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Procedía - Social and Behavioral Sciences 122 (2014) 29 - 34
2nd World Conference on Design, Arts and Education DAE-2013
Pre-service teachers' awareness of communicative behavior variations in translated film discourse
Dana Kabylbekova a *, Madina Ashirimbetova b, Zauresh Akhmetzhanova c
a b c Faculty of Philology and Educational Sciences, Suleyman Demirel University, Almaty 040900, Kazakhstan
Abstract
The issue of national communicative behavior research became urgent with the rapid development of international relations. Interest to the representatives of another lingua cultural community grows together with the development of the latter. The films provide the audience an opportunity not only to embrace the atmosphere of modern life of that or another country but also to get acquainted with its cultural features and traditions. The present paper discusses the study conducted in one of Kazakhstani universities (Suleyman Demirel University) aiming at investigating awareness of pre-service teachers of the variations in verbal and nonverbal communicative behaviors of Kazakhs and Americans through the means of original and translated film discourse on an example of one of the latest movies The Amazing Spider Man. The results of the study showed that the majority of the pre-service teachers are aware of the differences in communicative culture, both verbal and nonverbal of Kazakhs and Americans.
© 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Selection and peer-review under responsibility of Academic World Education and Research Center.
Keywords: Pre-service teachers, communicative behavior, verbal, non-verbal, film discourse, translation, cultural aspect;
1. Introduction
The issue of communication and communicative behavior research gained importance with the rapid growth of international and intercultural relations throughout the world today. And one of the reasons why modern social sciences are aimed at telling people about people is to facilitate and catalyze international and intercultural communication. The language and culture play an accumulative function, when they collect and reflect the socio-cultural experience of the nation in themselves. Tarlanov (1993) states the following: "The language within the boundaries of its speakers is not only the means of communication, but also memory and history of the nation, culture and experience of cognitive activity; its world-view and mentality; the luggage of knowledge that has been consolidated from generation to generation about nature and space, diseases and the ways of treatment, up-
* Dana Kabylbekova. Tel.: +7-701-744-9947 E-mail address: kdana@sdu.edu.kz
1877-0428 © 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Selection and peer-review under responsibility of Academic World Education and Research Center. doi: 10.1016/j.sbspro.2014.01.1298
bringing and preparation of new generation of people to life with the interest of preserving and increasing its ethnic identity. Thereby the language represents the form of culture which embodies historically formed national type of life with all its diversity and dialectical contradiction".
Movies are one of the primary reflections of national culture and one of the main means of transmission of the information and cultural codes of that nation. After its national release a film should not only reach an international audience but also gain success. In this process of reaching a broader audience sociolinguistic differences play the main barrier, therefore audio-visual translation has taken important social and economic importance. Language and culture are deeply interconnected and when translators interpret the material, they do not only translate linguistic features but also transfer cultural aspects. Thus these moments might lead to some difficulties in translation. Since in cinema translation two or more cultures meet, it might raise significant cross-cultural issues. If these issues are not treated properly it might end up with an unintelligible translation for target audiences.
2. Background of the study
Communication is the exchange of encoded data between the subjects of communication as the communicant possesses a common national and cultural background. On this stage people not just exchange data, but they also try to work out a common meaning of the message sent and received. In this case the information is not only accepted, but also understood. In order for this process to be successful, people have to find a 'common tongue'.
