‘They Wouldn’t Mind Pushing People Off the Bus’: Exploring Power in Practice Theory through the Work of Simultaneous Interpreters

Abstract

Based on a qualitative interview dataset, this article highlights the power relations in the work experiences of UK-based professional simultaneous interpreters, who provide valuable communication services to users but are constrained by the ‘invisible labour’ arrangements of their job. Adopting a practice theory approach, this study extends available theorisations of power as an effect manifested in performance, by articulating a view of power suffusing from the wider organisation of practices – meanings, competencies, and materialities – which governs social order. By making professional rewards conditional on collaborative engagement with other interpreters, the hiding of failure, and unobtrusive behaviours, the practice of interpreting translates power as the struggle to assert individual visibility. The study contributes to the sociological debate by offering an understanding of power shaped by the situated, practical order of everyday action.