Fansubbing Anime
Fansubbing Anime
Fansubbing Anime
To cite this article: Luis Prez Gonzlez (2007) FANSUBBING ANIME: INSIGHTS INTO THE BUTTERFLY
EFFECT OF GLOBALISATION ON AUDIOVISUAL TRANSLATION, Perspectives: Studies in Translatology, 14:4,
260-277, DOI: 10.1080/09076760708669043
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09076760708669043
260
Fansubbing anime:
Insights into the butterfly effect of globalisation on
audiovisual translation1
Luis Prez Gonzlez, Centre for Translation and Intercultural Studies,
University of Manchester (UK)
[email protected]
Abstract
1. Introduction
Audiovisual translation practitioners are reported to claim that subtitling and
dubbing are not translating, but rather forms of adaptation (Fawcett 1996:
65) understood loosely as a form of deliberate and, to some extent, arbitrary
interlingual and intercultural mediation. In a heavily constrained form of
audiovisual translation like subtitling, the priority is to ensure that maximum
synchronisation obtains in time and space between the delivery of speech in the
source language and the display of subtitles in its target counterpart (OConnell
1998). In professional and scholarly circles, adaptation has become accepted as
inherently and inextricably bound up with the practice of subtitling. However,
the emergence of new amateur subtitling cultures in recent years against the
backdrop of mainstream or professional subtitling has brought into sharp relief
the extent to which the latter is shaped by the commercial interests of Western
media industries. In this article, I propose to look at one of the most influential
amateur subtitling cultures, whose emergence and consolidation has gone hand
in hand with the globalisation of Japanese animated films or anime. Fansubbing,
a new subtitling-based mediation phenomenon postulated by anime fans (and
hence amateur subtitlers), was born to provide fellow fans worldwide with the
fullest and most authentic experience of anime action and the Japanese culture
which embeds it. Unsurprisingly, some of the subtitling strategies developed
for this purpose are at many removes from their mainstream counterparts.
Section 2 provides an overview of the historical origins and the rationale for
the popularity of anime in Japan and beyond. Early attempts to localise anime
into other languages are examined, before the discussion moves on to address
the significance of fansubbing as a new development on this front. Once the
role of fans in the popularisation of anime has been established, section 3 sets
out to gain deeper insights into the articulation of fansubbing as a collective
mediation paradigm; to this end, I account for the organisation of the fansubbing
0907-676X/06/05/260-18 $20.00
Perspectives: Studies in Translatology
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process in terms of participants, roles and stages; I also present some of the most
radical practices of amateur subtitling and explore the scholarly reception they
have enjoyed so far. In the final section, I consider the future of fansubbing
conventions by (i) placing this phenomenon within the wider framework
of current developments in the audiovisual marketplace as a whole; and (ii)
examining how media sociology is trying to theorise both the genealogy and the
potential effects of such changes.
2. Translation and Anime Fandom: the Fansubbing Phenomenon
In Western countries the term anime encompasses a relatively wide range of
Japanese animation genres. Wikipedias entry on this form of filmic entertainment
develops a rudimentary classification of the latter on the basis of criteria such
as the identity of the protagonist, the profile of the intended audience or the
nature of the narrative thrust that propels the action forward2. It then goes on to
note that, effectively, most anime films combine formal and dramatic elements
from more than one animation genre. Thus, it is not uncommon for an action
themed anime to also involve humour, romance, and even social commentary
or vice versa3. A single anime film often weaves together one prevalent genre that
sustains the plot and a set of underlying genres which add depth to the storyline
by way of subtexts. Unsurprisingly, Western characterisations of anime have
tended to play down this thematically motivated diversity. Instead, they have
opted to highlight the permeability between the boundaries of the constitutive
genres of Japanese animation cinema and bundle these together under the
umbrella term anime. Wells (1999: 240), for instance, defines it as a highly
idiosyncratic entertainment form that prioritises exaggerated and sometimes
caricatured expressions of human traits in order to direct attention to the detail
of gesture and the range of human emotion and experience. Born outside the
sphere of influence of Western filmic conventions, anime has come to be known
and recognised worldwide by the core aesthetic and narrative patterns that cut
across the boundaries of individual anime genres4.
