Translation Is About More Than Words: Indigenous Languages, Metaphor, and the Risk of Distorting Meaning in Counseling
Original Chinese title: 翻譯的不只是語言：族語、隱喻與心理諮商中的意義失真
Words used in counseling are not interchangeable labels. Indigenous languages, metaphors, place names, and kinship terms carry meanings about relationships and worldviews; translation that seeks only literal equivalence can erase important experiences from professional records.
王莉如
王莉如 is a counseling psychologist and supervisor whose work focuses on lived experience, relationships, trauma recovery, cultural differences, and the helping professions.
Language Is More Than Different Words for the Same World
One of the most common misunderstandings in cross-language counseling is to imagine translation as word-for-word substitution—as though “sadness,” “anxiety,” “trauma,” and “family” each occupied exactly the same conceptual box in every language, and the only task were to find the matching term. Language also carries a community’s ways of distinguishing feelings, understanding relationships, describing the body, and making sense of lived experience.
Some languages describe distress in terms of where it is felt in the body, weather, weight, breath, spirituality, or changes in relationships. If a client says, “My heart feels weighed down,” “The path has disappeared,” or “My body has not returned,” immediately interpreting those words as depression, disorientation, or dissociation may help with professional classification, but it may also close off other meanings too soon. Such expressions may be connected to family obligations, loss of land, relationships with ancestors, or cultural taboos.
Original Terms Can Matter More Than a Perfect Translation
A counselor does not need to pretend to understand every Indigenous language, but they can allow important words to remain in their original form. Useful questions include: “How would you say this without using Mandarin or English? What kind of experience is this word closest to? Who usually uses it? Is there any part that cannot be translated directly?” Recording the original word alongside the client’s own explanation is often safer than having a professional choose a technical term that merely appears precise.
Kinship terms are especially important. Some kinship terms simultaneously encode generational position, obligations, taboos, and caregiving relationships; they do not simply mean “uncle,” “aunt,” or “cousin.” If a counselor reduces a complex kinship network to a nuclear family, they may misjudge the client’s support system, sources of conflict, and ways decisions are made.
Interpreters Are Not Transparent Channels
When interpreting is needed, the interpreter affects tone, pacing, confidentiality, and trust. In a small community, a client may know the interpreter or members of the interpreter’s family, so simply “finding someone who speaks the same language” does not guarantee a safe setting. Before the session, the counselor should explain confidentiality obligations, roles, and how information will be handled, and the client must be able to choose, decline, or request a different interpreter.
Counselors should speak directly to clients rather than treating the interpreter as the primary addressee. They should use short sentences, allow time for interpreting, avoid jargon, and refrain from asking several questions at once. After the session, the counselor can also check with the interpreter: Which terms had no direct equivalent? Where might cultural context create misunderstanding? Without the client’s consent, however, the counselor must not discuss personal information beyond what is necessary.
Diagnosis Requires Linguistic Humility
Psychological assessment often relies on questionnaires and descriptions of symptoms. If an instrument has not been validated for the relevant language and culture, literal translation can change the meaning of an item. For example, “hearing voices” may reflect a pathological perceptual experience, but it may also be associated with dreams, bereavement, or religious or cultural experience. A professional must assess the degree of distress, impact on functioning, sense of control, whether the experience has a shared cultural meaning, and any safety risks, rather than assigning a diagnostic category as soon as a keyword appears.
This does not mean that all culture-related experiences are beyond clinical assessment. If a client is at risk of self-harm, harm to others, severe disorganization, or inability to care for themselves, timely intervention is still necessary. Cultural responsiveness and clinical safety are not an either-or choice. A fuller assessment helps professionals avoid both missing genuine risks and treating difference as disease.
Let Clients Decide Which Words Can Be Carried Beyond the Session
Session notes, referral letters, and interdisciplinary discussions can strip nuanced, context-rich language down to simplified labels. Before ending the session, a counselor can ask: “Which terms from today would you like me to preserve? How can I write them in the record so that they stay close to your meaning? Is there any cultural information that should not be passed on?”
Respecting language means more than providing translation services; it means recognizing that the act of naming carries power. Only when a person can describe their life in their own words can counseling truly begin to approach that person’s world.
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This article was prepared with assistance from Yuan Media AI in keeping with the editorial direction of the Life Creation Lab column, drawing on publicly available international sources and perspectives from counseling psychology. It should be reviewed by the author or an editor before publication. This general educational information does not replace individual counseling, psychotherapy, psychiatric care, or crisis intervention.