Cover not available

Interview published In: Digital Translation
Vol. 12:1 (2025) ► pp.85–104

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF
EPUB logo with download linkDownload EPUB
Industry watch

Understanding the digital ecosystem of interpreting

ORCiD logo with link | Hamad bin Khalifa University | KU Leuven
ORCiD logo with link | Independent Scholar of Interpreting


This article is available free of charge.

Published online: 4 February 2025
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/dt.24015.das
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • 1.Digital ecosystems are defined by so many variables. How do you define this concept when it comes to interpreting?
  • 2.In order to allow a richer understanding of this digital ecosystem, what trends are you observing that are gaining momentum and are likely to have a significant impact on the interpreting industry and market?
  • 3.We might expand our understanding of this digital ecosystem of interpreting if we carefully examine it through the lens of the gig economy as in the growing recent trend of the platformization of interpreting services (Giustini 2022; 2024a; 2024b). Considering the emergence of this trend, what are the opportunities and challenges that lie before this digital ecosystem?
  • 4.This digital ecosystem of interpreting is growing, but, in my critical assessment, it currently does not seem to be balanced, particularly in the framework of research, development, and application (Dastyar 2024). This is a crucial aspect to address when it comes to the efficiency of this ecosystem, and different stakeholders, including researchers, tech companies, and end-users, seem to play a role. Do you agree with me in your assessment of the current status of this ecosystem? If so, will you please share your insights on how to best redress such an imbalance?
  • 5.When it comes to the intersection of emerging technologies, interpreting and language rights, cross-cutting topics of inclusivity and fair access to interpreting services (often dubbed ‘digital or AI-based accessibility’) seem to be not only essential, but also challenging to the efficiency and balance of this digital ecosystem (Monzό-Nebot and Tasa-Fuster 2024). What are your thoughts on this? What are we likely to gain or lose if different stakeholders, including the interpreting profession, tech developers, and society at large, either do or do not take into consideration this essential aspect of the digital ecosystem of interpreting?
  • 6.Previously, I interviewed you on the topic of critical AI literacy (CAIL) and its importance for the symbiosis between interpreting and emerging technologies (Giustini and Dastyar 2024). Not only is CAIL instrumental in our understanding of the digital ecosystem of interpreting, but it also seems to play an important role in sustaining and fostering this ecosystem. What are your thoughts on this?
  • Notes
  • References
References (40)
References
Barad, Karen. 2007. Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning. Durham: Duke University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Baumgarten, Stefan, and Carole Bourgadel. 2024. “Digitalization, Neo-Taylorism and Translation in the 2020s.” Perspectives 32(3): 508–523. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Castells, Manuel. 2011. The Rise of the Network Society. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Corpas Pastor, Gloria. 2021. “Interpreting and Technology: Is the Sky Really the Limit?.” In Proceedings of the Translation and Interpreting Technology Online Conference, edited by Ruslan Mitkov, Vilelmini Sosoni, Julie Christine Giguère, Elena Murgolo and Elizabeth Deysel, 15–24. Shumen: Bulgaria. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Corpas Pastor, Gloria, and Bart Defrancq, eds. 2023. Interpreting Technologies — Current and Future Trends. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Council of the EU and the European Council. 2024. EU Rules on Platform Work. [URL]
Dave, Paresh, and Jeffrey Dastin. 2021. “Google Fires Second AI Ethics Leader as Dispute over Research, Diversity Grows.” Reuters. [URL]
De Meulder, Maartje, Davy Van Landuyt, and Rehana Omardeen. 2024. “Lessons in Co-Creation: The Inconvenient Truths of Inclusive Sign Language Technology Development.” arXiv preprint arXiv:2408.13171.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dejean, Mathieu, and Jean-Marc Lalanne. 2021. Jacques Rancière: “The Issue Is to Manage to Maintain Dissensus.” Verso Book Club. [URL]
Fantinuoli, Claudio, ed. 2018. Interpreting and Technology. Berlin: Language Science Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fennell, Andrew. 2024. “Gig Economy Statistics UK.” [URL]
