電影中雙關語與慣用語之字幕翻譯策略：以三部台灣電影為例

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(1)國立屏東教育大學英語學系碩士班碩士論文 Department of English National Pingtung University of Education Master’s Thesis. 電影中雙關語與慣用語之字幕翻譯策略：以三部台灣電影為例 STRATEGIES FOR TRANSLATING PUNS AND IDIOMATIC EXPRESSIONS AS DEMONSTRATED IN THREE TAIWANESE FILMS. 指導教授：余慧珠博士 Advisor ： Dr. Hui-chu Yu 研究生：朱正揚 Graduate Student ： Cheng-yang Chu. 中華民國 102 年 7 月 July 2013.

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(4) Acknowledgement. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my thesis advisor, Dr. Hui-chu Yu, for her insightful advice, patient instruction, and constant encouragement throughout the research process. Without her thoughtful guidance, the completion of this thesis would not be possible. I would also like to thank my committee members, Dr. Yong Chen, who not only taught me a lot during my graduate studies but also cared much about my career plans, and Dr. Wei-cheng Lin from NCNU, whose precious suggestions inspired me and broadened my view on the field of translation research. Besides, I appreciate all the professors who have instructed me in my graduate education, Dr. Jackie Chang, Dr. Li-hung Chang, Dr. Lily Chang, Dr. Kimberly Dawn Heeren, Dr. Jong-shing Liang, Dr. Tsae-tzy Wang, Dr. Pei-chen Wu, Dr. Hsin-hsin Yang, and Dr. Hsiu-hsiu Yang.. Because of their earnest teachings and enlightening. lectures, my graduate school years could be full of challenges and inspirations.. In. addition, I would like to thank the executive assistant of the English Department, Greta Liu, who was always patient to answer my questions and helped me a lot on many things. I could not accomplish this thesis and my graduate studies without the love and support from my families, especially my parents, my parents-in-law, my wife, and my baby boy.. It was their sincere consideration that helped me pass through the hard. times in my graduate school years. I truly thank my wife for her understanding and for taking care of everything at home while I was away studying.. Special thanks to. my son, whose innocent smile always cheers me up and gives me hope. I dedicate this thesis to my dearest families. me moving forward.. They are the strength that keeps. I love them with all my heart!.

(5) 電影中雙關語與慣用語之字幕翻譯策略：以三部台灣電影為例. 摘要. 長久以來，台灣電影的英文字幕一直扮演著本土電影與外國觀眾之間相互溝通的重要橋梁，然而在過去的翻譯研究當中，這些英文字幕卻很少受到應有的重視。有鑑於此，本研究特別選定三部近年來廣受歡迎的台灣電影：海角七號、雞. 排英雄、陣頭，針對片中經常出現的雙關語和慣用語，分析其英文字幕所使用的翻譯策略，並探討其英文字幕如何藉由不同的翻譯策略表現出對白的原意，經逐一檢視片中相關的翻譯實例，本研究也會歸納整理出在何種情況下適合採用何種翻譯策略，以提供有心從事字幕翻譯工作者做為參考。. 關鍵字：翻譯策略、字幕、雙關語、慣用語. i.

(6) STRATEGIES FOR TRANSLATING PUNS AND IDIOMATIC EXPRESSIONS AS DEMONSTRATED IN THREE TAIWANESE FILMS. Abstract. Although playing an important role in communicating between local films and foreign audience worldwide, the English subtitles of Taiwanese films have not received as much attention as they are supposed to in previous translation studies. To bridge this gap in research, this study examines the English subtitles of three recent popular Taiwanese films: Cape No.7, Night Market Hero, and Din Tao: Leader of the Parade.. Focusing on the puns and idiomatic expressions in the films, the study. analyzes what translation strategies are used in subtitling the spoken lines into English as well as how the English subtitles represent the original meanings of the spoken lines by adopting these strategies. By demonstrating with numerous examples, the study also suggests how certain strategies can be used in translating puns and idiomatic expressions in the films under certain circumstances so that the findings can be provided as practical reference for subtitle translators of Taiwanese films or anyone interested in this subject.. Keywords: translation strategy, subtitle, pun, idiomatic expression. ii.

(7) Table of Contents Chinese Abstract ........................................................................................................... i English Abstract ...........................................................................................................ii Table of Contents ....................................................................................................... iii List of Tables ................................................................................................................ iv List of Figures .............................................................................................................. iv Chapter One Introduction........................................................................................... 1 Background and Motivation ............................................................................... 1 Statement of the Problem .................................................................................... 1 Purpose of the Study ............................................................................................ 3 Significance of the Study ..................................................................................... 4 Limitations of the Study ...................................................................................... 5 Definition of Terms .............................................................................................. 6 Chapter Two Literature Review ................................................................................. 8 Translation Theories and Strategies ................................................................... 8 Translating Puns ................................................................................................ 16 Translating Idiomatic Expressions ................................................................... 18 Empirical Studies about Subtitle Translation ................................................. 21 Theses in Taiwan about Subtitle Translation .................................................. 23 Chapter Three Methods ............................................................................................ 27 Rationale ............................................................................................................. 27 Research Samples............................................................................................... 27 Data Collection and Analysis ............................................................................ 28 Trustworthiness .................................................................................................. 32 Chapter Four Findings and Discussion .................................................................... 35 Translating Puns in Subtitling .......................................................................... 35 Translating Idiomatic Expressions in Subtitling ............................................. 52 Chapter Five Conclusions and Implications............................................................ 76 Summary of the Study ....................................................................................... 76 Implications for Subtitle Translation ............................................................... 78 Suggestions for Further Research .................................................................... 80 References ................................................................................................................... 81 Appendixes.................................................................................................................. 87 Appendix A Classification of Translation Strategies (Task 1) ........................ 87 Appendix B Classification of Translation Strategies (Task 2) ........................ 91 Appendix C Classification of Translation Strategies (Attachment) .............. 95 Appendix D Puns in the Three Selected Films ................................................ 97 Appendix E Idiomatic Expressions in the Three Selected Films ................... 99 iii.

(8) List of Tables Table 1 The classification system of translation strategies in the present study .......... 29 Table 2 Use frequency of translation strategies for puns ............................................. 36 Table 3 Use frequency of translation strategies for idiomatic expressions .................. 53. List of Figures Figure 1 The progression of translation strategies in a diagram .................................. 16. iv.

(9) Chapter One Introduction. Background and Motivation In addition to Chinese subtitles, Taiwanese films in theaters, on DVDs, or for overseas film festivals, often include English subtitles.. For foreign audience, these. English subtitles serve as a key to understand these films and perhaps to know further about Taiwanese or Chinese culture. Although these English subtitles are important as they communicate between not only two languages but also two cultures, so far they have not been much discussed in translation studies either in Taiwan or abroad. Due to the lack of formal research and proper guidance, there are still many doubts about how these local films are subtitled into English. Since the huge success of Cape No.7 in 2008, the entire box office of Taiwanese films has been growing enormously.. More and more local films have become box. office hits and received the attention of foreign audience and film distribution companies as well (Hsu, 2011; S. Y. Lin, 2013; M. J. Tsai, 2011).. As the English. subtitles of these popular films can easily affect how target language audience view or appreciate the films, it is significant to examine these subtitles and find out how they represent the rich Taiwanese cultural and linguistic features in the spoken lines. Therefore, in the hope that more appealing local films can be understood and enjoyed by foreign audience worldwide in the future, this study investigates the English subtitles of Taiwanese films and provides the findings as practical reference for subtitle translators of Taiwanese films or anyone who is interested in this subject.. Statement of the Problem In translation processes, it is likely to encounter certain terms or expressions that 1.

(10) are so unique to the source language that “there is no obvious official equivalent” in the target language (Pedersen, 2005, p. 1). Such kind of terms may be very unfamiliar to target language viewers and need to be rendered with various translation strategies. Especially when dealing with puns and idiomatic expressions, the challenges result from not only the differences between two languages but also the knowledge gaps between two cultures.. A pun is often used to create a humorous,. ironic, or rhyming effect in the context by using a word that has more than one meaning, or words that have different meanings but sound the same or similarly. example, the words 帶 and 娶 are both pronounced as [tshua] in Taiwanese. former means to bring, take, or lead, while the latter to marry.. For The. If a man says in. Taiwanese that he wants to bring someone along, others may make fun of him since it sounds like he wants to marry that person.. Due to the differences in pronunciation,. puns in one language usually cannot be comprehended by the speakers of another language if translated literally.. Also, an idiomatic expression often involves. connotation between the lines and is unlikely to be spoken the same way in another language. For instance, the Taiwanese saying 人在吃米粉你在喊燒 [lang teh tsiah bi hun li teh huah sio] literally means that you feel hot while someone else is eating rice noodles, but it actually implies that it’s none of your business. If the expression is translated by its literal meaning, it will not make too much sense to target language viewers. The challenges in subtitling can be even more complicated than those in translating a printed document such as a book or a magazine.. In subtitling, the. amount of words shown on the screen at the same time is limited and each line of words only appears a few seconds to match the timing of the oral dialogue.. Under. these particular restrictions of space and time, the translated subtitles tend to be concise and even reductive so that they can be more readable to the audience (Y. X. Li, 2.

(11) 2001).. Even when dealing with certain unique terms that are supposed to be. explained with plenty of descriptions, subtitle translators still have to use as few words as possible and maintain the correspondence between the subtitles and the visual contents on the screen (Tortoriello, 2006).. Therefore, various translation. strategies are required as well. In subtitling, translators often tackle with the difficulties in rendering certain terms that are unique to the source language as well as the translation strategies that are available.. Such issues have been widely investigated in the translation between. English and other languages (Matielo & Espindola, 2011; Pedersen, 2005; Ramière, 2006; Tortoriello, 2006), but not in the field of subtitling Taiwanese films into English. To bridge this gap in research studies and provide practical reference for subtitle translators of Taiwanese films to work with, it is necessary to find out what translation strategies are commonly used in the English subtitles of Taiwanese films, especially when dealing with certain unique terms like puns and idiomatic expressions.. Purpose of the Study To find out what translation strategies can be used in subtitling Taiwanese films into English, this study examines the English subtitles of three recent Taiwanese films: Cape No.7, Night Market Hero, and Din Tao: Leader of the Parade, with particular focus on puns and idiomatic expressions. The research questions are as follows: 1.. What strategies are used for translating the puns and idiomatic expressions in the films into English, and what is the use frequency of each strategy?. 2.. How do the English subtitles represent the original meanings of the puns and idiomatic expressions in the films by using these translation strategies?. 3.. What translation strategies are more applicable for rendering the puns and 3.

(12) idiomatic expressions in the films into English?. Significance of the Study The significance of this study is as follows: First, this study analyzes the translated English subtitles of three Taiwanese films. The rendition is from a combination of Mandarin, especially the Mandarin spoken in Taiwan (also known as Guoyu; 國語), and common dialects in Taiwan such as Taiwanese and Hakka1 into English through subtitling.. So far, this kind of research. is still rarely seen in Taiwan and abroad. Second, in contrast with the Taiwanese films selected in previous translation studies (M. Y. Yang, 2008; Y. C. Yang, 2009), the research samples of this study are three of the top-selling Taiwanese films released during 2008 to 2012 and are all local comedies filled with Taiwanese cultural features and humorous elements.. The films. not only represent parts of local culture but also are enjoyed by millions of audience members.. Therefore, these three films can be very suitable research samples for. understanding how Taiwanese cultural and linguistic features are translated into English through subtitling. Third, among previous empirical studies about subtitle translation, many of them did not describe how frequently certain translation strategies are adopted in the selected movies or TV series (for example, C. Chen, 2005; J. Tang, 2008; Tortoriello, 2006).. Thus, the readers could not tell whether the examples discussed in these. studies belonged to usual or special cases. To better support the findings, this study not only collects and analyzes all the cases of puns and idiomatic expressions found in the films but also provides the use frequency of each translation strategy so that the 1. Although the source languages include Hakka, no puns or idiomatic expressions pronounced in Hakka are found in the films. As a result, the terms collected for data analysis in this study do not include the lines spoken in Hakka. 4.

(13) readers can have a more concrete idea of what strategies are more commonly employed in the films.. Also, those who are interested in the translation of movies. can understand what kinds of techniques are more preferred by some of the professional translators. Last, by examining various cases found in the films, this study also suggests several strategies that are appropriate for translating Chinese or Taiwanese puns and idiomatic expressions into English through subtitling.. Limitations of the Study The limitations of this study are as follows: First, the research samples are merely three Taiwanese local comedies. The results of the study represent the situations in these three films and may not be applicable to all other Taiwanese movies. Also, since the dialogue in these three films is often presented in a local comedic style, the findings may not be applied to the films of other genres, for example, drama, action, thriller, science fiction, documentary, etc. Second, this study focuses particularly on the puns and idiomatic expressions spoken in the films.. Other kinds of terms or utterances appeared in the movies are. not taken into consideration, though they may also be quite unique to Chinese or Taiwanese culture. Third, the analysis emphasizes more on how the translated English subtitles express the original connotations or achieve the intended effects of the spoken lines through certain translation strategies.. Therefore, it does not particularly discuss. about the changes of grammatical or syntactical structures in the translation processes, such as the modifications in word order, part of speech, voice of speech, sentence patterns, etc. 5.

(14) Definition of Terms Translation Strategy. According to Lorscher (1991), a translation strategy refers to “a potentially conscious procedure for the solution of a problem which an individual is faced with when translating a text segment from one language into another” (as cited in Kearns, 2009, p. 283). There are nine major types of translation strategies classified in this study, including transliteration, literal translation, specification, annotation, generalization, paraphrase, cultural substitution, adaptation, and omission. Subtitling. According to Gonzalez (2009), subtitling or captioning “involves a shift from a spoken to a written medium” and “consists of the production of snippets of written text to be superimposed on visual footage - normally near the bottom of the frame - while an audiovisual text is projected, played, or broadcast” (p. 14). are two major types of subtitles: intra-lingual and inter-lingual.. There. The former are. composed in the same language as the original speech, while the latter provide a written rendition from the source text speech into another language.. In this study,. the term subtitling mainly refers to inter-lingual subtitling. Taiwanese film. According to the official website of Ministry of Culture, Taiwanese films refer to films that conform to one of the following situations: at least one-half of the main actors and actresses are citizens of Taiwan, ROC; the directors and at least one-fourth of the main actors and actresses are citizens of Taiwan, ROC; at least one-third of the scenes are shot in Taiwan and at least one-third of the main actors and actresses are citizens of Taiwan, ROC; the films are post-produced in Taiwan and at least one-third of the main actors and actresses are citizens of Taiwan, ROC. Guoyu.. In this study, the term Guoyu (國語) refers especially to the Mandarin 6.

