Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Dubbing as a T ype of Audiovisual Translat ion: A St udy of it s Met hods and Const raint s Focusi…
Ayhan Şahin
Translat ing Verbal Humor in Audiovisual Text s in Select ed Dubbed Animat ed Movies
helia alaee
24.04.2016 Translating Humor in Dubbing and Subtitling
Volume 13, No. 2
April 2009
Translating Humor in Dubbing and Subtitling
by Anna Jankowska
Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland
Anna Jankowska graduated with Abstract
an MA in Spanish Philology from
the Jagiellonian University in
Krakow (Poland). Now a PhD This article presents the results of an empirical study on how elements of
student at the UNESCO Chair for humor from an animated American film (Shrek) travel across languages,
Translation Studies and cultures (Polish and Spanish) and different translation methods (dubbing and
Intercultural Communication she
is working on her doctoral subtitling). The analysis is based on the method designed by a Spanish scholar
dissertation which will concern Juan José MartínezSierra, which allowed to determine the percentage of
Audio description. As junior original humorous load as compared with the load of the target texts in four
lecturer at the UNESCO Chair she
teaches PolishSpanish translation different language versions (Polish and Spanish dubbing and subtitles).
and audiovisual translation. She is
also active translator and travel
guides author.
Introduction
Anna can be reached at
anna.m.jankowska@uj.edu.pl. t is very often said that humor does not travel well. This approach seems to have
inspired many scholars to research on the (un)translability of humor. Nevertheless,
it is enough to turn on the TV or to go to the cinema to realize that, regardless of any
possible travel inconveniences or even a possible motion sickness, humor does travel
across linguistic and cultural barriers. Having assumed that humor travels, the objective of
Front Page the study was to establish how it travels across different languages, cultures, and
translation methods.
Select one of the previous 47
issues.
Select an issue: Objectives
There were two basic objectives of the study which was carried out in order to write a
master thesis. The first one was to revise the validity of the translation tendencies
identified and described by Juan José MartínezSierra, who analyzed the transfer of humor
in The Simpsons (English being the source and Spanish dubbing the target language). In
order to achieve that objective, the method designed by MartínezSierra was used in a
different corpus and included two target languages (Polish and Spanish).
Index 19972009 The second objective was to identify the tendencies in humor transfer with respect to the
target language and different types of audiovisual translation (dubbing and subtitling). It is
TJ Interactive: Translation
this second objective that is presented in this article.
Journal Blog
Corpus
From the Editor
The Invisible Articles Żor the purpose of this research, I have selected Shrek, an animated American film, which
by żabe Bokor was successfully broadcast worldwide. Although there are multiple reasons to justify this
choice, initially there were just two requirements which the potential research material
had to meet: it needed to have dubbed and subtitled versions in Spanish as well as in
Translator Profiles
Polish and it had to be a comedy. Since in Spain all films broadcast on the TV and in the
Uniquely Typical or Typically
cinemas are dubbed and DVD releases also have subtitles, finding an appropriate material
Unique?
by Holly Mikkelson in Spanish did not present any problems. Poland, on the other hand, is a different case.
With the exception of products intended for young audiences. foreign films are presented
to the audience with voiceover (television) or with subtitles (cinema). With these
The Profession
restrictions. choosing an animated film was an obvious choice.
The Bottom Line
by Żire Ant & Worker Bee There were also some reasons to choose Shrek in particular.
Compared to dubbing, The most important and relevant one for the purpose of the
Ethics 101 for Translators
by Danilo Nogueira and Kelli
the subtitled versions research was the fact that Shrek belongs to the category
Semolini preserve less of the called by Patrick Zabalbeascoa (2000: 27) "white background
original humorous with black spots" which in other words means a text
presented as a infantile genre but with elements directed
Translators Around the load. exclusively to adults. In the case of Shrek, the content of
World
Bringing the Best Western
humor directed exclusively to adults was a guarantee of
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24.04.2016 Translating Humor in Dubbing and Subtitling
Classical Literature to Turkish interesting and complex research material.
