About the AUSIT Excellence Awards

The AUSIT Excellence Awards recognise initiatives/activities by individuals and organisations operating in all sectors of the translating and interpreting industry. They encourage best practice, professionalism, dedication to quality, innovation and outstanding contributions.

 
The Awards celebrate organisations and individuals/teams in the following categories:

  • Excellence in Interpreting

    • This award recognises an interpreter or interpreters with appropriate certification or qualifications for an outstanding performance in a particular assignment, a series of related assignments or a project. The following elements will be included in the assessment: linguistic and interpreting skills; professionalism and ethical conduct; outcomes/purpose fulfilment.
     

  • Excellence in Literary Translation

    • This award recognises a translator or translators with appropriate certification or qualifications for the outstanding translation of a literary work (prose or poetry or drama). It may be given either for a single book-length translation of outstanding quality or for the entire body of a translator’s work in the domain of literary translation (LOTE>English).
     

  • Excellence in Non-Literary Translation

    • This award recognises a translator or translators with appropriate certification or qualifications for a single translation of outstanding quality or for the entire body of a translator’s work in the scientific/technical/non-fiction domain (LOTE>English).
     

  • Outstanding Contribution to Translation & Interpreting

    • This award is for an individual, team or organisation for consistently outstanding performance in conducting activities or developing initiatives benefiting the industry as a whole, including end-users and practitioners. Areas of activity may include:

    • Research and development
    • Leadership
    • Supporting/enhancing the discipline and/or the profession
  • Outstanding Contribution to Interpreting and Translating: Working with languages of limited diffusion

    • This award will be presented to a practitioner, team of practitioners, language service provider, organisation, business, or institution that is part of, related to, or involved in some aspect of interpreting and/or translating using an Indigenous language or a language of limited diffusion, in recognition of their work on a particular assignment, project or initiative that benefits the community as a whole, including end-users and practitioners.

The coveted AUSIT Excellence Awards is highly regarded and submissions are encouraged from AUSIT members as well as all translators & interpreters from Australia and New Zealand.


The Awards were originally launched in 2004 with one category only - Outstanding Contribution to the Translating and Interpreting Industry. The categories of Excellence in Interpreting and Excellence in Translation were added in 2005, and the category Outstanding Contribution to Indigenous Interpreting was added in 2009. The Awards were not organised in 2015 and 2017 as AUSIT was preparing for hosting the International Federation of Translators Congress in Brisbane in 2017. Instead, between 2015-2017 a committee reviewed the procedure and guidelines, and in 2018, the present categories were established.


The key selection criteria for initiatives recognised by AUSIT through these awards include innovation, role model value, benefits delivered to users and/or practitioners and their level of impact on the industry as a whole.


 
For details regarding the Application Process and Eligibility use this link:

Nomination Form

2018 Recipients


Excellence in Interpreting

Winners: Chin Communications Team – Charles Qin, Xin Jin & John Zhou, for their work on the ANZSOG project.

Runners-up, highly commended: MaryJane Kwon, for facilitating communications between NT Beverages and Jace, a South Korean firm.


Excellence in Literary Translation

Winners: James Grieve (French language), for the entire body of work; Kevin Windle (Multiple languages), for the entire body of work.


Excellence in Non-literary Translation

Winner: Jing Han (Chinese language), for the entire body of work.


Outstanding Contribution to Translating and Interpreting

Winner: Anna Kenny, for the lasting impact her training has had on the quality of interpreter services.


Outstanding Contribution to T&I Working with Languages of Limited Diffusion

No entry received.


2013 Recipients


Excellence in Interpreting

Winners: Chin Communications Team – Charles Qin, Joseph Li Tu & Bruce Leifu Song, for their work on the Dairy Australia Greater China Scholarship Program; Yveline Piller & John Benson, for their work on the Australia-Africa Partnership Facility project.


Excellence in Translation

Winner: Catherine Manning Muir, for translating into English one of the earliest examples of pre-independence Indonesian literature: Hikayat Siti Mariah (The Saga of Siti Mariah).

Runner-up, highly commended: Elizabeth Meister (German language), for her work on Cate Shortland’s multi-award-winning feature film Lore.


Outstanding Contribution to the Translating and Interpreting Industry

Winner: SBS Subtitling and PPU Preparation, for their ground-breaking deployment of LOTE subtitles in programs aimed to speak directly to multiple generations of multilingual Australians about important social issues.


Outstanding Contribution to Indigenous Interpreting

Winner: Industrial & General (I&G) Pty Ltd, for the use of portable VOIP recording technology through regional and remote Australia which resulted in significant gains for Indigenous interpreting and translation.


2011 Recipients


Excellence in Interpreting

Winner: Xin Jin (Mandarin language), for leading the interpreting team at the Australian Pavilion, World Expo 2010 Shanghai.

Runners-up, highly commended: Nadesan Sundaresan (Tamil language), for a series of interpreting assignments in a detention facility for asylum seekers; Rona Zhang (Mandarin language), for interpreting at the Australian Pavilion, World Expo 2010 Shanghai.


Excellence in Translation

Winner: Dalia Matar (Arabic language), for translating and subtitling work on the award-winning SBS Dateline program Iraq’s Deadly Legacy.

