russian into English. They worked with the records of speeches from the UN General Assembly, meetings of the President of Russia, the Foreign Minister and many other high-ranking officials with their foreign colleagues, and weekly briefings of Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova.
It was the first visit of Andrey Zavarukhin to our School, and the students took advantage of the opportunity to ask many different questions about the work of language specialists at the Foreign Ministry, about the traineeship, accreditation test, employment and other issues.
The experience and knowledge, shared by the Ministry Attaché, are of great value. We truly hope that Andrey Zavarukhin will visit us next year to give classes to our MA students who are also looking forward to meeting him during their traineeship at the Foreign Ministry in spring.