In order for the process of communication to flow successfully, there have to be several stages:
- Contact setting (acquaintance)
- Orientation in a communicative situation, realizing of what is happening, pausing
- Discussion of the problem
- Problem solution
- The conclusion of the contract (Averintsev,1988)
The term communicative behavior is a range of standards and traditions of communication of people. National communicative behavior (Sternin, 2001) is a range of standards and traditions of communication of a certain lingua cultural community. These differ from nation to nation. For example, when greeting Americans always smile. Kazakhs, however, not necessarily smile when greet somebody. Or when addressing Kazakh people try to change the tone to respectfully kindred level. Situational norms are noticed when communication is limited by the certain extra linguistic situation. There exist various kinds of limitations, for example, by status. There are two types of status limitations: vertical (superior - inferior); and horizontal (equal - equal). Limitations also vary and carry national characteristics. For example, in Kazakh culture the relations between elder generation and the younger generation are vertical. Group norms reflect specifics of communication, fixed in the culture for certain professional, gender, social, age, and etc. groups. Individual norms of communication reflect individual culture and communicative experience of an individual and personal deflection of general cultural and situational norms in linguistic persona.
It turns out to be more productive to study a film discourse for contemporary linguistics as a linguistic foundation with its broadened structure and characterized by a number of features such as relatedness, integrity, intertextuality, modality and so on and has a wider sphere of activity for contemporary researchers. Film discourse is a wide concept, which includes a film text, a film itself, the interpretation of the film by the spectator and the meaning that was put by the creators of the film. In addition the film discourse includes various types of correlation with different kinds of arts, for instance, literature, theatre and interactive systems as television series and computer games. The concept a film discourse might be defined through the concept of the film text. In comparison with a film discourse a film text might be considered as its fragment, whereas a film discourse as a whole text or a corpus of texts combined with some features.
Having understood a film discourse as a semiotic complex foundation in which the impact on an addressee is made by the means of verbal and iconic cohesion we refer to Meschkovskaya (2000) talking about the role of an integrated character of signs which secure communication: "a success of the communication depends on its semiotic framing - on to what extent it was possible to express the necessary information in concentrated sign
appearance - on ritual, symbol, formula, geographic map, scheme, terminology, slogan or aphorism, traffic sign, poster, symphony, poem, film....". Thus, a film discourse represents concentration of two types of signs - verbal and iconic, it should be studied from the angle how this unity takes part in the process of successful realization in inter and cross cultural communication. Our interest in a film discourse is connected with a latter one.
3. Methodology
In order to investigate pre-service teachers' awareness of cultural variations of communicative behavior the movie The Amazing Spider Man was chosen. The movie was translated into Kazakh and was shown on the big screen recently. In the most of the films translated from English into Kazakh some aspects of American communicative behavior were not accurately transmitted to Kazakh audience. This is why in order to find out if the pre-service teachers were aware of those inaccuracies we chose three episodes that portrayed standard communicative situations between Americans. Because the Kazakh version of the film was without subtitles in Kazakh, the episodes were transcribed by the authors of article. Table 1 shows the episodes with commentaries.
Table 1. Movie subtitles with commentaries
English subtitles
Kazakh dubbing
Comments
At School: 4:20- 5:10
G: Hey. It's uhh..Peter, right? I really like your photos. P: Oh, thanks. Thanks. G: Listen, are you busy Friday night? P: Uhh ...
G: Cool. Can you take pictures of my boyfriend's car? I just. you know, I really wanna frame a good one for his birthday
P: That's really nice of you. Wow, that's such a nice
thought. Yeah, I'll have a look at the old ... the old
schedule.
G: Okay.
T: Parker.
P: Yes, sir?
T: You want to keep that skateboard? P: Yeah.
T: Keep it off the ground. P: Sure. Yeah. T: Wheels up. That's it. P: Okay
Мектепте
КЫЗ: Питерсщ той, я? ПИТЕР: Аха
КЫЗ: Суреттерш ете унайды. ПИТЕР: О, рахмет, рахмет. КЫЗ;: Сен жума куш кешке не ютейсщ? ПИТЕР: Аа
КЫЗ: Тамаша. Жттсмнщ келтн суретке туыршьТуган кунше сыйлайын деп едiм. Эдемi шывдан.
ПИТЕР: Ия, оньщ табылган ацыл. Жацсы сыйльщ.. Жарайды, цолым тшп жатса керешн.