(15) spoken in Taiwan.. Influenced by its pronunciation, accent, vocabulary use, and. orthography (written in Traditional Chinese characters), Guoyu is not exactly the same as the Mandarin spoken in Mainland China (also known as Putonghua; 普通話) or elsewhere.. Therefore, the Mandarin spoken in Taiwanese films may also sound. different from the Mandarin spoken in other Chinese films made in Mainland China, Hong King, Singapore, etc. Pun.. According to the online Oxford Dictionaries, a pun is defined as “a joke. exploiting the different possible meanings of a word or the fact that there are words which sound alike but have different meanings.”. In other words, a pun refers to a. humorous, amusing, or clever use of a word that has more than one meaning, or of words that have different meanings but sound the same or similarly. Idiomatic expressions. This term refers to a combination of idioms, proverbs slang, and other fixed phrases that are common and natural to a native speaker of a language. Since the concepts of idioms, proverbs, slang, and other similar terms may sometimes overlap, a more general term idiomatic expressions is used to encompass the above terms for data collection and analysis in this study.. 7.

(16) Chapter Two Literature Review. Translation Theories and Strategies Among the various translation theories proposed by different researchers, many of them share two major concepts: source-language (SL) orientation and target-language (TL) orientation.. SL orientation refers to a concept that the. translated text tend to conform to the source language/culture as well as the form and meaning of the original text.. Theories conforming to this concept include formal. equivalence (Nida, 1964/2004), semantic translation (Newmark, 1988), foreignization2 (Venuti, 1995), etc. On the contrary, TL orientation is a concept that the translated text tend to conform to the target language/culture, so that it may appear more acceptable and familiar to the target audience.. Theories of this kind include. dynamic equivalence (Nida, 1964/2004), communicative translation (Newmark, 1988), domestication (Venuti, 1995), etc. The arguments between SL orientation and TL orientation in translation studies have been going on for at least decades. As Newmark (1988) has pointed out, “the central problem of translating has always been whether to translate literally or freely” (p. 45).. Although the above concepts or theories brought forth by the scholars can. serve as central guidelines or beliefs for translators to choose and follow, in practical translation processes, the situations are often somewhere in between these two orientations. On a case-by-case basis, translators need to decide when to be more SL-oriented and when to be more TL-oriented. Even in translating one single document or subtitling one single film, the translation strategies or procedures used 2. Foreignization (Venuti, 1995) is the strategy of making the translated text closely conform to the source language/culture, and therefore the translated text may appear foreign or exotic to target-language viewers. 8.

(17) may vary from word to word or from sentence to sentence. It is not likely to just follow one central guideline and go all the way through.. To understand more about. how a source text is translated into a target text, it is necessary to look into the practical translation strategies proposed by different researchers. In practical translation processes, there can be a series of translation strategies ranging from the most SL-oriented to the most TL-oriented. As argued by Ramière (2006), “most classifications of translation strategies follow a common general progression from the most exoticising to the most domesticating” (p. 156).. Among. various translation strategies, some tend to be more SL-oriented, while others tend to be more TL-oriented. There are also some strategies that seem to be more neutral. Based on previous studies about translating between English and other languages (Baker, 1992; Newmark, 1988; Pedersen, 2005; Vinay & Darbelnet, 1995/2004) and translating between English and Chinese (T. T. Chang, 1989; D. A. Chen, 1997; Y. X. Li, 2001; Zhang & Wang, 2010), there are at least nine types of basic strategies, including retention, literal translation, specification, annotation, generalization, paraphrase, cultural substitution, adaptation, and omission. The following sections review and illustrate these strategies together with the corresponding examples found in the English subtitles of the three selected Taiwanese films. Retention. This strategy may be the most SL-oriented since it simply “allows an element from the source language to enter the target text” (Pedersen, 2005, p. 4). Other treatments similar to this kind include transference (Newmark, 1988), borrowing (Vinay & Darbelnet, 1995/2004), and the use of loanwords (Baker, 1992). However, in Chinese-English translation, it is unlikely to directly borrow a word from the source language into the target text because the writing systems of these two languages are completely different.. Therefore, it is more appropriate to use the term. transliteration, which refers to “the conversion of different alphabets” or writing 9.

(18) systems (Newmark, 1988, p. 81).. Such strategy is most commonly used in. translating proper names of people, places, organizations, etc. For example, in the film Cape No.7, the term 恆春, the name of a town in southern Pingtung County, is translated as Hengchun in the English subtitles. This is a kind of transliteration since it simply converts the Chinese characters into the corresponding letters of the English alphabet. Literal translation. Similar to direct translation (D. A. Chen, 1997; Y. X. Li, 2001; Pedersen, 2005), this strategy directly renders “a source language text into a grammatically and idiomatically appropriate target language text” (Vinay & Darbelnet, 1995/2004, p. 130).. Different from plain word-for-word translation, literal. translation needs to follow the grammatical or idiomatic rules in the target language. Therefore, certain modifications in grammatical or syntactical structures are very likely to be made, for example, inversing the word order, transposing the part of speech, modulating the voice of speech, and adding or reducing certain function words.. As long as “the semantic load of the source texts is unchanged” (Pedersen,. 2005, p. 5), these modifications can also be regarded as literal translation. For example, in Cape No.7, the Chinese term 孔雀之珠 [kong que zhi zhu], the name of a handicraft, is subtitled as Bead of Peacock in English.. Instead of following the. original word sequence “Peacock’s Bead,” the rendition directly transfers the source text into a grammatically appropriate target text, with no relevant information added or subtracted. Specification. Similar to notes, additions, or glosses (Newmark, 1988), the strategy of specification means leaving the original term “in its untranslated form, but adding information” that is latent in the source text so that the target text can be more specific than the source text (Pedersen, 2005, p. 4).. In Chinese-English translation,. it is unlikely to leave the source text “in its untranslated form” since the writing 10.

(19) systems of these two languages are totally different.. Therefore, a more appropriate. specification for Chinese-English translation is to keep the source text in its transliterated or literally translated form and add supplementary information to make the target text more specific.. For example, if the name of a person who is. well-known only to the SL culture is mentioned in the original text, the translator may add the person’s title or label beside his/her name in the translated text through this strategy.. Another example of this kind is found in the film Night Market Hero.. The Chinese term 金門 is translated as Jin-Men Island in the English subtitles.. In. here, Jin-Men is the transliterated form of 金門, while Island is the added information to make the target text more explicit than the source text. Annotation.. Similar to specification, this strategy also involves adding extra. information to explain the original text, but the additional description is placed in parentheses, brackets, or as footnotes. As the added information can be written as another phrase or sentence apart from the main text, it may somehow interrupt readers’ or viewers’ flow of attention (D. A. Chen, 1997; Newmark, 1988).. For. example, in the film Din Tao: Leader of the Parade, the Chinese term 抓周 is translated as zhuazhuo (a traditional ritual predicting a child’s future) in the English subtitles. The explanatory information is added in parentheses instead of being merged into the main text. Generalization. As this strategy involves replacing the original term that refers to “something specific” by another term that refers to “something more general” (Pedersen, 2005, p. 6), it is more like an opposite way of specification.. Furthermore,. it resembles what Newmark (1988) defined as functional equivalent, which “requires the use of a culture-free word” and therefore generalizes or neutralizes the source text (p. 83).. Sometimes generalization may be an expediency when the item or idea. referred in the source text is quite unique to the SL culture and the translator does not 11.