Fırat, Gökhan, Joanna Gough, and Joss Moorkens. 2024. “Translators in the Platform Economy: A Decent Work Perspective.” Perspectives 32(3): 422–440. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Giustini, Deborah. 2022. “COVID-19 and the Configuration of Materiality in Remote Interpreting: Is Technology Biting Back?.” In Translation and Interpreting in the Age of COVID-19, edited by Kanglong Liu & Andrew.K. F. Cheung, 197–213. Singapore: Springer.
. 2024a. “You Can Book an Interpreter the Same Way You Order Your Uber”: (Re-) Interpreting Work and Digital Labor Platforms”. Perspectives, 32(3): 441–459. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2024b. “Interpreting One’s Way Through the Gig Economy: Neoliberal Shifts and the Platformization of Interpretation Work.” In Translation and Neoliberalism, edited by Ali Jalalian Daghigh and Mark Shuttleworth, 203–221. Cham: Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Giustini, Deborah, and Vorya Dastyar. 2024. “Critical AI Literacy for Interpreting in the Age of AI.” Interpreting and Society: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 4(2): 1–18. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haraway, Donna. 2004. “The Promises of Monsters: A Regenerative Politics for Inappropriate/d Others.” In The Haraway reader, by Donna Haraway, 63–124. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hobsbawm, Eric. 1990. “Goodbye To All That.” Marxism Today, October, 18–23.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
International Telecommunications Union. (2023). Press release. [URL]
Lessig, Lawrence. 2002. The Future of Ideas. New York: Random House.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Marx, Karl. 1857/1858. Grundrisse. London: Penguin.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Monzό-Nebot, Esther. 2024. Private Communication. September 2024.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Monzό-Nebot, Esther, and Vicenta Tasa-Fuster, eds. 2024. Gendered Technology in Translation and Interpreting: Centering Rights in the Development of Language Technology. London: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Moore, James F. 1996. The Death of Competition: Leadership and Strategy in the Age of Business Ecosystems. New York: Harper Business.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nachira, Francesco. 2002. “Toward a Network of Digital Business Ecosystems Fostering the Local Development.” [URL]
Nachira, Francesco, Paolo Dini, and Andrea Nicolai. 2007. “A Network of Digital Business Ecosystems for Europe: Roots, Processes and Perspectives.” Introductory Paper, 1061, 1–20. Bruxelles: European Commission.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nimdzi. 2023. “The Nimdzi Language Technology Atlas.” [URL]
. 2024. “The 2024 NIMDZI 100.” [URL]
Pham, Quynh N., and Himadeep R. Muppidi. 2012. “Colonial Wars, Postcolonial Specters. The Anxiety of Domination.” In Orientalism and War, edited by Tarak Barkawi and Keith Stanski, 105–25. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rodríguez Melchor, María Dolores, Ildikó Horváth, and Kate Ferguson, eds. 2020. The Role of Technology in Conference Interpreter Training. Oxford: Peter Lang. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Srnicek, Nick. 2022. “Data, Compute, Labor.” In Digital Work in the Planetary Market, edited by Mark Graham and Fabian Ferrari, 241–262. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Stasimioti, Maria. 2022. “What to Do About the Talent Crunch in Media Localization.” Slator. [URL]
United Nations. 2021. “Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities on Artificial Intelligence and the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.” [URL]
Weil, Elizabeth. 2023. “You Are Not a Parrot.” Intelligencer. [URL]
World Bank. 2023. “Demand for Online Gig Work Rapidly Rising in Developing Countries.” [URL]
World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF. 2022. Global Report on Assistive Technology. [URL]
World Health Organization (WHO). 2024. “Disability.” Key Facts. [URL]
Zuboff, Shoshana. 2018. The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power. London: Profile Books.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2022. “Surveillance Capitalism or Democracy? The Death Match of Institutional Orders and the Politics of Knowledge in Our Information Civilization.” Organization Theory 3(3): 26317877221129290. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (1)

Cited by one other publication

Arunraju Chinnaraju
2025. Quantum Computing in Consumer Behavior: A Theoretical Framework for Market Prediction and Decision Analytics. International Journal of Advanced Research in Science, Communication and Technology ► pp. 339 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 20 november 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue