Aspects Of Audiovisual Translation

This chapter presents the aspect of audiovisual translation, it’s development and usage. In separate subsections of this chapter three main methods of AVT are described.

II.I The overview of AVT
At first it should be explained what is the meaning of the term audiovisual. It may be said that it is a “combination of verbal, nonverbal, audio and visual elements to the same degree of importance”. All these elements complement each other to make the viewer perceive the content in a previously settled way. Some elements, for instance, music may be created specifically for the content or earlier by someone else. What matters is the relation to other elements and the how it affects the recipients to communicate, for example, sadness or horror. Taking

There are also some live events, like the theatre and the opera, which are sometimes translated in surtitles. Taking into consideration all of these media it is impossible to count how many translations are produced in a given country. There are also programmes like quizzes, talk shows, soap operas, contests and so on which are copied by other countries and do not need to be translated with the exception of the title (Diaz Cintas and Ander-man 2009: 1-2). Despite this fact the need for audiovisual translation also rises because broadcasters have to find more programmes suitable for national circulation such as cookery, DIY and award ceremonies with which they can pack their new channels. Fur-thermore, the digitalisation and emergence of the DVD enabled people to buy and see more audiovisual programmes on different players. One can buy new movies on DVD with additional materials which also need translation, old movies, cartoons, TV series, sitcoms and even concerts. Consumers may pick if they want to see the subtitles or hear the voice-over or dubbed version. These programmes are sometimes translated several times because

In Poland subtitling is used almost only in cinemas or there are intralingual subtitles in television when there are weak quality utterances. Dubbing is used in cartoons for children, but due to the expectations of the audience and low costs everything else is translated in the voice-over mode (translation maine, Bogucki 2004: 69). The choice of the form of translation depends also on customs and audience profile. For example older people prefer voice-over or dubbing to subtitles because of their visual impairments or the fact that reading forces them to make greater mental effort in comparison to younger people and therefore is tiring. The problem of the accessibility of audiovisual materials to people with hearing and visual impairments is gradually decreasing due to the fact that, after being previously ignored by scholars, it aroused their interest and now has an established position in audiovisual translation. Researchers are more interested in this issue because the life expectancy grows and along with it grows the number of people with sensory impairments. Nowadays people with hearing impairments can easily have access