Going global against the tide: the translation of Chinese audiovisual productions

With the rapid development of digitization and the emergence of social networks and streaming platforms, audiovisual translation (AVT) has become one of the most prolific expressions of global communication in today’s society, able to overcome linguistic barriers when disseminating culture across the world. While audiovisual productions originally shot in English seem to be able to take full advantage of this situation, China’s domestic programs frequently encounter more challenges to make it overseas. Adopting a primarily translational approach, this paper borrows the concept of “cultural discount,” coined by Hoskins and Mirus (1988), to capture the notion that audiovisual productions are rooted in one culture and, therefore, may have diminished appeal among viewers from other communities. The study holds that the degree of cultural discount audiovisual productions may encounter when exported depends on numerous factors, which are explored through examples of recently localized films and TV series of Chinese origin

Audiovisual Translation in the Foreign Language Classroom. Introduction

Audiovisual translation (AVT) has been hailed by many as one of the most prolific and fast-growing areas of research in the field of Translation Studies and as the quintessential translation practice of the 21st century. This is hardly surprising in a society like ours, saturated with screens and mediated by the constant presence of moving images, as we turn to audiovisual productions for entertainment, to secure information, to carry out our work, to keep in touch with our peers, to learn and to study. As a result of the exponential boom in audiovisual texts and formats over recent decades, today’s language learners are typically very familiar with a range of digital formats that crop up, and indeed they use, in their everyday life for very many different purposes. This exposure, in which social media and interactions are also instrumental, means that language learners are also versed in the interplay of the different codes on which audiovisual material draws in order to construct meaning.Audiovisual translation (AVT) has been hailed by many as one of the most prolific and fast-growing areas of research in the field of Translation Studies and as the quintessential translation practice of the 21st century. This is hardly surprising in a society like ours, saturated with screens and mediated by the constant presence of moving images, as we turn to audiovisual productions for entertainment, to secure information, to carry out our work, to keep in touch with our peers, to learn and to study. As a result of the exponential boom in audiovisual texts and formats over recent decades, today’s language learners are typically very familiar with a range of digital formats that crop up, and indeed they use, in their everyday life for very many different purposes. This exposure, in which social media and interactions are also instrumental, means that language learners are also versed in the interplay of the different codes on which audiovisual material draws in order to construct meaning

The Riches of Hands-on Subtitling in the Foreign Language Classroom

Using subtitles and subtitling as a means of diversifying foreign language teaching and learning has become increasingly popular in recent decades, particularly across Europe, where the European Commission has promoted, among others, the development of projects like ClipFlair, a web-based subtitling platform for foreign language learning (FLL). As part of this boost of research on FLL through subtitling, this empirical study was conducted in mainland China, where the role of subtitling in foreign language classroom has not been widely recognised by scholars. Carried out on seventeen higher education level Chinese L1 students, the experiment studied the effects of performing subtitling activities on English L2 vocabulary acquisition and discovered that doing subtitling tasks from L2 to L1 can result in a significantly better performance in vocabulary acquisition than doing intralingual subtitling activities (L2 to L2) or doing non-subtitling activities.El uso de los subtítulos y de la subtitulación como prácticas didácticas que ayudan a diversificar la enseñanza y aprendizaje de lenguas extranjeras ha crecido en popularidad en las últimas décadas, especialmente en Europa, donde la Comisión Europea ha fomentado, entre otros, proyectos como ClipFlair, una plataforma de subtitulado en la nube para el aprendizaje de lenguas extranjeras. Enmarcado dentro de este auge investigador, el estudio empírico que aquí se documenta se ha llevado a cabo en China, donde el uso de la subtitulación en el aula de idiomas extranjeros apenas si ha recibido atención por parte de los académicos. El experimento, que ha contado con diecisiete estudiantes de grado y chino como L1, explora el impacto de la subtitulación en la adquisición de vocabulario en inglés (L2). Los resultados demuestran que la práctica activa de subtitular videos interlingüísticamente, de L2 a L1, puede conducir a una mayor adquisición de vocabulario que cuando las tareas se centran en la subtitulación intralingüística (de L2 a L2) o son actividades que no tienen nada que ver con la subtitulación

Introduction : the landscapes of audiovisual translation

The purpose of this paper is to describe the so-called fansubs, a different type of subtitling carried out by amateur translators. The first part of this study covers both the people and phases involved in the fansubbing process from beginning to end. The second section focuses on the legality and ethics of fansubs. The third part pays attention to the actual translation of fansubs and their unique features, such as the use of translator's notes or special karaoke effects. The paper concludes with a reflection on the work done by fansubbers and the possibilities opened by this mainly Internet phenomenon

Closing round table

Moderated by Mary Carrol

Session 19. User research in subtitling

The 'so what' of research in media accessibility-finding out what individual users say about the use and provision of subtitling / Zoe Moores (University of Roehampton & University of Surrey) ; Go vertical: Challenges of subtitling vertical content / Evgeniya Malenova (Alba Multimedia LLC & Dostoevsky Omsk State University), Elena Aleksandrova (Alba Multimedia LLC & Murmansk Arctic State University) ; An eye-tracking study on the influence of number of lines and subtitle speed on the processing of Brazilian deaf and hard-of-hearing participants / Italo Alves Pinto de Assis (Acaraú Valley State University), Patrícia Araújo Vieira (Federal University of Ceará), Vera Lúcia Santiago Araújo (State University of Ceará) ; Subtitling for the deaf and hard-of-hearing (SDH) and eye-tracking: results of an experimental research / Silvia Malena Modesto Monteiro (State University of Ceará), Patrícia Araújo Vieira (Federal University of Ceará), Elisangela Nogueria Teixeira (Federal University of Ceará). Chair: Jorge Díaz-Cintas (University College London