Traduction et Langues
Volume 25, Numéro 1, Pages 69-100
2026-06-30
Intercultural And Ideological Transmission In The Subtitling Of African Films Into German And German Films Into English
Authors : Ajadi Rasaq Atanda .
Abstract
Audiovisual translation has become a central medium of intercultural communication within global media circulation. Yet scholarship on subtitling has often prioritised technical accuracy and linguistic equivalence, while paying comparatively limited attention to subtitles as sites of ideological negotiation and cultural mediation, especially in African-European cinematic exchanges. This study addresses this gap by examining how subtitles transmit, reshape, or attenuate cultural meanings, ideological positions, and identity constructions across languages and sociocultural contexts. It adopts a qualitative interpretive design informed by Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), Critical Stylistics (CSA), and functionalist perspectives on audiovisual translation, particularly Skopos theory and translation equivalence frameworks. The corpus comprises three African films subtitled in German-Lumumba, What a Wonderful World, and No Time to Die-together with the German film Nirgendwo in Afrika subtitled in English. Selected subtitle extracts and interactional sequences were analysed to identify recurrent patterns of ideological framing and cultural mediation. The findings indicate that subtitling is not a neutral mechanism of linguistic transfer but an ideologically situated and culturally performative practice. Subtitles often attenuate political resistance, simplify culture-bound expressions, neutralise indigenous epistemologies, and recalibrate gendered and migration-related identities in accordance with target-language norms. Lexical substitution, semantic narrowing, modality shifts, pragmatic omission, and selective explicitation emerge as recurring strategies that shape audience perceptions of power, identity, and belonging. The study concludes that subtitles actively participate in constructing and transforming intercultural meaning. It therefore underscores the need for culturally responsive subtitling practices capable of preserving ideological nuance, cultural specificity, and more equitable forms of cross-cultural representation in audiovisual communication.
Keywords
Audiovisual Translation; Subtitling Studies; Critical Discourse Analysis; Cultural Mediation; Ideological Framing; Identity Construction; African-European Cinema
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