(20) feel like spending too much effort to explain it explicitly.. For example, in Night. Market Hero, the Taiwanese term 薏仁 [i jin], referring to a kind of grain from Southeast Asia called Job’s tears, is subtitled simply as grain in English. The rendition replaces the original term with something less specific.. In another example,. the original spoken lines 從基隆到高雄，從台中到台東 (From Keelung to Kaohsiung and from Taichung to Taitung) are subtitled as From north to south, east to west.. The names of the four major cities or counties separately located in different. regions of Taiwan are replaced by more general terms as north, south, east, and west. Paraphrase. This strategy means keeping only the “sense or relevant connotations” rather than the literal meaning of the source text (D. A. Chen, 1997; Pedersen, 2005, p. 8).. When the referred idea is not likely to be understood through. its surface meaning and is also too complex to be dealt with by means of generalization or specification, this strategy makes it possible to express the intended meaning of the original words.. The translated text is often stated in a plainer and. simpler way than the source text so that the original implication between the lines can be easily revealed.. For example, in Night Market Hero, the Taiwanese term 白賊七. [peh tshat tshit], which originally refers to a well-known character in Chinese folklore who was good at lying, is translated as that big liar in English. Or, in Din Tao: Leader of the Parade, the term 擲筊 [puah pue], a common religious ritual of divination by means of casting two half-moon-shaped blocks to the ground, is subtitled as asking the goddess.. Such kind of renditions keeps only the relevant. connotations of the original terms. Cultural substitution. This kind of strategy involves replacing the original term that is unique to the SL culture with another term that is more familiar to the TL viewers and “is likely to have a similar impact” on them (Baker, 1992, p. 31; Pedersen, 2005).. The treatment is similar to what other researchers called as cultural 12.

(21) equivalent (Newmark, 1988) or naturalization (Y. X. Li, 2001) and is often used for translating a culture-specific item like the name of a celebrity, an institution, or a special kind of food.. For example, the name of a pop singer who is well-known only. to the SL audience may be rendered into the name of another pop singer who is famous in the TL culture so that the TL audience can have a quick idea of what kind of person is being mentioned. Night Market Hero.. Another example of this kind is found in the film. The Taiwanese term 蚵仔煎 [o a tsian], a Taiwanese snack. with fried oysters, eggs, and vegetables, is subtitled as oyster omelet in English.. The. translation uses a western snack, omelet, to replace the Taiwanese snack to make it more familiar to the TL audience. In addition, the concept of cultural substitution can also be applied to the translation of certain common expressions.. For instance, a SL expression can be. rendered into a TL expression that may not have the same literal meaning but is used to describe a similar idea under similar circumstances.. Such usage resembles what. other researchers defined as equivalence (Vinay & Darbelnet, 1995/2004) or borrowing (D. A. Chen, 1997; Zhang & Wang, 2010; different from Vinay and Darbelnet’s borrowing), which is particularly used for translating fixed expressions like idioms, clichés, and proverbs. In this study, this kind of application is also regarded as a subcategory of cultural substitution. Adaptation.. This strategy involves the use of “a situational equivalence” when. “translators have to create a new situation that can be considered as being equivalent” (Vinay & Darbelnet, 1995/2004, p. 135).. It is also very similar to Pedersen’s (2005). situational paraphrase, which replaces the item or concept referred in the source text by “something that fits the situation, regardless of the sense” of the original term (p. 9).. By using this strategy, the translator does not need to take into account both the. literal and implied meanings of the original words. Nor does he/she need to consider 13.

(22) the cultural background involved in the referred item or concept.. The only thing that. matters is whether the translation can fit into the context and be understood by the TL audience. Therefore, adaptation can be considered as the most TL-oriented strategy reaching “the extreme limit of translation” (Vinay & Darbelnet, 1995/2004, p. 90). For example, in Night Market Hero, the Taiwanese term 里長伯 [li tiunn peh], referring to the head of a neighborhood or of a smaller district, is subtitled as my friend in English.. The rendition replaces the source text with a totally different term,. regardless of the original meaning. Omission. This strategy means replacing the original term with nothing; sometimes it may be “the only viable option, but it may also be opted for out of laziness” of the translator (Pedersen, 2005, p. 9).. For example, in Cape No.7, the. Chinese spoken line 好酒量，女中豪傑 is translated as You really can drink in the English subtitles.. The rendition only keeps the idea of the former phrase 好酒量. [hao jiu liang], referring to one’s good drinking capacity, but totally omit the latter phrase 女中豪傑 [nu zhong hao jie], meaning a heroine or an excellent woman.. As. omission neither retains nor intervenes the original term and “tends to be culturally neutral” (Pedersen, 2005; Ramière, 2006, p. 158), it is questionable whether the strategy is SL-oriented, TL-oriented, or neither of both. In addition to using only one of the above strategies, sometimes translators may combine two or even more strategies for translating one single term.. Such kind of. treatment is called couplets, triplets, or quadruplets according to Newmark’s definition (1988) and is also commonly applied in Chinese-English translation.. For. example, in Night Market Hero, the Chinese terms 阿里山 [a li shan] and 烏龍茶 [wu long cha] are subtitled as A-Lee Mountain and Oo-Long Tea in English. Two strategies, transliteration and literal translation, are employed for each of the two terms.. The words 阿里 and 烏龍 are transliterated into A-Lee and Oo-long, while 14.

(23) 山 and 茶 are literally translated as Mountain and Tea respectively. From the review above, we can see that the strategies available in practical translation processes are numerous, rather than just one way or the other. Translators can make use of these strategies according to the real situations and do not need to be limited by the boundaries of SL or TL orientation. Based on the concept of the progression of translation strategies (Ramière, 2006), the relationships among the nine basic strategies described above can be converted into a diagram.. As shown in. Figure 1, transliteration (TR) can be regarded as the most SL-oriented while adaptation (AD) the most TL-orientated strategy.. Literal translation (LT),. specification (SP), and annotation (AN) can be considered as closer to SL orientation because they tend to conform to or make clear the source text.. As specification adds. something that originally does not exist in the source text, it can be considered as less SL-oriented than literal translation. Also, annotation can be regarded as less SL-oriented than specification since the added information can be lengthy and apart from the original context.. On the contrary, generalization (GE), paraphrase (PA),. and cultural substitution (CS) can be regarded as closer to TL orientation since they tend to replace the source text with something more understandable to the target language viewers.. As cultural substitution involves employing a reference or. expression that is familiar to and specific in the target language/culture, it is considered more TL-oriented than paraphrase and generalization. Moreover, since omission (OM) is still questionable to be SL-oriented or TL-oriented, it is placed in the middle of the progression bar with a question mark.. 15.

