Evaluation of Vulgar Language Management - 《冰與火之歌：權力遊戲》業餘字幕與職業字幕比較

Translating the vulgarity of the show is necessary to depict the world of Westeros as it should be in the TT. A visible line divides the translation objectives of both camps, with the prosubs more frequently avoiding vulgar language and or replacing it with a euphemism to the detriment of the TT. For example, both prosubs translated Euron Greyjoy line, “But first I’m gonna fuck the queen” as, 「搞定女王」, which is not something that Euron would say as he is a detestable villain. Most fansubs, other than Visionary Sub, depicted Euron more accurately with the rendering, 「但我先要上了女王」. Certain fansubs would even go so far as to provide glossing for difficult to translate passages containing vulgar language. For example, when Samwell says that Eddison Tollett isn’t technically fucked, FIX was the only group to explain that the implied meaning of “fucked” means to have had sex rather than to say one is doomed. All other translations either omitted the humor of the passage or left the audience very confused. In most instances the fansubs managed vulgar language better, but the fansub camp’s desire to stick to the ST in all cases sometimes had its drawback,

especially when it came to the word “bloody” and “fucking” when used as an adjective. In most cases, it was best to omit these two words and save the translation from unnecessarily vulgar and awkward Chinese. For example, when Arya tells Gendry to take off his own bloody pants, it is best policy to just omit the word “bloody” and translate it as ,「你自己脫褲子」. After all, there is nothing especially 「該死的」 about his pants. Amongst prosub groups, no one group translated vulgar language with higher efficacy than the other, which is not surprising as the DVD subs hardly ever deviated from the TV subtitles.

Chapter Seven Conclusion 7.1 Summary

This paper looked at the success of prosub and fansub groups that translated the HBO fantasy series Game of Thrones. Overall, the prosubs were more conservative and tended to produce better sounding, concise Chinese. As is expected from professional translators and writers in general, they say as much as they can in the least amount of space possible.

Unfortunately, they often played it too safe by avoiding difficult to translate passages and replacing vulgar language with euphemisms. The fansubs were more likely to produce awkward Chinese and certain fansub groups made egregious translation errors. That being said, owing to a desire to convey the spirit of the ST, the fansubs were better at translating the nuances of difficult passages and tended to boldly translate curse words, which lets the

characters in the show reveal their true colors. In some instances, fansub groups provided glossing that explained the humor of certain characters’ lines and ultimately improved the viewing experience of the show. The fansub groups, however, were more likely to produce overly vulgar subtitles due to an overestimation of vulgarity in the ST.

Lumping the TV subtitles and the DVD subtitles under the banner of prosubs and ShinY, Fix, Visionary Sub, and YYeTs under the banner of fansubs makes it difficult to declare a victor as no camp performed flawlessly. Certain groups amongst the two camps provided subtitles of a more consistent quality. Amongst prosubs, the DVD subtitles were more accurate to the ST and possessed better writing skills and amongst fansubs Visionary sub and YYeTs were more consistent and or tackled difficult passages with higher precision.

They were less likely to produce subtitles that reek of translationese, far less likely to make egregious diction errors, and were more sensitive to the importance of necessary vulgar language. The fansub camp as a whole does not pose any significat threat to professional subtitlers; however, the consitant quality of certain fansub groups does. These exemplary

fansubbers both tend to understand the ST better than paid subtitlers and possess good writing skills. Paid subtitlers are usually working alone on a project and under time

constraints and paid poorly for their work. Unless paid subtitlers are paid a fee commensurate with the quality expected, subtitling translation work will be mostly left up to tfansubbers.

This paper was able to demonstrate that there exists a quality gap between prosubs and fansubs but only when lumping all groups together under the banner of prosub or fansub, with some individual fansub groups surpassing the prosubs in dealing with difficult passages.

However, being focused on one TV show, it was not comprehensive nor exhaustive of all TV series spreading across all genres. Applying a qualitative analysis approach, I was able to provide specific examples of both translation camps’ pros and cons, but did not provide quantitative data to statically prove said conclusion.

Further investigations spreading across genre and even language would reveal more concrete and verifiable conclusions about the inherent differences between professional and amateur translations. It would also behoove future researchers to conduct a quantitative study including items such as questionnaires designed to discover the attitude of prosub and fansub audiences, and/or an overall linguistic analysis of semantic/pragmatic differences existing between them. Lastly, analyzing proper nouns for selection and consistency would also yield valuable research data.

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Benioff, D., Weiss, D.B., Martin, G.R.R., Gerardis, V., Vicinanza, R., Casay, G., Strauss, C., … Warner Home Video (Firm). (2019). Game of Thrones: The complete eighth season.

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