Discourse Markers in Translation of Pragmatics: The Case of English to Persian Subtitle Translations Across Movie Genres

Abstract

Despite a wealth of research on various linguistic and literary aspects of audiovisual translation, there is still a paucity of data on Discourse Markers (DMs) at the interplay between genre-specific dialogue movies and their translation challenges within the lens of pragmatics. This study investigates the occurrence of eleven common discourse markers (DMs) across three distinct film genres—melodrama, comedy, and thriller—and identifies the translation strategies employed in their subtitles, using the taxonomy proposed by Díaz Cintas and Remael (2007). Utilizing a corpus-based methodology, this research employs a descriptive qualitative analysis to extract data from six English-language films. The findings reveal that comedies enjoyed the highest occurrence of DMs, with 240 cases, outnumbering those in thrillers and melodramas. Notably, the study discovered that five predominant translation strategies - loan, calque, explicitation, transposition, and omission - were utilized across the genres. With Iranian subtitle translation, calque emerged as a favored approach. These insights provide translators with an enhanced understanding of effective techniques for rendering DMs, thereby reducing prevalent translation inaccuracies and improve intercultural competence and awareness of translation educators and translation teachers and students.