This paper contains some thoughts on how an approach based on speech act theory can be used for quality assessment in subtitling. It is assumed here that subtitling is a pragmatic form of translation and that it might be more felicitous to give a speaker’s primary illocutionary point (what is meant to get across) precedence over what is actually said, if there is a conflict. Analyses of subtitled utterances containing Extralinguistic Cultural References (ECRs) illustrate the approach, showing that there is a difference in kind between more or less felicitous translations and translation errors. By considering the sender’s primary illocutionary point first, a felicitous subtitle is faithful to the original message, despite the media-specific constraints, while giving the viewer/reader guidance to access the message. In this way, high fidelity is achieved through high felicity.
2022. Cultural references in films: an audience reception study of subtitling into Arabic. The Translator 28:1 ► pp. 112 ff.
de Pablos-Ortega, Carlos
2020. Directive Speech Acts in English and Spanish Filmspeak. Pragmática Sociocultural / Sociocultural Pragmatics 8:1 ► pp. 105 ff.
Desilla, Louisa
2014. Reading between the lines, seeing beyond the images: an empirical study on the comprehension of implicit film dialogue meaning across cultures. The Translator 20:2 ► pp. 194 ff.
2017. Legal Drama and Audiovisual Translation: The Role of Legal English in the Construction of Stereotyped Representations. Studies in Logic, Grammar and Rhetoric 49:1 ► pp. 247 ff.
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