equivalence of english - vietnamese translation for subtitles of sume documentary films = nghiên cứu tương đương dịch thuật anh – việt trên phụ đề của một số phim tài liệu

Aims of the study The study aims at equivalence in translation, especially equivalence for terminology in the series of documentary film: “Swam loggers” broadcasted on Discovery Channel

1 Rationale 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Scope and method of the study 2

4 Organization of the study 3

PART II-DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1 Film and subtitle translation 4

1.1 Definition of translation 4

1.2 Translation of dramas/films 4

1.3 Subtitle translation 7

1.4 Subtitle Quality 10

2 Terminology and translation of terminology 11

2.1 Definition and features 11

2.2 Terminology in translation 12

3 Baker’s approach to equivalence 13

3.1 Equivalence and equivalence at word level 13

3.2 Problems of non-equivalence and strategy 15

CHAPTER II: TRANSLATION AND SUBTITLING OF THE SELECTED SERIES 19

1 Synopsis of the series “Swam loggers” 19

2 Linguistic features in the relationship with subtitles translation 20

3 Problems of non-equivalence 22

4 Strategy to deal with non-equivalence 24

4.1 Different equivalence to a source word as a method of subtitles shortening 24

5 Concluding remarks 34

PART III: CONCLUSION 36

1 Addressed issues and some applications 36

2 Suggestions for further study 37

REFERENCES 38 APPENDIX I

Qnet instruction to subtitle translate I Sample of “Swam loggers” scripts V Sample of “Swam logger” subtitles XXXVIII

1 Rationale

Translation is recently considered a language skill – the fifth macro skill It requires certain level of language acquisition and no one ever classifies translation into such levels as elementary, intermediate or advanced Translation studies have also been a controversial topic since this subject was raised in methodology Each translation method is suitable for each purpose Newmark (1991) defines five purposes of translation in his book “About translation” as:

1 Help nations, groups, individuals understand and make peace among one another

2 Help bring the knowledge to learners

3 Help cultures to be understood and mediated

4 Help translate the world‟s great works of art

5 Help in teaching/learning a language

He also mentions the overlap between the purposes which is a regular phenomenon These purposes also lead to the different strategies which are skills and tactics more than a theory withdrawn from some activities

Besides, as the world becomes closer, the exchange flow becomes more fluent, the cultural purpose of translation also becomes more significant One of the most efficient means

of culture exchange is via motion pictures and television programs Bringing inter-lingual motion pictures and television programs to viewers in different nations and cultures draws the world closer, and this can be done in many ways It can be mentioned here voice-over, which

is the voice of one narrator reading the translated scripts all over the film; another way is dubbing, which is the replacement of original voices by the target language voices; last but not least it is subtitling, in which the text appears on the screen along with dialogue of the film This last mode of translation is the focus of the research to be presented in this paper

subtitling industry in Vietnam seems to be underdeveloped, with not many specialized companies It is hoped that this research will make a small but critical contribution to the development of new theoretical foundation of subtitling in Vietnam

2 Aims of the study

The study aims at equivalence in translation, especially equivalence for terminology in the series of documentary film: “Swam loggers” broadcasted on Discovery Channel in association with Vietnamese Cable Television

The study also focuses on how the translators transfer terminology from source text to target text while maintaining the cultural aspects and accurate function of the phrases using Discovery Channel series program as a case

More specifically, this study will seek to answer the research question: "How equivalence

in translation between English and Vietnamese is achieved through the Vietnamese subtitling

of the documentary series “Swamp loggers” shown on Discovery Channel in association with

Vietnamese Cable Television?"

3 Scope and method of the study

The study focuses mainly on equivalence for terminology achieved in the subtitles of the documentary series “Swam loggers”

The evaluation of equivalence will be based on the approach suggested by Baker (1992)

using a list of the two texts: the source text and the translated version

The data were collected from throughout the scripts of the series and the subtitles broadcasted on Discovery Channel in association with Vietnamese Cable Television

The data analysis is based on the equivalence illuminated from the sorted out scripts and the subtitles

The study is confined to the analysis of equivalence at word level

Part I is the Introduction which describes the reasons for the choice of the topic, the aims, the scope, method and organization of the study

Part II is the Development, which consists of two chapters Chapter I provides the literature review of translation, terminology and equivalence; Chapter II gives the synopsis as well as subtitling of the selected series; the problems of non-equivalence and subtitlers‟ strategies to deal with those problems

Part III is the Conclusion and suggestion for further study

CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW

1 Film and subtitle translation

1.1 Definition of translation

Although translation is a variedly defined concept that has caused vigorous debate along its development history, there still exists agreement among the scholars whose opinions are discussed here

Catford (1965) considers translation is the replacement of textual material in one language (source language) by equivalent textual material in other language (target language)

Along the line, Hartman & Stock (1972:713) define translation as the replacement of a representation of a text in one language by a representation of another equivalent in a second language

From a more detailed point of view, Nida & Taber (1974) argue that translation consists of reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style

All of the listed authors agree that equivalence is the key to translation Finding the closet equivalence while maintaining “style” and “meaning” as authentic as possible determines the authenticity of the translation in grammar, culture, comprehension, and message content To have a deeper investigation into equivalence, film subtitles translation will be discussed in this research paper

