Humor,%20Translation%20and%20Bilingual%20Issues

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Humor, Translationand Bilingual Issues

• by Don L. F. Nilsen and
• Alleen Pace Nilsen

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Problems in Translating Jokes

• In tellilng a joke we must understand a great
  deal about about cultural and social facts, about
  shared beliefs and attitudes, and about practical
  bases of communication.
• We best understand the humour of those who have
  shared our history and who understand our ways of
  interpreting the experience.
• Nevertheless, there is a fund of common knowledge
  and recollection, upon which all jokes draw rely.

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Translation in Quentin Tarantinos Pulp Fiction

• VINCENT You know what they call a Quarter
  Pounder with cheese in Paris?
• JULES They dont call it a Quarter Pounder with
  cheese?
• VINCENT No man theyve got the metric system
  they dont know what a Quarter Pounder is!
• JULES So what do they call a Quarter Pounder
  with cheese?

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• VINCENT They call it a Royale with cheese.
• JULES Royale with cheese.
• VINCENT Thats right.
• JULES What do they call a Big Mac?
• VINCENT A Big Macs a Big Mac only they call it
  Le Big Mac
• JULES Le Big Mac. What do they call a Whopper?
• VINCENT I dont know. I never went to a Burger
  King. You know what they put on French Fries
  instead of Ketchup?
• JULES What?
• VINCENT Mayonnaise.

5
A Riddle

• If you are Swedish, you stroke it.
• If you are Spanish you beat it.
• If you are German, you cover it in food.
• If you are British, you use it as an excuse not
  to have sex. What is it?
• A Personal Computer.
• NOTE PCs in Spain often suffer violence, with
  57 percent of owners admitting to hitting them.
  Germans are unamused by PCs only one in six has
  enjoyed a laugh with their PC.

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Arabic Humor (Bad Translation)

• GADDAFIS BEST SPEECH EVER (ON CONAN OBRIEN
  SHOW)
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vaF6tipZDs4kfeature
  related

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Untranslatable Canadian Joke

• Je suis allé dans un magazin Newfie et jai
  demandé une robe de chambre.
• Le Newfie ma demandé Quelle grandeur la
  chambre?

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Chinese Translation of My Blackberrys Not
Working

• Here is the web site for "My Blackberry's Not
  Working" with Chinese subtitles. Enjoy.
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?v7sPGePuyR-E
• They translate both meanings with 2 lines
  (the first line is the mobile phone-related
  meaning, the second the literal translation about
  fruits).

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FRENCH

• What has fifty legs and cannot walk?
• Half a centipede.
• TRANSLATION
• Quest-ce qui a cinq cent pattes et qui ne peut
  pas marcher?
• La moitié dune mille-pattes
• NOTE A French centipede is a mille-pattes
  (thousand-feet).

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Formal Equivalence vs. Connotative Equivalence

• Werner Koller would say that translating the
  English centipede into the French
  mille-pattes is apt in terms of reference, but
  becomes inept when the English and French words
  are analyzed because mille-pattes is more
  hyperbolic than is centipede.

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An English Sick Joke in France

• Mummy, Mummy, is it still a long way to France?
• Shut up and keep swimming!
• Maman, Maman, est-ce que lAngleterre est loin?
• Tais-toi et continue à nager!

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Discussion

• Notice that in the translation, England is
  substituted for France.
• As one of Delia Chiaros French colleagues
  pointed out to her, Why would someone French
  want to go to England?

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September of 2016 French Presidential
PrimariesCandidates are pictured on Cheese
Advertisements

1. Juppé is 70 Le Vieux Pané stale bread (old)
2. Marine Le Pen (populist) the cow that laughs
   (cow)
3. Lepetit Sarkozy short or small (midget)
4. Bleu Macron young maverick (greenhorn)
5. Hollande plump or Flamby
6. Aubry leftist or plump (from a Vermeer
   painting)

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German Humor

• Between 1931 and 1936 The Jack Pearl Show was on
  radio. Baron von Munchausen was the central
  figure in a running skit.
• The Baron spoke with a strong German accent that
  contrasted with the ordinary language of Charlie
  (Sharlie).

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• BARON Und dere in frundt of me wuz a green
  elephant.
• SHARLIE Now wait a minute, Baron do you mean
  to tell me you actually saw a green elephant?
• BARON (with great indignation) Vas you dere,
  Sharlie?

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Russell Peters Indian Accent

• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vJpw34gt5gY0

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Irish and Jewish Humor

• Since Irish humor developed out of the oral
  tradition (the telling of jokes and stories in
  Irish pubs), it is very epiphinal in nature.
• Like Jewish humor, Irish humor developed out of
  pain and tragedy that resulted in a diaspora.

