• Evotech@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    3
    ·
    edit-2
    27 days ago

    I think people are unreasonable when they want media too be literally translated word by word.

    Japanese for instance, like English, is filled with word play, sayings etc that doesn’t make sense when translated.

    I love FFXIV, yes the dialogue is localized, not translated, but this allows for so much word play and humour in the English version. Japanese is not a very humerous language I’m told.

    Just, don’t mistake translation and localization.

    • Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      27 days ago

      Afaik they don’t know any sarcasm and swearing (swearing in comparison to english)? I believe to have read somewhere on Lemmy how a english/japanese bi-lingual mentioned to their japanese friends how much nuances and jokes were left out to make Deadpool 3 work for the audience.

      • Lvxferre@mander.xyz
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        27 days ago

        Japanese uses sarcasm (“needling” through words) and irony (a statement conveying its opposite) heavily, perhaps even more than English does. The problem is that how you convey sarcasm and irony changes from language to language, and Japanese relies heavily on context to do so.

        I’ll give you an example: in English you can show deference towards a person using Mr., Ms., or similar. If I were to do this here, and wrote something like “Mr. Appoxo”, it would sound weird (as there’s no reason to show deference), but not insulting.

        In Japanese however this would be interpreted as ironic and belittling towards you. Specially if I used a “stronger” honorific like -様 / -sama.