1.2 Translation of dramas/films

Newmark (1988, as cited in Ton, 2001) argues that when a film is transferred from the source language to the target language culture, it is usually no longer a translation, but an adaptation It is convenient for the translators of other forms of text, especially fiction, to be able to explain puns or ambiguities or cultural references, to transcribe the words for the sake

drama must be concise – it must not be an over-translation

From the connection point of view, Mbom (1988, Joseph, 2005) asserts that: “The play when performed no longer belongs to the author alone It is the collective product of four creators: the author, the producer, the actors and the audience.” The fourth creator is the one who holds the key for whether the work of all three others becomes a success or a failure However, the connection to the audience does not go directly from the producers but through mediators, who is the translator/interpreter Therefore it can be said that films translation reflects a linkage of three essential participants:

1 Message originators (characters in films)

2 Message mediators (translators or interpreters)

3 Message receivers (persons for whom the message is intended indirectly through film vision

Ton (2001) gives the process of film/drama translation:

Figure 1: Model by Ton (2001)

Slightly different from dramas, in which all voices normally belong to the characters, in documentary films one other type of voice - the host voice is added Host voice tells the story,

language full of slangs, idioms and street vocabulary Beside, documentaries, especially reality shows, have a tendency to stress on action and situation more than characters and their performance Dramas send the messages largely via characters while documentaries have both characters/the narrators as message originators Therefore, the model suggested by Ton (2001) can be adapted as follows:

full attention to implication, tone, innuendo, hidden reference On the other hands, register requires translator to “distinguish between formal or fixed expressions and personal expressions, in which writer or speaker sets the tone” (Ton, 2001) As for style, she asserts that the style of the original where characters are the heart of any conversation should be kept intact These criteria are identified to form a strong background supporting idioms translation

in dramas, which, therefore, is not necessary for the subtitles translation, especially terminology translation to follow exactly How the difference is expressed and what criteria subtitles translation follows will be discussed in the next part

1.3 Subtitle translation

These days, films and TV programs in multiple languages are easier to access thanks to many kinds of translation such as voice-over, dubbing, and subtitling Among these methods, subtitling recently tends to be more favorable due to many advantages it offers Subtitles, according to Baker, M (Ed.) (1998) are “transcriptions of film or TV dialogue, presented simultaneously on the screen.” She also highlights the “authenticity” gained in subtitles, which includes the real voice quality and intonation of the actors Later, Poel, M., & Ydewalle, G (2011:261) agree that subtitles with the original soundtrack “give the two more advantages of subtitles as the channel of information: the pictorial information, and the translation of the text

in the subtitles.” Therefore, Jan Ivarsson (1992) (as cited in James, 2001:151) stresses on the

“vulnerable position” which subtitler is in because the original text is available for the message receivers to double check if it is not a faulty translation

The following table demonstrates a section of English film scripts translated and made into Vietnamese subtitles:

01:00:00:26 Host VO Few weapons on the 21st century

battlefield are as effective as the modern sniper

1: 10:00:01.15 10:00:04.09 Rất ít vũ khí

trên trận địa ở thế kỷ 21

2: 10:00:04.13 10:00:07.03 hiệu quả như

lính bắn tỉa hiện đại

01:00:06:12 Parker

VO/OC

On any battlefield a professional sniper's got the capability to change the tide of that battle

3: 10:00:07.07 10:00:08.09 Trên mọi trận địa, 4: 10:00:08.13 10:00:12.13 lính bắn tỉa chuyên nghiệp

có thể thay đổi thế trận

01:00:11:24 Host VO Now fielded by every branch of the

U.S Armed Forces from the Army

to the Marines, Coast Guard and Navy, these elite warriors continue

to prove their value in modern conflicts

5: 10:00:12.17 10:00:15.21 Có mặt trong mọi ngành của

Lực lượng Vũ trang Hoa Kỳ, 6: 10:00:16.00 10:00:19.03 từ Quân đội, Thuỷ quân,

Bảo vệ Bờ biển, Hải quân, 7: 10:00:19.07 10:00:23.16 họ vẫn chứng tỏ giá trị

của mình ở trận địa hiện đại

01:00:22:28 Merowski

VO/OC No shot is the same shot, so you have to be prepared for every shot 8: 10:00:23.20 10:00:28.17 Không có 2 phát đạn giống nhau,

phải chuẩn bị cho mọi cú bắn

As can be seen from the above, in the first column, which is video time, time code is shown in a chain of number For example, the 1st row, 01:00:00:26 with Host Voice, indicates that the Host Voice starts at the 26th second of the video and includes one sentence in the 3rdcolumn Video time is broken into frames; 1 minute = 25 frames according to Discovery Channel‟s subtitles regulation Subtitles making procedure can be clearly described as John Michinton (cited in Morgan, 2001)

“It‟s our job to do justice to the authors of the work We are not the authors, but we are their intermediaries Dialogue in film and videotape is measured and the measurements are noted in the original language dialogue list This is internationally called “spotting” Thus the texts are broken into sections, initially depending on the speed at which dialogue is delivered

If a few words are spoken rapidly, followed immediately by a few words spoken by another character and so on, the subtitles are, perforce, of short duration – sometimes only one second

If the speech is long, the spotting follow the speech rhythms, using pauses and aspirations as stop and start points, but almost never spotting one title longer than six seconds Cuts (shot changes) are carefully respected, because they punctuate the action and they can be used to punctuate the flow of subtitles; the general rule is never to carry a subtitle over a cut unless there is no alternative… the subtitles translating the dialogue are then written to the spotting, which indicate how much time is available for each translation.”