Whilst a detailed characterisation of Japanese animated cinema falls
beyond the scope of this article, it cannot be emphasised enough that anime
is a conglomerate of culturally-centred filmic genres. Admittedly, it is not
the only type of animated film available on the market that relies heavily on
a representation of culturally idiosyncratic values, customs and objects. In a
recent study, Di Giovanni (2004: 208) observes that Disney animated films are
increasingly turning to the depiction of cultures which are distant in space or
even in time from the familiar cultural background and experience of Western
audiences as a strategy to boost the success of the American animated film
industry worldwide. Disney animation and anime, however, differ in at least
two fundamental aspects. The first difference pertains to the number of cultural
systems interacting within a given film. In Di Giovannis terms, Disney animation
sets out to exploit the interplay between the alien narrated culture and the
Western narrating culture via the latters deployment of an identifiable range
of filtering or adapting strategies. For its part, anime exhibits an almost total
overlap between the culture portrayed in the film and the culture that packages
the animated product. Secondly, while Disney animated films are conceived
as internationally-valid products, aiming generally at large audiences beyond
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the American national boundaries (Di Giovanni 2004: 217), anime films were
originally created for the enjoyment of one or more specific segments of the
Japanese audience.
The connection between Japanese animated films and their viewers is worth
exploring in some depth at this point. According to Sato (2002), the consolidation
of anime as a form of entertainment with artistic quality dates back to the late
1970s. Although children-geared examples of this filmic manifestation were
well-established before then, the release in the transition between the 1970s
and 1980s of a number of successful (predominantly science fiction) animation
films oriented towards a more adult audience prompted a fundamental shift
in the cultural status of [Japanese] animation. Since then, anime has evolved
and grown to take over live-action cinema as the undisputedly dominant form
of cinematic entertainment in contemporary Japan. In addition to economic
constraints and the pervasiveness of manga (comics) in the Japanese culture
since the Second World War, Sato identifies two major historical reasons whose
importance deserve being quoted at length:
[The] flight to anime is an inevitable result of the ethnic self-denial that has
suffused Japanese society ever since the Meiji era, and especially since the end of
World War II. Bent on achieving the goals of modernization and Westernization,
the Japanese, in rejecting their own history and traditions, have sought to become
Nihonjin-banare (de-Japanized) a generally complimentary term, implying that
one looks and acts more like a Westerner or a Caucasian than the average Japanese
[This] tendency of Japanese to reject their own history and traditions in favor of
a Western ideal has undermined live-action film also by affecting the performances
of Japanese screen actors. An obvious example is the inability of todays younger
actors to portray Japanese of earlier eras with authenticity. It is not only in period
pieces, however, that the rejection of our countrys history and tradition robs actors
performances of authenticity. In postwar Japans cultural climate, it is exceedingly
difficult for actors in any type of role to convincingly express complex, deep or
intense emotion in fact, any dramatic emotion at all [in live-action films] Yet
in animation, which lacks visual realism and features de-Japanized characters to
begin with, the expression of emotion paradoxically takes on a more convincing
sense of reality. This may explain why most of the serious and ambitious film
efforts have used the vehicle of anime. (Sato 2000)
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into a particularly sharp focus the role that the language-culture revolving door
plays in the reception and enjoyment of these audiovisual products.
Over the last three decades, globalisation has contributed to the increasing
availability of previously local forms of entertainment outside the contexts
in which they originated. The diffusion of anime outside Japan that began in
the late 60s5 required the translation of the films and opened up faultlines that,
for the first time, split the language-cum-culture conglomerate underpinning
Japanese animation. The fact that these early televised anime shows were
oriented towards American children had a major impact on the approach to
their translation. Dubbing, the modality chosen for these transfers, made it
possible to alter the stories and characters to suit the perception of the tastes
of American children and their parents by Americanising Japanese names
and removing elements of Japanese Culture (Cubisson 2005: 52). Drawing
on Furniss (1998), Cubisson reports that viewers were immediately aware of
the visual and narrative differences between these pioneering anime series
and the more established products of the American industry. However, the
transformations that the original texts underwent during the translation process
meant that the viewers could not even identify anime as a Japanese product.
Despite these initial obstacles,
[t]he fandom grew through screening sessions at science fiction conventions and
through the efforts of Westerners who traveled to Japan. Anime videotapes and
laser discs were imported and distributed among club members and later by
small companies formed by fans. When through such means Western fans became
aware of the extent to which these texts had been altered for American audiences,
distribution practices within the fan community were aimed at gaining access to
the original versions of the programs (Cubisson 2005: 48).
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debate on the advantages of dubbing and subtitling among anime fans has been
just as intense as in other filmic genres6, the cost factor has effectively ended
up imposing subtitling a relatively inexpensive modality of audiovisual
transfer (Dries 1995; Luyken et al. 1991) for the translation of non-mainstream
translations of anime. In the remainder of this section, I propose to examine
the implications of this de facto monopoly of subtitling for the fans enjoyment
of translated anime, with particular emphasis on (i) the widely acknowledged
limitations of subtitling when it comes to conveying the alterity of the source
culture to the target audiences; and (ii) the emergence of the fansubbing
phenomenon as a reaction to the former.
