Collaboration with Dartmouth College Engages Students in Critical Asylum Translation Work

During the summer of 2020, Respond Crisis Translation collaborated with Professor Pablo Dominguez and his students at Dartmouth College to complete a 125-page translation of critical evidence related to an asylum case.

This summer, Respond Crisis Translation worked with Professor Pablo Dominguez and the eight students who took his course “Migration, Refuge, and Transnational Justice in the Americas” at Dartmouth College. A unique opportunity presented itself in the form of an extensive set of critical evidence documents related to a single asylum case. The project allowed Professor Dominguez´s students to learn about the asylum process while also making a tangible, essential contribution to a case.

“The extreme language violence that pervades the asylum system, including the potential disqualification of an entire case over trivial details like a mis-spelled word and the general weaponizing of language technicalities to inhibit access to asylum, means that every case must be translated and thoroughly proofread to ensure 100% precision. The extensive length of this case made it a fit for a team of committed students to work on collaboratively with the support of Professor Dominguez and our team of proofreaders”, Respond Crisis Translation founder Ariel Koren explains.

The collaboration included several video conferencing interactions with Professor Dominguez and his students, who are taking the class virtually due to COVID19. The initial presentation focused on Respond’s work, the challenges that our translators routinely face, and the ways that language intensifies the complexity and injustice of the asylum process in the United States. The students were then divided into small groups and assigned a section of the text to translate from Spanish to English.

Delia Friel, one of the students who participated in the project, wrote the following about her experience: “Thank you for the opportunity to help with this translation. I learned a lot about the translation process, including navigating difficulties such as colloquialisms, and about the importance of ensuring that language does not stand in the way of communicating about a case. This experience was the highlight of my summer!”

Professor Dominguez added, “It is a privilege for a class that studies migration, refuge and contemporary forms of transnational justice in our hemisphere to introduce the most important issues based on the real experience of involvement in real cases of asylum seekers. Working on translations of asylum seekers’ case files opens a window onto the reality of their situation, allowing us to think, research and contextualize the issues in a way that is absolutely engaged with reality and the present. It also invest us to contribute and to feel that our academic work and teaching and learning has an impact beyond the walls of a classroom or the Zoom screen. My course’s collaboration with Respond this summer was the backbone of my efforts to set the tone and convey the urgency, importance, complexity and relevance of studying these topics and the responsibility that it involves coming from a space of privilege like those of institutions of higher education. The consensus among all of the participants in the class is that this has been an invaluable experience that contributes richness, depth and commitment to education as a driver of change.” 

Professor Pablo Dominguez and his students, whom he instructs via Zoom due to COVID19 sanitation measures.

Over the course of several weeks, members of Respond’s leadership team met with the students to address their questions about terminology, strategy, and language. Once the translations were complete, they were compiled into a single document by Respond Project Manager Geneva Gist and reviewed by our proofreading team to ensure complete precision prior to being submitted to the client's legal team in advance of the hearing.

Respond Crisis Translation supports individual clients and partner institutions that represent a wide range of individuals, many of them asylum seekers. We are also committed to developing partnerships with universities and other academic institutions interested in being part of this work.

RESPOND IS GRATEFUL TO PROFESSOR PABLO DOMINGUEZ AND THE EIGHT AMAZING DARTMOUTH STUDENTS WHO TRANSLATED THIS CRITICAL MATERIAL. THANK YOU FOR ALL OF YOUR HARD WORK!

Interested in developing an academic partnership with Respond? Contact Kate Goldman at kate@respondcrisistranslation.org

Blog written by Kate Goldman, Head of University and Academic Partnerships