Masses
by Arnold Reisman, Ph.D.
The second reason is linked directly with the phenomenon of the film's Polish dubbed
version, which marked the "pre" and "post" Shrek era. Poles, as all other societies, are
Translation History very attached to the traditional audiovisual translation methods used in their country
Japanese Technical (voiceover in the television and subtitles in the cinema), and when asked about their
Translation a Quarter of a translational preferences they list dubbing as the least desirable one, pointing out its lack
Century Ago of naturalness and poor quality. That is not the case of Shrek. Many people, including the
by Steve Vlasta Vitek
ones who claimed to prefer watching films in the original version, describe its dubbing as
excellent and even "funnier" than the English version. The success of the Polish dubbing
Science & Technology was so great that its translator, Bartosz Wierzbięta, became not only recognizable, but
Detección de problemas en even popular (there were many press interviews with him and the films which he
traducción cientifica translated later on were advertised as "translated by Bartosz Wierzbięta").
Olga TorresHostench
Theoretical Frame
Medical Translation
The Sounds of Clinical The study is based on the taxonomy of humorous elements formulated by Juan José
Medicine
by Rafael A. Rivera, M.D.,
MartínezSierra (2005), who used it to analyze audiovisual jokes in the popular American
ŻACP animated series The Simpsons. Basically, this taxonomy follows the trail blazed by Patrick
Zabalbeascoa (1993, 1996, 2005) who talks about different joke types. Assuming that the
category of joke types might sometimes be too narrow to apply (it is hard if not
Cultural Aspects of
impossible to classify a given joke exclusively as national or languagedependent)
Translation
The Cultural Transfer in
MartínezSierra suggests using the category of humorous elements, which in different
Anime Translation combinations can be combined to result in a joke. According to MartínezSierra (2005:
by Mariko Hanada 290291), there are eight different humorous elements: CommunityandInstitution
(elements, which make a reference to cultural or intertextual features bound to a
concrete culture such as politicians, celebrities, organizations, newspapers, books, films,
Arts & Entertainment
etc.), CommunitySenseofHumor (topics which appear to be more popular in certain
Translating Humor in Dubbing
and Subtitling
communities than in others by preference, rather than cultural specificity), Linguistic
by Anna Jankowska (elements based on linguistic features), Visual (humor produced by what can be seen on
screen, not what can be read), Graphic (humor derived from a written message inserted
in a screen picture), Paralinguistic (nonverbal qualities of voice associated with
Advertising Translation
expressions of emotions as well as narrative silence), Sound (sounds found in the
Motocicletas, Internet y soundtrack and the special effects which by themselves or in combination with others may
estrategias de traducción
publicitaria
be humorous), and NonMarked (miscellaneous instances that are not easily categorized
by Junming Yao but are, nevertheless, humorous).
Literary Translation The Analysis
Translating Rape
by Irene Chen The analysis was performed in three stages. The first one consisted in detecting source
jokes and their four translations (Polish and Spanish dubbing and subtitling) and tagging
the humorous elements as their constituents. Żortytwo jokes were detected in the source
Translator Education
text, which gives a total of two hundred and ten jokes analyzed. In order to carry out this
The Effect of the Translator's part of the study, I resorted to a card designed by José MartínezSierra (2005: 293),
żender on Translation
Evaluation modifying it to suit my research. The card used in the study is presented below.
by Ebrahim żolavar
Professionalizing Literary
Card: 16
Translation Education
by Rebecca Hyde Parker Film: Shrek
Translation Theory Minute of the film: 11' 56"
Is Translation a Rewriting of
an Original Text? Context: Lord Żarquaad tortures żingerbread Man forcing him to reveal the hideaway
by Tomoko Inaba of creatures from tales which he wants to liquidate. Only after being threatened with
losing his sugar buttons żingerbread Man starts to talk.
Translators' Tools
American source version
Żrom Mechanics to Managers
by Jost Zetzsche
żingerbread Man: Do you know the Muffin Man?