Runner-up, highly commended: Rekha Rajvanshi for the translation from English into Hindi of Dreaming Stories – Australian indigenous oral histories rendered as animations.


Outstanding Contribution to the Translating and Interpreting Industry

Winner: Transcultural & Language Service (TALS) Department at Northern Health (Vic), for its centralised language service model and transcultural training for Northern Health staff in how better to work with interpreters.

Runner-up, highly commended: Sign Language Communications (SLC) (NSW), for the ‘John Ferris Interpreter Internship’, pairing newly accredited Auslan interpreters with experienced mentors.


Outstanding Contribution to Indigenous Interpreting

Winner: TAFE SA, for the Diploma of Interpreting course designed specifically for Anangu-speaking students living in remote communities in South Australia.


2009 Recipients


Excellence in Interpreting

Winner: Mona Jabbour (Arabic language), for interpreting between counsellors and traumatised asylum seekers and refugees.


Excellence in Translation

Winner: Suzan Piper (Indonesian language), for her translation and subtitling of the award-winning documentary The Burning Season.


Outstanding Contribution to the Translating and Interpreting Industry

Winner: Queensland Health Multicultural Services, for the Queensland Health Interpreter Service Model.


Outstanding Contribution to Indigenous Interpreting

Winner: Kimberley Interpreting Service (KIS), for the development and implementation of a multi-faceted professional development plan and interpreters’ handbook.


2007 Recipients


Excellence in Interpreting

Winners: Shaperai Jallya (Dari and Farsi languages), for interpretation in court proceedings for a man with mental health problems; JC Lloyd-Southwell (Spanish and several other languages), for simultaneous court and conference interpreting at the International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the Hague.


Excellence in Translation

Winner: Marc Orlando, for translation into French of an 11,000-word feature article on the war in Iraq written in English by Jon Stephens, published in Metro magazine. The translation won the 2006 International Prize for War Correspondents in Bayeux.

Runner-up, highly commended: Victor Xu (Mandarin language), for interpreting a series of training sessions for Chinese government officials on income modelling and forecasting as part of the World Wide Project Management Services initiative for the China-Australia Governance Program.


Outstanding Contribution to the Translating and Interpreting Industry

Winner: SBS Subtitling Unit, for developing innovative procedures in subtitling.

Runners-up, highly commended: Merril Clayton, for translating from German a series of medical documents; Sue Jollow, for translating from Chinese of insurance documents relating to a multi-million-dollar wind power project.


Honorary Award

Winner: Terry Chesher, for her outstanding contribution to translation and interpreting through her work on the professional development programme for AUSIT NSW.

Runners-up, highly commended: NABS (National AUSLAN Interpreter Payment and Booking Service), for its interactive interpreter training resources; NSW Multicultural Health Communication Services and I&G Media, for their joint submission: Can Creativity Be Translated – Towards Good Practice in Translating Radio Commercials – The Emphysema Test containing the innovative approach in developing guidelines to ensure that script translations matched the original creative talent.


2005 Recipients


Excellence in Interpreting

Winners: Vannessa Hearman and Liang Joo Leow (Indonesian language), for their simultaneous interpreting for Channel Seven of the Corby verdict from Denpasar on a live news feed – first time ever in Australia.

Runners-up, highly commended: Charles Qin (Mandarin language), for simultaneous interpreting as part of the inaugural visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao; Christoula Nicolaou (Greek language), for interpreting work at the Melbourne Greek Film Festival 2005; Vera Oujaimi (Arabic language), for a series of interpreting assignments with Victoria Police


Excellence in Translation

Winner: David Holm (Chinese languages/dialects), for annotated translations and transcriptions of Zhuang cosmological texts in the book Killing a Buffalo for the Ancestors (published by Southeast Asia Publications, Northern Illinois University, 2003).

Runners-up, highly commended: Victoria Jourdan, for the translation into Spanish of the 88-page guidebook Crystal Oracle – Guidance from the Heart of the Earth; Leviseda Bun Douglas, for translation into Khmer of published information for the NSW Multicultural Health Communication Service.


Outstanding Contribution to the Translating and Interpreting Industry

Winner: The Victorian Department of Education & Training for the Talking in Tune – a Guide to Working with Interpreters in Schools package (video, hard copy guide and user notes).

Runners-up, highly commended: Victorian Deaf Society (VicDeaf), for their Auslan Interpreter professional development programme; The Victorian Department of Justice’s Diversity Issues Unit; for its Justice Online Directory for Justice Information; Melbourne Metropolitan Ambulance Service, for making their 4 Steps for Life CPR programme available in languages other than English.


2004 Recipients


Outstanding Contribution to the Translating and Interpreting Industry

Small team/individual, winner: LOTE Marketing, for the talking book Every Child is Important - part of the Australian Childhood Foundation’s campaign - managing the translation of the content into seven languages.

Organisation winner: All Graduates, for introducing an online interpreter booking system: a first in Australia.

Organisation, highly commended: Web Communications Unit of the Victorian Department of Human Services, for creating a Health Translations Online Directory.


Honorary Award

Winner: David Connor (multiple languages), for lifetime achievement as one of the institute’s founding members and former AUSIT Vic/Tas office-bearer who for many years served the translating and interpreting industry in a variety of roles.