“Who are you standing with?”: cultural (self-re)translation of a Russian-speaking conference immigrant-interpreter in Israel during the war in Ukraine

Abstract

The war in Ukraine, which began on February 24, 2022, has led to a significant civilian involvement in Israel, particularly among immigrants from the former Soviet Union, who began to provide humanitarian assistance, including interpreting. Highlighting the interrelation between translation and migration, I argue that the war strongly affects multiple hybrid identities of immigrant-interpreters who along with interlingual translation engage also in processes of cultural (self-re)translation. Scholarly attention for such experiences has been relatively limited, since most research on interpreting in war and conflict has prioritized interpreter experiences within war struck regions. Little attention has also been devoted to the work of (conference) interpreters who are themselves immigrants. In this autoethnographic study therefore, I present my own experience during the war as both an immigrant from Russia and a conference interpreter who works with Russian and Hebrew. I discuss several aspects pertinent to the immigrant-interpreter experience within and beyond the interpreting practice: being part of a collective of immigrants, involved in humanitarian assistance; negotiating the devaluation of Russian(ness); facing challenges to the (in)visibility, implied in the interpreter’s role; and moving in-between the origin and the host countries.