A more detailed view of subtitling in Vietnam can be seen in Appendix I – Subtitling instruction by Qnet Entertainment Following that instruction, the first sentence in Figure 2, for example, is translated and made into two subtitles, as can be seen in the 4th column The number in the 3rd column shows subtitle time code, which helps explain the starting/ending time as well as the duration of a subtitle along video time code Take the 1st subtitle time code,

for example 10:00:01.15 – 10:00:04.09, to the right, it can be understood that the subtitle starts

at the first second of the video, on 15th frame and ends or 4th second, 9th frame If a sentence is divided into more than one subtitle, the clauses will be connected by a comma „,‟ if the utterance is finished as in:

3: 10:00:07.07 10:00:08.09 Trên mọi trận địa,

4: 10:00:08.13 10:00:12.13 lính bắn tỉa chuyên nghiệp

có thể thay đổi thế trận

or by a ellipsis „ ‟ if the utterance is unfinished as in:

1: 10:00:01.15 10:00:04.09 Rất ít vũ khí

trên trận địa ở thế kỷ 21

2: 10:00:04.13 10:00:07.03 hiệu quả như

lính bắn tỉa hiện đại

For more details, Appendix II & III, which are the example of scripts and subtitles versions, can provide a more detailed view on how scripts are made into subtitles

1.4 Subtitle Quality

According to James (2001), subtitles quality is to meet clients‟ expectation “Clients” here are among many people working and enjoying in the entertainment industry The producer wants subtitles “which are not only accurate and authentic but which are in keeps with the rhythm of the dialogue The author/scripts writer expects his or her intention to be reflected accurately and authentically” in the translated subtitles (James 2001:152) However, the most important is viewers‟ expectation Subtitles to viewers must be easy to follow and reliable to trust Accuracy, clearness, credibility and consistency with the action on the screen are what to expect in subtitles Moreover, a subtitled film must satisfy expectation in compromising among clients From this point of view, subtitling conventions are born in regard to time code, duration of subtitle, shot cuts and formatting In general, subtitles translation requires

“reduction of original dialogue, simplification of language, character portrayal, cultural adaptation…” (James 200:152)

Moreover, subtitles are evaluated by the quality of translation and quality of typo accuracy The translated subtitles should be short and clear so that viewers who do not have much time to read and understand the subtitles to follow along with the movie The viewers can be anyone in front of the TV and the key factor in translation is that all of them can understand Besides, typo accuracy, which includes spelling accuracy, is aimed at the professional quality Broadcasted and widely viewed films with spelling mistakes on subtitles seem to be unacceptable

2 Terminology and translation of terminology

2.1 Definition and features

Cambridge Advanced Learners‟ Dictionary defines “term” as a word or expression used in relation to a particular subject, often to describe something official or technical; and

“terminology” as special words and expressions used in relation to a particular subject or activity

Besse, Nkwenti-Azeh & Sager (1997) (cited in Kageura, 2002) defines term as “a lexical unit consisting of one or more than one word which represents a concept inside a domain”; and terminology as “the vocabulary of subject field”

He later argues that the use of “lexical unit”, “vocabulary” needs to be considered further Kageura (2002) also cites from Sager (1998) and give definition to term “as linguistic signs, terms are a functional class of lexical items”, whereas words can be used in many other linguistic levels and language systems

For further distinguishing, he uses Chomsky‟s distinction of language competence and performance For example, if words or lexical units in general talk about word information at the level of language competence, discarding real-world factors and focusing on the possible forms of theoretically infinite complex words, analogous to Chomsky‟s syntactic theory It

would be nonsense to speak of the formation of terms in an analogous way, because, by their very essence, terms have a concrete social existence as functional class of lexical items which manifest itself in the actual communication activity or performance in a domain

Sager (1998) (cited in Kageura, 2002)) argues that “as linguistic signs, terms are functional class of lexical units” The basic function of terms is to express more sharply delineated meanings identified as necessary within a particular domain by the complexity and number of concepts that have to be clearly distinguished In other words, the way the meaning of lexical units are consolidated by clarification and narrower determination in order to satisfy the degree of specification required by the domain makes that lexical unit become terms

Therefore, the distinction between words and terms are not fixed Each term constantly interacts and intersects with general words because they consist of the same linguistic forms

2.2 Terminology in translation

Newmark (1988) considers new terminology as the central difficulty in technical translation The main problems may be that technical neologisms in the source language are relatively context-free and appear only once If they are context-bound, translators understand them more easily by eliminating the less likely versions, but if there is a constant term, without further details, it is hard to find the right equivalence

According to Newmark (1988), engineering is a basic technology and one basic branch of engineering is mechanical Although suggesting beginner translators to start technical practice here, he advises them to open the range of technology translation as wide as possible The golden key here is to bear in mind that understanding the description, the function and the effect of a concept such as entropy is more important than in learning laws, particularly axioms, theorems, theories, and system In other words, translators must understand roughly what is happening in real life, and not just convince themselves that the translated sentence linguistically makes sense