While it is difficult to pin down consistent patterns in professional translations
of culture-specific material (Ramire 2006), an emergent body of literature
within the field of audiovisual translation studies suggests that commercial
subtitling practices foster cultural and linguistic standardization by ironing nonmainstream identities out of the translated narrative (Daz Cintas 2005). Drawing
on Venutis well-known domestication/foreignization dichotomy, Ulrych (2000)
argues that the medium-related constraints under which audiovisual translators
operate lead to the acculturisation or domestication of the source text in line
with dominant conventions and expectancies prevailing in the TC [Target
Culture] and, more often than not, to the translators effacement or invisibility
(2000: 130). Concomitantly, audiovisual translators become subservient
scribes failing to take a proactive stance in the act of cross-cultural mediation.
In assuming and accepting such a position, Ulrych contends, translators
endorse the positive and negative effects of both foreignising and domesticating
processes and do nothing to improve standards in the film translation industry
(2000: 140). Contrary to what is normally assumed, domesticated translations
do not result solely from the condensation and streamlining of the source text
and hence, the suppression and substitution of references to foreign source
cultures that subtitling requires (Fawcett 2003). In a recent study, Perego (2004)
shows that subtitling culturally-loaded language may occasionally demand an
explicitation of certain elements that are present in the source text. Peregos
analysis reveals that, despite the effects of spatio-temporal restrictions on
subtitled discourse, expansion is sometimes the only feasible strategy to mediate
successfully between non-converging world-views that a particular film has
brought into contact. However, Perego herself is quick to express her preference
for a domesticating strategy, i.e. an unobtrusive manipulation and use of target
culture frames to orient viewers and provide them with an effective cognitive
framework that enables them to interpret new realities consciously, and process
them quickly and easily despite their foreignness (2004: 161). Regardless of
the translation strategies and techniques deployed at each particular juncture,
professional subtitlers appear to be trapped by subtitling standards attuned to
the interests of commercial products (see section 3.3 below). The upshot of this
situation is that professional subtitlers have little room for manoeuvre when
dealing with the subtleties of social, ideological or cultural diversity even
more so when there is at least one non-Western culture involved.
Since professionally subtitled anime was first released for the home video
market, fan communities objected to the use of mainstream subtitling conventions
in the translation of these Japanese genres. In their opinion, commercial
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they connect to the work as it appears in its tangible mediated format (2005: 45;
my italics). In other words, the Web is not just a rich source of anime programmes
or texts for anime fans. It is also a technological environment that determines
which texts are selected for translation and shapes the subtitling process itself
both in terms of workflow organization and selection of linguistic and cultural
mediation strategies. The upshot is that fansubbed anime texts, as packaged and
made available for consumption via the Internet (online works), differ from the
TV-broadcast versions of those same texts (conventional works).
This section explores the status of fansubs as idiosyncratic translated works
based on anime texts. To this end, I will begin by outlining the process of
production of fansubs, thus accounting for the appropriation, manipulation and
dissemination stages involved in fansubbing anime. Secondly, I will focus on the
actual subtitling standards deployed in the translation stage of the fansubbing
process. This section ends with a brief survey of the reception that fansubbing
has been given by scholars from film and translation studies.
3.1. An overview of the fansubbing process
Although fansubbing is a new phenomenon that has so far attracted little
scholarly attention, there are already a number of published accounts of the
way the fansubbing process is typically organized (Daz Cintas and Muoz
Snchez 2006; Infusion Fansubbing Newbie Guide). The overview provided below
informed mainly by Henry (2006) and Live-EviL9 aims to cover the main
steps that tend to recur in the fansubbing process across individual fansubbing
group protocols.
The first stage in the fansubbing process is the acquisition of raw (original
or unsubtitled) audio and video captures of the episode or series that a fansub
network intends to subtitle. The most common course of action to acquire raw
is ripping (copying) the audio and/or video data from the original source,
typically an original DVD previously released in Japan. Although DVD-rips
are used whenever possible as they offer the best image and audio quality (Daz
Cintas and Muoz Snchez 2006), the most common way to secure raw anime
is via television broadcasts. Up-to-date raws can be easily obtained through
peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing interfaces. Raw anime often becomes available
on P2P sites within 3-4 hours of airing on Japanese television networks. Most
fansubbing groups have members who work in the capacity of raw hunters
or providers; they browse through the files available online until they find
a reliable Trip. Within P2P environments, Trip IDs [are used] to verify the
identity of a person sharing a file. A Trip is a sort of encrypted key that identifies
a person is who they say they are10. The use of Trips enables the user to make
an informed choice about whether or not to download a file from that person,
based on previous sharing experience or on information from other users: a
reliable trip would be one that consistently provides high quality captures.
