Introduction
According to 2004 world statistics regarding the number of speakers of languages, Mandarin Chinese sat comfortably in first place with 873 million native speakers, Hindi as second with 370 million native speakers, Spanish as a close third with 320 million native speakers and followed by English with 340 million native speakers (Vistawide, 2004). At that time, despite English being in 4th place with the number of native speakers, closer estimations including speakers who learned English as a second language (or more) brought the grand total of English speakers to 510 million, which was second behind Mandarin Chinese’s grand total of 1.051 billion speakers (Vistawide, 2004). In 2021, the top four languages are still the same but slightly rearranged. In first place, the number of English native speakers peak at 1.348 billion, followed closely by Mandarin Chinese with 1.12 billion, 600 million speaking Hindi, and 543 million speaking Spanish (Szmigiera, 2021).
With such English dominance, it comes with little surprise that language plays a role in the success of filmography and types of media. Anglophonic- and Western-centered films typically dominate award shows, such as the Academy Awards, Oscars, Globes, Emmys, and Grammys, though foreign films of late are noticeably resonating with viewers as opportunities for exposure and accessibility increase. Foreign-produced films tend to experience more difficulty in reaching final selections for such award shows, leading to public dissatisfaction with the lack of diversity in the winners and nominees and lack of recognition for other films, leading to controversies such as the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite in 2016, and films such as Parasite (2019) and Minari (2020) (Medium, n.d.)
As producing companies consider the extension of their foreign-produced films and media across national, cultural, and linguistic borders in search for profit and non-profit reasons, translation is necessary. Language and translation will become major areas of interest as online technologies alter the global media-scape, affecting modes of access and availability, redirecting content flows and challenging copyright and intellectual property regulations (Dwyer, 2018:2). It is within this act of translation that this paper discusses the importance, impact, and implication of subtitles as a technological development.
Context
The earliest known films were silent movies, such as 1888’s ‘Roundhay Garden Scene’, created and designed by Louis Le Prince (Reach, 2016). Instead of sound on the film, Prince included a musical accompaniment to communicate the story as the audience watched. It was in 1903 in which director Edwin Porter created ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’, which included written language as text placed between film sequences, known as ‘intertitles’ (Reach, 2016). In 1909, director M. N. Tropp designed the intertitles to be at the bottom of the screen, and hence, would become the foundation for what are ‘subtitles’ (Reach, 2016).
The exportation of films overseas quickly ran into problems in the 1920s when films began to include sounds recordings (Reach, 2016). As films were limited to only an audience that spoke the same language, a solution was required to allow additional soundtracks that could replace the original audio; hence, dubbing was born. Dubbing, which requires a separate audio track to replace the original, is a complex and expensive process. Around the same time, subtitles became a cost-effective alternative, which were readable text at the bottom of the screen without interruptions to the picture (Reach, 2016). A conservative estimate would compare the cost of dubbing to equal around five to ten times as much as subtitles, though the precise cost will depend on a number of different factors such as the country’s economic, wealth, size of its language community, and the health of its national film industry based on import/export ratios (Dwyer, 2018:39). In general, larger language communities importing under 30% of their film and television content tend to dub, while smaller language communities in countries with a higher percentage of imports tend to subtitle (Luyken et al, 1991:32). As the main producer of films was the United States, the majority of subtitles were in foreign languages. This, however, did not last very long. After World War II, European countries adopted the inclusion of subtitles into their films as a means of lessening American exposure and influence (Reach, 2016, Betz 2009:90). In such contexts, dubbing is a means of asserting the supremacy of the national language and its accompanying political, economic, and cultural power, whereas subtitles highlight foreignness; the choice of translation preferences reveal how a country perceives itself in relation to others (Danan, 1991). When dominant cultures and language communities decidedly reject and refuse to read subtitles, this exhibits a national narcissism, and a mode for perpetuating cultural dominance (Kapsaskis, 2008:48).
