Film Dubbing Research Articles

Research on the Principles of Translation and Dubbing of Translated Films under the Threshold of Intercultural Perspective

Amidst the deepening tide of globalization, cultural exchange emerges as a pivotal conduit knitting together disparate nations and peoples. The art of dubbing, serving as a significant modality of cultural dissemination, finds its role in intercultural communication increasingly conspicuous. Dubbing transcends mere linguistic conversion; it engenders the transmission and reshaping of cultures, constituting a process of cultural creation in its own right. Consequently, the exploration of intercultural principles in dubbing assumes paramount significance in fostering global cultural exchange. Against the backdrop of globalization, the dubbing of films faces unprecedented challenges and opportunities. On one hand, audiences from diverse cultural backgrounds exhibit varying degrees of comprehension and acceptance towards works, necessitating dubbing to not only ensure linguistic accuracy but also embrace cultural adaptability and innovation. On the other hand, with technological advancements and the application of innovative strategies, the methods and means of dubbing are in constant evolution, offering myriad possibilities for cross-cultural dissemination.

ENGLISH-LANGUAGE FILM TEXTS AS A MATERIAL FOR THE STUDY OF IRONY

The main purpose of the article is to study the use and difficulties of translating irony in English-language film texts. For this purpose, a thorough study of theoretical research on the concept of "irony" was conducted. The increasing demand for Ukrainian-language dubbing of foreign films and the Ukrainization of the film industry make this issue particularly relevant. To achieve this goal, general scientific methods such as analysis, synthesis, historical method and description were used. The article deals with the origin of the phenomenon of irony, sarcasm as a negative form of irony, the peculiarities of multimodal use of irony in film texts and the difficulties of its translation. In the course of analyzing scientific works on the study of irony in the field of cinema such communicative functions of irony as criticism, ridicule and parody were identified. The ways of conveying ironic content were also considered, namely: visual, acoustic and kinesics. The results of this study can be used to identify, interpret and translate irony. The study makes a significant contribution to the scientific heritage of both translation theory and practice and pragmalinguistics. After all, translating irony requires not only deep knowledge of the source and target languages, but also an understanding and ability to interpret the intention of the ironist. The scientific novelty of this study is an attempt to cover and generalize the ways in which irony is used and translated. Given how widespread irony is in film texts, the results of the study indicate that further research is relevant.

«Я понимаю!»: опыт реализации инновационного межвузовского проекта по обучению китайских студентов русскому языку на базе кинопедагогики и «системы Станиславского»

This article presents the results of an academic experiment dedicated to learning Russian by Chinese students, utilizing the program “I Understand!”. “I Understand!” is an innovative system of working on authentic audio-visual film production, this system was created for foreign language speakers learning Russian as second lan-guage (RSL) at B1–B2 level. The program has been implemented in 6 universities in Russia and China since 2022 and is regarded as a first application of elements of academic theatrical methodology (“Stanislavski Method”) and professional dubbing of films by RSL students. The effectiveness of work performed in the dub-bing studios opened at the participating university campuses is justified by the high level of students’ voice-overs for the cartoons and films submitted to the international festival, as well as by the accelerated transition of foreign students to a qualitatively new level of Russian language proficiency – from B1 to B2 and from B2 to C1.

Prejudice in Films in Cross-Cultural Context: Take the Example of Mulan

International communication has become more and more frequent in recent societies, but misunderstandings and miscommunication due to stereotypes inevitably exist in cross-cultural exchanges. Therefore, this paper would analyze the live-action film Mulan, a Chinese story told by Disney that reflects the stereotypes of Chinese culture from the Western perspective. Due to the cultural differences between China and the U.S. (such as the different pursuit of individualism and collectivism), the filmmakers’ misunderstanding of the story, especially the important plot of Mulan replacing her father in the army, Disney sets the core viewpoint of the story as Mulan pursuing proving herself, instead of the traditional Chinese culture’s understanding that Mulan makes the decision to take her father’s place in the army for the sake of her family and the country’s collective interests. There are many other stereotypes in the film, these stereotypes have caused dissatisfaction of Chinese audiences with the film. The paper gives some suggestions to improve the acceptance of cross-cultural film and television works in the local market, like investors can choose local market cultural figures as the film’s main producer. The film producer should be rigorous in the examination of local culture and it is better to choose the local language for the dubbing of cross-cultural films. This paper profoundly analyzes the situations and causes of misunderstandings and deviations in cross-cultural communication and provides suggestions, which to a certain extent improves the efficiency of cross-cultural communication and cross-cultural film and television production in future.