КЫЗ: Жа^сы.
М¥ГАШМ: Паркер. ПИТЕР: Ия, сэр.
М¥ТАЛМ: Саган скейт керек ре? ПИТЕР: Ия.
М¥ТАЛМ: Ендеше кетерш жур. Децгелегш жогары. ПИТЕР: Осылай ма? М¥ГАШМ: Осылай.
ПИТЕР: Жарайды._
The episode reflects two aspects of
communicative behavior:
- Getting introduced to each other (a girl starts conversation with the main hero)
- Students' behavior in the school ( a) a boy and a girl kiss next to the main hero's locker and b) the main hero rides a skate in the school).
In the kitchen: 7:31 - 8:15 P: Hey.
A: I am making spaghetti and meatballs tonight P: You're serious? Spaghetti and meatballs. A: Since when don't you like spaghetti and meatballs, huh? ... Oh, my God! P: What's up?
A: What happened to your face?
P: I'm alright! Just. I fell, skating. It's alright.
A: Ben Parker, don't you even think about leaving that
filthy box in my kitchen!
B: These are my bowling trophies
A: Oh well, then, by all means, please, leave that box in
my kitchen.
B: What happened to you?
A: He fell. Why you, kids, ride those things. I'll never know.
B: Because it's stupid and dangerous. Remember, when we were stupid and dangerous?
Ас белмесшде ПИТЕР: Сэлем!
МАИА: Спагетти мен котлет дайындап жатырмын. ПИТЕР: Солай ма? Спагетти мен котлет дейыз бе? МАИА: Кашаннан берi спагетти мен котлетл унатпай калгансын? А? А, Кудайым-ау! ПИТЕР: Не?
МАИА: Бетще не болган?
ПИТЕР: А жэй эшешн, кулап калдым. Скейттен. Ештене етпейд^
МАИА: Бен Паркер, андагы корабынды кайда экеле жатырсьщ?Асхананы ыбырсытпый экет ары. БЕН: Боулингтен алган жYлделерiм. МАИА: Ендеше оны; жеш белек. Лас болса да, асханада тура берсш. БЕН: Саган не болган?
МАИА: Кулап калыпты. Сол тактайга неге Yйiр болып калганын тYсiнбеймiн.
БЕН: Жас адам катерге Yйiр келедь Ес1нде ме, бiзде
This episode reflects the following communicative situations:
- Beginning of contact (the way the main hero addresses his aunt, and his aunt's addressing to her husband)
The demonstration of discontent by somebody's unwanted behavior
A: No.
B: Trust me, we were.
P: All right. Good to know. Hey, where is the flood? B: Follow me. I'll show you. P: You serious? B: Yes. P: All right.
Coming home late: 23:48 — 25:14
P: Uhh... Hey... Hey. Hey... Sorry, I'm late. I got
uhh...
A: We've been so worried.
P: I know. I'm sorry. watch out!
A: That's a fly, Peter.
P: Yeah. I am so sorry. I kept you , guys, up. I'm insensitive, I'm irresponsible. and I am hungry. Meat loaf.
A: Drinking? P: What's this? B: I don't think so.
P: This is your meat loaf. This beats all other meat loafs. A: Something is very wrong. B: Yeah. Nobody likes your meat loaf. P: I've got it.
A: He took the frozen macaroni and cheese. B: I noticed that
A: Why didn't you tell me you didn't like my meat loaf? You could have said that to me 37 years ago. How many meat loafs have I made for you?
сондай едж кой?
МАЙА: Жок!
БЕН: Болганда кандай!
ПИТЕР: Керермш! Су тасыган ба не?
БЕН: Ер соцымнан, керсетемш.
ПИТЕР: Рас па?
БЕН: Ия.
Кеш келу
ПИТЕР: Сэлем, сэлем! Кеш1рщ1здер, кештп калдым.
МАЙА: Бiз катты уайымдадык!
