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This study investigates how use of the Swedish verb “bli” corresponds to the Japanese verb “naru” using translated materials as a corpus.  

Japanese is said to be a situation-oriented language, while English is person-oriented.

          e.g., Mariko wa kekkon surukotoni NARImashita.

                   (It became so that Mariko will be married.)

                   ‘Mariko will get married’ in English.

The Swedish verb ”bli” usually means ’to become’ or ’to be (as an auxiliary verb),’ yet is used more widely than these English meanings.

          e.g., Det blir 100 kronor, tack.

                   (100 kr ni NARI-masu.)

                   ’It makes/will be 100kr.’

Examples like this lead to the observation that ”bli” is used in a context more similar to the Japanese verb ”naru.” than English verb “become.” Comparison of some translated materials also shows that “bli” is often translated into Japanese as “naru” while it is more likely to be replaced by a transitive or intransitive verb in English.

However, erros such as

           *okoru ni NARU (verb ‘to be upset’+naru)

              [okoru: a verb]

           *annshin ni NARU (noun ‘feeling at ease’ +naru)   

              [annshin suru: a verb derived from a noun]

which are made by Swedish learners of Japanese indicate that the translation of “bli” into Japanese is not so straight forward.

In this study, we examined the following questions:

1. How is ”bli” translated into Japanese/English?
2. If ”bli” is translated into ”naru” in Japanese, in what grammatical context(s) does it occur?
3. How are these variations related to the errors students make in translating ”bli” into  Japanese?

In order to examine the above research questions, we conducted two separate studies:

Study I: Examining how Swedish bli is translated into Japanese in literature translation

Using children´s novels “Sommerboken” by Tove Jansson and “Pippi Långstrump” by Astrid Lindgren as the data source, all the sentences that contain bli were extracted along with their translations into English and Japanese. The extracted sentences were, then, categorized according to the various types of usage of the verb bli, and the translation into Japanese for each of those categories was analyzed.

Study II: The translation of various uses of bli into Japanese by Swedish students

Study I above showed usages of the verb bli in various context. In Study II, we tried to see if some of these usages cause more problems than the others for the Swedish students. The students in the Japanese-English translation course at Högskolan Dalarna (Sweden) were given 7 Swedish sentences containing various usages of bli, and were asked to translate them into Japanese. Then the accuracy of the translation and the translation techniques used were analyzed.

The results from Study I showed that there were numerous usages of the verb bli, such as describing conditions, describing the changes of conditions, indicating certain emotional status, and so on, which naturally led to the variety in Japanese translation. Furthermore,  apart from the most literal translation, which is to use the verb naru, various types of compound verbs (main verb – help verb combinations) were used in order to express different nuances.

In some of the usages identified above, translation shifts were obligatory when translated into Japanese; i.e. the literal translation was impossible, and the translator has to make minor changes from the ST (source text) to the TT (target text), such as changes of grammatical categories or of voice (e.g. passive to active).

The results from the Study II show that the sentences which require more complicated translation shifts tend to cause more errors when students translate them into Japanese.

Clarifying how the use of “bli” correlates with the use of “naru” will not only help Swedish students understand the use of the somewhat difficult concept of “naru,” but also help translators deal with this issue. Finding a more systematic way to translate “bli” into Japanese using more tokens from various genres would be necessary in order to achieve this.

Learning outside the academic institution, or affinity-based informal learning, has been studied by various scholars (e.g., Paul Gee and Henry Jenkins). One place where this type of learning can occur is in online participatory fan culture activities, where fans create, for example, works of literature, films, and translations, as well as comment on one another’s work and teach one another.

In Sweden, very little research on fan culture as a place for collaborative learning has been conducted and existing research has mainly focused on high-school students (Olin-Scheller); therefore, our examination of fan culture activities and learning processes among university students will serve as in important contribution. The general purpose of our project is to find out more about informal learning activities that exist among our own students so that we can then apply that knowledge to our teaching and pedagogical methods as university teachers. We are interested to see how the practitioners themselves experience informal learning activities and how they benefit from these.

As such, a two-step project was designed: first, a questionnaire was distributed to all students of ten language departments at Dalarna University (2432 students). The questionnaire contained questions about the level of awareness of online fan activities and the degree of student participation in these activities. The second part of the project comprised qualitative interviews (in the autumn of 2013) of some of the students who responded to the survey. Here, we examine the kind of fan culture activities that they are consuming and the reasons for their participation. As well, we examine whether they think they have developed any language, cultural, or other skills and knowledge through the communities. In our paper we present the results of this study.

