The Instructional Value of Subtitles

Thorbjörn BroddasonDepartment of Sociology

Faculty of Social Sciences

University of Iceland

IS-101 ReykjavíkIceland

Telephone: +354 525 4509

e-mail: tbrodd@hi.is

Informal learning and digital media:constructions, contexts, consequences21-23 September 2006University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark

Community through communication

The linguist Anna Wierzbicka quotes her colleague, Thiru Kandiah, as follows:“Community is created through communication, in a discourse…whose natureand manner of use are agreed on…by those who go to make up the community.Indeed, it is by virtue of such agreement or shared authorization that these people emerge as a community” (Wierzbicka, 2006: 15). This is reminiscent of James Carey’s definition of communication as “a symbolic process wherebyreality is produced, maintained, repaired, and transformed" (1992: 23) as well ashis discussion of the transmission view

. the ritual view of communication. Ashe sees it "A ritual view of communication will...view reading a newspaper lessas sending or gaining information and more as attending a mass, a situation inwhich nothing new is learned but in which a particular view of the world is portrayed and confirmed" (Carey, 1992:20). Wierzbicka points out thatimmigrants to the major English-speaking countries (the “Anglo countries” as shelabels them) need to learn “to understand the meaning of unfamiliar conversational routines and to grasp the cultural values and assumptionsreflected in them” (2006: 11); this in view of what Wierzbicka identifies as theHumboldtian view of languages: “Language is the repository of the history of a people” (2006: 9). Wierzbicka further dismisses as totally unrealistic the idea“that international English can take the form of a culturally neutral “nuclear English” and thus be divorced from the historically shaped and culture-bound(Anglo) English” (2006: 14). The above observations are all highly relevant for those who wish to consider the transfer of meaning involved in the translation of a cultural product from one language (culture) to another.

The transfer of meaning

Since the beginnings of their trade, successful publishers of daily newspapershave usually had a fairly clear idea of who their readers were and done their bestto meet their requirements. The most obvious and basic method of accommodating the readers is to write the paper in the language of its desiredconstituency.Similarly, when radio superseded newspapers as the most advanced massmedium during the first third of the twentieth century, practically all (textual) programmes were transmitted in the language of the primary audience of each broadcasting service.If texts of foreign origin were to be printed or broadcast they were firsttranslated into the appropriate vernacular. Although this inevitably involvedsome loss and even distortion of the original communication, whether deliberate

or not, it was a fairly straightforward exercise. What the users read or listened towere the familiar words of their mother-tongue.During the latter half of the twentieth century a new mass medium, television,gradually established its pre-eminence over the earlier two daily media. Towardsthe end of the century average daily viewing time in industrialized countries was between two and four hours (IP Group, 1999; Carlsson and Harrie, 2002).This gave rise to a novel situation in most countries, particularly those whereEnglish was not the native or official language. Due to well-known historicaland cultural circumstances programmes originating in English-speakingcountries – in particular the USA – came to constitute a disproportionate shareof the output of European television (de Bens and de Smaele, 2001; Broddasonand Karlsson, 2004; Carlsson and Harrie, 2002): “US fiction succeeds in breaking through all cultural barriers in Europe” (de Bens and de Smaele (2001:51)). As is the case with newspapers and radio, imported products on televisionhave to be translated for the benefit of the target audience. The obviousdifference is, however, that the translation is only partial: we translate thespoken words, whereas the visual images are left intact.The two most common forms of screen translation are

dubbing

, where thespoken text in the programme is removed and substituted with a new one in thelanguage of the receiving audience, and

subtitling

, where the soundtrack is leftintact, but a text with a translation of the dialogue in condensed form appears atthe bottom of the screen. “In short, dubbing is a process of acoustic replacementwhile subtitling is a process of visual supplementation” (O’Connell, 1998: 66).In both cases the original product has been substantially interfered with. In the process of condensation the text is reduced by about 30% but there is indicationthat in most cases condensation will not lead to loss of information (Koolstra etal., 2002: 328; Kristmannsson, 1996: 241; Lomheim, 1999). This may be due to“the fact that spoken language often contains unimportant verbal padding whichis only confusing if kept in the written subtitles” (Wikipedia). In the case of dubbing the problem of condensation does not arise. There is a considerabledivergence of opinion as to the relative merits of these two language transfer methods:

Particularly strong views are held…about the purported shortcomings of dubbing,to the extent that in some quarters it is regarded as a wholly contemptible practice.For those who take the contrary view, subtitling is regarded with almost equaldisdain (Kilborn, 1993: 643).

The complaints against dubbing concern “the imperfect lip-synchronicity indubbed programmes, and subtitling is defended with the argument that theoriginal voices of the actors are left intact.” (Koolstra et al., 2002: 326). Boththese aspects are highly important, but there is even more involved. We do not