Film Dialogue Translation And The Intonation Unit : Towards Equivalent Effect In English And Chinese

This thesis proposes a new approach to film dialogue translation (FDT) with special reference to the translation process and quality of English-to-Chinese dubbing. In response to the persistent translation failures that led to widespread criticism of dubbed films and TV plays in China for their artificial \u27translation talk\u27, this study provides a pragmatic methodology derived from the integration of the theories and analytical systems of information flow in the tradition of the functionalist approach to speech and writing with the relevant theoretical and empirical findings from TS and other related branches of linguistics. It has developed and validated a translation model (FITNIATS) which makes the intonation unit (IU) the central unit of film dialogue translation. Arguing that any translation which treats dubbing as a simple script-to-script process, without transferring the prosodic properties of the spoken words into the commensurate functions of TL, is incomplete, the thesis demonstrates that, in order to reduce confusion and loss of meaning/rhythm, the SL dialogue should be rendered in the IUs with the stressed syllables well-timed in TL to keep the corresponding information foci in sync with the visual message. It shows that adhering to the sentence-to-sentence formula as the translation metastrategy with the information structure of the original film dialogue permuted can result in serious stylistic as well as communicative problems. Five key theoretical issues in TS are addressed in the context of FDT, viz., the relations between micro-structure and macro-structure translation perspectives, foreignizing vs. domesticating translation, the unit of translation, the levels of translation equivalence and the criteria for evaluating translation quality. lf equivalent effect is to be achieved in all relevant dimensions, it is argued that \u27FITness criteria\u27 need to be met in film translation assessment, and four such criteria arc proposed. This study demonstrates that prosody and word order, as sensitive indices of the information flow which occurs in film dialogue through the creation and perception of meaning, can provide a basis for minimizing cross-linguistic discrepancies and compensating for loss of the FIT functions, especially where conflicts arise between the syntactic and/or medium constraints and the adequate transfer of cultural-specific content and style. The implications of the model for subtitling arc also made explicit

中国映画の英語字幕における文化的指示の翻訳研究

Tohoku University中本武志課

Exploring the intersection of translation and music: an analysis of how foreign songs reach Chinese audiences

The thesis looks into the practice of song translation, which occupies a peripheral position in translation studies (TS) despite its commonplace occurrence and significant impact on the global spread of songs. Foreign songs enjoy enormous appeal in China, where different methods have been adopted to translate them with the aim of enhancing listeners’ full reception. In particular, the practice of writing Chinese lyrics anew and setting them to the foreign tunes regardless of the semantic relationship between the source text (ST) and the target text (TT) has proliferated over the past decades. Some translated songs capture the gist of the original lyrics omitting minor details whereas some sever their relations with the original. This blurs the boundaries between translation, adaptation and rewriting lyrics. Another noticeable phenomenon is the emergence of self-organising communities, whose involvement in translating song lyrics and circulating subtitled music videos (MVs) cannot be overlooked in today’s digital landscape. Song translation can be understood as a field with its own “rules of the game” and exchange of different forms of capital following a Bourdieusian perspective. Adopting a case study methodology, the thesis investigates the particular field of song translation with special reference to the translation practices of a veteran song translator named Xue Fan 薛范, online amateur translators, and a professional lyricist from Hong Kong called Albert Leung 林夕. These case studies have been conducted for providing an in-depth analysis of China’s song translation activities through time and the dynamics of the power relations in the field. To translate a song from one language and culture into another invariably involves the losses and gains of certain elements, given the song’s semiotic richness. Against this backdrop, the thesis attempts to examine how the interplay of different meaning-making modes in a song has been dealt with by different agents under various circumstances through close examination of the relationship between STs and TTs. This will allow a better understanding of the production, circulation and reception of song translations in respective historical, ideological and social contexts. It is hoped that the thesis can provide new insights into our understanding of ‘translation’ in relation to music, and further shed light on how translation evolves at the convergence of music and technology in the globalisation era

The translation of children's literature: Ideology and cultural adaptations. Captain Underpants as a case study