At the Dalarna University (Sweden), which is specialized in online education, there has been a three-year research project called “Informal Learning Environment”, which explored the educational aspects of fan activities and possible ways to apply them in foreign language and literature courses. One part of the project was a study, conducted in two stages. First, an online questionnaire survey on the language student’s awareness about online fan activities, as well as their participation in those, was carried out. In the second stage, seven students that were actively participating in various fan activities were interviewed. The interviews examined the qualitative aspects of the participants’ involvement in fan communities with four different question areas: In what kind of fan activities do they participate?; Why do they participate, and what makes participation attractive to them?; What kind of knowledge and skills (such as language or cultural or other skills) do they think they have developed through participation?; and do they think it is possible to apply this mechanism of informal learning to the university courses? We also asked whether they see any connection between informal learning in the fan communities and their learning at university / college.During the project (which includes the actual application of some fan activities to the courses), various educational elements of fan activities have become clear. In this proposed paper we do the final analysis of the aforementioned study with a focus on the curiosity and playfulness that we could see in this informal learning. Based on the interviews, we will analyze the motivation / mechanism for the intensive learning processes that seem to take place outside the classroom.

Atsuko Suga –Vivir entre dos culturas y dos idiomas

Atsuko Suga (1929-1998) es la autora/traductora japonesa, que merece el título de un viajero entre Europa y Japón más que nadie  en el tiempo moderno. Su primer viaje a Europa fue en 1953 para estudiar en Francia. La época era después de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, y ella era de la primera generación de las mujeres japonesas que estudiaba en Europa.

Sin embargo, su conexión más fuerte con Europa era con Italia. Después de haber vuelto a Japón en el año 1955, se trasladó a Roma, primero para estudiar Sociología pero después cambiando el campo de estudio a literatura. Sin embargo Suga no era una estudiante extranjera cualquiera, como su interés estaba en uno de los movimientos sociales en Italia en esta época, Liberalismo Católico. Siendo católica ella misma, su interés yacía en la búsqueda del punto donde la religión podía fundirse con el activismo social. Se acercó a David. M. Turoldo (1916-1992) que representaba el círculo de la Librería Corsia dei Servi, que fue muy activo en el movimiento.

Su matrimonio con uno de los líderes del círculo, Giuseppe Ricca, en el año 1961 parecía ser un movimiento que concretara su vínculo con Europa. Sin embargo, la muerte trágica de Giuseppe después de solo X años de matrimonio dejó Atsuko otra vez en la posición entre Europa y Japón.

No solo en su vida privada, sino en su vida profesional también, Suga se puso entre dos culturas y dos idiomas, empezando a traducir una serie de las obras de la literatura moderna japonesa al italiano, incluso los autores más famosos como Yasunari Kawabata y Shozo Unno. Algunas obras fueron traducidas por la primera vez en Europa. Después de la muerte de su marido, ella seguía con las traducciones, hasta que decidiera a volver a Japón en el año 1971.

Una vez traslada a Japón, empezó a traducir numerosas novelas y poesía italiana al japonés, presentándolas a la audiencia japonesa por la primera vez. Sus traducciones incluye las obras de Italo Calvino y Antonio Tabucchi entre otras. Suga empezó a escribir sus propias obras que son entre la novela y el ensayo sobre su vida en ambas culturas, cuando tenía ya más de 60 años.

En la ponencia, se presentará las obras y la vida de esta figura más especial que vivía entre Europa y Japón.

Several novels by Morimi Tomihiko (1979-) have been translated into other languages. However, readers of the original Japanese must wonder how such texts, heavy as they are in cultural associations, can be translated without losing the key elements that characterise the author’s works.   

Morimi is a prize-winning author of both essays and novels, many of which feature Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan. His contemporary stories feature preposterous characters and settings that are rich in cultural reference. As well as realia, which represents both material culture and specific concepts (e.g., Mayoral 1999), and intertextuality, there is a wealth of cultural associations apparent from expressions, vocabulary, orthography, and classical verb and adjective conjugation. By carefully selecting these cultural elements, the author constructs a literary style that is reminiscent of modern Japanese literature from Taisho (1912-1926) and early Showa (1926-1989). His style also effectively creates a universe that exudes traditional Japanese aesthetic associations expressed by both cultural objects (e.g., food, art, music, decorative objects) and legendary beings (e.g., gods, monsters). Morimi’s abundant humour twists these associations: for example, he uses classical orthography and ancient vocabulary to describe trivial incidents, and he places traditional Japanese ornaments in unexpected settings. This serves to presuppose the diversity of Japanese cultural knowledge on the part of the reader.

The present study analyses both Morimi’s novel The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl (2006), and its English translation. Comical and fantastical, it has two narrators: a male university student in Kyoto and his object of love kurokami no otome (“dark-haired maiden”), who recount various episodes to the readers while making full use of the cultural elements described above. It has been adapted into an animation film in 2017, which won an international award and possibly led to the translation of the novel. Its English translation was published in 2019 (translator: Emily Balistrieri) without any translator’s notes, which suggests use of other translation techniques for cultural elements. The study identifies the different types of cultural elements present in the source text while considering their literary effects and analyses how – and how often – they are translated into English.

