Gods with "sama"-honorific treated as full names in Viz?

[Rocketman]

Wait, why are Japanese honorifics nonsense? Putting aside for a moment whether they belong in localizations, I think the Japanese honorific system itself is useful, interesting, and easy to understand.

Because English doesn't need them, any more than we need to translate noun gender from German/French/basically every other language, or we need to translate the fact that the German word for "to get married" uses a prefix that denotes "bad thing".

[Super Sonic]

Something that Viz does with One Piece that irrates me is that they translate the martial art-sy stuff instead of leaving the translations as footnotes. The Rokushiki (Six Forms) arts just do not flow well when translated ('Finger Gun' instead of 'Shigan/'Shi-gun'; 'Iron Body' instead of 'Tekkai'). I'm hoping FUNimation's subtitles and dub won't do this, and with the lips flaps being what they are I have a little more hope for the dub. I know they also translate Zoro's sword technique techniques, which annoys me. Sanji's attacks are French and Robin's Spanish, but they to will sometimes meet with being translated. Franky mixes English (Strong Right, Weapons Left) and French (Coup de Vent), too. Hell, most of the Straw Hats don't even use Japanese in their attack names. Luffy, on the other hand, will use English and Japanese ('Gomu Gomu no Yari'/'Gum Gum Spear'). I'm a little more lenient when it comes to Luffy's attacks but where I allowed to I'd leave them untranslated ('Gomu Gomu no Pistol') because that's what it is.

Speaking of this reminds me of a moment I had with a friend the other day. We were talking about cosplaying the Seven Warlords of the Sea and she mentioned someone called the "Yonko" which drew a big "huh" look from me until she explained and I realized she was talking about who Viz called the "Four Emperors". Sometimes it can be confusing when you read the English manga/anime and use the translated terms and talk to someone who saw fansubs/scanlations that used the Japanese terms.

As for name suffixes in the manga, I think it depends on the situation. Though noticed it usually was only used with King Kai and Kami, but not with Kaioshin.

[Dr. Casey]

Because English doesn't need them, any more than we need to translate noun gender from German/French/basically every other language, or we need to translate the fact that the German word for "to get married" uses a prefix that denotes "bad thing".

Ah. I thought you were saying the Japanese honorific system in itself sucked at first, hence the confusion. And lol at that tidbit about the German word for marriage.

[Rocketman]

Because English doesn't need them, any more than we need to translate noun gender from German/French/basically every other language, or we need to translate the fact that the German word for "to get married" uses a prefix that denotes "bad thing".

Ah. I thought you were saying the Japanese honorific system in itself sucked at first, hence the confusion. And lol at that tidbit about the German word for marriage.

Well, it does suck, but I'm willing to admit that that particular viewpoint is because I'm American and therefore loud, rude and disrespectful and would never dream of calling my jackass schoolmates 'Sir'.

[SHINOBI-03]

The main problem I have with converting honorifics to "Mr.", "Ms.", etc. is gender confusion unless it's spoken out loud that the character is male or female.

For example. In BLEACH, you have Yorouichi who first appeared as a cat. In Viz's adaptaion of the manga and the anime, they refer to her starting with Urahara who is supposed to know who she was as "Mr. Yorouichi" and she was treated as male all the time by everyone else. The anime version used a male voice to support this as well. But, when it's the "big reveal" and it turned out that she is actually a female, they switched to "Ms. Yorouichi". In the Japanese version, they referred to her as "Yorouichi-san" beginning to end and no other changes were made.

That's why I think converting them is not that good of an idea when it comes to adaptations. Again, when it's a Japanese setting and it's part of their culture and customs.

[Bussani]

One more thing to add to the pile is that there are times when an honorific is part of a character's name, such as P-chan from Ranma ½.

[TonyTheTiger]

This is why translation is not just a babelfish job. Context matters. A blanket statement that "honorifics should always be left in" or "honorifics should never be left in" is unrealistic. There's always going to be a situation where in order to do a good job you have to make exceptions one way or the other. And sometimes the "right" way to do things is to get a little creative.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

And sometimes the "right" way to do things is to get a little creative.

Exactly. Some translators get lazy and just leave all of the honourifics in.

