Trust, distrust and translation in a disaster

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to describe, explain and provide context for relationships between translation, trust and distrust using accounts of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake given by foreign residents who experienced the disaster. Design/methodology/approach This research provides a qualitative analysis of ethnographic interview data drawn from a broader study of communication in the 2011 disaster using the cases of 28 foreign residents of the disaster zone from 12 different countries of origin. Findings The study confirms the general importance, the linguistic challenges and the context dependency of trust in disaster-related communication at the response phase. It found that translation was involved in some trust reasoning carried out by foreign residents and that translation was an ad hoc act undertaken by linguistically and culturally proficient acquaintances and friends. Research limitations/implications The research examines a limited range of trust phenomena and research participants: only reason-based, social trust described by documented foreign residents of the 2011 disaster zone in Japan was considered. Furthermore, generalisations from the case study data should be approached with caution. Originality/value This paper adds to the literature on trust and disaster response as opposed to trust and disaster preparedness, which has already been comprehensively studied. It responds to calls for more studies of the role of context in the understanding of trust and for greater attention to be paid in research to relationships between trust and other phenomena.

Mobilizing foreign language students for multilingual crisis translation in Shanghai

“…Third, long-term and stable student volunteer networks should be built as part of municipal public health management planning. The network of "Disaster Language Volunteers" created by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government can be referred to as an exemplar case (Cadwell 2020). In an initial attempt, the "Epidemic Language Service Corps" was established by a group of Chinese scholars during the fight against the COVID-19 (Li et al 2020; see also Li, Rao, Zhang, and Li, this issue).…”

“…Similar difficulties were mentioned by volunteers of Korean (P4) and Russian translation (P6). This means that the volunteers did not have the high levels of intercultural awareness that is described as desirable in the literature on crisis communication (Cadwell 2020;O'Brien and Cadwell 2017).…”

Wuhan Household Food Provisioning under Blockaded COVID‐19 Lockdown

“…Another recruitment challenge was mistrust. In conjunction with existing trends in disaster research, initially disaster survivors were fatigued by their experiences, were apprehensive of re‐visiting traumas and anxious about re‐exposing their vulnerabilities (Cadwell 2019; National Research Council 2006). Potential respondents contacted by US‐based researchers in late 2020 had additional concerns, however, including potential Chinese governmental surveillance and the threat of consequences; US governmental or media exposure; or misuse within negative and often racist vilifications of Chinese people circulating at that time including in the US presidential election campaign (Hvistendahl 2020).…”

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“…Nevertheless, the fundamental premise underlying the concept of crisis translation remains that in today's age of globalization, increased urbanization and migration, communication during a crisis must be multilingual and multicultural and that this communication is enabled through translation and/or interpreting. It is worth noting that attention on crisis translation commenced in advance of the global COVID-19 pandemic (see, for instance, Cadwell, 2019;Cadwell & O'Brien, 2016;Doğan, 2016;Federici, 2016;O'Brien & Cadwell, 2017). The COVID-19 pandemic only reinforced the argument emerging in pre-pandemic times that translation had been seriously overlooked as a crisis-response, risk reduction and preparation tool.…”