This stage of the process is completed when the raw hunter sends the video
and audio files to the fansubbing groups FTP (File Transfer Protocol) server
computer, commonly known as the dump.
The raw anime is then passed onto the translator, thus initiating the second
stage of the fansubbing process. The translator watches the footage a number
of times using a video player until a script in the form of a plain text file with
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When transferring from Japanese into English most translators are not English
native speakers This is a factor with a crucial impact on the quality of the final
translation. Knowledge of the Japanese language is generally not required in the
case of translating into other languages because translators usually work from the
fansubs translations that have been distributed in English (Daz Cintas and Muoz
Snchez 2006).
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the source language in question, should there be any ambiguity stemming from
the translation of the dialogue. At this stage of the fansubbing process, the raw
anime and the subtitles are still separate texts awaiting their final conflation.
Therefore, the editor usually watches the raw anime using programs such as
Direct VobSub, which links up to SSA and shows the subtitles on screen over the
raw without the video file having to be encoded yet. If editors detect any errors,
they will go back into SSA to revise the script and carry out the amendments
required.
Encoding is the next stage in the fansubbing process and consists in using the
finalised edited script to make a video file with the subtitles encoded onto it.
Encoding typically involves the compression of the raw anime file, so that it takes
less time to aggregate the subtitles onto it and the resulting file is, ultimately,
easier to distribute due to its smaller size. Codecs (compressing devices) such as
XviD and DivX rank high among the most popular tools used for the purposes
of video compression. Once the latter has taken place, the audio file must be
added along with the subtitles using Virtual Dub (a video capture/processing
utility designed for Windows platforms). At the end of the encoding stage, the
fansubs in the target language appear superimposed on the original programme
and are ready for distribution.
There are two main channels of distribution currently in use, XDCC (Xabi
Direct Client-to-Client) and BitTorrent, a P2P tool that distributes over the
Internet fragmented torrent files which will be reassembled once downloaded.
According to Henry (2006), most of the downloading activity occurs within the
first 72 hours of release of the subtitled product by the fansub group. Screen
capture 1 shows the interface of BitTorrent available at Animesuki11, an index
of links to other fansubbing-related websites. The screen capture provides
complete and convenient overview of links to all unlicensed English anime
fansubs available through this P2P application, with the most recent additions
listed at the top. Venus Versus Virus 1, for instance, was released by Gnu-Fansubs
on 15 January 2007 at 01:01 hours. The figure listed for this anime under the ul
column (245) quantifies the number of fans who had a complete downloaded
file (seeders) at the time of printing this screenshot. The dl column refers to
the amount of people connected who were still trying to download the file but
did not have a complete file yet (leechers).
Contrary to the norm in the mainstream film and television industries, anime
fans interact within their Internet-based networks in their uniquely multifarious
capacity as patrons, producers, distributors and viewers of the subtitled product.
Albeit at a very small scale, the overview of the fansubbing group dynamics
presented in this subsection fittingly illustrates a number of what Gambier
(2005) regards as emerging trends within the changing audiovisual landscape.
Firstly, there is the vertical concentration between production, distribution and
programming (2005: 8). Fansubbers bring new products understood as releases
of previously existing films or shows in a new language into existence, make
them available via fan-dedicated channels and turn them into the staple diet of
a growing number of entertainment consumers. The second trend pertains to
the increasingly complex relation between copyright holders and distributors
resulting from the ever pervasive digitisation of the audiovisual industry
commodities. In this respect, Gambier anticipates that [t]hose who actually
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Screen capture 1:
Latest unlicensed fansubbed anime available through BitTorrent at the Animesuki site
(Accessed 15 January 2007 at 1:51 am).
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have learnt to articulate for themselves and for anime distributors their
product specifications [or subtitling preferences], hoping that the latter will
eventually become standard practices in commercially released anime. In this
subsection I will focus on the fansubbers own stance within these market
dynamics. Anime fans integrated in the fansubbing movement represent an
extreme faction within the otaku audience segment. Instead of negotiating with
or attempting to persuade anime producers, distributors and retailers to take
their preferences on board when packaging anime for DVD release, fansubbers
impose their own linguistic and cultural mediation strategies. Going back to
the text/word dichotomy presented in the introductory paragraphs of section
3, it can be safely contended that otaku and fansubbers share an interest in the
same texts, but work towards the production of their preferred works in different
ways. While otaku aim for the acceptance of their agenda in mainstream circuits,
fansubbers have developed their own appropriation, manipulation (including
translation) and distribution mechanisms that allow for a unique form of
comprehensive intervention directed at a smaller target audience. As far as
the translation stage is concerned, fansubbers have developed the means to
avoid domesticating practices in the mainstream audiovisual industry, where
translators often receive
either suggestions or outright orders from above (distributor, dubbing studio,
and the censorship agencies) to alter foreign elements and culturally unfamiliar
items to make them more palatable and attractive (that is marketable) to their target
language audience (Whitman-Linsen 1992: 125).