Uncontrolled Terminology and
MT: The Importance of Making Lord Żarquaad: The Muffin Man?
żood Comparisons
by Rafael żuzmán żingerbread Man: The Muffin Man.
TranslateCAD—a software Lord Żarquaad: I know the Muffin Man who lives on Drury Lane
tool that enables CAT
translation with CAD
drawings żingerbread Man: Well, she's married to the Muffin Man.
by Vicente Victorica
Humorous load: communityandinstitutions, nonmarked
Translators’ Emporium
Polish dubbing Spanish dubbing:
Caught in the Web
Hombre de żengibre: Słyszałes o Hobre de żengibre: ¿Conocéis vos,
Web Surfing for Żun and Profit
by Cathy Żlick, Ph.D.
Muchomorku? conoceis a Mambru?
Translators’ OnLine Lord Żarquaad: O Muchomorku? Lord Żarquaad: Si me suena mucho
Resources Mambru. ¿Mambru se fue a la guerra?
by żabe Bokor Hombre de żengibre: Tak, o Muchomorku.
Hobmre de żengibre: Mire usted que
Translators’ Best Websites Lord Żarquuad: Tak, znam Muchomorka
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by żabe Bokor ten od wirka tak? pena.
Hombre de żengibre: Tak. wirek kręci z Lord Żarquaad: No sé cuando vendrá
Call for Papers and
Editorial Policies Muchomorkiem!
Load: communityandinstitutions, non Load: communityandinstitutions, non
marked, communitysenseofhumor marked
Polish subtitles Spanish subtitles:
Hombre de żengibre: Znasz Pana Pączka? Hombre de żengibre: ¿Conoces al
pastelero?
Lord Żarquaad: Tak znam Pana Pączka z
ulicy Lecącego Bączka. Lord Żarquaad: Sí le conozco. ¿El que vive
en Drury Lane?
Hombre de żengibre: Ona jest oną Pana
Pączka. Hombre de żengibre:Ella está casada con
el pastelero.
Load: 0 Load: 0
Comment:
The joke in the source version is based on two elements communityandinstitutions (a
popular children's poem) and nonmarked (the lack of intelligence of Lord Żarquaad,
who does not recognize the poem and thinks that żingerbread Man reveals the secret
hideaway). Spanish dubbing by referring to a popular children's poem maintaining both
the communityandinstitutions and nonmarked elements. Polish dubbing by referring
to a popular cartoon about two dwarfs also manages to maintain the original humorous
load unchanged. Moreover, its load is amplified by a communitysenseofhumor
element (żingerbread Man suggests that the dwarfs are gay, which is a common joke
topic in Poland). Neither one of the subtitled versions, which are more or less literal
translations of the source text, managed to render the humorous load. The target
audiences of the subtitled versions in both languages instead of laughing at Lord
Żarquaad's stupidity find themselves at the position of Lord Żarquaad who is trying to
understand what the sense of żingerbread Man's answer.
Afterwards I proceeded to the "global quantity analysis" which consisted of counting all the
humorous elements previously detected in the source and target texts. This part of the
study allowed me to formulate conclusions regarding some general tendencies in humor
translation in dubbing and subtitling.
Unfortunately, the quantitative analysis alone does not present a full picture of the
differences in humor transfer in dubbing and subtitling. As SierraMartínez (2005: 292)
aptly noticed, jokes after their translation can suffer not only from a quantitative but also
qualitative losses or changes. This basically means that not all the elements are rendered
on the one to one basis. The fact that the target text contains i.e. twelve linguistic
elements and the source text sixteen, does not mean that twelve elements were translated
and four lost. According to what Martinez noticed (2005: 292), humorous elements can of
course be lost in translation, but they can also change type or even be added. To give an
example: in the source text of Shrek a total of sixteen linguistic humorous elements were
detected and in the Polish dubbing text only twelve. The detailed analysis carried out in
the third part of the study enabled me to observe that out of the sixteen linguistic
humorous elements from the source text eleven were rendered without the change of type
(i.e. English wordplay was substituted by Polish wordplay), three were lost, two changed
type (given joke is still laughable but not because of linguistic reasons) and one element
was added (a linguistic element appeared in target text even though it was absent in the
source text). The results of both parts of the analysis as well as the conclusions are
presented in the following chapters.