One more thing to add to the pile is that there are times when an honorific is part of a character's name, such as P-chan from Ranma ½.

I admit that would have to be the exception.

[Gaffer Tape]

Really? Just playing devil's advocate here, but you didn't think that Eighter or 8-Man were decent adaptations of Ha-chan and would rather it be left as it is even though you think that leaving in honorifics is lazy?

[Fin]

Really? Just playing devil's advocate here, but you didn't think that Eighter or 8-Man were decent adaptations of Ha-chan and would rather it be left as it is even though you think that leaving in honorifics is lazy?

I'm not a fan of Eight-man, but I think Eighter is fine. Not as good as Ha-chan, but I think getting across the idea that Goku is playing off his number is more important in this case.

[Kaboom]

"Eighter" really is a good example of how to get around having an honorific. In this case, the "-chan" in "Ha-chan" is used as nothing more than a playful nickname, and there's a million and one ways to do that in English.

Other things in Dragon Ball are easy to get around, too. In cases where "-san" is actually used for respect, it can be just translated to "sir" or "mister." Gohan's "Mister Piccolo" is a good example of this.

Stuff like "-sama" is used for gods and what-not, but something like "Lord" is easily substituted. I bet if FUNimation had decided to call the character "Lord Kaio" from day one, nobody would think it's weird or out of place.

And then minor things like Chi-Chi using "-sa(n)" with Goku is just an extraneous semi-formal thing, and not really necessary to keep or adapt at all. Calling your spouse just by their first name is perfectly fine in English. If they really want to show some sort of respectful affection, you can have her use pet names or something. "Goku, sweetie," or "honey" and what-not.

Point being that, aside from certain small parts, the culture within the Dragon Universe, even just the Dragon Earth, is not overly-Japanese. 99% of the time, these language quirks aren't some special, super-important thing vital to the story or its world and characters. They're just how things happen to be said in the Japanese language.

[linkdude20002001]

I agree with Herms. It always irrates me with Viz's translations (espicially in anime) when the honorfics are not retained in. 'Kurosaki-kun' simply becomes 'Kurosaki' in Bleach meaning I hear one thing but see another, and that just gets annoying. The thing about Ichigo and Orihime's relationship is that they keep each other at a distance by their choice of name usage. With Dragon Ball, Bulma's use of 'Son-kun' quickly turned from faux-politeness to a genuine term of endearment. Heck, Chichi uses 'Gokû-sa' and I can't think of any good 'English translation' for that, other than 'Mr. Gokû'.

I swear to God every time I hear Kuririn say 'Bulma-san' as delivered by Tanaka I swear he had a secret crush on her, but that's just me interjecting my own thoughts into the discussion. :p

I couldn't care less about the name suffixes as long as the intent of them is retained. The reason I refuse to buy most Viz releases is because their translations are very, very poor. And I'm talking about their terrible inconsistency with everything.

For example: in Bleach, you've got Ichigo Kurosaki, Orihime Inoue, and Uryu Ishida. Ichigo refers to the other two as Inoue and Ishida, Orihime refers to the other two as Kurosaki and Ishida, and Ishida refers to the other two as Kurosaki and Inoue. So, as you can see, they use their last names. But Viz has it like this: Ichigo uses Orihime and Ishida, Orihime uses Ichigo and Uryu, and Ishida uses Kurosaki and Orihime, but then suddenly switches to Ichigo after one chapter. It gets so confusing. But that's just the comic. If you're watching the anime subtitled, it'll switch back and forth frequently, even mid-episode. Once they even had someone use "-kun" out of nowhere.

This ridiculous name changing is also the reason I can't watch the official release of Honey and Clover subtitled: I can't understand it!

As for Gokuh-sa, it's all in her being a hick, so what she calls Gokuh is irrelevant. As long as she speaks like a hick (which Viz fails to do aside from a single chapter), her dialogue as translated correctly.

[TonyTheTiger]

The problem is that the intent of honorifics is more than just the obvious show of respect or familiarity. There are social norm considerations and just basic cultural folkways. When honorifics are used, the "intent" is usually not quite to hammer into the audience's head that this person is showing respect or whatnot. It's first and foremost to have people talk to each other in a way the audience can relate to. And since the dialogue is written in Japanese it's going to use Japanese conventions to that end. You can leave the "-san" in but that is only superficially addressing the issue. It's not getting to the core of what those suffixes are there for. They're there because that's just how people talk in Japanese. It's much more subtle than "Hey, Gohan is showing Piccolo respect by calling him Piccolo-san."

