Frontiers in Educational Research
ISSN 2522-6398 Vol. 6, Issue 1: 139-143, DOI: 10.25236/FER.2023.060122
Published by Francis Academic Press, UK
-142-
In example 3, Guy helps the Croods make shoes to walk on the pointy rocks. When Eep puts on her
new shoes, she can not stand still and falls down with Guy. Grug, Eep’s father, notices it and comes to
split them up. Guy uses “Okay” as a response marker to demonstrate his understanding of Grug’s nervous
feeling so as to calm down Grug. The use of “Okay” expresses Guy’s intention to reduce Grug’s worry
about his intimate relationship with Eep.
The translator has obviously understood the mental states of both Grug and Guy, and “Okay” is
rendered as “Take it easy” in Chinese, rather than the literal meaning. In this way, the dubbed translation
is more coherent with the visual image and sounds more natural in the dubbed language. Besides, the
speaker's communicative intention is also expressed.
3.4. Conversion to Specific Actions
Conversion to specific actions means that the translator converts a discourse marker to a specific
action in accordance with the visual image in the film. This not only ensures that the translation is
synchronized with
the image and sound, which facilitates the audience to
quickly understand the film
without obstacles, but also better reproduces the naturalness and orality of the dubbed language.
Example 4: Thunk:
All right, Dad! Get them. Go get ’em.
Now you get them right in the no....Oh man, there
In example 4, the Croods meet a monkey on their way to find a new home. Grug
has a fight with it
when the other family members watch them and his son Thunk cheers him on. The discourse made by
Thunk is closely related to Grug’s body movements. The discourse marker “All right” is put at the initial
position, signifying
approval, acceptance, or confirmation. When Thunk says “All right”, he is very
excited to encourage his father to fight the monkey back because it has started the war. It can be noticed
that the verbal discourse is tightly connected to the non-verbal elements in the film. When translating,
the translator takes into consideration both the verbal discourse and the visual image. Thus, “All right”
is translated into a specific action “Go” in Chinese, which is consistent with the body action of the film
character Grug. In this way, the translator recreates a naturally-occurring and spontaneous-sounding
dubbed text, which is dynamic and easier to be accepted by the target audience.
In audiovisual translation, linguistic choices are influenced by both verbal and non-verbal elements.
Therefore, the translator needs to take both verbal and non-verbal factors into consideration and convert
discourse markers to specific actions when needed.