Newmark (1988) suggests steps technical terms as:

“When you approach a technical text, you read it first to understand it (underline difficult words) and then assess its nature (proportion of persuasion to information), its degree of formality, its intention (attitude to its topic), the possible cultural and professional differences between your relationship and the original one Next, you should give your translation the framework of recognized house-style, either the format of a technical report adopted by your client, or, if you are translating an article or a paper, the house-style of relevant periodical or journal”

From another point of view, Baker (1998) places translation and terminology in two different linguistic and cognitive tables with differently focused areas of language study Translation is an applied linguistic study, concerned with the manipulation of texts, and terminology is a discipline involving both theoretical and applied linguistics while texts are only used as one of the range of source material in one of its many applications Baker (1998) argues that finding the terms which has the same concept in two languages does not require translators‟ minimal theory of terminology This is because translation focuses mainly on the linguistic representation of a cognitive unit, and the translators move from the linguistic item

to the concept in order to find a corresponding realization in other language

The solution for subtitles translation tends to agree with Baker‟s approach to terminology equivalence which does not require the transference of every unit in source language but the core meaning to the target language

3 Baker’s approach to equivalence

3.1 Equivalence and equivalence at word level

In the most general meaning, equivalence is the relationship between a source text (ST) and a target text (TT) that allows the TT to be considered as a translation of the ST On the other hand, some theorists define translation in terms of equivalence relations (Catford, 1965; Nida and Taber 1969; Toury 1980a; Pym 1992a, 1995; Koller 1995) while others reject the theoretical notion of equivalence, claiming it either irrelevant (Snell-Hornby 1988) or damaging (Gentzler 1993) to translation studies (Baker, 1992, p 100-1002)

Other theorists steer a middle course: Baker uses notion of equivalence “for the sake of convenience – because most translators are used to it rather than because it has any theoretical status” (1992:5-6) She also points out the three following types of equivalence:

a) Grammatical equivalence refers to the diversity of grammatical categories across

languages She notes that grammatical rules may vary across languages and this may pose some problems in terms of finding a direct correspondence in the target language In fact, she claims that different grammatical structures in the source language and target language may cause remarkable changes in the way the information or message is carried across These changes may induce the translator either to add or to omit information in the target text because of the lack of particular grammatical devices in the target language itself Amongst these grammatical devices which might cause problems in translation, Baker focuses on number, tense, and aspects, voice, person and gender

b) Textual equivalence refers to the equivalence between a source language text and a target

language text in terms of information and cohesion Texture is a very important feature in translation since it provides useful guidelines for the comprehension and analysis of the source text which can help the translator in his or her attempt to produce a cohesive and coherent text for the target context audience in a specific context It is up to the translator to decide whether

or not to maintain the cohesive ties as well as the coherence of the source language text His or her decision will be guided by three main factors, that is, the target audience, the purpose of the translation and the text type

c) Pragmatic equivalence refers to implicatures and strategies of avoidance during the

translation process Implicature is not about what is explicitly said but what is implied Therefore the translator needs to work out implied meanings in translation in order to get the source text message across The role of translator is to recreate the author‟s intention in another culture in a way that enables the target context reader to understand it clearly

Baker also acknowledges that equivalence at word level is the first element to be taken into consideration by translators, who look at words as a single unit to find a direct

equivalence when analyzing the source text Although translators/interpreters often pay more attention to transfer messages being communicated rather than to smaller units such as word and structure, words are still important as they carry the core meaning of the information The situation cannot be truer to apply to subtitles translation, where words are deeply taken into consideration Under time pressure and word limitation, finding a suitable equivalence at word level is a never ending challenge Especially when terminology is encounter, an equivalence which can be used throughout a series of 10 to 30 episodes requires more and more effort by subtitlers

3.2 Problems of non-equivalence and strategy

Baker (1992) also points out 11 common problems of non-equivalence at word level, which are listed as following:

- Culture-specific concepts cause problems when the word in source language does not

make sense in the target language, for example, religion concept, social custom, name

of food, etc In “Swam Loggers”, many names of trees are encountered, some of which can be found in the dictionary or translated before but some are totally new to Vietnamese culture

- The source-language concepts are not lexicalized in the target language when the

concept in the source language word is understood in the target language but there is

no word to express it

- The source-language word is semantically complex and a single word need a whole

sentence to explain the meaning

- The source and target languages make different distinctions in meaning therefore

the target language differently distinguish a concept in comparison with the source language

- The target language lacks a super-ordinate is encountered when the target language

may have specific words (hyponym) but no general word (superordinate) to head the

semantic field

- The target language lacks a specific term (hyponym), which is contrary to the last case when the word distinction between languages is different

- Differences in physical or interpersonal perspective

- Differences in expressive meaning

- Differences in form

- Differences in frequency and purpose of using specific forms

- The use of loan words in the source text

She also figures out strategy by professional translators as:

The strategy is the most common solution to various types of non-equivalence, especially

to express propositional meaning The strategy is effective in most languages because hierarchical structure of semantic field is common in all language

To illustrate this strategy Baker gives many examples which use a general word (superordinate) to overcome a relative lack of specificity in the target language compared to the source language

Example:

Source text (A brief History of Time – Hawking, 1988):