物理的な距離を越えて－オンライン交流会の意義

ダーラナ大学（スウェーデン）　猪瀬博子

発表要旨

ダーラナ大学（スウェーデン）では、２０１５年３月よりグラナダ大学（スペイン）と共同で、オンラインで互いの大学の初級日本語学習者の交流会を行っている。二週間に一度の二時間程度のセッションのために、学習者は予め決められたテーマ（①自己紹介、②私の家族、③クリスマスまたはイースター、④日本に行ってしてみたいこと）についての発表をそれぞれ準備し、オンライン上の小グループで各々発表を行い、ディスカッションを行う。

本発表では、クラスでは文法習得で精いっぱいになりがちな初級日本語学習者が、オンライン上のディスカッショングループで互いに「つながりたい、つながりやすい」環境を作り出すことで、どのように「コミュニケーションのための日本語」を体感し、これを学ぶことができるかを、参加学生による振り返り、および交流会後のアンケートにより分析していく。

Human, This Ever-changing Creature: Oshiko’s Default Standard by Yukiko Motoya

As seen in the classical SF anime film Galaxy Express 999 (1979), relations between human and AIenhanced transhuman, and an AI-controlled dystopian society have always been popular in Japanese imagination. These relations can be confrontational, or alternatively, affectionate as sometimes depicted in shōjo manga. In the novel Oshiko’s Default Standard (Oshiko no deforuto in Japanese original) (2021) by Yukiko Motoya (1979-), however, there is no human-transhuman relations as such, as the story depicts the process of human rapidly transforming into AI-enhanced transhuman – in a seemingly dystopian society. Set in the post-crisis Japan, the novel focuses on an everyday-life sphere - child-rearing and nursery school - in a society in which co-prosperity with the AI had become the main national policy. The lessons at the nursery school aim to raise children with outstanding ”abilities to become homogenous”, as individual differences are now considered vulnerability rather than strength. Many professions have been taken over by white cube-shaped robots produced by a single company, and although there is no description of these robots actively controlling the society, people – especially children and youths - start idealizing them and imitating their functions through implanting devices in all body parts. Oshiko, the protagonist, is a mother of two and has adapted well to this society, in which everyone is connected to internet for 24hours/day and endlessly consume digitized content. The nature, including natural human feelings, has been tamed and trivialized to become mere ”undigitized” or ”raw” content for her. Through the close reading, the present paper analyses some of the issues this controversial novel raises, focusing on the possible changes AI-dominated society make on humans, including borders between normal and abnormal, connection with others and loss of individuality, shifting bodily senses, as well as the human essence which can only exist in the constant state of changes.

The present study identifi es the methods used in translating onomatopoeic and mimetic words in Japanese literature into Spanish and English, specifically from the novel Sputnik no koibito by Haruki Murakami. Nearly 300 cases are extracted and nine translation methods – using adverbs, adjectives, verbs, nouns, idioms, onomatopoeia in the target language, explicative paraphrase, combinations of words and omission – are identified. Examples are given of each method analysed, and its effectiveness in transmitting the meaning of the original expressions is considered.

Language Spoken by Murakami’s Female Personages and Japanese Pseudo-Translation Style

Hiroko Inose (Dalarna University, Sweden)

Murakami’s original Japanese text is often described as if it was “translated” from English. The reason for this can vary, and some mention his use of metaphors imported from English, while others suggest that his sentence structure is close to that of English language. The present study suggests yet another element which might be contributing to such claim – the Japanese female language spoken by Murakami’s female personages.

Japanese female speech patterns (onna-kotoba) can be found most frequently in texts translated into Japanese from other languages, where it appears much more often than in actual language spoken by today’s Japanese women. This includes not only fictions, but also translation of interviews or film/TV subtitles and dubbings. It is very possible that this excessive use of now classical female language in translated texts has contributed to the creation of a prototypical image of “translated Japanese” style.

The present study analyses several female personages in Murakami’s works from different periods (e.g. Sputunik Sweetheart, Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage among others) to compare their articulation style to the female speech patterns frequently found in translated Japanese texts.  It also considers in the Murakami’s original Japanese text, what nuance this female speech pattern is adding to the female personages– in other words, what has to be inevitably lost or changed in translation into other languages which do not differentiate male/female/neutral speech patterns as markedly as in Japanese.     

Literature Translation as Re-importation: When the Text Travels Twice Between Cultures

Name: Hiroko Inose

Contact address: hin@du.se

Affiliation: Dalarna University (Sweden)

In the field of literature translation, the treatment of cultural references becomes one of the major issues. In order to transfer the source culture (i.e. the culture of the source text, ST) into the target culture (i.e. the culture of the target text, TT), there are numbers of translation strategies. However, the problem becomes even more complicated if the text has to travel not only once, but twice between the source and target cultures.

This can happen in various ways, but one case is when a ST, written about the target culture, is translated into the target language (TL), to be read by the readers of the target culture.  For example, translating a novel on Japanese traditional culture published in U.S. and written in English into Japanese language would give a series of special translation problems that would not occur when the same novel is translated into any other language. This is not only because of the distance between English and Japanese languages and differences in their structures, but because of the significant difference of cultural knowledge between ST (in this case, English original version) and TT (in this case Japanese translation) readers – unlike in the usual case of translation, the TT readers are expected to have much more knowledge than ST readers about the cultural themes treated in the novel. This may be called re-importation of culture. The target culture is first imported into the ST for the ST readers, and then re-imported into the TT through translation.