The aim of this research is to explore cultural differences in the children’s publishing industry in the USA and Spain and the impact these have on translation, and to develop a case study of the translation of Dav Pilkey’s Captain Underpants series into Spanish from a cultural and linguistic perspective. The main aim of this dissertation is to demonstrate the ways in which ranges of meaning are narrowed, expanded or refracted in children’s literature translation and how they affect early readers’ understanding of the text (as more or less subversive), modelling all this as a dynamic rather than static system. Bakhtin’s concept of dialogism is applied to the Captain Underpants texts to show that the translation process is a continuum, never a finalized project, which can - and does - change with time.This dissertation explores the ways in which the translator of the Captain Underpants series, Miguel Azaola, negotiates the pressures and constraints, be they political, historical, cultural, editorial, commercial, or linguistic, which are imposed upon him via ideology, commissioning editors and the publishing industry. All translations imply a certain level of manipulation of the original text, and the translation of a subversive text written for a younger audience is even more vulnerable to change, due to the existing power imbalance between adults and children and the potential of humour as a tool for undermining or reinforcing social control. The Captain Underpants books mock and challenge authority-figures and the structures of the adult world (parents, teachers, political and religious institutions). These books provide a carnivalesque context that enables children to establish a dialogue with the text through which to question societal norms that have been learnt in school and at home. This dissertation examines how humour and references to food have been translated into Spanish in this context. It also points out the dilemmas posed by retaining the original pictures in the translated text, and how the lack of a supporting cultural peritext affects not only the visual meaning of the text as a whole but also children’s reading experience and their perception of the books as cultural artefacts. Translation loss in children’s literature can be attributed to linguistic difficulties of capturing meanings or stylistic features. However, it may also reflect societal attitudes towards childhood and cultural differences. The history of publishing for children in Spain and the didactic mission of the publishing house (El Barco de Vapor) have had a strong impact on the translation of this series. Examples of the manifestation of this impact include domesticated names, loss of word-play, discrepancies between pictures and texts, and the almost complete deletion of the dual readership (adult and child). Translation has diminished the potential subversive elements of the target text, resulting in a significant reduction of humour. By adopting an interdisciplinary theoretical framework, in which theories from children’s literature, translation studies, reader response and studies on recent Spanish publishing trends are integrated, this thesis aims to make a scholarly contribution to the hitherto neglected study of the translation of contemporary children’s literature into Spanish. Highlighting throughout the differences in the textual content and children’s responses to the translated texts, this thesis explores the editor’s and translator’s decision-making processes and the challenges posed by translation for younger readers

A comparative analysis of film subtitle translation from English to Chinese : a case study of 15 popular animation films

As film-making has evolved, subtitling has become “a translation practice that consists of presenting a written text, generally on the lower part of the screen”, which seeks to deliver “the original dialogue of the speakers” (Diaz-Cintas and Remael 2007: 8). Subtitle translation in the field of Audiovisual Translation has attracted increasing interest from scholars, who believe that the quality of subtitling is an important criterion when evaluating the quality of a film. Inspired by Even-Zohar’s (1978) polysystem theory and Gottlieb’s (1992) typology, this comparative study focuses on the subtitling of English-language animation films, which represent one of the main foreign film genres introduced to Chinese audiences, in order to identify effective strategies to improve the quality of translated subtitles from the perspective of cultural awareness. I propose three main hypotheses in this research: 1) that the length of a film subtitle translated into Chinese is generally greater than the corresponding original English text; 2) that effective translation is contingent on the use of Chinese idioms and traditional expressions within translated subtitles; 3) that effective translation is contingent on the use of popular expressions within contemporary Chinese culture. The methodologies employed to address these hypotheses are: a self-built parallel corpus (as the main research tool) comprising 15 sets of animation film subtitles; a questionnaire survey; and interviews with relevant AVT practitioners and scholars. The research findings are: 1) the length of a film subtitle translated into Chinese is generally greater than the corresponding original English text; 2) the two discussed types of expression are effectively employed in the data; 3) unnecessary, erroneous or inappropriate uses, among others, were highlighted by the data; 4) the frequency of using popular expressions is higher than for traditional expressions; 5) there is frequent use of the typology strategies of paraphrase, transfer, condensation and transcription, as well as newer strategies of globalization and localization. Keywords: audiovisual translation (AVT), subtitle translation, animation films, traditional expressions, popular expression

“MORE JAPANESE THAN JAPANESE”: SUBJECTIVATION IN THE AGE OF BRAND NATIONALISM AND THE INTERNET

Today, modern technologies and the rapid circulation of information across geographic boundaries are said to be making the nation-state less relevant to daily life. In contrast, this dissertation argues that national boundary maintenance is increasingly made more relevant not in spite of such technologies, but precisely because of them. Indeed, processes of circulation are themselves making and re-making such boundaries rather than erasing them, while states simultaneously react to contain the perceived threats of globalization and to capitalize on the sale of their “cultural” commodities through nation branding. For American otaku, or Japan fans, internet technologies and the consumption of Japanese media like videogames and anime are quintessential global flows from within which they first articulate a desire for Japan. Increasingly, some make the very real decision to leave home and settle in Japan, although scholars have suggested otaku are unable to understand the “real” Japan. Once there, however, the Japanese state’s ongoing nation branding policies, along with immigration control and patterns of everyday interactions with Japanese citizens, marginalize even long-term residents as perpetual visitors. Building on the work of Foucault, I seek to understand how notions of national “of courseness,” which fix Japaneseness as naturally homogeneous and impenetrable, subjectivize American fans. Drawing on 12 months of full time participant observation with otaku living in Tokyo, along with 18 months of part time follow-up research, diachronic interviews with Americans in the US and Japan, and extensive textual analysis of all things “Japanese,” this work contrasts the purported deterritorializing promise of online communications and the withering of the relevance of the modern nation-state, with the national boundary making work that these otaku migrants participate in, both online and off. Once in Japan, otaku themselves actively support Japan's nation branding efforts by teaching English and producing the very cultural commodities that motivated their migration in the first place, as they increasingly codify what Japaneseness is for other “foreigners.” At the same time, otaku migrants further reproduce Japanese national identity through accepting and affirming their status as non-Japanese, and through the reinscription of these very boundaries onto other otaku