Donate to help Bek get to Madrid to present her research
¤ I need your donations to help me fly to London and Madrid to accept a global award that I have earned and expand my knowledge base helping interpret for the Australian Deaf Muslim community. Travel is hard because I live with a physical disability ¤
Hi, I'm Bek,
If you tune in to the Friday prayers livestream from Lakemba mosque you might recognise me as the person in the small box on the bottom left corner where I have the honour of interpreting into Auslan (Australian Sign Language) the Khutbah (sermon) delivered by the Sheikh for the Deaf community.
Screen shot from Lakemba Mosque Facebook page 21/03/25
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1A4q2hPEQL/
I also have the honour of interpreting on screen during events at Imam Hussain Islamic Centre.
I have the privilege of working as an Auslan-English interpreter, including working with the Deaf Muslim community here in Sydney to provide interpreted access to their faith. I head a small team of just 4 interpreters who provide weekly access to Islamic religious sermons and also provide a month long program during Ramadan, translating talks and reminders from a variety of Sheikhs and scholars. We are the only team providing this access in Australia.
What you might not realise is that I live with a disability which causes pain, and limits my energy and mobility. That hasn't stopped me from pursuing things that challenge me and enriching the lives of others in my personal and professional life.
The work I do in the Muslim Deaf community is dear to my heart and inspired me to do a Master of Research thesis, entitled “Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Raheem” – What did the Sheikh say? Challenges for Auslan-English interpreters rendering code-switching in Arabic-English Islamic source texts.
My thesisexamined not just how interpreters handle working in the "between" where three languages (Arabic, English and Auslan) intersect. But more importantly, it examined the specific context of when that "between" happens during Islamic religious services. I completed my thesis in 2024.
The research is groundbreaking and its findings can be applied to many domains in the interpreting field. My supervisors at Uni agreed and submitted my paper to a global award, the CIUTI Prize. This prize is an award for the most outstanding Translation & Interpreting-related Master’s thesis in a given year.
To my surprise and great honour, the judges unanimously chose my thesis as the winner! And as a result I have been invited to attend this year's CIUTI conference in Madrid this May, where I will receive the prize and also present my research findings to the translation and interpreting experts in attendance.
See the past winners of the CIUTI prize here
On the way to Madrid I will have the opportunity to visit the East London mosque and observe their trilingual interpreting program (English, Arabic and BSL). Al-Isharah have invited me to meet the interpreting team who provide access at their mosque, talk with the Deaf congregants, and discuss best practice in this domain. This is an exciting opportunity for cross-country collaboration in such a fledgling interpreting field.
What am I asking for?
As a disabled person, travelling is not simple. I am unable to travel in economy seats due to my disability, accessible accommodation is more expensive, and I need to take extra days to recover after each leg of the journey, which of course all increases the cost.
I have been fortunate to receive a grant which will cover the cost of a support person to travel with me to assist with my mobility. However, I need to fund the rest of the costs myself.
(Please note: I initially had my goal set at a lower amount to just cover the basics. Thanks to the generosity of donors I am now able to source more suitable accommodation as well!)
This is where you come in.
I would be grateful for any donations you are able to make towards the cost of this important journey. On my return I will share my learnings with my interpreting colleagues and the Deaf Muslim community for whom we do this work, but as a donor, I will share photos and updates along the way so that you will be able to see what your contributions have enabled.