The present study will focus on language combinations English/Japanese and French/Japanese, and study novels written on traditional or current Japanese culture and society that have been translated into Japanese.  Original and translation of novels such as Memoir of a Geisha (Arthur Golden,1999), An Artist of the Floating World (Kazuo Ishiguro, 1986) or Stupeur et Tremblements (Amélie Nothomb,1999) will be analysed to see the translation problems encountered, as well as translation strategies used to solve them.

Abstract

The act of choosing the language(s) in which one expresses oneself, or the decision to cross  boundaries between  languages, is closely related to  one’s identity. If this is considered in the context of Japanese literature, Japanese authors like Kyoko Mori and Yoko Tawada started writing in other languages in the 1990s. Around the same time, non-Japanese writers, such as Levy Hideo and Arthur Binard, started publishing works written in Japanese. While this crossing of the Japanese language boundary in both directions has been taking place, one could also find some authors who chose not to use one language, but decided to mix several. This is called bilingual literature, where the authors use more than one language within the same text, often without translation, such as in the case of Shishosetsu from left to right by Minae Mizumura (1995) or Chorus of Mushrooms (1994) by Hiromi Goto. Both these writers mix English and Japanese languages in the text, the former novel having been published in Japan and the latter in Canada.  This type of work is unique, since what is transmitted, which could be considered a gap between two languages or cultures, or the disturbing sense of not being able to understand the complete text, prevents translation, at least into the “second” language used in these novels. It might also suggest what these authors consider to be  untranslatable due to either linguistic or cultural distance or both.  In the current study, the language and cultural hybridity of the above-mentioned works of Mizumura and Goto will be analysed partly in relation to the concept of translatability in translation studies.

The act of choosing the language(s) with which one expresses oneself, or the decision of crossing a boundary of languages, would be deeply related to one's identity. If we see this in the context of literature in Japan, Japanese authors started writing in other languages (e.g. Kyoko Mori, Yoko Tawada) in 1990s. Around the same time, non-Japanese writers such as Levy Hideo and Arthur Binard started publishing works written in Japanese.

While this "crossing the boundary of Japanese language" to both directions has been taking place, we could also find some authors that chose not to choose one language, but decided to mix several. It is hybrid literature in which the authors use more than one language within the same text, often without translation, such as in cases of Shishosetsu From Left to Right by Minae Mizumura (1995), or Chorus of Mushrooms (1994) by Hiromi Goto. They both mix English and Japanese languages in the texts, though the former was published in Japan, and the latter in Canada.  This type of work is unique since what it is transmitting, which could be a gap between two languages or cultures, or a disturbing sensation of not being able to understand whole of the text, refuses translation, at least into the "second" languages used in these novels. It might also suggest what these authors felt "not translatable" for either linguistic or cultural distance (or both). 

In the current study, the language and cultural “hybridity” of the above mentioned works of Minamura and Goto will be analysed, partly in relation with the concept of the translatability in translation studies.

The present paper discusses two pilot studies carried out to see the possibility of the fan community of manga (Japanese comics), in which fan translators translate the original Japanese manga into English (which is called scanlation), functioning as an informal learning environment for the Japanese language learning and translator training. Two pilot studies consist of a) comparison of the original Japanese version with the scanlation and official translation, and b) comparison of the original Japanese version with two different versions of scanlation to see the translators’ level of Japanese language and the overall translation quality. The results show that in scanlation versions, there were numbers of inaccuracies which would prevent them to be treated as professional translation. Some of these errors are clearly caused by insufficient understanding of Japanese language by the translator. However, the pilot studies also suggested some interesting features of fan translation, such as the treatment of cultural references. The two pilot studies indicate that it is desirable to conduct further studies with more data, in order to confirm the results of present studies, and to see the possible relationship between the types of trnalsation errors found in scanlation and the particular type of Japanese language (informal, conversational) that could be learned from manga.

The present paper discusses two pilot studies carried out to see the possibility of the fan community of manga (Japanese comics), in which fan translators translate the original Japanese manga into English (which is called scanlation), functioning as an informal learning environment for the Japanese language learning and translator training. Two pilot studies consist of a) comparison of the original Japanese version with the scanlation and official translation, and b) comparison of the original Japanese version with two different versions of scanlation to see the translators’ level of Japanese language and the overall translation quality. The results show that in scanlation versions, there were numbers of inaccuracies which would prevent them to be treated as professional translation. Some of these errors are clearly caused by insufficient understanding of Japanese language by the translator. However, the pilot studies also suggested some interesting features of fan translation, such as the treatment of cultural references. The two pilot studies indicate that it is desirable to conduct further studies with more data, in order to confirm the results of present studies, and to see the possible relationship between the types of trnalsation errors found in scanlation and the particular type of Japanese language (informal, conversational) that could be learned from manga.

