The rendering of Japanese comedy: The case of culture-specific references in the English subtitles of Hitoshi Matsumoto presents Dokyumental

Abstract

This study focuses on the linguistic and socio-cultural components in the translation process of Japanese humour. The cultural apparatus plays a key role in the development of humour exchanges but is still insufficiently explored. Heydon and Kianbakht (2020) argue that there is no greater challenge than to deal in translation with references directly related to cultural aspects of other, often distant and different languages. All of this contributes to historical theories on the untranslatability of humour (Delabastita 1994), even though more recent research favours a predominantly functional approach especially in the field of audiovisual translation (Dore 2020).

   In this context, this study, in addition to providing a brief examination of the main characteristics of Japanese-made humour - an area almost unexplored by previous studies - has the primary aim of intercepting the rendering in English subtitles of culture-specific references (CSRs) in the Japanese comedy programme Hitoshi Matsumoto presents Dokyumental. The programme counts thirteen seasons, but now only two are available in translation on the Amazon Italia platform. In particular, I try to analyse the strategies adopted by the translator to convey a type of humour that often significantly transcends Western canons (Davis, 2006; Swan, 2022b). As Ranzato (2010: 42) points out, the problem of cultural references has not been exhaustively explored in the context of audiovisual translation yet. Although research in cultural references has been fruitful in the recent years, the statement of Ranzato remains valid for what concerns the Japanese context. This is why the present study may prove significant in the fields of Audiovisual Translation Studies, Humour Studies and Japanese Studies.