2. The importance of Subtitling

 

It is important, first of all, to define what is understood by subtitling. "Subtitling can be defined as the linguistic practice which consists of offering – generally in the lower part of the screen – a written text that tries to report the actors' dialogues, as well as those discursive elements that conform the scenery or soundtrack."[1] (Jorge Díaz-Cintas, Teoría y práctica de la subtitulación Inglés - Español, 2003: 32)

 

Subtitles usually consist of a maximum of two lines of written text synchronised with the actors' dialogues. Thus, they must reflect the actors’ conversations, although sometimes not every nuisance can be conveyed in only two lines. In order to express the whole meaning of the conversations, the translator needs – in some occasions – to summarize the dialogues yet keeping all the nuances. This is a difficult task that sometimes includes play on words or puns, which difficult even more the translation process.

 

The final product might be of interest for language learners – provided that subtitles and soundtrack are in the same language – since students can acquire:

1) A wide range of passive vocabulary, this is, the vocabulary which is understood although it is hardly performed.

2) Pronunciation and accent.

3) Collocations, idioms, and idiomatic expressions.

4) Understanding of pragmatic expressions such as sarcasm or irony.

 

All these features might be learned with the aid of subtitles; using subtitles in order to understand an audiovisual product. However, there is an innovative project that also includes subtitles in order to help the learning process, yet in a different way.

 

Despite the difficulties that subtitling entails, some universities have developed a project that includes creating subtitles as part of the process of language learning. The project is called Learning via Subtitling (LeviS: http://levis.cti.gr/index.php?option=com_frontpage) and the project team is formed by: Hellenic Open University (Greece), Research Academic Computer Technology Institute (Greece), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (Spain), Transilvania University of Brasov (Romania), University of the Algarve (Portugal), Roehampton Unversity (United Kingdom), University of Pécs (Hungary).

 

This project is committed to use subtitling as an activity in order to learn foreign languages. It is not a method per se, but rather it proposes several activities that can be carried out to complement a given methodology. It combines the audiovisual field, so attractive to the students, with the handling of language in order to adequate the conversations into the two-line sequences.

 

The present study focuses on the use of produced subtitling for language learning and not on the creation of subtitles. However, the latter is an interesting and innovative project that I would like to experience with students at some point in the near future.

 

 

© Teresa Agost Porcar. 2007.

teapor@alumni.uv.es



[1] My own translation