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Interpreting language is the focus of this article. Interpretation studies are a comparatively new field of language study. Journals such as Interpreting highlight research studies that look at interpreting from a wide range of perspectives. Currently there is a growing trend in articles and books that focus on quantitative as well as qualitative data. Moreover, although writings in the period from 1952 to 1988 are primarily by French authors, recent work provides evidence of an increasing internationalization in the field. There has also been a growing tendency toward collaboration among interpreting researchers and scholars working in related fields. Such cooperation is typified by the interdisciplinary efforts of Kurz and Petsche. Court interpreting publications also deal with linguistic challenges as well as analytical tools. Paulsen Christensen discusses judges' use of direct and indirect speech in Danish courtroom proceedings in which interpreters facilitate communication. The twenty-first century holds much promise for those who strive to better understand interpretations.

Interest in translation has grown owing to global changes. Translation, nowadays, signifies interchange between cultures. Translation is a communicative activity that involves the transfer of information across linguistic boundaries. Translation has a sociocultural context. Alongside the advent of the term ‘cultural mediation’, the term ‘cultural translation’ has also come into being, generally used to refer to transactions that do not explicitly involve linguistic exchange. The development of translation studies as an independent field has not been a linear process, and today there are a number of approaches to the study of translation and the training of translators. The two most significant lines of development have been descriptive translation studies and Skopos theory respectively. The functional approach of Skopos theorists has been useful, and there are huge developments in machine translation, but the task of mediation between cultures, involving negotiating understanding between global and local systems, still requires human agency.