Comparative analysis – the differences between the two translator groups

In this chapter I will compare the quantity and quality of the translation errors occurring in the subtitles translated by the former in-house and freelance translators working directly for MTV to the errors occurring in the subtitles translated by the freelance translators subcontracted by BTI. As the analysed subtitles are a couple of years old now, it is difficult to say whether the freelance translators subcontracted by BTI at the time of airing are still working for the company but this information is not relevant to the analysis. The objective of this comparison is to examine whether there has been any change in the quantity and quality of errors after MTV outsourced its translation services to BTI. My purpose is to connect the subtitling quality to the bigger picture of the recent changes in the audiovisual translation sector. I will mirror the findings of other researchers with the results of my analysis to see whether my results give similar indications as their studies.

The subtitles of the twenty episodes of Emmerdale contain a total of 167 errors. The first set of ten episodes was subtitled by former in-house and freelance translators working directly for MTV and these episodes contain 61 errors. The other set of ten episodes was subtitled by freelance translators subcontracted by BTI and these episodes, in turn, contain 106 errors. This means that 63.5 per cent of the errors appear in the subtitles translated by BTI’s translators, while 36.5 per cent appear in the subtitles translated by MTV’s translators.

The distribution of errors into the error categories between the two translator groups is shown in Figure 2 below.

69 Figure 2. The distribution of errors into the error categories between the two translator groups.

As Figure 2 shows, linguistic errors are the most common type of errors both in MTV’s and BTI’s subtitles. Linguistic errors occur 61 times in the subtitles translated by BTI, whereas in MTV’s subtitles they occur 25 times. Accuracy errors, in turn, are slightly more common in MTV’s subtitles than in BTI’s subtitles, whereas stylistic errors are more common in BTI’

subtitles than in MTV’s subtitles. Accuracy errors occur 21 times in MTV’s subtitles but in BTI’s subtitles the equivalent number of accuracy errors is 16. Stylistic errors, then, occur 29 times in BTI’s subtitles but in MTV’s subtitles the number is 14. It is evident that in BTI’s subtitles linguistic errors form the largest part of the translation errors but in MTV’s subtitles linguistic errors and accuracy errors occur nearly as frequently. An overview of how the translation errors are distributed between the categories in both translator groups is shown in Table 4 below.

25

21

14

1 61

16

29

0 0

10 20 30 40 50 60 70

MTV (N) BTI (N)

70 Table 4. The occurrence of errors in the subtitles translated by MTV’s and BTI’s translators.

Translation errors in the subtitles translated by

MTV's in-house and freelance translators

Translation errors in the subtitles translated by BTI's freelance translators

N % N %

Linguistic error 25 41.0 61 57.5

Accuracy error 21 34.4 16 15.1

Stylistic error 14 23.0 29 27.4

Subtitling error 1 1.6 0 0.0

Total 61 100.0 106 100.0

As Table 4 shows, it is evident that linguistic errors are the most common type of translation error in both translator groups. Nevertheless, the errors in MTV’s subtitles are more evenly distributed than in BTI’s subtitles. In BTI’s subtitles linguistic errors appear clearly more frequently than any other error. Linguistic errors account for 57.5 per cent of the errors in the subtitles translated by BTI, while in the subtitles translated by MTV they account for 41 per cent of the errors. What is interesting, and somewhat surprising in my opinion, is the

difference in accuracy errors. The subtitles of MTV contain more accuracy errors than BTI’s subtitles. Accuracy errors appear 21 times in MTV’s subtitles which is slightly over 34 per cent of the total number of errors, whereas the 16 accuracy errors in BTI’s subtitles account for 15.1 per cent. In other words, MTV’s subtitles contain more accuracy errors with relation to the total number of errors. Stylistic errors, on the other hand, are more frequent in BTI’s subtitles than in MTV’s. Stylistic errors form 23 per cent of the errors in MTV’s subtitles but in BTI’s subtitles the equivalent number is 27.4 per cent.

There are some surprising findings when studying the quality of translation errors within the two translator groups as well. As mentioned, linguistic errors are the most common type of translation error in both groups and within that category, punctuation errors are the most typical ones. However, MTV’s subtitles contain more misspelling, as in example 16, whereas BTI’s subtitles are more prone to use awkward word choices, as in examples 17 and 18. The most interesting finding in my opinion lies in the differences in the quality of

accuracy errors. Accuracy errors are more frequent in MTV’s subtitles than in BTI’s but there are differences within that category. On one hand, BTI’s subtitles contain more meaning errors than MTV’s. In other words, BTI’s translators were more prone to make errors that change the meaning of the source text. On the other hand, unnecessary omissions are more typical of MTV’s subtitles which could be related to the translators’ specialisation. As

71 subtitling becomes more routine-like, the translator might be more prone to condensate and omit even when it is not be necessary. The most common type of sentence element to be omitted is an adverbial within both groups. Stylistic errors, in turn, are more common in BTI’s subtitles. BTI’s translators are more inconsistent in the use of different registers than MTV’s translators.

When analysing the severity level of the translation errors, no major differences can be seen. Of the 61 errors in MTV’s subtitles, 6 are evaluated as major errors. This accounts for 10 per cent of errors. The equivalent number in BTI’s subtitles was 7 major errors of the 106 errors which accounts for 7 per cent of the errors. The results are nearly identical which is somewhat surprising as it was subtly expected that BTI’s freelance translators would be more prone to make errors that have a negative effect on the source text.

