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Audiovisual translation (AVT)

 approaches to translation:

 source versus target oriented

 linguistic, functional, cultural studies-oriented, cognitive, philosophical

examples of issues:

 equivalence, e.g. formal versus dynamic

 strategies to be adopted, e.g. domesticating versus foreignising

 textual features such as deixis, presupposition, lexical choice, modality, politeness

markers

 ideology

 Translation (cont’d)

 audience design

 translation and publication patterns in the world

 translation and (post) colonialism

 translation and gender

 universals of translation

 Types of audiovisual translation

Inter-lingual translation

 subtitling

 dubbing

 voice-over

Intra-lingual (monolingual) subtitling for the hard-of-hearing and the deaf

 Audio description for the blind

 Live subtitling (e.g. news broadcasts)

 Surtitling for opera and the theatre

 Subtitling, dubbing, or voice-over?

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Subtitling

 advantages: not expensive, does not take a very long time, original soundtrack is

preserved, may have a role in language learning, is better for the hard-of-hearing
and the deaf and for immigrants and tourists

 disadvantages: ‘contaminates’ the image, greater loss of information due to

compression, the attention of the audience is split between

image, soundtrack, and subtitles

Note: oral text  written text

 Subtitling, dubbing, or voice-over?

Dubbing

 advantages: does not distract attention from image, is better for children and for

people with poor reading skills, less reduction of the original dialogue compared to
subtitling

 disadvantages: expensive, takes more time, loss of the original soundtrack, the

voices of dubbing actors can become repetitive after a while

Note: oral text  oral text

 Subtitling, dubbing, or voice-over?

Voice-over

 advantages: not expensive, does not take a long time to make, may be appropriate

to some audio-visual genres (such as documentaries, particularly

when it comes to translating the narrator’s part)

 disadvantages: it ‘contaminates’ the original soundtrack, if used in genres such as

feature films it may create confusion as to who is speaking

 Subtitling for the hard-of-hearing

 indicate relevant noises in your subtitles (music, phone or doorbell ringing, footsteps,

shouting). Otherwise, scenes may become incomprehensible

 make it easier to understand who is speaking (especially if off-screen): use colour

codes and/or change the position of the subtitles

 avoid paraphrase; use as many of the ST words as possible (unlike in interlingual

subtitling!)

 take into consideration the issue of reading speeds

 Audio description for the blind

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 the ‘usual’ soundtrack is not enough to understand what is going on in the

programme

 but why does someone blind need to ‘watch’ TV? Can’t they listen to the radio

instead? Issues of social integration and access to information

 different views on how to best do audio-descriptions

 the skills of an audio-describer

 AV translation and language policy

 the right of linguistic and/or ethnic minorities to have access to audio-visual

programmes in their own language;

 the role of nationalism in decisions with respect to form of audio-visual translation;

 the right of the hard-of-hearing and the deaf to have access to audio-visual

programmes;

 the role of screen translation in language acquisition.

Subtitling

Main issues involved in subtitling:



linguistic, cultural, and cognitive issues involved in subtitling



spoken versus written language



the audience



time/space constraints in subtitling  text

compression

Linguistic issues involved in subtitling

 transfer from spoken to written text

 cohesion

 swear words and slang

 dialects and accents

 broken language

 use of several languages in the audio-visual programme

 etc

Cultural issues

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 cultural references

 intertextuality

 cross-cultural politeness

 humour

 etc

Cognitive issues

 reading speed

 efficiency (processing ease), effectiveness (processing depth) and appropriacy (correlation

between text, current occasion, and receivers).

 considerations of relevance (see Sperber and Wilson 1986)

Note: the importance, for the audience, of experiencing

the audio-visual programme in a holistic way

Time/space constraints 
Text compression

Constraints

 time constraints: a minimum of 1.5 to 2 seconds display per chunk of subtitles, and a

maximum display of 6.5 to 7 seconds

 space constraints: not more than two lines per screen, and not more than 34-37

characters/line

 rhythm

 cuts

Text compression (cont’d)

Text compression

 the original may need to be reduced with as much as 1/3 (e.g. fast speakers, several

people speaking at the same time, programmes where it is felt that the audience
should be left to focus on the image)

 involves reformulation, summarisation, adaptation

 simplification of syntax

So, how do you decide what to leave out?

Examples: false starts, interjections, (some) repetitions,