Published:
The Multilingual Debate showcases the interpreting skills of undergraduate students on our Interpreting and Translating degree programme.
Over 1,000 secondary school pupils from across Scotland visited the University's Edinburgh Campus to take part in the Multilingual Debate 2017.
The annual debate gives secondary school pupils a taste of language interpretation in a European Union-style debate which is interpreted live into French, Spanish, Hungarian, German, Italian, Chinese, Catalan, British Sign Language and English.
This year the topics up for debate were whether sport is vital for social integration and whether robots are to become a positive part of day-to-day life.
The event was live-streamed so that pupils across the world could listen in and take part.
Fanny Chouc, teaching Fellow in the School of Social Sciences, said, “The Multilingual Debate showcases the interpreting skills of undergraduate students on our Interpreting and Translating degree programme, as well as the developing professional skills of postgraduate students on our MSc Interpreting and Translating programmes.
“It's an exciting event that allows high school students to see languages and translation in action, as well as think about topical subjects that affect our society.
“As it's the University's Year of Robotics, we dedicated the afternoon debate to whether robots are a positive force, and if they're about to become indispensable. It was certainly a lively and interesting debate!”
The Multilingual Debate takes place each spring and attracts a global audience online. If you missed it, you can catch up on social media with video, chat and pictures - @hw_lifeinlincs and on @heriotwatt_soss.