Scanlation as Teaching Material for Japanese – English Translation

Hiroko Inose (Dalarna University, Sweden)

hin@du.se

Scanlation, or translation of Japanese manga by amateur fan translators is widely practiced, and it is made available online. Though it is deemed illegal by the publishers, it can be used in practical teaching of translation. The present study demonstrates three different ways of using scanlation (or imitation of its system) in teaching of Japanese-English translation. In all cases, it is important to first inform the students about the legally dubious status of the practice.

In the first case, mock scanlation was practiced – students in small groups were given different chapters of manga work to translate. Translation was uploaded in the learning platform, and students were required to comment on chapters translated by others. Although the work of manga to translate had been chosen by the teacher, team translation and importance of feedback from the readers was experienced, similar to that of fan translators. The second case is using scanlation for translation criticism – it is known that scanlation prefers culturally more loyal translation than the official translation of manga, and students who were given excerpt of original Japanese manga and its scanlation version were asked to comment on various translation strategies used, as well as to check the accuracy of translation. The third case is using scanlation works to write a BA thesis in Japanese studies (specialised in translation). Here, the students compared the scanlation and official translation of a manga work to the original version and compare different approaches to translation adopted by professional and amateur translators.   

The subculture of manga (Japanese comics) and anime (Japanese animations) has been exported to practically all over the world, including U.S., Europe, Asia and Latin America, creating the fandom that could affect one’s identity on various levels. One example of very direct influence of this subculture could be found in cosplay, where fans dress up as their favourite manga or anime characters, and often participate in a competition.

On the other level of influence, the crave for “more of” manga/anime work could make the fans adopt the identity as creators, or sometimes translators. There are numerous secondary creations, in the form of amateur novels or manga, creating new episodes, using the existing manga or anime characters. Another way to “have more” is to be able to read/see the newest episode of particular manga or anime work as soon as possible, or to be able to appreciate the works which have not been released outside Japan. In this case, the fans could adopt the role of not the creator but the translator.

In fact, one can find the newest manga/anime episode within few days or even hours after its release in Japan, translated into other languages and subtitled (in case of anime). These scanlation (in case of manga) and fansub (in case of anime) works are all released on internet for free. In fact, the whole process of scanlating, that is scanning the original material, cleaning the image, translating, and editing – is done for free, normally by teams of fans. The translation into English and Chinese are often done from the original Japanese version, which means fan translators have somehow learned Japanese language.

The presentation will be on the manga subculture outside Japan, with its special focus on scanlation, an exercise very popular among manga fans in spite of its dubious legal status (in relation to the copyright). Academically this field is not yet studied extensively, and the presentation will introduce the overall structure and situation of this fan translation of manga.

The present paper discusses how various elements in shōjo manga (Japanese comics for girls) have been incorporated in works of Japanese contemporary literature. The connection between shōjo manga and literature was pointed out for the first time when the novel Kitchen by Yoshimoto Banana was published in 1987. This paper argues that this connection has developed further since then, focusing on one of the most active writers in contemporary Japanese literature, Miura Shion. The paper briefly introduces the genre shōjo manga and describes its connection with the novel Kitchen before analysing a short story and an essay by Miura Shion, focusing both on their motifs and styles, to identify elements influenced by shōjo manga.

En este artículo se analiza cómo varios elementos de shōjo manga (cómics japoneses para chicas) se han incorporado en las obras de literatura contemporánea japonesa. La conexión entre shōjo manga y la literatura se señaló por primera vez cuando la novela Kitchen de Yoshimoto Banana se publicó en 1987. La autora de este artículo argumenta que la conexión entre los dos géneros se sigue desarrollando desde entonces, tomando como ejemplo Miura Shion, una de las autoras más activas dentro de literatura japonesa contemporánea. El artículo introduce brevemente el género de shōjo manga y describe su conexión con la novela Kitchen, antes de analizar un cuento y un ensayo de Miura Shion, centrándose tanto en sus temas como en el estilo, para identificar los elementos que tienen influencia de shōjo manga.

Though sound symbolic words (onomatopoeia and mimetic words, or giongo and gitaigo in Japanese) exist in other languages, it would not be so easy to compare them to those in Japanese. This is because unlike in Japanese, in many other languages (here we see English and Spanish) sound symbolic words do not have distinctive forms that separate them immediately from the rest of categories of words. In Japanese, a sound symbolic word has a radical (that is based on the elaborated Japanese sound symbolic system), and often a suffix that shows subtle nuance. Together they give the word a distinctive form that differentiates it from other categories of words, though its grammatical functions could vary, especially in the case of mimetic words (gitaigo). Without such an obvious feature, in other languages, it would not be always easy to separate sound symbolic words from the rest.

