Gayspeak and gay subjects in audiovisual translation

Gayspeak and gay subjects in audiovisual translation: strategies in Italian dubbing

Dr Irene Ranzato, University of La Sapienza, Roma, Italy

Date: Tuesday, 11^th February 2014

Time:  4-5 pm

Location: Medawar G01 Lankester LT (map: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/maps?locationID=96)

 Address: G01, Medawar Building, Gower Street, London, WC1E 6BT

Talk outline:  This talk will provide some insights in the analysis of fictional language of homosexuals as portrayed on the screen, as well as the way in which Italian translators and dubbing adapters have dealt with gayspeak. The words of the gay lexicon in the English and the Italian languages do not cover the same semantic areas and the lack of balance between the two languages in this particular field may create problems for the translator. Various examples from dubbed films and television series in which some of the features of gayspeak are substantially altered will help investigate whether these modifications are due to constraints determined by the vocabulary used to define the idiolect of this speech community or, rather, to overt and covert constraints imposed by a culture, the Italian, which has opened up to homosexual themes much more slowly than the Anglosaxon world.

Biography: Irene Ranzato is a researcher in English language and translation at Sapienza University of Rome, where she teaches audiovisual and intersemiotic translation for BA, MA and Master courses. She has a PhD in Translation Studies (Imperial College London): her research focused on the translation of culture specific references in dubbing for television. She has written extensively on themes related to audiovisual translation: censorship and manipulation in dubbing, culture specific references, the translation of regional and social varieties of English. She is also interested in film and television studies and in theories of adaptation. She has written a book on Tom Stoppard - which analyses his work as a playwright, screenplay writer, translator and adapter – and a book on audiovisual translation.