The choice of subtitles is not without risk; it is dependent on the literacy or the reading comfort of its audience. Nor are subtitles void of critique; several opinions consider non-native viewers spending precious time reading instead of looking at what was going on, stressing the eyesight by having it move back and forth from images to subtitles (Crowther, 1960). Most critiques surround three main arguments regarding subtitles: (1) distortion or misrepresentation, (2) disruption, and (3) elitism (Dwyer, 2018:28). The addition of text distorts the visual ‘purity’ of the image, and disrupt the fullness or subtlety of its sounds, by causing viewers to break from their immersion to read instead of to watch and listen. The ability to read, and read quickly, are elitist; subtitles alienate a large portion of the audience, especially those who are unable to read. A final critique considers how subtitles are an ‘additional’ translation to the original language, thus inviting a comparison for disparity between the two as they are presented simultaneously during the film (Dywer, 2018:29).
In favour of subtitles, considerations begin with arguing how dubbing erases the index of ‘foreignness’, whereas subtitles supplement it by respecting the original; allowing for the audience to appreciate the performance of speech through quality and intonation of voices (Dywer, 2018:34).
Implications and impact
The appeal of translation accelerated with the movement of fansubbing in the 1990s and 2000s; an amateur form of subtitling that is done by fans who are untrained volunteers. It began with anime fandom, following monumental growth of networks, file sharing programs, and broadband (Dwyer, 2018:138). From anime, fansubbing has gone further into genres of single products, specific genres, television series, soaps, and dramas, just to name a few.
In the 1980s, screen translation first began at conventions and fan clubs, in which a bilingual fan would stand in front of the screen, translate lines of dialogue and summarize plot details (Dywer, 2018:140). Within the next two decades, the ability to share discs and tapes enabled fansubbing and fan distribution to ‘explode’, courtesy of the development of digital and online technologies. These volunteers pioneered the use of decentralized, collective labour, online networking, and web-assisted translation. In consequence to their collaborative online communities, fansubbing is exceptionally known for its phenomenal release times, often within a few hours after the release of the original video (Dwyer, 2018:148). Within the subbing community, individuals identify benefits of genre knowledge, technological expertise, immediate peer feedback, and a healthy interactive translator community. As many of these volunteers do not have the formal training experience as a translator, many professionals do worry about the devaluation of their profession (Dwyer, 2018:149). In addition to this concern, many production companies and distributors frame fansubbing as piracy, despite subbing communities’ best efforts to maintain ethical standards.
If fansubbing raised the expectations for subtitle translations, Viki, a streaming platform whose name involved a play on the words ‘video’ and ‘wiki’, skyrocketed the movement even higher. Viki launched in 2010, evolving from a non-profit project based on language learning (Wee, 2014). In its mission statement, Viki’s goal is to remove the language and cultural barriers that stand between great entertainment and fans (Dwyer, 2018:164). The platform’s crowdsourcing of subtitles was a leap from traditional fansubs; various opportunities for contribution were open for fans, even without bilingualism. Monolinguals were able to refine and correct subtitles, such as typos, grammar, and overall smoothness of lines (Dwyer, 2018:167). By 2016, Viki had an average of 40 million users per month, with subtitles produced in two hundred languages, including those are listed as ‘endangered and emerging languages’ (Dwyer, 2018: 172). In this way, less prominent languages apart from Western and Anglophone media gained tremendous exposure by becoming more globally accessible. When surveyed for motivations to translate and contribute without compensation, many users identify the improvement of language skills, refining coding prowess, doing good and giving back, and addressing global inequality. Viki’s transnational business model demonstrates an approach to technology and its globalizing effects that encourage language difference and appreciating language diversity (Dwyer, 2018:179).
From an educational perspective, subtitles has neither a significant benefit nor detrimental effect on learning from educational videos (van der Zee et al., 2017). In general, the assistance of subtitles provide learners a vast exposure to vocabulary as well as a rich environment that combines images, sounds, and text (Sadiku, 2017). For development of full language fluency, a single educational video or context is insufficient; rather, fluency develops when learners are repeatedly exposed to the same vocabulary in a variety of contexts, thus requiring multiple film selections (Sadiku, 2017). In addition, movies and films provide alternative environments that are more realistic, have natural language, normal conversational speed and accents. For an enriched language learning experience through subtitles, educators should enable interactive abilities to pause, re-watch, and use other strategies, which may be useful for non-native speakers (van der Zee et al., 2017).