These expressions are extremely common and used in almost all types of text in Japanese, but their elaborated sound symbolic system and possibly their various grammatical functions are making giongo and gitaigo one of the most difficult challenges for the foreign students and translators. Studying the translation of these expressions into other languages might give some indication related to the comparison of Japanese sound symbolic words and those in other languages.

Though sound symbolic words are present in many types of texts in Japanese, their functions in traditional forms of text (letters only) and manga (Japanese comics)are different and they should be treated separately. For example, in traditional types of text such as novels, the vast majority of the sound symbolic words used are mimetic words (gitaigo) and most of them are used as adverbs, whereas in manga, the majority of the sound symbolic words used (excluding those appear within the speech bubbles) are onomatopoeias (giongo) and often used on their own (i.e. not as a part of a sentence). Naturally, the techniques used to translate these expressions in the above two types of documents differ greatly.

The presentation will focus on i) grammatical functions of Japanese sound symbolic words in traditional types of texts (novels/poems) and in manga works, and ii) whether their features and functions are maintained (i.e. whether they are translated as sound symbolic words) when translated into other languages (English and Spanish). The latter point should be related to a comparison of sound symbolic words in Japanese and other languages, which will be also discussed.

The entry of works of manga to foreign countries has been made through the original translation into several languages. If the Spanish language translation at first through the third language (eg English) was quite common. However, market development and the "subculture" of fans demanding as faithful to the original in every way (even the direction of reading and the size of the book), is now more normal conduct the translation of the original, ie the Japanese language. In this article we focus on the translation of the Japanese onomatopoeia and mimesis in the works coming out wide. In the translation of manga, the Japanese onomatopoeia and mimesis written (or almost "drawn") out of the sandwiches can be problems for translators. It is not always easy to find equivalent expressions in other languages, nor is it easy to skip them, because they are written directly into the bullets and sometimes costly or technically difficult to remove. The use of onomatopoeia and mimesis is one of the salient features of the Japanese language and are deeply related to the Japanese phonetic symbolism. In this article, we use these expressions and sleeve very briefly, before examining some translation techniques such expressions. We will also see examples of iberomanga, which is a genre of manga created by the authors speaking.

The present study identifies the methods used in translating Japanese onomatopoeic and mimetic words in literature into Spanish and English. From the novel Sputnik no koibito by Haruki Murakami, which was used as the data source, almost 300 cases are extracted and nine methods (using adverbs, adjectives, verbs, nouns, idioms, onomatopoeia in the target language, explicative phrases, combinations of words and omission) are identified. Each method is analyzed with some examples, considering its effectiveness in transmitting the meaning of the original expressions.

TRANSLATING JAPANESE ONOMATOPOEIA AND MIMETIC EXPRESSIONS IN MANGA INTO SPANISH AND ENGLISH

Dr. HIROKO INOSE (Lecturer, Department of Japanese, Dalarna University, Sweden)

Onomatopoeic and mimetic expressions are widely used in almost all levels of Japanese language, giving it a richness of the expression. However, due to their elaborated sound symbolic system, those expressions are a challenge for Japanese language students and translators. The present paper focuses on those expressions used in manga, or Japanese comics, and their translation into Spanish and English. Maison Ikkoku, a famous work by Rumiko Takahashi, is used as the main corpus.

In the first 3 chapters which were used as the corpus, more than 140 cases of using onomatopoeias and mimetic words were found. As for the techniques used to translate them, 9 were identified in both English and Spanish versions, though they do not coincide with each other. The present paper categorizes and analyses those techniques, and discuss their effectiveness.

The study shows that the use of these expressions in original Japanese manga differs from their use in more traditional style texts, such as Japanese novels. This, by itself, is not surprising since manga has drawings as well as texts to transmit messages. However, the different use of these expressions in this genre seems to have lead to the adoption of different techniques of translation as well. In the translation of manga the translators use a series of more dynamic and original techniques compared to the techniques used to translate these expressions in novels, such as neologism or use of the third language.

The present study analyses how the Western-Other in Moto Hagio’s original Japanese version of the graphic novel (manga) The Heart of Thomas (1975) is translated into English.

Translation of Japanese manga into English and other European languages became popular in the 1990s; however, modern shōjo (girls) manga began publication in Japan 40 years earlier in the 1950s. As critics point out, shōjo manga is a medium that traditionally reflected the dreams and problems of Japanese girls, which in turn influenced their understanding of the world. In the 1960s and early 1970s, when Japan was poor yet economic growth rapid, many shōjo stories took place in a Western setting because at that time, the West symbolised wealth. With no Japanese characters and often with much anachronism, these stories demonstrate the idealised Western-Other or Occidentalism. 

The Heart of Thomas is a story about adolescent boys in a boarding school in a small German town, and it served as the precursor to the establishment of the androgynous ”beautiful boy” prototype in shōjo culture. The work featured the Occidentalism that was prevalent in shōjo manga at the time, demonstrating a version of Europe translated into Japanese. 