Global quantitative analysis
Judging from the global quantitative analysis, we can say that, regardless of the language
and translation method, the target texts tend to contain less humorous elements that the
source texts. The proportional loss of the humorous elements is almost 5% in dubbing
(2,5% in Polish dubbing and of 7% in the Spanish dubbing) and 18% in subtitling (a 18%
both in Polish and Spanish subtitling).
It is also clear that the translations had the weakest performance in the rendition of the
linguistic and communityandinstitutions elements. Only 70% of the original linguistic
humorous load and 55% of the communityandinstitutions humorous load was rendered in
translation. Also in the case of these two particular elements, the divergence between both
translation methods is most visible. In the case of the linguistic elements, dubbing with
84% of the original quantity of elements rendered (75% in Polish and almost 94% in
Spanish) performed far better than subtitling with 56% of the original elements rendered
(62,5% in Polish and 50% in Spanish). Dubbing in general managed to render 75% of the
original quantitative load of the communityandinstitutions elements (93% in Polish
dubbing and 57% in Spanish dubbing), which is over 40% more that subtitling with a 35%
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of the original amount rendered (43% in Polish subtitling and 28,5% in Spanish subtitling).
It should also be pointed out that as much as 46% of the humorous load in the original
text belongs to the category of visual or nonmarked elements. Precisely these elements
are the ones which were rendered in 100% (visual elements) or even in 126% (non
marked) in the translated texts. This basically means that the translations contain more
nonmarked elements that the original. It is also noticeable that the amount of the non
marked elements is higher in subtitling (32% more than the original amount) than in
dubbing (20% more than the original amount).
V 18 18 18 18 18
SHC 9 11 9 6 9
CI 14 13 8 6 4
L 16 12 15 10 8
NM 20 23 25 26 27
P 5 4 3 3 3
S 2 1
ż 1 1 1 1 1
Total 85 83 79 70 70
Table 1. Humorous element content
Detailed analysis
Before talking about the elements preserved which did not suffer any qualitative change
during the translation process we have to point out that according to MartínezSierra a
humorous element is rendered without changing its type as long as a substitute in the
target language or culture is found (i.e. Poles would consider a given element as a Polish
wordplay or a reference to Polish culture).
Regardless of the target language, dubbing preserved on the average 85% and subtitling
72,5% of the original humorous elements. The most significant divergence between
dubbing and subtitling can be noticed in the case of the communityandinstitutions and the
linguistic elements. Dubbing managed to render almost 71,5% (86% in Polish and 57% in
Spanish) of the original communityandinstitutions elements without changing their type,
while the subtitled versions in only 35% (43% in Polish and 28% in Spanish) of the cases
maintained the type of the elements unaltered.
As far as the linguistic elements are concerned in the dubbed versions as much as 75%
(69% in Polish and 81% in Spanish) of the elements were rendered without a type change,
while only 56% (56% both in Polish and Spanish) of the elements remained unchanged in
the subtitled versions. Differences between dubbing and subtitling are slightly smaller in
the case of the nonmarked and paralinguistic elements. The dubbed versions preserved
the type of the original elements in 95% and 70% of the cases respectively, while the
subtitled ones in 87,5% and 60%. The visual elements were rendered in 100% in both
translation methods.
L L 16 11 13 9 9
CI CI 14 12 8 6 4
SHC SHC 9 7 8 6 8
NM NM 20 19 19 18 17
P P 5 4 3 3 3
V V 18 18 18 18 18
Table 2. Elements rendered without type change
As far as elements which suffered from a qualitative change during translation are
concerned, in the study only three types of elements were detected as typechanging. It is
the case of the communityandinstitutions (65% of all changes), linguistic (27% of all the
type changes), and communitysenseofhumor (7,5% of all the changes) elements. The
change of type in all the cases happened always towards a nonmarked element and was
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more common in subtitling (70% of the type changes) than in dubbing (30% of the type
changes).