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Screen capture 2:
Temporal asynchrony between conventional subtitles and fansubbers top-of-screen
notes (Naruto, episode 178).
Screen capture 3:
Fansubberss intervention on film reception through top-of-screen notes (Naruto,
episode 178).
Frame 4a:
Commercial version (FUNimation)
Frame 4b:
Fansubbed version (Lunar)
Screen capture 4:
Visually integrated scenetiming: Differences between commercial and fansubbed
anime (Burst Angel, episode 1).
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Small variations in those initial conditions, such as the proverbial butterfly flapping
its wings in a tropical rain forest, will be expressed through huge differences
in outcome further down the line Chaos theory tells you that the slightest
uncertainty in your knowledge of the initial conditions will often grow inexorably.
After a while, your predictions are nonsense (op. cit: 19).
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Notes
1. I would like to thank Jonathan Bunt (Japan Centre, The University of Manchester) for
his assistance in accessing the data used in this study and Craig Henry (fansubber) for
providing me with facts and figures on the fansubbing process.
2. Given the role that the Internet has played in the development of fansubbing and the
fact that the latter is ultimately a collective undertaking on the part of fan groups, my
reliance on Wikipedia for the characterisation of anime is deliberate. Traditional scholarly
sources are, however, resorted to later in the paper when analysing the significance of
fansubbing within audiovisual translation studies.
3. Available online at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anime#Genres. Last accessed on 5 January
2007.
4. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anime#Style for an introductory overview of such distinctive traits. Last accessed on 5 January 2007.
5. The first anime programmes broadcast on American TV networks were amalgamations
of unrelated anime series cobbled together into a single story (Wikipedia, en.wikipedia.
org/wiki/Anime#Early_anime_in_the_United_States). Last accessed on 5 January 2007.
6. Despite not being an audiovisual translation scholar herself, Cubisson (2005: 49)
explores in some detail the consequences that the self-empowerment of fans had for
the linguistic transfer of anime films outside Japan, paying particular attention to the
dubbing-versus-subtitling debate.
7. The fans ubiquitous concern over the translation of cultural references in anime
is perhaps most evident in online forum threads. In a RIUVI (Research Institute for
Unicultural Visual Arts) post, a fan complains that [w]ith the large amount of anime
in history and the present, its pretty much impossible to know most of them so I dont
get all the references in anime. Some references used in the right places are funny. I
feel the [creating] staff get a bigger kick out of references than viewers really The
biggest problem with references is that it slows down subbing and a lot of the jokes
are lost if improperly subbed But doing research takes a lot of time and effort and
many a subber have given up on this unrewarding task (RIUVI 2006). The difficulties
that some fans experience in interpreting these references explain the success of anime
companions (such as Poitras 1999 and 2005).
8. Available online at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fansubbing. Last accessed on 5 January
2007.
9. Live-eviL (www.live-evil.org) is a fansubbing group that has been established for 5
years and whose primary goal is the subtitling of classic unlicensed anime. According to
Henry (2006), Live-eviL released 120 fansubbed animes during 2006, which amounts to
over 2,800 minutes of subtitled footage.
10. Definition available online at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Share_(P2P). Last accessed on 5
January 2007.
11. Site available at www.animesuki.com. Last accessed on 15 January 2007.
12. For a complete discussion of the relationship between copyright and the ethics of
fansubbing, see Wikipedias entry on fansubs, available online at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Fansub#Recent_legal_action (Last accessed on 15 January 2007) and A New Ethical Code
for Digital Fansubbing, available online at www.animenewsnetwork.com/feature/200306-08/2 (Last accessed on 15 January 2007).
13. In expressing this opinion, Ferrer Sim seems to overlook the fact that current DVD
editions of certain anime programmes already incorporate such extras. Fortunately for
American viewers, discs already come with optional pop-up video notes which explain
the many Japanese-language puns and cultural references (Robinson 2003). However,
although DVDs incorporating such notes or capsules (Cubbison 2005: 51) support the
textual experience desired by many fans (ibid.), the fansubbing phenomenon has not
ceased to grow.