40 years after its original publication, the work was translated into various European languages (French, English and Italian in 2012, 2013 and 2019 respectively).  The present study focuses on how this Western-Other constructed for Japanese girls in the 1970s was transferred for the modern Western readership. The source text elements which construct the exotic Europe – German terms transcribed in Japanese, anachronic European customs and institutions for example – are identified through close reading of the text.  Then the strategies used to translate these elements into English are analysed along with reader reception of target texts. Was the Western-Other constructed for Japanese girls more than 40 years ago translated into European languages as ”Us”, as one might expect? Or was it kept as exotic and alternate Europe, as someone else’s Other? How is Occidentalism in a classic Japanese shōjo manga received by Western readers? These are some of the questions discussed in the study. 

The present paper provides an analysis of how the Other(s) in Moto Hagio’s original Japanese version of the graphic novel The Heart of Thomas (1975), which was written for Japanese girls, is translated in the 2012 translation by Thorn. 

Translation of Japanese manga into English and other European languages became popular in the 1990s; however, modern shōjo (girls) manga began publication in Japan 40 years earlier in the 1950s. As critics point out, shōjo manga is a medium that traditionally reflected the dreams and problems of Japanese girls, which in turn influenced their understanding of the world. In the 1960s and early 1970s, when Japan was poor yet economic growth rapid, many shōjo stories took place in a Western setting – for example, with the portrayal of English nobility – because at that time, the West symbolised wealth. With no Japanese characters and often with much anachronism, these stories demonstrate the idealised Western-Other or Occidentalism. 

Shōjo manga is also known to experiment with stereotypical gender norms and to explore all possible alternatives, which reflects the struggle of girls in Japanese society. One of the prototypes that developed from this tradition is the androgynous ”beautiful boy”, who can engage in amorous relationships with other men or, indeed, other “beautiful boys”. The essence of shōjo manga is compathy; here, however, the girl reader has the chance to enjoy the romantic, sometimes sexual, relationships as the Other – that is to say, not as either girl or woman, but as somebody who can enjoy the freedom of the absent male gaze.

The Heart of Thomas is a story about adolescent boys in a boarding school in a small German town. It featured the Occidentalism that was prevalent in shōjo manga at the time and served as the precursor to the establishment of the androgynous ”beautiful boy” prototype, its main theme being  boys’ amorous feelings for each other. Its first and currently only official translation into a European language (English) was published in 2012, almost 40 years after its original publication. This fact allows us to study how these elements – that is to say, Occidentalism and the “beautiful boy” – that were developed for Japanese girls in the 1970s were transferred for the modern Western readership. Through a close reading and analysis of translation problems and strategies, as well as reader reception, the Other(s) presented in the source and target texts will be discussed.     

文化的レファレンス―マンガを教材とした日本語教育

今日、外国人学生が大学・高校等で日本語を学ぶ大きなきっかけの一つがマンガやアニメの存在であることはよく知られている。実際、元来サブカルチャーであったこれらのジャンルは日本文化の海外への輸出手段として注目されるようになり、「コンテンツビジネス」として、経済産業省等の政府機関が輸出に力を入れる分野ともなっている。また国際交流基金も、日本語教育におけるこれらのコンテンツの有用性を利用して、マンガ・アニメ形式の教材を開発している。

本発表では、言語および文化教育におけるマンガの利用法について考察する。発表者はスウェーデンの大学にて日本語中級レベルの学生を対象に、マンガ四冊を十週間で読むReading Mangaというコースを担当しているが、本発表ではこのコースの内容のみに限らず、①自国語に翻訳されたマンガを読むレベル、②日本語オリジナルのマンガを読みはじめるレベル、③自ら日本語のマンガを翻訳してみるレベル、の三つのレベルにおいて、日本語（および日本語からの翻訳）の学生が、何を学べるかを概観する。①の段階では学生は必ずしも日本語を学んでいる必要はないが、マンガの欧米語への翻訳では翻訳者が原作の文化的レファレンスに非常に忠実であるという特徴があるため、翻訳者による注が非常に詳細にわたって示されており、読者は自然と特定の日本語の単語や文化的背景について学ぶ結果となる。②のレベルでは、学生は一年間程度日本語の基本的な文法を学んでいるが、文化的レファレンスのほかに口語、擬音語・擬態語、役割語など言語的にもマンガを原作で読むことで学べる点は多い。③のレベルでは、発表者が大学で担当している日英翻訳のコース（日本語上級者対象）で翻訳文書の一つとしてマンガを扱っており、ここで学生が直面することになる翻訳上の問題を例に挙げる。ジャンルにもよるが、一般的にマンガには文化的レファレンス、およびそのパロディが多用されており、原文の意味を完全に把握するには日本語能力のみだけでなく、文化的知識も必要とされるのである。

時間的な制限もあり、本発表では上記①②③についての詳細な考察は難しいが、実例を多用することで、マンガが言語教育、文化教育の双方において非常に豊かなリソースであることを検証したい。

要旨

日本語学習の大きなきっかけの一つとして、アニメやマンガが注目をあびている。本発表では、①他言語に翻訳されたマンガを読む、②日本語オリジナルのマンガを読み始める、そして③自分で日本語から翻訳する、という三つのレベルで、学習者が日本語と日本文化について何を学べるかを考える。

The presentation discusses a possible way of adapting internet fan activities to the academic level online education. At the Dalarna University (Sweden), which is specialized in online education, there was a three-year project called “Informal Learning Environment”, which explored the educational aspects of fan activities, and the possible ways to apply them in language (French, German, Japanese, Portuguese) and literature courses.

