The potential implications of Arabic diglossia on the pedagogy of simultaneous interpreting in Algeria

The Algerian society is considered to be diglossic due the prevalence of two linguistic forms:Standard Arabic (the High variety) and Dialectal Arabic (the Low variety) although diglossiaas a concept is itself under debate with literature suggesting that many countries have atriglossic or even a multiglossic language. The proposed study investigates the potential impactof Arabic diglossia on the participants’ perceptions of SI. All of my participants had been SIstudents. It further sets out to explore the challenges that Algerian students of simultaneousinterpreting in one of the Algerian universities go through in relation to diglossia during theirinterpreting practice. This dissertation addresses the question of how learners can fulfil theinterpreting tasks that require a full mastery of the formal style (Modern Standard Arabic),without being influenced by the low language (Dialectal Arabic), the language variety that isused in daily life interactions. The study further explores to what extent course designers ofsimultaneous interpreting take into consideration the concept of Diglossia. These researchquestions were answered through the lens of a mixed research methodology that includedquestionnaires and individual interviews. One of the key findings is that MSA was a significantchallenge according to the participants’ perceptions, whereas it has been perceived that theforeign language was also a problem. Furthermore, the findings highlight that it was verychallenging for the students to interpret from and into MSA and English as the participantsclaimed that they encountered linguistic difficulties in both languages. Despite the vast studiesthat were conducted on diglossia in teaching and learning contexts in the last decade,investigating the impact that diglossia may have on the teaching and learning of simultaneousinterpreting is rarely tackled especially in Algeria, and this is a gap in literature. The findingsof this study have importance because they inform the pedagogy of SI through an explorationof the SI students’ perceptions when interpreting from and into a diglossic language. Hence, itis anticipated that the expected outcomes will contribute to raise Algerian teachers and learners’awareness of the various effects that Arabic diglossia may have on simultaneous interpreting.