Towards a model for film literacy in audiovisual translation: a case study of the subtitling of a classic Egyptian film into English

Abstract

The emergence of DVD technology prompted a surge in subtitling a large number of Egyptian films into English. Although subtitling has been around in Egypt since the early thirties of the past century, most of the activity has been into Arabic only. Most western universities have been debating audiovisual translation issues for the last decade. Yet contribution from Arabic has been virtually negligible. The increasing number of Egyptian films subtitled onto DVD has prompted the examination of subtitling Arabic language films.

In the current study, the subtitling of Egyptian classic films is examined. The study looks at the current professional practice, the quality of the subtitling and the teaching of screen translation in Egypt. The study will argue that the current subtitling practice is flawed as it remains oblivious to three significant factors that impact on the training of subtitlers and consequently on the quality of subtitling. These factors are 1) the lack of formal debate of subtitling in translation curricula, 2) the reliance on the dialogue list as an economical way of producing subtitles and 3) the lack of film literacy.

The research examines the first film produced by the DVD industry in Egypt. The film, featuring Omar Sharif, is widely considered an Egyptian classic. It applies a multimodal analysis of thirty significant scenes in the film and highlights the common challenges in the subtitling which were not met. It will argue that failure to meet the challenges is primarily due to the above three factors which seriously hamper the production of quality subtitling in Egypt.

The major conclusion reached is that film literacy is a must for audiovisual culture to take root in the country.