CHANGE OF SCENE: Translators and interpreters meet for
the XVIII World Congress of FIT held for the first time in China (WANG RUI)

Just one week before world's best athletes meet in Beijing for the Olympics, translators and interpreters from 74 countries and regions met in another Chinese metropolis, Shanghai. The International Federation of Translators (FIT), a federation of associations of translators, interpreters and terminologists, held its largest ever world congress with over 1,400 participants.

The XVIII World Congress of FIT is also the first time in FIT's 55-year history that a congress was held in a country outside of Europe and the United States.

Cultural diversity needed

COMMUNICATION GURU SPEAKS: Wu Jianmin, China's former ambassador to France, delivers
his keynote speech highlighting the importance of cultural diversity in today's world. (ZOU YI)

"Coming to China has helped FIT to be a truly international organization," said Peter Krawutschke, FIT's outgoing President, whose tenure was from 2005 to 2008. He said that China's rising presence at FIT during recent years has helped to bring FIT to Asia and bring Asia to FIT.

The federation, founded in Europe, had mainly been European-dominated until the last few years. The increasing interest about this international organization from Asia, whose linguists are relative newcomers, was on display at the statutory portion of this year's world congress. Eight new member associations were admitted, of which three were from Asia.

For the time being, FIT has two member associations on the Chinese mainland, the Translators Association of China (TAC) and the Science & Technology Translators' Association of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Huang Youyi, Secretary General of the Beijing-headquartered TAC, has been reelected as the vice president of FIT for the coming term of 2008 to 2011.

The growing diversity within the body of translators and interpreters has coincidentally highlighted the theme for this year's congress, "Translation and Cultural Diversity."