El acento canario en el cine y el teatro españoles: un primer acercamiento

The absence of the Canarian accent in the Spanish Cinema and TV Series is perceived by the inhabitants of the Archipelago as an element of marginality compared to other accents of the Spanish state. However, it is more widespread than we might think as there is a tradition of a type of diction, intonation and melody called «neutral», heir to classical theatre, radio and film dubbing; that was imposed in all film productions in Spanish since the beginning of the last century. The latest Canarian productions generate hope by opening the ear beyond the neutral accent and educating from the richness of one of the outermost European accents. Perhaps in the future our Canarian accent, heir, mestizo and open, but warm and closer to the speech of millions of Spanish-speakers can serve as a substitute for the neutral Castilian accent in audiovisual productions in our language. In this paper we try to analyze more in detail.

Эмоциональная оценка звуков окружающей среды студентами творческих профессий

Background. The present-day mass media and cinema specialists do not pay much attention to the environmental sounds for the effect of creation and putting the viewers and radio listeners into the appropriate emotional atmosphere during the film dubbing and cultural events scoring. Each acoustic event has a specific range and type of emotional impact on people, i.e. each separate sound has a different sort of influence on human beings and brings out specific emotions. Therefore, we come up with an idea that each acoustic event can be classified from the point of view of its emotional impact on human beings by the type and the kind of sentiment. Objective. The aim is to study and analyze the features of the affective evaluation of the environmental sounds by the students of the creative professions. Sample. The pilot study involved 69 students of the Russian Institute of Theatre Arts — GITIS (acting faculty, ballet master faculty and musical theater faculty), of which 26 (38%) were boys and 43 (62%) were girls. 710 verbal units have been encrypted. Methods. The study participants have recorded the environmental sounds that have brought out different kinds of basic emotions in themselves such as guilt, anger, interest, disgust, sadness, scorn, joy, fear, shame, surprise. The audio-record also included the participant’s comments concerning the date and time, sound source and the reasons for the emotions’ uprise. Later on the received data were transformed into text and processed with the procedures of inductive and frequency analysis. Results. The results of the frequency analysis revealed the groups of the environmental sounds bringing out the basic emotions from the point of view of the students of the creative professions. Guilt was brought out by the sounds expressing the complaints against you from other people; anger and scorn were evoked by the sounds made by the person who intentionally breaks the rules of social behavior; interest and sadness were aroused with the sounds of musical instruments, music and speech; disgust was brought out by the physiological sounds of other people, and shame was evoked by the sounds of one’s own physiological sounds; fear arose with sudden shrilling sounds; surprise was brought out by the sounds giving us a notice about some new piece of information. Conclusion. The results of the frequency analysis confirm that the environmental sounds can help in modeling different kinds of emotional impact.

TACTICS OF TRANSLATING ENGLISH FILM TITLES INTO UKRAINIAN LANGUAGE

The full-scale Russian-Ukrainian war proved the need to abandon everything that is a marker of the aggressor country, in particular, Russian-language content. With this in mind, the translation and dubbing of foreign films into Ukrainian are worth paying attention to. The film title serves as the key to its success. It's a kind of a sign of the work which introduces the film.
 The article analyzes the main tactics of translating film titles from English to Ukrainian. To find out the specifics of playing film titles in the conditions of the new artistic reality, the film titles posted on the resource https://eneyida.tv/ were selected. Translations were made by film distribution companies "Старий майстер", "MEGOGO Voice", "Так Треба Продакшн", "НЛО TV", "MVO", "Line In", "UFD", "DUB", etc.
 Film titles are included in the objects of the secondary nomination, which is interpreted as the designation of elements of reality with the help of ready-made language units. The translation of nomen appears as a variant nomination since it is not an object that is nominated, but a variant that functions in other national and cultural spheres and which is related to the original name as a variant and invariant.
 Three main tactics of translating English film titles into Ukrainian have been identified and characterized: direct translation, transformational translation, and indirect translation (full replacement of the film title). In direct translation, the film title preserves the original idea as much as possible. In the array of Ukrainian equivalents that arose as a result of direct translation, filmonyms-monolexes, names-phrases formed according to the Adj+N model, and movie titles containing three or more full-meaning words are differentiated.
 The essence of transformation as a type of translation tactic is clarified and the following methods of transformation are analyzed: substitution, expansion, and truncation of the component composition of the filmonym. Among the researched material, a number of methods of transformation of the primary name are singled out: specification, generalization, compensation, antonymic translation, and semantic development. It has been established that indirect translation, or full replacement of the name, is used for names containing various culturally specific components.

