Nilo-Saharan language interpreting and translation

Interpreting once the language is identified

With the language confirmed, we arrange face-to-face interpreters for asylum interviews, tribunals, court hearings, hospital appointments and resettlement meetings. Telephone interpreting is available at any time, on any day of the year, and video interpreting via our SILA Linguists® app or your organisation's own video software is often the fastest way to reach speakers of less widely spoken languages from South Sudan, Sudan, Chad or the Great Lakes region.

Many clients also speak a local form of Arabic, Swahili or English. We always recommend interpreting in the first language for legal, medical and asylum work, keeping relay through a shared language for situations where the client chooses it. Consecutive interpreting is standard, and simultaneous interpreting, including RSI, can be arranged for community or humanitarian events. We can provide a woman or a man to interpret where a subject such as sexual violence or maternity care calls for it.

Translation across Latin and Arabic-based orthographies

Most written Nilo-Saharan languages use the Latin alphabet with extra letters, tone or vowel marks, while some communities write in Arabic script. Because spelling conventions differ from one language to the next, we confirm the readership before we start, whether the text is a consent form, a resettlement guide or a public health message.

Supporting documents from Sudan, Chad and neighbouring countries are often in Arabic, French or English. We provide certified translation of these and of documents in the languages themselves, with a signed certificate confirming accuracy, accepted by UK authorities such as judges, immigration caseworkers and universities, and by prospective employers.

Transcription and language identification

We transcribe and translate recorded interviews, testimony and field audio, with time stamps and clear notes on code-switching. Where a person's origin is in question, our specialist linguists and analysts carry out language analysis to determine origin (LADO), which is particularly relevant to claims from Darfur, the Sudan and South Sudan borderlands and eastern Chad.

Sectors we support in Nilo-Saharan language

Our vetted, trained and qualified linguists can support immigration and asylum services, solicitors, courts, NHS and community health teams, social care, refugee charities and international humanitarian programmes. With SILA Linguists®, one case coordinator takes your request from first identification to final delivery, using vetted linguists bound by confidentiality agreements and the requirements of UK GDPR.