ПИТЕР: Бшем. Кеш1рщ1здер. Абайла!
МАЙА: Б^л жэй шыбын той.
ПИТЕР: Ия. Екущ1зд1 элекке ту^ргешме кешiрiм
©тшемш. Мен тас журекпш, оцбаганмын. фарным
ашты. Орама!
МАЙА: 1шкен-ау деймш?
БЕН: Олай емес сиякты.
ПИТЕР: Мына орамаца жететш тамак жок шыгар?! МАЙА: Тегш емес мунысы. БЕН: Ия. Орамац юмге унамаушы едi? ПИТЕР: Мен 0зiм!
МАЙА: Муздай тамакты калай жейдi? БЕН: Бшмеймш гой.
МАЙА: Ораманы унатпайтынынды неге айтпай
журсщ?
БЕН: Ия..
МАЙА: 37 жыл бурын айтуыца болар едi гой?! Осы уакытка дейiн канша ецбепм рэсуа кеткен!
The episode demonstrates the situation when the main hero comes home late -his contact-setting phrase.
3.1 The purpose of the study
The correlation between communicative behavior and film discourse as a reflection of cultural aspects of a nation has been already mentioned above. The present study aims at investigating pre-service teachers' awareness of communicative behavior variations in Kazakh and American lingua-cultural communities through original and translated film discourse. Since foreign language teachers teach language along with culture of the target language they should be able to differentiate peculiarities of both cultures.
3.2 Participants
In order to find out teachers' awareness of cultural variations and possible opportunity for these to be taught in the target language classroom in the future present research was conducted. 60 pre-service teachers participated in the study. 48 of the participants were female and 12 - male. Their age ranged from 20 to 22. The participants were the junior and senior students of two foreign languages specialty, foreign languages department, Faculty of Philology and Educational Sciences of Suleyman Demirel University.
3.3 Data collection and analysis
The research method chosen for the study was a qualitative one. A survey, observations and interviews were conducted. In order to find out Suleyman Demirel University pre-service teachers' awareness of certain aspects of verbal and non-verbal communicative behavior the three movie episodes demonstrating standard communicative situations were chosen. Before conducting the experiment we watched both of the versions and noticed that sarcasm in the second and the third episodes was not transferred to Kazakh version. The participants were asked to watch the three episodes provided in the Table 1 without the commentaries. They were given an opportunity to watch the translated version in order to find out if they would notice the absence of sarcasm, and
then the original version of the movie to compare. Their reactions to certain heroes' actions and words were observed and documented. Furthermore, they were given a survey to fill out. The survey consisted of the following questions: a) Is the verbal communicative behavior demonstrated in the first episode of the movie typical for Kazakh schools? Why? Why not? b) Is the nonverbal communicative behavior demonstrated in the first episode of the movie typical for Kazakh families? Why? Why not? c) Does the translation of the third episode into Kazakh correspond with the same situation in our society? Why? Why not? d) Is the communicative behavior demonstrated in the third episode of the movie typical for Kazakh families? Why? Why not? Furthermore, three post-experiment semi-structured interviews were conducted. The respondents were asked to share their opinions concerning the episodes - they were asked to share their opinions concerning the overall impression of the translation into Kazakh and concerning the same situations in Kazakh society.
4. Research findings and discussion
As it has been mentioned above, the students were given a questionnaire consisting of two types of questions: the first part of each of the four questions was a yes / no type and the second was open-ended.
4.1 Analysis of the first and the second parts of the questionnaire
As it has already been mentioned above in order to find out pre-service teachers' awareness of variations in communicative behavior between Kazakhs and Americans the Suleyman Demirel University Philology and Educational Sciences Faculty, Two foreign languages department junior and senior students were asked to watch three episodes of The Amazing Spider Man in English and in Kazakh. They were given a list of subtitles to evaluate the appropriateness of the translation into Kazakh. Furthermore, they also were asked to indicate if the behavior demonstrated in the movie was appropriate for their (Kazakh) lingua-cultural community. The results obtained from the first part of questionnaire, which was yes / no - type, is presented in the table below.
