Public service interpreting in Finland: legal framework, education, and current trends

Abstract

The article describes the current state of public service interpreting in Finland. The situations where authorities must provide interpreting services and the individual rights of access to interpreting are defined in the national legislation. The legislation on linguistic rights covers the two national languages of Finland, Finnish and Swedish, as well as other languages with a statutory special status, such as the Sámi languages, the Finnish sign languages, and migrant languages. An overview of the languages spoken in Finland and education and the training in public service interpreting is presented as the basis for further discussion in the article.The article discusses how the statutory right to public service interpreting is implemented in practice. Recent developments and current trends in the domain of public service interpreting in Finland are discussed on the basis of interviews with practising public service interpreters and representatives of associations of interpreters and translators.