A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture

on astronomy He described how the earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the center of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy

Target text (translated back from Spanish):

A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a lecture on

astronomy In it he described how the earth revolved around the sun and how the latter

in its turn revolved around the center of a vast collection of stars known as our galaxy

(Baker 1992:27-28)

b Translation by a more neutral/less expressive word

There are various types of situation where this strategy can be used to deal with equivalence at word level, however, the meaning of word may be lost in translation

non-c Translation by cultural substitution

Using this strategy, translator replaces a culture-specific item or expression with a target language item which does not have the same propositional meaning but is likely to have a similar impact on the target reader This strategy is complicated, risky and not always welcomed

d Translation by a paraphrase

The paraphrase strategy has certain advantages and disadvantages Its most outstanding feature is that in the translated version the propositional meaning is more precisely specified However, paraphrase does not produce a lexical item therefore it cannot “convey expressive, evoked, or any kind of associate meaning” (Baker, 1992:40) because the meaning sticks with stable lexical meaning which has appeared in certain contexts

There are two paraphrase strategies, using a related word and using unrelated word

 Translation by paraphrase using related word is used in the source language appears a concept which is expressed by the source item lexicalized in the target language but in

a different form The strategy of paraphrase using a related word should be applied

Besides, using a different form in the target language would make the sentence sound more natural and smoother

 Contrary to the above situation, the concept in the source language totally unlexicalized in the target language, the paraphrase strategy is still useful in some cases Instead of related words, unrelated words are used to modify a superordinate or simply on unpacking the meaning of the source item

e Translation by omission

“Drastic” as it sounds, this strategy is actually useful and effective It involves giving up translating a word or expression in some contexts Omission strategy is used when a particular insignificant item or expression is not necessarily translated because it would cause readers‟ distraction

In short, all above translation theories will make a steady background for the study‟s development for further investigation in the next parts

CHAPTER II:

TRANSLATION AND SUBTITLING OF THE SELECTED SERIES

1 Synopsis of the series “Swam loggers”

“Swamp loggers” is a reality television show made by Discovery Channel The show tells

a story about the working and social life of loggers in North Carolina swamps with hardship, dangers and joy and special experiences Logging itself is a tough job; logging in swamps, especially swamps with no bottom in North Carolina requires even more effort from the loggers The main characters are Goodson‟s All Terrain Logging Company, with the fourth generation logger and also the owner of the company, Bobby Goodson, his son, Justin Goodson – the foreman and the united logging team: the loader Dave Muller and the veteran logger – Simitrio Although each of the team members has his or her own job, the murky, dangerous swamps force them to be multi-talented so that when needed, the logger can load wood and repair machines

Logging procedure starts with the logger Simitrio‟s cutting into the swamps so that the team can come later to move wood, or in swamp terms, to shovel wood to the deck Simitrio is one of the key persons with his extensive experience and considerable ability It is not overly exaggerated to say that the whole team depends on him for some time When coming first to cut, he opens the road into the swamps, uses the logged trees as shovel road, drives cutting machine on that road so that the machine will not stuck or sink down to the swamps Following him, the other machines coming into the swamps will have a road to go on The deck is where the loaders load wood on the trucks Trucks haul wood to the mill and go to and fro between the mill and the tract When the logger finishes his cutting, he will move to another tract, which is basically another swamp to continue cutting so that when the crew move in, they don‟t have to wait for the wood to be logged In swam logging, time is money

as Bobby usually says

Swamp logging hides the dangers behind the trees, under wet ground or even in the air Physical danger is not the only worry here Bobby needs to keep his crew working, keep making profit and keep the equipment as well as his crew safe

Finishing one tract, Bobby‟s crew will move to the others Moving is one of Bobby‟s nightmare because it costs him a lot of money and effort Besides, new tracts often come with new dangers, both on the road and in the swamp itself However, Bobby sometimes is desperate to move when most of the sites are flooded but the mill wide opens That is the time when every other company stop their action and that is also the time for Bobby crew proves their “all terrain logging” strong point

2 Linguistic features in the relationship with subtitles translation

It is necessary to understand the linguistic properties of the series The job‟s specialty requires certain equipments, certain activity, and the longer dialogue/speech may cause confusion outside the logging context The swamps are full of traps for the loggers and for the translators, and even more for the subtitlers These are among the fastest speaking voice of Discovery Channel films The greater the speakers‟ speech and the larger the proportion of character voice per host voice give more challenges to the translator/subtitlers Moreover, most of the crew is originally from Spain, when necessary, English subtitles are made beside the Spanish-English speaking as follows:

Male Wearing Black Hat VO/OC

GRAPHICS ON SCREEN

<SUBTITLES>

He better be bringing breakfast? Is he

bringing breakfast or something? Sausage

subtitlers is how to simplify down to a certain level of language which is acceptable among viewers of different types Swam logging language is not only incredibly complicated in the way of word using but also in the word playing In the limited scope of this thesis, although word playing is a sufficiently interesting topic, it cannot be deeply analyzed here However, word using and context figuration are among the two most important factors in understanding and translating as well as subtitling of these extraordinary series