Information-Theoretic Method for Assessing the Quality of Translations.

In recent years, the task of translating from one language to another has attracted wide attention from researchers due to numerous practical uses, ranging from the translation of various texts and speeches, including the so-called "machine" translation, to the dubbing of films and numerous other video materials. To study this problem, we propose to use the information-theoretic method for assessing the quality of translations. We based our approach on the classification of sources of text variability proposed by A.N. Kolmogorov: information content, form, and unconscious author's style. It is clear that the unconscious "author's" style is influenced by the translator. So researchers need special methods to determine how accurately the author's style is conveyed, because it, in a sense, determines the quality of the translation. In this paper, we propose a method that allows us to estimate the quality of translation from different translators. The method is used to study translations of classical English-language works into Russian and, conversely, Russian classics into English. We successfully used this method to determine the attribution of literary texts.

Investigating the Effects of Online English Film Dubbing Activities on the Intelligibility and Comprehensibility of Chinese Students’ English Pronunciation

Intelligibility and comprehensibility in English learners’ pronunciation plays a vital role in effective communication. Empirical studies show that Chinese English learners have difficulties achieving a high level of intelligibility and comprehensibility in their English pronunciation, one possible cause being the lack authentic context for pronunciation practice. Mobile-assisted Language Learning (MALL), i.e., language learning assisted or enhanced through the use of a handheld mobile device, is reported to provide a more authentic and therefore robust learning environment for EFL learners. This research explored the impact of online English film dubbing activities using mobile phones (MALL) on the intelligibility and comprehensibility of Chinese English learners’ English pronunciation. We recruited two classes of first-year college students, one as the experimental group and the other the control group. Recordings of the two classes were collected before and after the online English film dubbing activities, and a questionnaire was administered to the experimental group. The findings show that online English film dubbing activities positively influenced the performance of the EG’s English pronunciation in intelligibility and comprehensibility. The results from the questionnaires showed general positive attitudes towards the online English film dubbing activity.

Malawians’ Foreign Film Dubbing, Film Pirating and Consumption as “Weapons of the Weak”

ABSTRACT None of the multinational companies has ever released any film in Malawi – a so-called "fourth world” whose GDP per capita is fourth from the bottom in the world (as of 2018). However, global films are widely found there, including in remote areas. Based on detailed fieldwork materials collected in Malawi, this article discusses the topic of foreign film dubbing (pirating) and consumption in Malawi. After the discussion, this article provides examples of how a "fourth world”, which is excluded by global film networks, inserts itself back into that network again, and further stays connected to the globe.

A Research on the Integration of Traditional Culture into College English Teaching Under the Background of “Internet +”

The advent of the era of “Internet +” has opened up a new channel for college English teaching and improved its quality. However, college students tend to overlook traditional culture as they place greater emphasis on learning English grammar, along with British and American cultures. Teachers should attempt to change students’ attitude in time [1]. College English teachers can utilize the high-quality English resources on the internet, create information-based courses, use micro courses to share British and American film clips, establish English associations, organize English poetry recitation, drama performance, and film dubbing activities, carry out English-Chinese translation training, improve students’ cross-cultural awareness, and ensure that traditional culture takes root in college English classes.