L NM 16 2 1 2 2
CI NM 14 4 7 6
SHC NM 9 1 1
S NM 2 1 1 1 1
Table 3. Elements rendered with type change
The study also showed that some humorous elements are lost in the translation process.
Surprisingly it is the linguistic elements which disappear most frequently in both languages
and in both translation methods, as they constitute a 48,5% of the entire loss. They are
followed by the paralinguistic (21% of the entire loss) and communityandInstitutions
elements (18% of the entire loss). The loss of the communitysenseofhumor elements
amounts to 12% of the entire loss. Looking at the results of the study it is obvious that the
loss of the humorous elements is more significant in subtitling (64% of all the total loss)
than in dubbing (36%). Subtitling lost 86% of all the paralinguistic, 69% of all the
linguistic, 66% of all the communityandinstitutions and 50% of all the communitysense
ofhumor elements lost.
L Ø 16 3 2 5 6
CI Ø 14 1 1 2 2
SHC Ø 9 1 1 1 1
P Ø 5 1 2 2 2
S Ø 2 1 1 1 1
Table 4. Elements lost in translation
Elements added in translation
One of the most interesting features of this study was the fact that jokes were found in
which the humorous load of the target version increased as compared with the original
version. As can be seen in the table presented below, the augmentation of the humorous
load occurred mostly in dubbing, where 91,5% of all added elements were detected. If we
compare the elements added in dubbing we can clearly see that this practice was more
common in Polish, where almost 80% of all elements were added, than in Spanish.
L 1 3 1
CI 2
SHC 5
Table 5. Added elements
Conclusions
The results obtained from the global and the detailed analysis allow us to draw several
conclusions regarding the translation of humor in dubbing and subtitling. Żirst of all, it
should be pointed out that regardless of the language or the method of translation, the
target texts tend to contain less humorous elements that the source texts. The quantitative
loss of the humorous load in the translated texts in general is 10%.
It is also clear that compared to dubbing, the subtitled versions preserve less of the
original humorous load (the percentage of humorous elements preserved without changing
the source elements' type is significantly lower in subtitling) and contain less humorous
elements in general. This conclusion is valid for subtitling in general, irrespective of the
language of the target text. In other words, it means that dubbing in general is closer to
the source text as far as the quantity and the quality of the humorous elements is
concerned. The closeness of quality of the humorous load in dubbing is the expression of
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the domesticating tendencies of this translation method. Thank to the latter, dubbed
versions of humorous films might appear more amusing to the target audiences.
There is one more observation that we can draw from this study, which concerns Shrek in
particular. It is quite probable that the fact that almost half of the humorous elements in
this animated film belong to the category of visual and nonmarked is not accidental.
Since these elements present less problems in transfer than other humorous elements, we
could risk the statement that their use was intentional, with the aim to make the humor of
the film internationally available. This leaves us just one step away from saying that part
of the translation, understood as facilitating the understanding of a given product, begins
at the time of creating the script.
Bibliography
MartínezSierra, José (2005) "Translating Audiovisual Humor. A Case Study", in Henrik
żottlieb (ed.) Perspectives: Studies in Translatology, Copenhagen: Routledge, 289296.
Zabalbeascoa Terrán, Patrick (2000) "Contenidos para adultos en el género infantil: el
caso del doblaje de Walt Disney", in Veljka Ruzicka, Celia Vázquez and Lourdes Lorenzo
(eds.) Literatura infantil y juvenil: tendencias actuales en investigación, Vigo:
Universidade de Vigo, 1930.
© Copyright Translation Journal and the Author 2009
URL: http://translationjournal.net/journal/48humor.htm
Last updated on: 02/25/2015 03:15:32
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