For subtitle in general, time code can be considered the top priority, however, time code is much dependent on the speaking speed of the dialogue According to Pearman & Albritton (2010:178), the average American speaking speed is 75-100 words per minutes but Bobby Goodson of “Swam loggers” has much faster one For example, in the episode “Swam fever” from 31:54 to 32:22, which is 26 seconds, he utters 103 words With a simple calculation, it is easy to realize that his speaking speed is almost 3 times faster than the average

As mentioned before, subtitles translation draws much attention to clear ideas and short sentences It is harder to make subtitles with a faster speaking dialogue Subtitles translator conveys the meaning other than translate it For such dialogue as by Spanish American loggers, conveying the meaning to common viewers is not an easy task Words must be changed into which are familiar and easy to understand as well as clear to read The longest subtitles can only appear in 7 seconds on the screen, the shortest one is four frames, which is 4/25 seconds Therefore the most challenging task translators encounter is time pressure and meaning conveyed

In the selected documentaries, it is possible to divide the language into two forms, which is narrating and speaking/talking Narrating voices often tell the story which is going

on, while characters‟ voices, on the other hands, are used to express the characters themselves Therefore, many of the term in one program are officially explained in the narration after their appearance in characters‟ dialogue

% of Host Voice

Character Voice

Host Voice

Character Voice

% of Host Voice

Character Voice

As can be seen from the table above, the length of time for Host Voice averagely takes only 15.5% although the number of words is 20.7% The table shows how much reality the series is and it also represents the difficulties for subtitlers because they have to turn unofficial speaking language into official written one

3 Problems of non-equivalence

- Different distinction in meaning

Subtitles viewers are sensitive to short expression on the screen Moreover, because they have different education, social even age backgrounds, it is critical for the choice of vocabulary to cause no misunderstanding among them Some certain terms have their fixed meaning which is true in any cases, such as: “ventilation” – “thông khí”; “cooling fan” – “quạt làm mát”; “axle” – “trục xe”; “gear box” – “hộp số”; “rim” – “vành xe” However there is a wide range of terms which culturally distinguish between source text and target text language Unfortunately, it is unavoidable for the translator sometimes to directly refer to a more available meaning of a term For example, the equivalence of “forester” – “kiểm lâm” should not cause any problem because both words refer to “the person who is in charge or takes care

of a forest”; but the problem arises in how people in each culture perceive their terms “Kiểm lâm” in Vietnamese culture, literally meaning forestry police, are people of a security branches while “forester” in “Swamp loggers” is actually the manager/the owner of a forest Another example is “quota” and “hạn ngạch” While the term “hạn ngạch” is easily referred to

“commercial quota” at first thought in Vietnamese culture, “quota” in “Swamp loggers”

means a limitation the mills set to the wood quantity they take in

- Semantic complexion: words with semantic complexion may cause

translators/subtitlers the biggest professional agony of all For example:

Shovel logging is a logging method which uses a log loader to swing logs to the forest

road Rather than driving out to the log and dragging it back to the landing, the loader moves slowly across the harvest area, grabbing logs/trees within reach, and swinging them around to drop them closer to the road Logs further from the road can be shoveled to the landing in a few passes back and forth

Shovel road is a kind of support in the swampy terrain and must be done as a first priority

Shovel road is actually a log road, made by continuously laying cut tree on the surface of the swamp to make a grid The trees keep the tract dirt above the mud instead of running through the mud so that machines can run on without worrying of being stuck

Drag racing is a competition in which two specially prepared cars compete at a time to be

the first to cross a set finish line, from a standing start, in a straight line, over a measured distance, most commonly a ¼-mile [402.3-metre (1,320 ft)] straight track

- Target language lacks a specific term: “log”, “wood” and “timber” are not separately translated in the series although they have different aspect of meaning

- Word form difference such as “swampy” - “swamp”, “restriction” - “restrictive”,

“haul” and “load” are used both in noun and verb

- Cultural specific term such as wood names:

Cypress Ash tree

Water oak

4 Strategy to deal with non-equivalence

4.1 Different equivalence to a source word as a method of subtitles shortening

The word “to haul” has its original meaning as “to pull something heavy slowly and

with difficulty” and it is frequently used in “Swamp loggers” to describe the hard work of pulling the wood out of the swamp to the deck and sometimes it is used as a substitution of

“drive” the wood from the deck to the mill “Haul” is used in both noun and verb form and

translated differently in different cases:

But we're glad we're back We got

plenty wood to haul…

Harrison (2010)

Thật vui khi quay lại

Có nhiều gỗ cần kéo

In this subtitles, “haul” has its equivalence as “kéo”, which in the researcher‟s

opinion, does not perfectly express the original meaning However, the translator here uses a more general word to deal with such a complicated meaning and at the same time he/she satisfies the time pressure This is a comment after long time off work, lack of pay check, and

“haul” is used for carrying wood to the mill, for pulling wood out of the swamp

With the same meaning, in another situation, where time pressure is not so high, the subtitle comes as:

Every hour that Simitrio isn't cutting wood Mỗi giờ Simitrio

không xẻ gỗ

means the truckers will catch up to him and

have nothing left to haul

(Harrison (2010)

có nghĩa lái xe tải sẽ bắt kịp

và hết gỗ để chuyển đi

In this subtitle, “haul” comes back to its original meaning of “pulling”, but it is not

translated as “kéo”, but another more expressive word is used, which is “chuyển đi” Although the full meaning to explain may be “chuyển ra bãi”, once again, the requirement of conciseness forces subtitlers to use shorter cluster of words

