Reduced Forms in Japanese Subtitles: In Contrast with Korean

Abstract

This paper examines strategies used to reduce the length of Japanese subtitles and investigates how they differ from strategies for subtitles in Korean, a language of similar structure. The amount of information present in subtitles was analyzed based on the number of syllables and the reduced forms of sentences in the texts of translated subtitles on DVDs of 11 major American and British TV series, released in Japan and Korea from 2001–2012. In Japanese subtitles, sentences can be shortened by omission of particular elements at the sentence level, or by omission of information at the context level. Sentence level omission was observed in two forms, “particle-ending form” (sentence ends in a particle as predicate is omitted) and “noun-ending form” (sentence ends in a noun as there is no copula). Both forms appear to be unique omission strategies in Japanese, and were rare in Korean subtitle texts. Furthermore, these two forms seemed to result in a pragmatic supplementation of omitted information by making the sentences pithy and high-impact. These forms were also seen to be employed efficiently in scenes of heightened tension.