Finnish Subtitling of the N-word in The Hateful Eight and Django Unchained on Viaplay

Abstract

Taboo language is one of the problems a translator can encounter when translating works of fiction. These words give rise to different emotions depending on a person ranging from, for example, embarrassment to disgust. One of such words is the n-word often characterized as the most offensive racial slur in the English language. The aim of this thesis is to investigate what translation strategies have been used when translating the n-word. The research questions are what kind of translations strategies are used when translating taboo language, how often each translation strategy is used and can the effect of translation norms and Finnish subtitling quality recommendations be seen in the choices of strategies. The theoretical framework is comprised of four parts: the etymology and history of the n-word in the United States and Finland, translation of taboo language, audiovisual translation, and translation norms. The English etymology and history of the n-word is based on for example Henderson (2003) and Pryor (2016). The Finnish portion is heavily based upon Rastas (2007). The taboo language portion looks at studies by Hjort (2009; 2017), Díaz-Pérez (2020) and Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk and Trojszczak (2022). The audiovisual translation portion uses for example Díaz-Cintas and Baños Piñero (2015) and Pérez-Gonzáles (2014). For a Finnish perspective Oittinen and Tuominen (2007) and Tuominen (2018) are used. The translation norms section is based on Toury ([1995] 2012) and Chesterman ([1993] 2017). This section also introduces the Finnish Quality Recommendations for Intralingual Subtitling (2020). The translation strategy categories used in this thesis are based on Díaz-Pérez (2020) study on subtitling swearwords in Galician was used. The translation strategy categories are pragmatic correspondence, omission, de-tabooing, and addition. As material the Finnish subtitling of Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained and The Hateful Eight on Viaplay is used. Text comparative analysis is used while partially including the audiovisual context of the films. Additional factors such as which characters’ dialogue was being subtitled are also accounted for. It was found that pragmatic correspondence was the most common translation strategy used. However, there is a difference in the amount of pragmatic correspondence used between the films. The Hateful Eight had more pragmatic correspondence than Django Unchained. The second most used translation strategy was omission. De-tabooing and addition saw the least use in the subtitling of the films.