Whispered Simultaneous Interpreting (also known as Chuchotage)

Whispered interpreting is part of the full range of interpreting services that Rosetta Translation offers to meet the needs of our clients. Whether you need a conference interpreted simultaneously or a business meeting interpreted consecutively, we have the right interpreter in our team for your needs.

What is whispered interpreting?

Whispered simultaneous interpreting, sometimes called Chuchotage [shoo-shoh-tazh] after the French for ‘whispering’, is small-scale simultaneous interpreting.

A simultaneous interpreter is assigned to a very small group of people, and re-speaks what is being said simultaneously in a whisper, so as not to hinder the conference or meeting. This type of interpreting is becoming increasingly popular.

For whispered simultaneous interpreting, our experienced, qualified interpreters work into their mother tongue.

Who is whispered interpreting useful for?

Chuchotage is usually used when the target audience is small (fewer than 4), who do not understand the source language.

Normally this type of interpreting would be used when only one or two of the participants of a meeting don’t understand the language being spoken by the majority of the other participants.

It is also useful when there is no space (or budget) for the materials required for a regular simultaneous interpreting like booths and guide tour systems.

Whispering interpreting is the best option when the interpreting is required for one language pair only, since having multiple whispering interpreters working at the same time in different languages in the same meeting can cause disruptions.

How does it work?

Whispering interpreting requires no specific materials, so it is easy to arrange.

Because the linguist is only interpreting to 1 or 2 people, there is little disruption to the meeting, since they can work at the same time as the meeting is being conducted – there is no need to stop the meeting for the interpreter to translate.

Depending on the length of the meeting, this might need to be done by a pair of linguists instead of just one, seen as it can be very intense work. Having two linguists allows them to switch at regular intervals, so they’re always working at their best level of performance.

We also offer consecutive, simultaneous, telephone and liaison interpreting.