An analysis of fansubbing in Zettai ni Waratte wa Ikenai: airport 24 ji

Abstract: Looking at Japanese media online, one often finds comments such as "crazy Japan" from international viewers in the comment section. A quick search on YouTube forJapanese comedy would give an understanding of the origin of this statement. Japanese humour contains many unconventional concepts, and Japanese stand-up comedy is no exception. This study investigated fan subtitling for Japanese comedy, and the chosen material is one episode from the Japanese TV variety show Gaki no Tsukai ya Arahende: Batsu game special (Gaki files, 2011). The research question is: Which of Gottlieb’s strategies was employed to translate each punchline that resulted in a penalty (Batsu) in the fan-subtitled translation of Gaki no Tsukai ya Arahende: airport special? Since there is no official translation, this research used only the fantranslation to analyse the strategies utilised in this five-hour special episode. This was done by transcribing humorous punchlines in the original and analysing the fantranslated version using the translation theory of Henrik Gottlieb (1992). By exploring the strategies and translation errors found in this fan translation, this study hopes to give some theoretical and practical applications for Japanese language learners and translators. Finding answers to the main research questions in this study also resulted in practical examples of naturally occurring translation theories.