The educational effects of fan activities are mentioned by various authors (e.g. James Paul Gee), and we focused on two activities, Fan Fiction and Scanlation.

In the Fan Fiction exercise, the students in French and German Literature had an introduction on Fan Fiction, then were asked to choose one of the literary works studied during the semester, and write a short fictional story based on it. Each student uploaded his/her text to the learning platform and then received peer-feedback from others.

In the Scanlation exercise, a group work was designed for the Translation course (Japanese-English translation). Students formed groups of threes and fours and each group translated two different chapters from Shisso Nikki, a manga by Hideo Aduma. They had two weeks to work together, and then the translations were uploaded to the learning platform. Each student then gave comment and feedback to the chapters translated by other groups.

In all courses, students were asked to evaluate the activities afterwards. The evaluation focused on if they enjoyed the activity, what they learned, and what the peer-feedback meant to them. Since we teach only online courses, the web-based interaction becomes very central. This is also the case in fan communities. Therefore, our hypothesis is that connecting fan activities with web-based teaching may be a way to develop and improve the formal academic learning environment.

Fan culture is a subculture that has developed explosively on the internet over the last decades. Fans are creating their own films, translations, fiction, fan art, blogs, role play and also various forms that are all based on familiar popular culture creations like TV-series, bestsellers, anime, manga stories and games. In our project, we analyze two of these subculture genres, fan fiction and scanlation.

Amateurs, and sometimes professional writers, create new stories by adapting and developing existing storylines and characters from the original. In this way, a "network" of texts occurs, and writers step into an intertextual dialogue with established writers such as JK Rowling (Harry Potter) and Stephanie Meyer (Twilight). Literary reception and creation then merge into a rich reciprocal creative activity which includes comments and feedback from the participators in the community.

The critical attitude of the fans regarding quality and the frustration at waiting for the official translation of manga books led to the development of scanlation, which is an amateur translation of manga distributed on the internet. 

Today, young internet users get involved in conceptual discussions of intertextuality and narrative structures through fan activity. In the case of scanlation, the scanlators practice the skills and techniques of translating in an informal environment. This phenomenon of participatory culture has been observed by scholars and it is concluded that they contribute to the development of a student’s literacy and foreign language skills. Furthermore, there is no doubt that the fandom related to Japanese cultural products such as manga, anime and videogames is one of the strong motives for foreign students to start learning Japanese.

This is something to take into pedagogical consideration when we develop web-based courses. Fan fiction and fan culture make it ​​possible to have an intensive transcultural dialogue between participators throughout the world and is of great interest when studying the interaction between formal and informal learning that puts the student in focus

The translation of exportation of manga, or Japanese comics, started in the late 1980s, and in Europe, the biggest market is France. In the present paper, we will focus on the techniques used to translate manga into French, identify and analyse them.

This paper presents a research project that is being conducted at Dalarna University in Sweden. The aim is to study the following: 1) The quality of online language education compared with that of campus education, and 2) Advantages and disadvantages of online language education and how the disadvantages might be overcome. The project consists of two parts: pedagogical methods in online language education from the teachers’ point of view and from the students’ point of view. The first part was conducted in 2012 and various characteristics (benefits and difficulties) of online language education were identified. Flexibility and wider opportunities were general benefits, while lack of physical co-presence, difficulty in having lively debates/discussions, and high dropout rates were among the problems. The second part of the project (being conducted in 2014) aims to investigate how students experience online language learning. The goal is to explore alignments and misalignments between teachers’ perspectives and students’ perspectives, and to develop methods to enhance the quality of online education.

The purpose of this presentation is to introduce the research project progress in “the mapping of pedagogical methods in web-based language teaching" by Högskolan Dalarna (Dalarna University). This project will identify the differences in pedagogical methods that are used for online language classes. The pedagogical method defined in this project is what the teachers do to ensure students attain the learning outcomes, for example, planning, designing courses, leading students, knowing students' abilities, implementing activities, etc. So far the members of this project have analyzed the course plans (in the language department at Dalarna University) and categorized the learning outcomes. A questionnaire was constructed based on the learning outcomes and then either sent out remotely to teachers or completed face to face through interviews. The answers provided to the questionnaires enabled the project to identify many differences in how language teachers interact with their students but also, the way of giving feedback, motivating and helping students, types of class activities and materials used. This presentation introduces the progress of the project and identifies the challenges at the language department at Dalarna University. Finally, the advantages and problems of online language proficiency courses will be discussed and suggestions made for future improvement.