(24) Figure 1. The progression of translation strategies in a diagram. Note that this diagram only shows the relative rather than absolute positions of the strategies among one another. Adapted from “Reaching a Foreign Audience: Cultural Transfers in Audiovisual Translation,” by N. Ramière, 2006, The Journal of Specialised Translation, 6, p. 156.. To understand how various translation strategies can be applied for dealing with puns and idiomatic expressions, the following sections review the related studies about rendering puns and idiomatic expressions into another language.. Translating Puns By using a word with different meanings or different words that sound the same or similarly, a pun is often created for “arousing laughter or amusement, and sometimes also to concentrate meaning” (Newmark, 1988, p. 211).. As puns are. easily made with monosyllables, they are commonly employed in both English and Chinese no matter in daily conversation, riddles, jokes, or literary works (He, 2010; Newmark, 1988).. In translating puns, ingenuity and creativity is especially required. since it is extremely difficult to maintain both “the lexical and phonological features of puns” at the same time in another language (He, 2010, p. 86).. In previous studies. (He, 2010; Newmark, 1981, 1988), researchers have suggested several ways of translating puns.. These treatments are quite similar to some of the strategies. described earlier, including literal translation, annotation, paraphrase, and adaptation. The timing for applying these different strategies depends on the actual situations as. 16.

(25) well as the translators’ choices. When the different meanings of a punning word are comprehensible in both the source language and the target language, it is suitable to use literal translation.. For. example, the word head can refer to the top part of the human body and the person who is in charge in both English and Chinese.. If a pun is made by using the word. head with both the above two senses, it can be translated literally between English and Chinese without causing misunderstanding to target language viewers.. Nevertheless,. such kind of ideal case is not always obtainable. Many of the times when the two senses of a pun cannot be rendered within a single word or phrase in the target language, translators may try to explain the both ambiguous meanings by adding more descriptions, which can be done through annotation or combining literal translation with paraphrase. However, the use of annotation may easily disrupt the coherence or smoothness of the target text. paraphrase may tone down the intended humor or other effects.. Also,. Sometimes. translators may decide to preserve only the primary information and sacrifice the secondary information of the pun either through literal translation or a paraphrase that simplifies the original meaning.. As a result, the witticism is definitely lost in the. translation. For example, the Chinese expression 吃豆腐 [chi dou fu] can refer to eating bean curd as well as taking advantage of someone else.. If a pun is created. through the above expression, translators may either add more explanations to reveal the both ambiguous meanings or interpret only one of the senses based on which sense is considered more important in the context. Furthermore, when a pun is used mainly for fun, translators can also utilize the adaptation strategy to replace the original punning imagery with another pun whose double meanings are more accessible to target language viewers.. In this way the. original meaning is changed, but the witticism can be expressed through a new 17.

(26) imagery in the target text. From the review above, there are various ways to deal with puns under different circumstances.. The use of these methods may easily affect target language viewers’. reception and appreciation of the context. Consequently, the translation of puns in Taiwanese local comedies would also influence how foreign audience view and enjoy the films.. Since research in translating puns in Taiwanese films is still insufficient,. further investigation is required.. Translating Idiomatic Expressions In a language, there are certain phrases or expressions that are idiomatic and unique in both the collocation of words and the association of meanings, for example, idioms, proverbs, and slang.. As defined in the online Longman Dictionary of. Contemporary English, an idiom is “a group of words that has a special meaning that is different from the ordinary meaning of each separate word,” while a proverb is “a short well-known statement that gives advice or expresses something that is generally true.”. Also, slang refers to “words and phrases used in casual speech, often invented. and spread by close-knit social or age groups, and fast-changing” (Fromkin, Rodman, & Hyams, 2011, p. 593).. In Chinese, the above terms are often classified as. idiomatic expressions, also known as 熟語 [shu yu] or 慣用語 [guan yong yu]. According to Chinese scholars (T. T. Chang, 1989; D. A. Chen, 1997; Fu, 2008; Zhu, 1999) and the online Chinese dictionary of Ministry of Education, idiomatic expressions refers to set phrases or sentences, including idioms, proverbs, slang, and other common sayings that are natural to native speakers of a language. In Chinese, an idiom is usually composed of four characters or words, which are fixed in order and cannot be replaced or removed.. On the other hand, proverbs, slang, and. common sayings are more flexible in the amount and use of words. 18. They also tend.

(27) to be pithy and harmonic in pronunciations so that they can be easily remembered and used in oral language in addition to written language.. Moreover, many Chinese or. Taiwanese idiomatic expressions originate from historical backgrounds or allusions and are formed gradually in everyday speech over a long period of time.. They. frequently employ rich and vivid figures of speech with various imageries or symbols such as animals, plants, natural phenomena, foods, colors, and many others (T. T. Chang, 1989; D. A. Chen, 1997; Fu, 2008; C. Tang, 2007; Zhang & Wang, 2010; Zhu, 1999).. Due to their unique characteristics, these expressions can serve as suitable. means of understanding Chinese and Taiwanese cultures and language styles. In previous studies (T. T. Chang, 1989; D. A. Chen, 1997; Zhang & Wang, 2010), researchers have also come up with several ways of translating idiomatic expressions between English and Chinese.. The ideas of these approaches resemble four of the. strategies described in earlier sections, including literal translation, cultural substitution, paraphrase, and annotation. Each of these different strategies can be utilized under different circumstances. When the figurative meanings of the expressions are not that incomprehensible to TL viewers, literal translation can be an appropriate way to introduce the imageries or characteristics of the original sayings to another culture. For example, when the Chinese saying 巧婦難為無米之炊 [qiao fu nan wei wu mi zhi chui] is literally translated as even a clever housewife can’t cook a meal without rice, the original imagery and flavor of the expression can be preserved.. Meanwhile, its implication. that one cannot accomplish anything without the necessary means should still be understandable to TL viewers.. Or, when the proverb 天下烏鴉一般黑 [tian xia wu. ya yi ban hei] is rendered as all crows are equally black according to its literal meaning, the metaphorical sense that same kind of people will behave the same all over the world should still be accessible. 19.

(28) In some cases when an idiomatic expression standing for the identical or similar meaning can be found in the target language, it is suitable to adopt cultural substitution. For example, the Chinese idiom 傾盆大雨 [qing pen da yu], raining heavily like water pouring down from a tub, corresponds with the English saying raining cats and dogs.. Even though the two expressions employ different imageries,. they are both used to describe the same natural phenomenon.. However, such kind of. close equivalent in another language is not always available. When the original expression is not likely to be interpreted through its literal meaning and no appropriate substitute can be found in the target language as well, it becomes impracticable to use literal translation or cultural substitution. In such cases, employing the paraphrase strategy can retain parts of the implied meaning, though it may sacrifice certain features in the original saying.. For example, if the. Chinese idiom 助紂為虐 [zhu zhou wei nue] is literally translated as to help Zhou do evil things, target language viewers may be confused since they have no idea that Zhou is a cruel tyrant in ancient China.. Through paraphrasing, the idiom can be. translated as to help the evil person do bad things or to take the side of the evil-doer. Or, by using annotation, the culture-specific knowledge involved in the expression can be explained to target language viewers. In this way, the above idiom 助紂為虐 can be translated as to help Zhou do evil things together with an explanatory information Zhou is a cruel tyrant in ancient China added in parentheses. Although the above studies have provided practical ways in translating Chinese idioms into English, most of them mainly focus on Mandarin idioms rather than Taiwanese. Due to the fact that there are abundant idiomatic expressions in Taiwanese that are filled with local cultural features as well, it is necessary to explore how these Taiwanese common sayings can be rendered into English, especially through subtitling.. Before examining the English subtitles of Taiwanese films, the 20.

