Microstrategies Employed for Translation of English Humor Subtitled into Persian: A Case Study of The Simpsons Movie

Zahra Amirian; Salma Soleymani Dameneh

doi:10.36923/jicc.v14i1.666

Article

Zahra Amirian ⁽¹⁾ , Salma Soleymani Dameneh ⁽²⁾

(1) Department of English language and literatute, Faculty of foreign languages University of Isfahan , Iran, Islamic Republic of

(2) Department of English language and literatute, Faculty of foreign languages University of Isfahan , Iran, Islamic Republic of

https://doi.org/10.36923/jicc.v14i1.666

Issue
Vol. 14 No. 1 (2014)

Submitted
November 10, 2010

Published
March 30, 2014

Keywords:

audiovisual translation (AVT), subtitling, translation strategy, comic genre, humor

PDF

Abstract

Humor is a universal concept. It is widely used in many different forms of literature. It is not surprising then, that in translation practice, the translator often comes across this phenomenon. This study was an attempt to identify the strategies employed to translate United States’ humor into Persian subtitle in a comic genre, and to determine their frequency, as well. Based on Ross’s (1998) classification of humor and Gottlieb's (1997) microstrategies, this study examined The Simpsons Movie. The results indicated that the most frequently used strategy was “transfer” and the least frequently used strategies were “decimation”, "deletion", "imitation", "resignation" and "substitution". The results of the study were in line with Gottlieb’s (1992) finding, who found by using strategies 1-5 (expansion, paraphrase, transfer, imitation and condensation) we get a more or less adequate rendering of the source text material into the target language, whereas strategies 6-8 (decimation, deletion and resignation) involve some degree of semantic and stylistic loss.

Full text article

Generated from XML file

References

Attardo, Salvatore. 1994. Linguistic Theories of Humor. Berlin-New York: Mouton de Gruyter.

Gottlieb, Henrik (2008). Screen translation. In: Understanding Translation. By: Schjoldager, Anne (2008). Århus: Academica.

Gottlieb, Henrik (1997). Subtitles, Translation & Idioms. PhD Thesis, Main volume. University of Copenhagen: Center for Translation Studies and Lexicography.

Jensen, Michael Balle (2007). Humor i dansk. Århus: Systime.

Munday, Jeremy (2001). Introducing Translation Studies. Theories and applications. London and New York: Routledge.

Pedersen, Jan (2007). Scandinavian Subtitles – A comparative study of subtitling norms in Sweden and Denmark with a focus on extralinguistic cultural reference. Stockholm: Universitetsservice AB.

Ross, Alison (1998). The Language of Humor. London and New York: Routledge.

Schjoldager, Anne (2008). Understanding Translation. Århus: Academica

Spanakaki, K. (2007) ‘Translating Humor for Subtitling’, Translation Journal. http://translationjournal.net/journal/40humor.htm

The Simpsons Movie. Twentieth Century Fox and Gracie Films (2007). DVD version.

Authors

Zahra Amirian

Department of English language and literatute, Faculty of foreign languages University of Isfahan

(Primary Contact)

Salma Soleymani Dameneh

Department of English language and literatute, Faculty of foreign languages University of Isfahan

Author Biographies

Zahra Amirian, Department of English language and literatute, Faculty of foreign languages University of Isfahan

Ph.D. in TEFL, Assistant professor, Department of English, University of Isfahan, Iran. She has taught English to Iranian EFL learners for about 12 years. Her research interests are discourse analysis, genre analysis, second language writing and translation studies.

Salma Soleymani Dameneh, Department of English language and literatute, Faculty of foreign languages University of Isfahan

M.A. student of translation studies, Department of English, University of Isfahan, Iran.

Amirian, Z., & Dameneh, S. S. (2014). Microstrategies Employed for Translation of English Humor Subtitled into Persian: A Case Study of The Simpsons Movie. Journal of Intercultural Communication, 14(1), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.36923/jicc.v14i1.666

Download Citation

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Copyright / Open Access Policy: This journal provides immediate free open access and is distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). This is an open-access journal, which means readers can access it freely. Readers may read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles for any lawful purpose without seeking prior permission from the publisher or author. This is consistent with the Budapest Open Access Initiative's (BOAI) definition of open access.