The results of this comparative analysis show that there have been slight changes in the quantity and quality of translation errors after MTV outsourced its translation services to BTI. However, the results are not as straightforward as one might think. Even though the quantity of errors has increased, the quality has not necessarily changed as much which could be seen when the severity levels of the errors were compared. Still, as there has been an increase in the quantity of translation errors, it is concluded that the overall quality of the subtitles has deteriorated. The results could to some extent be explained by the working conditions of translators which may have deteriorated after MTV outsourced its translation activities to Broadcast Text International. As discussed in Chapter 2.3., both Abdallah (2007) and Laine (2007) emphasise that the working conditions in multinational translation

companies are poorer than those in the public sector. The pace of subtitle production in the private sector is often fast and the translators are working under very strict time limits. This could also mean that there might not always be enough time to let other translators review the work before submitting it. Furthermore, the translation fees are significantly lower than in public sector. Even though MTV does not as such belong to the public sector, it previously used the collective Yhtyneet Agreement to guarantee its in-house and freelance translators an income level that reflected their expertise and ensured them favourable working conditions.

Since the outsourcing, Broadcast Text International, however, has refused to participate in negotiations on improving the terms and conditions of employment of its translators and continues to pay its translators fees that are significantly lower than what has been agreed in the Yhtyneet agreement (Suomen kääntäjien ja tulkkien liitto:

http://www.sktl.fi/?x18668=155543, accessed 24 October 2016). It might be likely that similar to other multinational translation companies, in order to keep the costs at the lowers

72 level possible, BTI recruits translation students still in training who lack the experience and skills to negotiate a suitable compensation for their work (Abdallah 2012a: 177). Quality is thus defined by quality in relation to price, as discussed in Chapter 3.1.

The issue of insufficient guidelines for subtitling affecting subtitling quality can perhaps be ruled out as Lång’s study (2013: 54-58) discussed in Chapter 3.1. indicates that the translation companies, including BTI, provide their translators extremely detailed subtitling guidelines. Even though BTI’s quality manual was not available for Lång’s study, its table of contents indicated that BTI’s audiovisual translation guidebook is very extensive (Lång 2013:

54) and the company also assures on their website that subtitling quality is achieved by the company’s high standards and by employing the best qualified linguistic translators in the industry (BTI Studios: http://www.btistudios.com/translation-subtitling.html, accessed 10 April 2016). It is difficult to say though whether these guidelines are actually followed and whether sufficient quality control measures are carried out. However, as the actual contents of the quality manuals are not known, the definition of a translation error is also a question mark.

This was especially prominent with regard to punctuation errors. As was shown in Chapter 6.2.1., it was common in BTI’s subtitles to leave the comma out when the sentence continues in the next line even though the Finnish punctuation rules would require a punctuation mark to be used. Can an error be evaluated as an error by an external evaluator if the company’s quality manual advises the translators to perform differently than, for example, YLE’s guidelines, which were used as the basis of this analysis, do?

The differences in quality in this case might also stem from the number of

translators involved in the subtitling process of the series. Three translators of MTV and five translators of BTI were subtitling the analysed episodes. Based on these numbers alone the work load of MTV’s in-house and freelance translators was greater. However, as there are fewer translators in MTV’s team, it means that one translator translates more episodes of that particular series and gets to know the series and its characters more in depth. The results of the analysis imply that, for example, BTI’s subtitles are more inconsistent in their use of certain registers, which could be explained by the number of translators working on the subtitles of Emmerdale. Also, as daily television series like Emmerdale are usually subtitled by a team of translators, the collaboration between translators on term or register usage might be difficult as freelance translators work is not bound to a specific place but they can work wherever they want. Additionally, the quality of the source text material can affect the quality of the end product. The discussion in Chapter 2.3, suggested that there is great variation in the quality of the source text material offered to audiovisual translators (Abdallah 2007: 284).

73 Sometimes translators working for multinational translation companies do not even receive the source text dialogue in written form but they have to translate the dialogue straight from the screen. In these kinds of situations, other background noises on the screen might impede hearing the original dialogue. It should be noted, though, that poor working conditions do not automatically mean the subtitling quality is poor. It nevertheless makes it more difficult and time-consuming for translators to produce high-quality subtitles. As translation fees are low, speed is essential in earning a living. In other words, producing high-quality subtitles, which take time to prepare, does not necessarily pay off.

In conclusion, this set of data implies that there have been changes in the quantity and quality of translation errors since MTV outsourced its translation services to BTI. The quantity of translation errors is considerably higher in the episodes aired after the outsourcing but the quality of the errors is not necessarily poorer. In fact, it was found that MTV’s

subtitles contain nearly as many major errors than BTI’s subtitles but when evaluating the overall quality of the subtitles, it can be said that BTI’s subtitling quality is poorer as they contain a higher number of errors. The subtitles of MTV contained an average of 6.1 errors per episode, whereas the subtitles of BTI contained an average of 11 errors per episode. The changes can to some extent be explained by the deteriorated working conditions of translators but there are other factors as well, such as the translators’ work experience and the knowledge of the series, which might have an effect on how prone the translator is to make mistakes.

Nevertheless, the results give subtle indications that the working conditions of the translators have become poorer after MTV outsourced its translation services to BTI which, in turn, might have an effect on subtitling quality.