Metaphor translation in subtitling

Metaphor translation in subtitling

Schmidt, Goran

The paper aims to shed light on how subtitlers cope with metaphor translation. The paper presents the results of a case study on a set of English subtitles of one Croatian movie. Metaphor translation procedures were analyzed using Conceptual Metaphor Theory. There are four basic ways to translate metaphors: a. using the same conceptual metaphor, b. using a different conceptual metaphor, c. using a non-metaphorical paraphrase; and d. deleting the metaphor. In addition, a non-metaphorical expression can be translated by a metaphorical expression. Metaphors are mental, linguistic, but also cultural entities. Since translation in the contemporary age is recognized as both linguistic and cultural transfer, translating metaphors is at the core of the translation task. Many conceptual metaphors are universal and can be found in (almost) all languages, but some are culturally specific, appearing in just one language (group). This case study shows that the universality of metaphor influences the choice of a metaphor translation procedure, in a way that shared metaphors are mostly translated using the same conceptual metaphor, whereas non-shared metaphors are translated by a different metaphor or a non-metaphorical paraphrase. The paper also explores the ways in which the specifics of subtitling as a constrained type of translation influence the choice of a translation procedure. The results are compared to the results of a previous study, which dealt with the translation of metaphors in literature. Keywords: conceptual metaphor, translation, subtitling, universality, conventionality, temporal and spatial constraints

Article
PeerReviewed

2015-04-13

2810