(29) researcher reviews studies abroad and in Taiwan about subtitle translation in the following sections.. Empirical Studies about Subtitle Translation This section reviews empirical studies about translating between English and other languages through subtitling. Although these studies did not discuss the translation from Chinese into English, they still provided useful ways for researchers to find out how certain terms in the films were dealt with in the translated subtitles. Among these studies, some mainly reviewed the translated subtitles of several scenes or passages excerpted from the selected films or TV series.. For example, C.. Chen (2005) studied the Chinese subtitles (Hong Kong version) of the English-speaking film Quills, J. Tang (2008) the Chinese subtitles (Mainland China version) of Disney’s animated film Mulan, and Tortoriello (2006) the Italian subtitles of Disney’s TV series The Book of Pooh.. Others provided not only commentarial. discussions but also numerical results to support their findings.. For instance, by. classifying and calculating the use frequency of a series of translation procedures in three French films, Ramière (2006) found that transference and literal translation were two of the commonly used procedures partly because proper names of people or places occurred quite often in the films. Also, although Matielo and Espindola (2011) only distinguished three translation procedures (foreignizaiton, domestication, and omission) in examining the Brazilian Portuguese subtitles of the American science fiction TV series Heroes, they did provide specific categorization for the collected terms.. In this way they could record the number of occurrences of each translation. procedure used for the terms in each category. Studies of this kind suggest useful ways to present how frequently each translation strategy is adopted under certain circumstances and make the findings more convincing. 21.

(30) As mentioned earlier in this chapter, the strategies that are used in practical translation processes may vary from time to time.. Among the reviewed empirical. studies, there was no general agreement on whether the translated subtitles tended to be SL-oriented or TL-oriented. Some researchers concluded that the translated subtitles were more SL-oriented. In the study of C. Chen (2005), it was argued that the translations “appeared to be unidiomatic enough and not audience-oriented enough” (p. 222).. Besides, Matielo. and Espindola (2011) found that the most frequent procedure for translating culture-specific items in their research samples was foreignization, a treatment by which the rendition tended to conform to the source language/culture.. The results. also implied that target-language viewers might feel a sense of foreignness or strangeness when reading the translated subtitles. On the contrary, some researchers stated that the translated subtitles were more TL-oriented.. For example, Tortoriello (2006) argued that “while something was. inevitably lost in translation, quite a lot was gained, or at least kept and re-created” (p. 65).. The notion of “lost,” “gained,” and “re-created” could refer to TL-oriented. strategies such as generalization, paraphrase, cultural substitution, and adaptation. The word “lost” could also refer to omission, a strategy which is still questionable. According to J. Tang (2008), the Chinese subtitles of Mulan “employed a variety of linguistic strategies to make them more familiar to, rather than foreign for, potential Chinese viewers” (p. 156).. The concern for target language audience also. corresponded to the perspective of TL orientation. In addition, some researchers argued that there was no general tendency in the use of translation procedures.. Ramière (2006) found that almost all translation. procedures of both SL orientation and TL orientation were used in the selected films, “making it impossible to demonstrate any form of consistency as far as foreignizing or 22.

(31) domesticating norms are concerned” (p. 159). Her findings also matched what was mentioned earlier in this chapter, that is, in practical translation processes, translators select translation strategies on a case-by-case basis instead of following either SL orientation or TL orientation all the way through.. Theses in Taiwan about Subtitle Translation For more empirical studies of translating between English and Chinese, especially Guoyu and other dialects spoken in Taiwan, through subtitling, it is necessary to look into the master theses and doctoral dissertations in Taiwan. Translating English to Chinese in subtitling.. According to the search result. from the database of National Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations in Taiwan, about 20 studies analyzed the Traditional Chinese subtitles (Taiwan version) of English-speaking films or videos from 2000 to 2012; all of them were master theses. Among these studies, most of them analyzed the translated subtitles of a single version, while others sought for the differences between multiple subtitle versions (for example, official vs. non-official versions) or multiple text types (for example, subtitles vs. magazine texts).. Although translating English into Chinese is different. from translating Chinese into English, it is still worth reviewing these studies to understand how they applied the related translation theories, how they analyzed the translated subtitles, and how they generalized certain rules or tendencies found in the translation processes. One type of studies focused primarily on particular expressions found in the original spoken lines, such as humor in American comedies (Hsieh, 2010; Jhu, 2009; P. W. Lu, 2008; T. H. Tsai, 2008), sexual languages and wordplay in the American sitcom Sex and the City (Hsueh, 2009; R. Lu, 2009; H. T. Tsai, 2009), vulgarism (C. C. Chen, 2005; Lo, 2009), terminology (Jung, 2010; Y. T. Li, 2009), slang (Hu, 2008), 23.

(32) lyrics (Chao, 2004), and Buddhism (Zhan, 2009).. These studies collected the. examples of the demanded expressions from the original dialogue and analyzed how these expressions were translated in the Chinese subtitles.. For instance, after. examining the American sitcom Friends, Jhu (2009) suggested four strategies for translating humor, including literal translation, amplification, adaptation, and paraphrasing.. In a similar vein, Hsieh (2010) focused on the humorous elements in. three American comedies and found that foreignization were more frequently used than domestication strategies in the Traditional Chinese subtitles (Taiwan version), while the situation was opposite in the Simplified Chinese subtitles (Mainland China version). Another type of studies focused on certain features found in the translated subtitles or the differences among multiple subtitle versions. For example, from the Traditional Chinese subtitles of 12 American comedies, C. L. Lin (2007) concluded that Taiwanese Mandarin (a non-standard form of Mandarin, influenced by the accent of Taiwanese) text are often used when dealing with accents, taboos, proper names, and dialects.. In addition, Szu-Tu (2009) compared the official subtitles with the. non-official subtitles of the American TV series Gossip Girl and reported that the distinguishing characteristics in non-official versions were the use of comments, zero-translation, domestication, and translator visibility. Other type of studies compared the translations in the subtitles with the translations of the same contents in other forms, like novel (D. T. Tsai, 2007), magazine (Tseng, 2011), and oral interpretation (I. H. Chang, 2010).. These studies. mainly investigated the simplification in subtitling, including the average sentence length and word count, the reduction of certain parts of speech, the combination of sentences, the use of simple sentences and fixed phrases, etc.. As mentioned earlier,. subtitle translators tend to use fewer words and simplify messages since the words 24.