Conclusion
In sum, subtitles are a supplementary technological development that has made a tremendous impact on visual media and how it is consumed by audience. Its positive implications include, but are not limited to, increased exposure and accessibility to global languages and culture, clarity of technical terminology, improved experience for those with learning disabilities, increased engagement and experience, better comprehension navigating language accents and background noise, learning in sound-sensitive environments, and improved literacy (Khalifa, 2018). Negative implications include, but are not limited to, divided visual attention between imagery and reading subtitle text, disparities between original language and translated text, further division between literate and illiterate populations, and formatting disparities such as presentation rate, colour of text against background, and placement of subtitles (van der Zee et al., 2017). As digital technologies continue to develop and improve at an accelerating pace, subtitles will also improve by increased accuracy, speed of translation, new and improved networks, and opportunities for more languages to become accessible globally.
It is with great anticipation for the speculative future that technology will eventually replace the need for human translators as the intermediary source; instead, technology would be able to translate visual and aural media into readable text, accurately and immediately.
References:
Betz, Mark. 2009. Beyond the Subtitle: Remapping European Art Cinema. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press.
Crowther, Bosley. 1960a. ‘Subtitles Must Go! Let’s Have Dubbed English Dialogue On Foreign-Language Films.’ New York Times, 7 August: 1; 3.
Danan, Martine. 1991. ‘Dubbing as an Expression of Nationalism.’ Meta: Translators’ Journal 36 (4): 606–14.Daniels, Joshua M. 2008. ‘ “Lost in Translation”: Anime, Moral Rights, and Market Failure.’ Boston University Law Review 88: 709–44
Dwyer, T. (2018). Speaking in subtitles revaluing screen translation. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Kapsaskis, Dionysis. 2008. ‘Translation and Film: On the Defamiliarizing Effect of Subtitles.’ New Voices in Translation Studies 4: 42–52.
Khalifa, Ahmed (2018, Oct 23). Top 15 Benefits of subtitles/captions & transcriptions (they’re not just for deaf people, y’know? Hear me out. Retrieved from https://hearmeoutcc.com/benefits-subtitles-captions-transcriptions/
Luyken, Georg-Michael, Thomas Herbst, Jo Langham-Brown, Helen Reid and Herman Spinhof. 1991. Overcoming Language Barriers in Television: Dubbing and Subtitling for the European Audience, Media Monographs. Manchester: The European Institute for the Media.
Medium. (n.d.). Retrieved April 11, 2021, from https://medium.com/@evangelinemason/oscarssowhite-the-problem-with-awards-shows-f7da45584590
Reach, Language. (2016, February 26). A history of film subtitles and the growth of video translation. Retrieved April 11, 2021, from https://www.languagereach.com/a-history-of-film-subtitles-and-the-growth-of-video-translation/#:~:text=Known%20as%20%E2%80%9Cintertitles%2C%E2%80%9D%20motion,technique%20was%20called%20%E2%80%9Csubtitles.%E2%80%9D
Sadiku, Alisa (2017) “The impact of subtitled movies on vocabulary development,” International Journal of Business and Technology: Vol. 6 : Iss. 1 , Article 4. DOI: 10.33107/ijbte.2017.6.1.04
Szmigiera, P., & 30, M. (2021, March 30). Most spoken languages in the world. Retrieved April 10, 2021, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/266808/the-most-spoken-languages-worldwide/
Top 30 languages of the world. (n.d.). Retrieved April 10, 2021, from https://www.vistawide.com/languages/top_30_languages.htm
van der Zee, T., Admiraal, W., Paas, F., Saab, N., & Giesbers, B. (2017). Effects of subtitles, complexity, and language proficiency on learning from online education videos. Journal of Media Psychology: Theories, Methods, and Applications, 29(1), 18–30. https://doi.org/10.1027/1864-1105/a000208
Wee, Willis. 2014. ‘Razmig Hovaghimian: From Failed Pizza Maker to Founder
of Viki.’ TechInAsia, 21 April. <http://www.techinasia.com/profile/williswee>