Attribuer un sens: la diversité des pratiques langagières et les représentations sociales éd. par Kristin Reinke

Reviewed by: Attribuer un sens: la diversité des pratiques langagières et les représentations sociales éd. par Kristin Reinke Amanda Dalola Reinke, Kristin, éd. Attribuer un sens: la diversité des pratiques langagières et les représentations sociales. PU de Laval, 2020. ISBN 978-2-7637-4884-9. Pp. 320. This volume investigates how the sociohistorical—political and cultural—contexts of Francophone North America have influenced the social representations of French-speaking communities, and how these representations have impacted present-day linguistic practices and perceptions of them. With an introduction and ten articles, the collection orders itself according to functional objective. The first five chapters explore the construct of a standard French variety in light of localized variation found in specialized contexts: diatopic phonetic variation in televised interviews, lexical variation in an online dictionary, (morpho)syntactic variation in SMS, age and first language-induced typographical variation in computer-mediated communication, and variation in film dubbing practices in Québec for Québécois audiences. While the first unit of the volume celebrates linguistic diversity via micro-sociolinguistic analyses of practice, the second half discusses the broader social meanings attributed to the cultural diversity of language practices in heterogeneous communities where French is just one of speakers' many possible codes. An investigation of young immigrant Francophones in Montréal, for instance, revealed that first-generation users retained the phonetic features of their first language when speaking French, while subsequent generations did not. Meanwhile, Franco-Ontarian teens who seemed to sample freely from French and English resumptive discourse markers when speaking French—(ça) fait que, donc, alors, so—were found to index their linguistic identity through their rates of use of two variants in particular: so and (ça) fait que. Those who identified as French-English bilinguals used higher rates of so, while those who identified as Francophone instead used higher rates of (ça) fait que. Other chapters explore minority Francophone communities in different locales—Ontario, Alberta, Haiti—to demonstrate that the sociolinguistic identity of a speaker, taken together with the unique identity of their local community, and the regularity and meaningfulness of their repeated interactions with other Francophones in it, are just as significant at predicting patterns of sociolinguistic variation as the often cited phenomenon of language contact. This message contributes to the larger objective of the work, which is not only to represent North American Frenches in plural, contemporary, and nuanced contexts, but to do so veraciously, such that readers are disabused of common misconceptions surrounding language use and variation and the sociocultural mechanisms that motivate them. This text is a useful addition to any curriculum showcasing themes of French (socio)linguistics, language and identity, and/or language variation in digital media. Although the magnitude of its message is greatest when enjoyed together, each of the volume's ten chapters is impressive enough to be read on its own. A celebration of sociolinguistic diversity [End Page 266] in varieties of North American French, this volume more than earns its title for encouraging readers to consider the multifaceted importance of attributing meaning to every level of language and society. [End Page 267] Amanda Dalola University of South Carolina Copyright © 2022 American Association of Teachers of French

The reception of swearing in film dubbing: a cross-cultural case study

ABSTRACT Swear words express and arouse emotions and due to their taboo-contravening origin are charged with an offensive potential. By mirroring the functions they perform in real life, they contribute to the makeup of audiovisual language and intensify filmic speech. Although swearing has long attracted the attention of audiovisual translation research, little consideration has been paid to viewers’ reactions. To address this gap, the present paper engages with the reception of swear words in film dubbing, while exploring the differences across two distinct linguacultures. Through a questionnaire-based methodology, it compares two groups of Italian and Spanish university students and their reactions to dubbed vis-à-vis domestic film clips. The results suggest that both Italian and Spanish groups’ tolerance for swearing onscreen is quite high. The Spanish participants, however, appear to be more lenient towards this phenomenon and more permissive with the staging of potentially offensive language in home productions. By contrast, Italian participants show similar levels of acceptance when they react to swearing in dubbing and Italian filmic speech. The two groups’ overall responses and their diverging orientations are discussed with reference to the cross-linguistic and intercultural dimensions of film viewing and distinctive preferences in audiovisual discourse.

Film Dubbing and Collaborative Pedagogy

ABSTRACT In this article, we discuss the multi-layered collaboration occurring among students, between students and teachers, and among instructors in the context of an advanced Italian course at the college level. We specifically showcase the project-based learning activity Ma chi parla? (Who Is Talking?), during which students generated the audiovisual translation from English to Italian of film and television show excerpts. We argue that, in its implementation in fall 2018 at our institution, Ma chi parla? fostered creativity, engagement, and pluralism thanks to its collaborative structure, in addition to establishing a decentralised co-laboratory of cultural experiences. The article also frames Ma chi parla? as a starting point to reflect on audiovisual translation, in particular dubbing, as a long-standing tradition in Italy, to illuminate its history, to question its cultural effects, and to problematise its pedagogical applications.