When it is necessary to express a more detailed meaning, the subtitle may be translated as:

Trucker Wayne Sauers has just returned

from the pulp mill,

Lái xe Wayne Sauers vừa quay về từ nhà máy giấy

after his latest haul

In the scripts, this “haul” clearly does not have the propositional meaning of “pulling

something heavy slowly and with difficulty” but “one trip to the mill” “Chuyến xe” should properly transfer the meaning of the speaker When the word is used in verb form, the solution

to equivalence comes differently as:

Together, they risk it all as they cut, load, Họ cùng nhau mạo hiểm

khi xẻ, chất lên xe,

and haul over 100,000 tons of timber each

year

Harrison (2010)

chở hơn 100.000 tấn gỗ mỗi năm

Similarly, in another case, the word “tract” is differently translated in different

context The whole speech is produced by Bobby Goodson when he and his team are assigned

a new tract of wood and start to harvest In the first appearance, “tract” is given the equivalence “khoảnh rừng”, which tends to express the full meaning of “tract” – an

area/swamp with trees ready to be cut down For the second time the term appears, it is subtitlers‟ right to adapt more than to translate so that their product can meet the requirement

of conciseness:

Good tract of wood Corbett, actually they

gave us a really good tract

Họ giao cho chúng tôi

khoảnh rừng Corbett rất tốt

It's actually not near as wet as a lot of the

tracts that we used to cut

Nó không gần đầm lầy như

nhiều nơi chúng tôi từng đốn The tract runs up against the Cape Fear

River,

Chỗ này chạy ngược

sông Cape Fear and years ago, the Cape Fear would flood

As for the listed words with semantic complexity as “shovel logging”, “shovel road”, drag racing”, one way is not sutbtilers‟ choice of solution

This weekend will mark her drag racing debut

And to give her a fighting chance at a win,

Cuối tuần này chị sẽ thi

và để có cơ hội chiến thắng, husband, Buddy, is making sure everything is

shipshape in her 355 small block, Chevy

Along the line, “shovel logging” and “shovel road” will be discussed:

conventional logging

Đốn gỗ bằng máy

khác cách truyền thống

We actually use the trees Chúng tôi dùng cây gỗ

Simitrio will cut them, laying them in

front of him

Simitrio đốn và đặt chúng nằm phía trước,

And then he'll take the other trees in there

and overlap them It actually makes a

grid

rồi lấy cây khác chồng lên tạo ra 1 mạng lưới,

And what that does, it keeps the tract dirt

above the mud instead of running through

subtitles

Even though this tract is dryer than most, Dù khoảnh rừng này

khô hơn các nơi khác, Bobby's heavy equipment still needs

support in this swampy terrain

thiết bị hạng nặng của Bobby vẫn cần vật đỡ ở nơi lầy lội Simitrio began felling trees a week earlier, Simitrio bắt đầu đốn cây

1 tuần trước,

so that he and the shovel loader could

build the log road,

để anh và máy bốc xếp

có thể làm đường gỗ,

known as the shovel road, gọi là đường bốc xếp,

the first step in logging any new site

Harrison (2010)

bước đầu tiên để đốn gỗ

ở 1 địa điểm mới

“Log road” to be explained as “the road made by arranging logs on the ground” should not have a proper equivalence of “đường gỗ” as the term “đường gỗ” itself is slightly vague in meaning Similarly, using “đường bốc xếp” as an equivalence of “shovel road” is not quite satisfying “Shovel” in “shovel road” is the same with “shovel” in “shovel logging”

In short, for one word in the source language, different equivalence with different expressive meaning is produced in the target language to fit with different situation in subtitling

4.2 Equivalence of logging machines and equipments

The set of logging machines represents the working steps from cutting to hauling, to loading Some of these machines and equipment are totally unfamiliar with Vietnamese subtitles viewers and the strategy adopted by translator is naming the machines according to their function:

Shovel/shovel loader/shovel machine Máy xúc

Bogey skidder/bogey/skidder Máy kéo gỗ

Figure 4: Equivalence Table for Logging Machine

It is not difficult to identify the linguistic structure of these terms, which is “V + er in English” and “Máy + function” in Vietnamese However, the unsolved problems stay still where there are different machines assigned to one task such as “cutter” and “feller buncher” above or “clambunk skidder” and “Bogey skidder” While cutter/feller other than feller

buncher is used, the speakers want to the heavy meaning of the equipment to be unstressed, almost like using short forms However, the lack of a specific term in the target language, which is Vietnamese language, makes it impossible to transfer the full linguistic intention of the speaker

The situation seems to be much more relaxing for the subtilers to deal with general terminology, which does not too specifically and fixedly belong to swamp logging

steam donkey Tời hơi nước

integrated air system Bộ tích hợp không khí

Figure 5: Equivalence for General Terminology

Relaxing as it may be, time and speaking speech always brings pressure If a subtitle cannot afford to contain a full equivalence, it is necessary to shorten every possible word Therefore, any kinds of transportation as “pick-up”, “semi-truck”, “dump truck”, “truck”,