(33) that can be shown on a screen at the same time are limited. From the above studies, it is indicated that researchers may concentrate on either specific types of expressions in the original spoken lines or certain features found in the translated subtitles. Either way, researchers should collect as many corresponding examples from the selected films or videos as possible and classify these examples into suitable categories to generalize certain rules or tendencies from the translation processes. Translating Chinese to English in subtitling.. According to the search result. from the database of National Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations in Taiwan, from 2000 to 2012, only two studies analyzed the English subtitles of Taiwanese films; both of them were master theses. One of the studies, done by M. Y. Yang (2008), analyzed the English subtitles of seven Taiwanese films directed by the renowned Taiwanese director Hsiao-hsien Hou, with particular focus on the translations of dialects, proper names, and cultural terms, including terms of allusion, religion, social custom, proverb, vulgarism, and slang. The study found that, in translating difficult cultural terms, subtitle translators “got rid of the most part of cultural traces of the original” by using naturalization, generalization, neutralization, and paraphrasing strategies (p. 69).. It also pointed out. that when dealing with proverbs, vulgarism, and slang pronounced in Taiwanese or Hakka, mistranslations were most likely to occur since translators “tended to literally translate the original text, presumably without truly understanding the context” (p. 69). The statement also implied that more efforts were required for the translation of dialects in Taiwanese films. Another study, done by Y. C. Yang (2009), examined the English subtitles of three Taiwanese films directed by another world-famous Taiwanese director Ang Lee. With an analytical tool called the Verbal and Non-verbal Explicitation Model, the 25.

(34) study analyzed how explicitation translation strategies, including addition, paraphrase, substitution, and full translation, were adopted to represent the verbal and non-verbal information in several movie themes, including continuation of the blood line, Li (propriety), Yi (sense of honor and loyalty), elder immigrants’ life in the U.S., Giang Hu, Xinjian, and Long (dragon).. This study was quite unique in exploring the. connection between verbal and non-verbal information; however, it only analyzed 11 examples from the films so that it did not provide a comprehensive view of how frequently certain translation strategies are used under certain circumstances. Both of the above two studies are helpful in understanding how researchers have analyzed the English subtitles of Taiwanese films, but there are still some aspects unexplored.. First, different from the popular Taiwanese comedies produced in recent. years, most of the ten films selected in these two studies were serious dramas or art films released one or two decades ago.. Four of the films were released in the 1980s,. four in the 1990s, and two in the 2000s. Second, these two studies did not provide enough examples to generalize the rules or tendencies found in the translation processes, for example, how frequently certain translation strategies were used under certain circumstances.. Third, the discussions about puns or idiomatic expressions in. these two studies were still insufficient.. Therefore, it is still needed to investigate. what translation strategies are commonly used for translating puns and idiomatic expressions into English in recent local comedies.. 26.

(35) Chapter Three Methods. Rationale With particular focus on puns and idiomatic expressions, this study aims to find out what translation strategies are used in subtitling three Taiwanese films into English and how the translated subtitles represent the original meanings of the spoken lines through these strategies.. To understand and interpret certain features found in. the spoken lines and the English subtitles of Taiwanese films, this study adopts qualitative research methods to collect and analyze data.. As qualitative research is. more discovery-oriented and interpretive rather than statistical (Mackey & Gass, 2005), it is processed “to build concepts rather than deductively testing hypotheses” or theories (Merriam, 2009, p. 15).. For answering the research questions, the. researcher needs to observe and identify the puns and idiomatic expressions in the spoken lines, analyze the strategies used for rendering the collected terms, and discuss how the translations represent the original meanings of the spoken lines by applying certain strategies.. Research Samples The research samples of this study are the officially released DVD-Video titles of three purposefully selected films: Cape No.7, Night Market Hero, and Din Tao: Leader of the Parade.. All of these DVD-Video titles are published in Taiwan and. include two versions of subtitles: Traditional Chinese and English.. In contrast with. the other Taiwanese films examined in previous translation studies, the three selected films are the top-selling Taiwanese films released during 2008 to 2012 and are all local comedies rather than serious dramas or art films. The varieties of language 27.

(36) spoken in the films include Mandarin, mainly Guoyu, and other common dialects spoken in Taiwan such as Taiwanese and Hakka.. As these three films represent not. only parts of Taiwanese local culture but also the speech used by ordinary people in daily life, they can be suitable research samples for understanding how Taiwanese cultural and linguistic features are translated into English through subtitling. Cape No.7.. Directed by Te-Sheng Wei, this movie describes a story about how. a bunch of ordinary residents in a small town in southern Taiwan become a warm-up rock band for a Japanese super star concert. Besides, the film also features their relationships with an old love letter left behind from the Japanese colonial era.. The. film was released in August 2008 and eventually received a box office of approximately 530 million NTD in Taiwan.. The runtime of the film is 130 minutes. in length. Night Market Hero. Directed by Tien-Lun Yeh, this movie describes a story about how a group of local night market vendors fight against an evil business corporation that attempts to illegally take over the land of the night market.. The film. was released in January 2011 and eventually received a box office of approximately 128 million NTD in Taiwan.. The runtime of the film is 124 minutes in length.. Din Tao: Leader of the Parade. Directed by Kai Feng, this movie describes a story about how a local religious troupe combines tradition with innovation and becomes a successful artistic performance troupe.. The film was released in January. 2012 and eventually received a box office of approximately 317 million NTD in Taiwan.. The runtime of the film is 123 minutes in length.. Data Collection and Analysis This study analyzes the strategies used for translating the puns and idiomatic expressions in the three selected films.. As stated earlier, a pun refers to the clever or 28.

(37) humorous use of a word that has more than one meaning, or of words that have different meanings but sound the same or similarly.. In addition, an idiomatic. expression refers to an idiom, proverb, slang, or any other fixed phrase that is common and natural in a language. Once the cases of puns and idiomatic expressions are found in the spoken lines of the films, they are collected for data analysis. Classification system of translation strategies. As for identifying and classifying the strategies used in rendering the collected terms, this study has established a classification system of translation strategies based on the discussion in the Literature Review chapter.. As shown in Table 1, the system classifies common. translation strategies into the following nine categories: transliteration, literal translation, specification, annotation, generalization, paraphrase, cultural substitution, adaptation, and omission.. The brief description of these strategies and the examples. of how they are applied in Chinese-English translation are also listed in the table. The explanations for these examples have been described in the previous chapter. With this classification system, this study also records the use frequency of each strategy in the three selected films.. As discussed earlier, sometimes more than one. strategy may be used for translating one term.. Therefore, the total frequency count. of the strategies adopted may be more than the total number of the terms collected.. Table 1 The Classification System of Translation Strategies in the Present Study Category of Strategy. Brief Description. Example (Chinese-English translation). Transliteration. Converting the original term into different alphabets or writing systems.. 恆春. 29. Hengchun.

(38) Literal Translation. Directly transferring the original term into a grammatically appropriate target-language text, without adding or subtracting the semantic meaning.. 天下烏鴉一般黑. Specification. Keeping the original term in its transliterated or literally translated form and adding extra information to make the translated text more specific.. 金門. Keeping the original term in its transliterated or literally translated form and adding explanatory information in parentheses, brackets, or as footnotes.. 抓周. Replacing the original term referring to something specific by another term referring to something more general.. 薏仁. Keeping only the relevant connotation rather than the literal meaning of the original term.. 助紂為虐. Replacing the original term that is unique to the source-language culture with another term that is more familiar to the target-language viewers and is likely to have a similar impact on them.. 蚵仔煎. Replacing the original term by something that fits the situation or context, regardless of the original meaning.. 明天里長伯做生日. Replacing the original term with nothing.. 好酒量…女中豪傑. Annotation. Generalization. Paraphrase. Cultural Substitution. Adaptation. Omission. Procedures.. All crows are equally black.. Jin-Men Island. zhuazhuo (a traditional ritual predicting a child’s future). grain. to help the evil person do bad things oyster omelet. 傾盆大雨 raining cats and dogs. It’s my friend’s birthday tomorrow.. You really can drink.. The following procedures were taken for data collection and 30.

