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Translating between the lines - Subtitles vs. dubbing in Polish language version of Shrek

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DreamWorks There are many challenges when it comes to translation of films. It can be especially problematic if the dialogues include many cultural references, idioms or humor which can differ greatly across languages and cultures. This often means that there might be multiple approaches to translating such pieces. On one hand, the original meaning should be kept. On the other hand, the dialogues should be understandable and relevant to the audience watching the movie with dubbing or subtitles and this is where a lot of differences appear. These can be seen very clearly in the Polish translation of the film Shrek.   Shrek (part one) is an animated film from 2001 originally released in English language. It became a great success and its popularity quickly spread across the world. It has been translated, dubbed and premiered in Polish cinemas in June 2001. Currently, Shrek is available on Polish Netflix where viewers can choose to watch it with the original audio with subtitles or with P
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How a single word missing in subtitles caused a nation-wide backlash

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What can happen if one word is missed in translation? In some cases, the context could probably allow the reader to still get a general understanding of the sentence, right? But what if the word that is missing is ‘not’? This can definitely cause a problem.  In February 2018, Polish Prime Minister’s Office posted a video on YouTube. In that video, the Prime Minister talks about rather delicate matters including the Holocaust and concentration camps.  1 minute 45 seconds into his speech, he says:   “ Obozy, w których wymordowano miliony Żydów nie były polskie"  which means “ Camps where millions of Jews were murdered were  not  Polish ”. However, anyone who wanted to watch that speech with English subtitles would see something different, actually the opposite of what was said in the video: This mistake was quickly noticed by the online community and the storm begun. Shortly after, the subtitles have been turned off and the Prime Minister’s Office posted a statement on Twitter.  Whi
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How inaccurate subtitles meant Zootopia was less racist in Indonesia

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Disney Are kids films really that deep? In my last blog, we were looking at how mistranslations in subtitles come about, and how they impact the communicative functions of dialogue in film and TV. Here, I thought we could focus on a case study and look at what it tells us about the role intercultural pragmatic awareness plays in how viewers understand broader themes and motifs in international media. Being a man of culture, the likes of the previously mentioned  Inglorious Basterds and Squid Game are unappealing to me, which is why I haven't watched them. Instead, I make sure I expose myself only to the highest quality expressions of artistic prowess, which is why we're zeroing in on a picture I have actually seen and can appreciate as the distillation of spell-binding filmmaking: Disney's Zootopia ( or Zootropolis in some parts of the world). You've read the title. Admittedly, the suggestion that an animated buddy cop movie about an anthropomorphic fox and rabbit inten
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Scaling the "one-inch tall barrier": translating figurative language for subtitles presents some unique challenges

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Netflix (No Squid Game spoilers in the comments please, I've still not seen it) As Bong Joon-ho, South Korean director of Parasite (2019), accepted his Oscar for best picture, he told the audience, "once you overcome the one-inch tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films." (Groskop, 2021) . The number of us using streaming platforms has exploded over the last decade, and as their popularity continues to grow, the sentiment of Joon-Ho's claim is resonating with viewers across the world more, and more. Literally thousands of films, box-sets, animated pictures that have been written, produced and initially released in countries on the other side of the globe are readily available to consumers basically everywhere.  As anyone who has recently binge-watched Squid Game on Netflix will tell you, this new way of consuming visual media means we can easily enjoy top-class art made by international talent, that we would otherwise likely neve
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Speech Acts in Translation

  Speech Acts in Translation Tani Fakile   In Linguistics, a speech act can be described as phrases that are used to perform an act, the act itself being more important than the informational content of the phrase (Austin, 1975). This can cover things like greetings, farewells, and requests etc. As we speak, the action is performed. Speech acts present another challenge for translators to work with. They can differ between cultural groups that even share the same language, let alone groups that speak different languages. For example, despite being born in England, I’ve often found myself confused by the ubiquitous greeting of “alright!/?”. At first glance, this may seem (and indeed it did to me) like a genuine, albeit contracted question, inviting the addressee to respond, perhaps with something along the lines of “yes I’m alright, how are you?”. However, in reality, responding in this way may be met with confusion of discomfort. This phrase is an example of a speech act, and i
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wrong subtitle translations : changing the essence of a character

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  In this blog you will find some curious information about a new and famous Netlflix show... come read! In some occasions, when translating subtitles, the meaning of some words can completely change. This, can become quite confusing for people not only because of what they actually read, but because in their cultures it may mean another thing. In "The quid game" show, new to Netflix, the translation between Korean and Spanish has raised many problems. At one point, in chapter 6, when one of the main characters (Kim) is speaking to Lee to try and convince him or joining his team, a great confusion in translation is made.  In Korean, she says "  난 아주 똑똑해, 공부할 기회가 없었어", which means "I am very smart, I  just never got a chance to study".  The author was trying to represent the prototype of a poor person in Korea that is clever or smart but just isn't wealthy enough to be able to study. He wants people to know about that and the purpose of her character i
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Translation: A Labour of Love

  Welcome to Our Blog! Tani Fakile   As more and more TV shows and movies find their way on to a global stage, the importance of translation is becoming increasingly more apparent. Despite appearing simple, the process of translation is truly intricate and complex, not as easy as entering something into Google Translate and receiving a perfectly accurate script in return. While media executives do have so much to focus on, we are encouraging you to not take the task of translation lightly. From a linguistic perspective, translation from one language to another is not always a 1:1 relationship. Even on a single word level, we often see cases of words that can’t be found in other languages. For example, in the case of concrete nouns, it may be a word for plant that isn’t found in other countries and as such no specific word exists in the languages in other countries. This becomes more complex when we begin to talk about abstract nouns. Take for instance, the Portuguese word ‘saud
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