“low boy” are all translated as “xe” in the subtitles Other examples to refer are: “steam powered winch and “steam donkey” to be translated as “Tời’; “engine ventilation” as “Bộ thông gió hydraulic pump” as “bơm”

4.3 Equivalence of logging activities and environment

Similar to logging equipment, short form is critically important to subtitles translation and terminology equivalence A more detailed view can be discussed with the following table:

Road/shovel road/log road/

Temporary road Đường tạm/đường gỗ

Đường

Hole (in tire) Lỗ thủng

Hole (in swamp) Hố lún

Quality pulpwood Gỗ giấy chất lượng cao Gỗ

Paper mill/mill Nhà máy giấy Nhà máy

Figure 6: Equivalence for logging activities and environment

Come to the wood names, a cultural substitution as suggested by Baker (1992) Risky

as it is, the substitution turns out to be fairly appropriate to subtitles translation

Mockernut hickory Cây/Gỗ hồ đào đầm lầy

Figure 7: Equivalence for Wood Names

These equivalences are not necessarily true to every situation where such cultural concepts appear It is required that no concepts are left untranslated Therefore, Vietnamese terms tend to be used to fill in the gap, not to transfer the meaning For example, missing meaning can be clearly demonstrated by using pictures of “tupelo” and “cây keo”

5 Concluding remarks

It can be seen from the last section that subtitlers encounter all word-level equivalences that Baker (1992) has pointed out To deal with these complicated problems, translators/subtitlers utilize and adapt Baker‟s suggested solution to their own work

The study identifies three groups of equivalence with nine sub-groups achieved in Vietnamese subtitles of the series “Swamp loggers”, which are:

1 Equivalence of words with meaning complexity

a Unlexicalized concepts

b Semantically complexity

c Different distinction in meaning

d Lack of specific term/super-ordinate

e Different in form

2 Equivalence of words with technical complexity

a Equivalence of logging machines and equipment

b Equivalence of logging activities and environment

c Equivalence of wood names

To satisfactorily solve the above problems, which is establishing equivalence for these terminology, translators/subtitlers flexibly apply Baker (1992)‟s strategies in each different situation As for equivalence of logging machines, the formation “máy + function” is used, whereas the general terms are used as equivalence for equipment However, short form, which

is impossible to create for machine terms, is the key to subtitles translation to achieve the shortest and clearest meaningful sentences Similarly, it is necessary to pay considerable attention to short form when equivalence of logging activities and environment is encountered The acceptability rather than the full form is appreciated due to the pressure that tight time put

on subtitlers Beside these groups, the most challenging one turns out to be “wood names” Such cultural specific concepts in the source language sometimes do not have a true equivalence in the target language and cause mistranslation However, mistranslation is definitely not mis-subtitling It should be acceptable to adaptively omit and turn such concept into an available term in the target culture

PART III: CONCLUSION

1 Addressed issues and some applications

The previous part has investigated the equivalence for terminology between original

English scripts and Vietnamese subtitled version of the documentary series “Swamp loggers”

shown on Discovery Channel in association with Vietnamese Cable Television This part will review the major findings to present the overall answer to the research questions Furthermore, based on these findings, some applications and suggestions for further study will be drawn out

The research question of this study was: "How equivalence in translation between English and Vietnamese is achieved in Vietnamese subtitles version of the documentary series

“Swamp loggers” shown on Discovery Channel in association with Vietnamese Cable

Television?"

It can be said that translators/subtitlers working on the series use various strategies, from the most common to the risky one, to deal with problems of non-equivalence as suggested by Baker (1992) Not all of the equivalence meets the translator/interpreter‟s expectation, however, from subtilers‟ point of view, the equivalence achieved in subtitles of “Swam loggers” is clear and credible, and gives the impression of being part of the action on the screen

Although the conclusion drawn from this study is contemporary and preliminary as the time and the scope of the study are both limited, it is hoped to modestly contribute to the literature in translation equivalence, especially in terminology and also to the assessment of translation Besides, it is hoped that there are some useful information to ELT

Translators can build the bridge between the two cultures: The more they investigate the similarities and differences, the fewer blanks will be left and the higher benefit the readers/viewers will receive This cannot be truer to subtitles when movie industry is developing rapidly on daily basis and demands from customers who are authors, script writers, broadcasters, and most importantly, viewers, are soaring

On the other hand, teachers of foreign languages with their guidance for good choice of reference books would be particularly helpful to their students if students can get the expressive means in the source language text and reproduce them in the target language text Through the process of investigating a translation and critical remarks on its equivalence, students‟ language capacity and acquisition as well as their knowledge of translation studies and skills can be developed and their studying of foreign literatures also can be facilitated This investigation into equivalence achieved by subtitlers and their strategy to deal with non-equivalence would hopefully contribute to researches of translation theories, especially in subtitles translation, a new but rapidly growing field in Vietnam

However, shortcomings of the study are unavoidable, for which the author would like to appreciate readers‟ tolerance

2 Suggestions for further study

The research author is fully aware that this study is far from being satisfisfactory and other issues should be taken into consideration so that it can possibly draw out an overall conclusion

of equivalence in subtitles translation The following topics can be considered for further studies:

- Equivalence above word level in subtitles translation

- Types of terminology in finding equivalence for subtitles translation

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2 Baker, M (Ed.) (1998) Routledge encylopedia of translation studies London

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