(39) analysis: First, the researcher watched the three films and made sure that all the plots and spoken lines in the films were understood. This step was essential since sometimes there was no one hundred percent correspondence between some dialects or colloquialisms spoken in the films and the written Traditional Chinese subtitles.. To. verify what were actually spoken in the films, the researcher needed to watch the films and listen to the oral dialogue instead of directly using the subtitles as sources of data collection and analysis.. For example, in Night Market Hero, one of the. characters mentioned a colloquial word 煏 [piak] in Taiwanese, referring something supposed to be kept secret was exposed to the public. In the original Traditional Chinese subtitles, the term was written as 東窗事發 [dong chuang shi fa], a formal Chinese idiom possessing a similar meaning. In this case, the researcher had to recognize that the character in the film was saying a particular word in Taiwanese rather than a four-word Chinese idiom. Second, with the software tool Xilisoft DVD Subtitle Ripper, all the Traditional Chinese subtitles and the English subtitles in a DVD-Video title were output to an image file.. Although the words displayed in the image file could not be edited, the. file was printed out as a paper document so that the researcher could refer to this document instead of playing the DVD over and over again to look for puns and idiomatic expressions. Third, searching through the above document, the researcher marked all the puns and idiomatic expression that were found and typed them into an editable text file, together with the corresponding English subtitles.. However, in this new text file, the. words that were transcribed for the original spoken lines were based on what was actually heard from the movies rather than the Traditional Chinese subtitles. Moreover, in transcribing some Taiwanese spoken lines into Traditional Chinese 31.

(40) words, the researcher did not always follow the official written forms but use the forms that were more commonly known to the general public.. For example, the. Taiwanese term 土虱 [thoo sat], meaning catfish, officially should be written as 塗虱 according to the Taiwanese dictionary of Ministry of Education, but it was written in the more usual format 土虱 in the researcher’s transcription. Fourth, through consulting the online Chinese and Taiwanese dictionaries of Ministry of Education, the researcher further confirmed the pronunciations, intended meanings, and relevant allusions of the terms collected from the original spoken lines. And then, by comparing these terms with the corresponding English subtitles, the researcher identified the translation strategies used for each case and recorded the use frequency of each strategy.. The initial results were reviewed and discussed with the. thesis advisor, Dr. Yu. During the review, when there was any disagreement, for example, some cases did not really belong to puns or idiomatic expressions, or some identification of the translation strategies was inappropriate, necessary modifications would be made until final agreement was achieved. Eventually, though discussing how the English subtitles represented the original meanings of the spoken lines and suggesting several ways to revise the English subtitles, the researcher generalized what translation strategies were more applicable for translating puns and idiomatic expressions under different circumstances.. Trustworthiness Since one of the main purposes of this study is to classify the translation strategies used in the selected films, it is necessary to ensure that the classification system of the strategies is valid and the identification of these strategies is reliable. To do so, the following measures were taken: Validity of the classification system. As described in earlier sections, the 32.

(41) classification system of translation strategies for this study was initially established on the basis of previous translation studies.. To make this classification system valid,. the researcher first collected nearly 200 examples of Chinese-English translation from other studies and the three selected films. These examples included various kinds of terms, not necessarily puns or idiomatic expressions.. Through examining these. examples with the defined classification system, the researcher confirmed that the system was suitable for identifying the translation strategies used in almost all the examples.. Out of the above examples, the researcher later selected two to three. corresponding examples for each type of strategy, with 25 examples in total.. These. 25 examples were then developed into a questionnaire and listed in random sequence (as Appendix A).. Through the questionnaire, the thesis advisor, Dr. Yu, helped to. identify the translation strategy used for each of the 25 examples according to the classification system.. The result of the questionnaire showed high agreement. between the thesis advisor and the researcher in classifying the translation strategies for the 25 examples.. Thus, the validity of the classification system could be further. confirmed. Reliability in classifying the collected data. To ensure the reliability in classifying the translation strategies for the puns and idiomatic expressions in the films, the researcher developed another questionnaire which included the translations of puns and idiomatic expressions excerpted from the three selected films, with 25 cases in total (as Appendix B). random sequence.. On the questionnaire, the 25 cases were listed in. The thesis advisor again helped to identify the translation strategy. used for each case through the questionnaire according to the defined classification system.. The result also showed high agreement between the thesis advisor and the. researcher in identifying the translation strategies.. Therefore, the reliability and. consistency in classifying the collected data could also be confirmed. 33.

(42) In addition, another way to enhance trustworthiness is to provide “a detailed description of the findings with adequate evidence” (Merriam, 2009, p. 227).. In the. Findings and Discussion chapter, this study provided plenty of examples excerpted from the films to demonstrate the findings.. 34.

(43) Chapter Four Findings and Discussion. Translating Puns in Subtitling As stated earlier, a pun is often employed to create humor or amusement in the context by using a word with more than one meaning, or different words with different meanings but sound the same or similarly.. After watching the three films. and observing the spoken lines, the researcher has found 15 cases of puns; four of them are made by using same words with different meanings, while others are created through different words that sound alike.. In addition, many of these puns occur. when someone disapproves of or disagrees with something said by the previous speaker.. Such kind of utterances often creates a humorous and somewhat sarcastic. effect in the dialogue. Comparing the original spoken lines with the English subtitles, the researcher has also discovered that the strategies originally used for translating the puns in the films include annotation (AN), paraphrase (PA), and adaptation (AD), as shown in Table 2.. It also appears that in most of the cases, the. translated subtitles do not attain a witty effect as the original spoken lines do.. The. following sections illustrate how these strategies are applied in the films with several examples and discuss if there are other ways to revise the English subtitles so as to achieve the intended humor in the dialogue. The full list of the puns collected from the three films is shown in Appendix D.. 35.

(44) Table 2 Use Frequency of Translation Strategies for Puns Translation Strategies. Source. TL. LT. SP. AN. GE. PA. CS. AD. OM. Total. Cape No.7. -. -. -. -. -. 2. -. 1. -. 3. Night Market Hero. -. -. -. 1. -. 1. -. 4. -. 6. Din Tao. -. -. -. 3. -. 1. -. 2. -. 6. Total. -. -. -. 4. -. 4. -. 7. -. 15. Note. TR: transliteration; LT: literal translation; SP: specification; AN: annotation; GE: generalization; PA: paraphrase; CS: cultural substitution; AD: adaptation; OM: omission.. Annotation. films is annotation.. One of the common strategies for dealing with the puns in the Although the strategy can easily explain the ambiguity in a pun,. it may also disrupt the coherence or smoothness of the target text.. Take Excerpt 1 to. Excerpt 3 as examples:. Excerpt 1. A case of annotation in Night Market Hero: Spoken lines:. 來喔，藍衫小姐！ English subtitles: This way. Miss “Blue Shirt” (coin exchange).. In this scene, a girl dressed in blue is providing coin exchange service in a night market.. Everyone is jokingly calling the girl Miss “Blue Shirt” because the. pronunciation of “blue shirt” (藍衫 [lan shan]) in Mandarin is very similar to the pronunciation of “small change” (零星 [lan san]) in Taiwanese.. Due to the. impossibility to replicate the pun in English, an annotation coin exchange is added in 36.