What Film Translation can Tell us About the Creation of Meaning, the Role of Accents and Gestures – A Few Essayistic Remarks About Multimodality

AbstractThis article aims to illustrate some aspects of film dubbing that are of interest to research in cognition and in particular to cognitive linguistics. Dubbed films contain unavoidable discrepancies between the lip movements and (other) gestures perceived visually and the sounds that are heard. Widening the scope to the issue of different accents of speakers, it is argued that multimodal construction grammar should investigate all modes of meaningful communicative behavior but that this does not necessarily imply the postulation of multimodal constructions as such.

To See Paris and Die: The Soviet Lives of Western Culture

To See Paris and Die: The Soviet Lives of Western Culture

Редактирование зарубежных фильмов в СССР как культурно- исторический феномен

The powers of Soviet fi lm editing extended not only to the sphere of creating domestic fi lms, but also to such areas as the selection and distribution of foreign fi lms. The topic of the article is ideological and aesthetic criteria by which a foreign picture received the right to be shown in the USSR. Editor’s work aff ected all the elements of the cinema process: from the «little things in life» to the fundamental issues of confronting social systems. The rental of a foreign – especially «capitalist» fi lms, sometimes of the most innocent content, nevertheless assumed the presence of a certain ideological message (even if it was not originally intended). One way or another, an idea should have formed in the viewer’s mind: the bourgeois “foreign land” is inevitably inferior to the advantages of living in the country of “triumphant socialism”. The fi lm background of analysis is mainly the work of leading capitalist cinematographies: USA, France, Italy, Germany and Japan. The directions of editorial work related to the adaptation of foreign paintings for the Soviet screen are considered: “political” and “aesthetic” remounting; practice of the names and “renaming” of the fi lm; the reasons why the contents were cut; culture of Soviet film dubbing; the history of «shelf» foreign fi lms in the USSR.

AN ICY FORCE BOTH FOUL AND FAIR: THE THEME OF LOVE VERSUS FEAR IN THE DUTCH DUBBED VERSION OF DISNEY’S FROZEN

Abstract:This study compares the songs from the original, English-language version of the 2013 Disney filmFrozento those of the Dutch dubbed version, investigating how the thematic representation of love and fear differ between these versions. To support this inherently qualitative analysis, this study employs the triangle of aspects, an analytical model that identifies certain aspects and variables central to animated musical film dubbing, allowing a quantification of differences between dubbed versions. It is found that the dubbed songs differ most strongly from the original songs in the verbal code, which covers issues such as semantic sense and register, and least in the musical code, which concerns matters of rhyme scheme, rhythm, and singability. The effects of the changes are a slight backgrounding of the theme of love versus fear: whereas the source version presents and explores a clear dichotomy between love and fear, the dubbed version concentrates more on love as the ultimate goal of life, eliminating much of the importance of fear. These results show that quantitative data can be useful in qualitative analyses, presenting an important step in the development of the field of animated musical film dubbing within translation studies.

Familiar Strangers: Images and Voices of Soviet Allies in Dubbed Films in 1950s China

After the establishment of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), dubbed Soviet films became an important tool to promote the Sino-Soviet alliance among the Chinese people. This essay explores the representation of the Soviet allies through the dubbing of Soviet films in 1950s China, with a focus on not only the content of these voices, but also the techniques and aesthetics of voicing. It shows that although designed by the PRC to produce an image of the Soviets as relatable and familiar, these films also produced an image of strangers, which allowed alternative imaginations of the Soviet characters and the Sino-Soviet relationship. This paper argues for the ambiguity of the image of the “Soviet big brothers” in dubbed films in the 1950s, which disrupted the official imagination of the relationship between the Chinese and the world.

“Language”, “Image” and “Meaning” of the Film Dubbing Art - a Case Study of THE SOUND

Recently, with the popularity of the TV program THE SOUND and the similar voice competition TV performance , dubbing actors and this industry are coming into the public notice gradually. Dating back to the pre-Qin dynasty, the theory of “Language”, “Image” and “Meaning” has appeared in the traditional Chinese art. For instance, “Language” cannot convey “Meaning” entirely; form “Image” to complete “Meaning”; gain “Meaning” and ignore “Image”. The relationship among them is the dialectical unity. Artists are required to integrate the three things organically in the artistic creation, creating excellent works of art. Film dubbing art is a kind of artistic creation, so this paper will take the TV program THE SOUND as an example to analyze how the dubbing actors use the three aspects of “Language”, “Image” and “Meaning” flexibly.