Abstract Professional interpreters are obliged by their codes of ethics to interpret the speakers’ speech faithfully, including offensive, profane or vulgar language. In order to achieve this goal, interpreters need to be pragmatically competent, so as to understand the intention and effect of the offensive remark in the source language and be able to appropriately render it into the target language to achieve the same effect in the hearer. Research has shown, however, that not all interpreters abide by this requirement, and many tend to tone down or even omit any offensive language, for a number of reasons, including attempts to protect the hearers or to save their own face. This study examined the ways in which Arabic, Mandarin and Spanish speaking interpreters interpreted offensive language by a suspect in a simulated police interview into English. Experienced qualified interpreters in the three languages, maintained the highest levels of pragmatic equivalence.

中文翻译：

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在警察采访中解释亵渎

摘要专业口译员必须遵守其职业道德守则，如实地翻译演讲者的言语，包括令人反感，亵渎或粗俗的语言。为了实现这一目标，口译人员需要具有务实的能力，以便理解冒犯性言论在源语言中的意图和效果，并能够适当地将其转化为目标语言，从而在听众中达到相同的效果。但是，研究表明，并非所有的口译员都遵守这一要求，并且出于多种原因，包括试图保护听众或保留自己的脸孔，许多人倾向于淡化甚至忽略任何令人反感的语言。这项研究研究了阿拉伯语，普通话和西班牙语口译员在模拟警察采访中将嫌疑犯的进攻性语言解释为英语。三种语言中经验丰富的合格口译人员保持了最高的语用对等水平。