Table 2. Number and percentages of pre-service teachers' opinions - awareness of communicative behavior variations
# Question Yes No Don't know
1 Is the verbal communicative behavior demonstrated in the first episode of the movie 3 53 4
typical for Kazakh schools? (%5) (88%) (%6)
2 Is the nonverbal communicative behavior demonstrated in the first episode of the 9 50 1
movie typical for Kazakh families? (%15) (%83) (%2)
3 Does the translation of the third episode into Kazakh correspond the same situation 12 48 6
in our society? (%20) (%70) (%10)
4 Is the communicative behavior demonstrated in the third episode of the movie typical 6 50 4
for Kazakh families? (%10) (%83) (%6)
As table 2 shows, majority of the pre-service teachers are aware of the differences in communicative culture, both verbal and nonverbal of Kazakhs and Americans. They could point out that behavior demonstrated in all the three movie episodes is not appropriate for average Kazakh lingua-cultural community.
Furthermore, the second part of the questionnaire was open-ended. The results of the second parts of the questions show that majority of the respondents (%80) are aware of the differences and managed to answer the question how the behavior in Kazakhstani schools differed from the schools in America - they said that 'I, for example, wouldn't bring my skate into the school', or 'I would never ask a boy his name first', 'you will never see the students kissing at school'.
4.2 Analysis of the interviews
There were five people selected for interviews. The interviewees were invited one by one and in different times. Interviews were conducted in a friendly relaxing atmosphere in the form of informal talk. Interviewees were selected according to the reactions they expressed during the process of watching film episodes. After analyzing the interview scripts it was noticed that all respondents reported that sarcasm elements in the second and last episodes were not conveyed in Kazakh version. The sarcasm was expressed by the means of specific vocabulary and tone in English version, whereas in Kazakh version the sentence structure and tone did not imply any sarcasm, thus the spectators felt the incomplete representation of the message.
The next issue of great importance is the fact that Kazakh translation seemed rather bizarre for the audience in the way it sounded and use of vocabulary. However interviewees pointed out that translation was quite good although there were a few confusing moments. It is of special interest to mention that the domestication strategy was used in translating kinds of food, for example орама for meat loafs.
5. Conclusions and recommendations
Because globalization swipes away all the borders most people risk losing their cultural peculiarities. Kazakhstan, however, is managing to retain most of the characteristic values. This is a country that manages to combine the newest trends with the traditions of their ancestors. Despite the fact that some traditional traits are becoming excluded from the list of the national characteristics of modern Kazakhs, major dominant features remain unchanged (Akhmetzhanova, 2012). At the same time, the impact of globalization is also reflected on the younger generation: today in the conversations between younger Kazakh people we can notice small talks and exchange of set phrases (clichés) usually attributed to American communicative culture more often. Western communicative behavior standards imposed to Kazakhstani audience, however, are noticed and the research findings show that the pre-service teachers of Suleyman Demirel University are aware of the differences and peculiarities between Kazakh and American communicative cultures.
It has to be taken into consideration that the audience sees the film in the perspective of film creators, how they see the message given in a literary work or a screenplay. And when we come to a translated version of the film, we must take into consideration the translator's outlook as well. Film discourse is the reflection of a specific type of culture; reflection of reality and modern understanding of traditional values and forming new values. That is why it is very important to pay attention to national and cultural aspects of a film discourse while transferring them from the source language to the target language.
It should be stressed that nonverbal components of a film have a great importance; therefore they should be thoroughly studied. The results of the present study can be applied in the theory and practice of international and intercultural communication education and translation studies. Further studies in the field can investigate the ways of applying the translated film discourse in the EFL classroom to teach cultural awareness.
References
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