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• Irish humor, like Jewish humor, contains much
  wordplay, and like Jewish humor, much of Irish
  wordplay is bilingual and/or bicultural, relating
  to both the Gaelic/Celtic and to the English
  language and culture.
• Many Irish, like many Jews, are trying to
  reestablish their roots, and it is the humor in
  Irish written and oral literature that is helping
  them to do so.

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Italian Humor

• In the late 1970s, comedian Don Novello spoke
  with an Italian accent and dressed in clerical
  garb when doing comedy skits about Father Guido
  Sarducci.
• He was a hit on Saturday Night Live and on The
  Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, but when he went
  to the Vatican to pose for publicity photos he
  was arrested for impersonating a priest.

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An Irish Joke in Italy

• What do they write on the bottom of Guinness
  bottles in Ireland?
• Open at other end.
• TRANSLATION
• Che cosa scrivono sul fondo delle lattine di Coca
  Cola che si trovano nei distributori di bibite
  nelle caserme dei carabinieri?
• Aprire dallaltro lato.

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Discussion

• The Irish are the butt of English stupidity
  jokes, so a different stupidity group needs to be
  used in Italian.
• In Italy, the stupidity group is not ethnic, but
  is professionalthe carabinieri (one of Italys
  police forces).
• There is no national drink in Italy.
• Furthermore, Italians consume alcohol usually at
  meals and from glasses, not bottles.
• So Coca Cola is used instead of Guinness.
• Finally, Italians see a bottle as having a top
  and a bottom, so bottle had to change to can.

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Now reread the joke and the translation!

• What do they write on the bottom of Guinness
  bottles in Ireland?
• Open at other end.
• TRANSLATION
• Che cosa scrivono sul fondo delle lattine di Coca
  Cola che si trovano nei distributori di bibite
  nelle caserme dei carabinieri?
• Aprire dallaltro lato.

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ITALIAN

• Whats black and white and red all over?
• A newspaper.
• TRANSLATION
• Che cosa è nero, bianco e rossa ovunque?
• A. LUnità, or (a Communist newspaper)
• B. Una zebra con labronzatura (a zebra with a
  sunburn)
• NOTE The first red retains the read
  association, while the second red does not.

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• Neither of these translations encapsulate the
  semantic ambivalency attached to the words
  red/read. Nevertheless, solution A does
  capture the read element of the original riddle
  coupled with the metaphorical value of the colour
  term red attached to a popular left wing
  newspaper LUnità.
• Since this is a childrens riddle, the first
  answer is inappropriate because children wouldnt
  know about LUnità.
• Furthermore the second answer has the kind of
  silliness that would be found in a childrens
  riddle.

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ITALIAN TIME

• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vETz0elhKvkM

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JAPANESE

• JACOB MEY Is there a toilet around here?
• ATTENDANT You want to use?
• JACOB MEY (somewhat astonished) Sure I do.
• ATTENDANT Go down the steps.
• NOTE In Japan there are Western toilets and
  Japanese toilets. There are also male toilets
  and female toilets

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NATIVE AMERICANS

• In American conversations, when the speaker is
  ready to relinquish the floor, he usually waits
  about one and a half seconds.
• In Athabaskan conversations, silence is used to
  organize thoughts and develop effective sentence
  structure.

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• So when an Athabaskan is talking with a
  non-Indian, the Athabaskan never gets the floor.
• The Athabaskan feels he has been interrupted and
  the English speaker feels the Athabaskan never
  makes sense, never says a whole coherent idea.

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Polish Jokes in America

• Do you know why they dont give Poles a coffee
  break?
• It takes too long to retrain them.
• What is stamped at the bottom of Coca Cola
  bottles in Poland?
• Please open at the other end.

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Russian Humor

• Russian immigrant yakov Smirnoff entertained
  Americans through the cold war and beyond with
  such jokes as,
• I have a Russian Express Card. It says, Dont
  Leave Home! and
• One of the biggest differences between America
  and Russia is that in America you can always find
  a party, but in Russia, the party always finds
  you.

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• The editors of a Soviet newspaper were arrested
  and possibly executed because they published
  Stalins name as Sralin, which in Russian means
  shit.
• Was this a Freudian slip
• Or an accident
• Or a slur?

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Scandinavian Humor

• Garrison Keilor exploits Scandinavian stereotypes
  in his Lake Wobegon.
• Swedish flu is the usual flu with chills, fever,
  diarrhea, vomiting, and achiness, but its
  accompanied by on overpowering urge to put things
  in order.

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Scottish Humor

• Whats the difference between a poor Scotsman, a
  rich Scotsman, and a dead Scotsman?
• A poor Scotsman has a can o pee under his bed.
• A rich Scotsman has a canopy over the bed.
• And a dead Scotsman can na pee at all.

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Alan Platt
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Peter McGraw and Joel Warner
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• Some Translation Problems in International
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• http//ifunny.co/fun/Fv2feoUn
• Amy Walkers 21 Accents
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?v3UgpfSp2t6k