Consider nicknames in the English vernacular. You buy a bag of chips and the clerk gives you change. Upon receiving the change you say, "Thanks, boss." You don't actually know this guy. You're certainly not referring to him as if he is your actual boss. But you use the word as a friendly showing of familiarity. It's not a submissive showing of respect but it is a respectful gesture among equals. Translating that conversation into Japanese, for instance, you have to deal with the "boss" somehow. Leaving it as is doesn't quite convey the actual purpose. It doesn't help the audience relate to the reason it was used to begin with.

You know how in writing there is a common rule called "show, don't tell"? That means when you're writing you want to show the audience what's happening rather than tell them what's happening. You want the audience to have an active understanding. Most of the time, though not always, leaving Japanese honorifics as is is telling the audience. A Japanese person experiencing the dialogue exchange isn't going to read/hear "-san" and then process that as an obvious "oh, he's being respectful." A Japanese person will experience that in a much more organic way. He or she will just understand it as a mode of speaking that they themselves are familiar with.

If you want the English speaking audience to have an experience similar to the Japanese audience you can't do it with honorifics because an English speaker does not organically relate to them. This all happens super fast, of course, and most certainly is not something conscious but if the goal of translation is to see to it that the English speaking audience has the same cognitive experience that the Japanese speaking audience did then honorifics are often counterproductive.

And this goes beyond honorifics. It's why sometimes I don't much like when "oniisan" gets a direct translation and you end up with dubs in which a girl calls people "big brother" all the time. You might be experiencing the most accurate translation but while watching this dub you are missing out on relating to the exchange in the intended way which I think is more important.

This doesn't apply to subtitles, of course, which, given that the spoken language actually is Japanese, has a higher standard of accuracy.

[Piccolo Daimao]

Something I just want to throw out here...I'm not sure how it is in the original Japanese version, but in the Viz manga, Freeza actually refers to Zarbon and Dodoria with "Mr", and once refers to Vegeta as "Mr. Vegeta". Also, Dodoria, Zarbon and other subordinates of Freeza refer to him as "Master Freeza". And as for people calling Dende with the "God" title, Kuririn once refers to Dende as "Kami-sama" when he asks him if he can bring his family to the palace. But I think, most other times, Piccolo and the others just call him "Dende" because he has an actual name.

[desirecampbell]

Yes there's a trade off between instant understanding and slower, more accurate understanding. That is, the more anglicized you make the production the chances the average English speaker will be confused decreases, but the chance something subtle or foreign is lost.

I mean, if your biggest concern is that Little Jimmy won't understand something Japanese, why are you A- showing him something Japanese, and B- not showing him the dub? If avoiding culture-shock is priority #1, then why not show him something from his own culture?

I think it's of monumental importance that you change as little as possible when translating foreign works, because otherwise, what's the point? Why not just watch it on mute?

On that note, why stop at anglicizing the script? Why not digitally paint over Japanese-centric images too? Those rice-ball things are super confusing, let's make 'em sandwiches, or doughnuts. Why are these characters sitting on the floor? Get some chairs under that table!

[caejones]

I mean, if your biggest concern is that Little Jimmy won't understand something Japanese, why are you A- showing him something Japanese, and B- not showing him the dub? If avoiding culture-shock is priority #1, then why not show him something from his own culture?

That wasn't the point being made (as I understand it, anyway). The point isn't to make it easier for a foreign audience to understand, but to make the experiences of the foreign audience as similar to that of the original audience as possible.
Though I suppose your "why not anglocize it further?" comments still hold...

[Fin]

*snip*

That pretty much expressed my thoughts much better than I could.

I'd add that I'd still like to keep footnotes to explain some of the original phrases. I prefer to read stuff translated through TonyTheTiger's philosophy, but it's not about avoiding Japanese culture - it's about experiencing the story in a way I can more easily relate to. I still like to know about the original version, why such-and-such a phrase was different in Japanese, the culture behind everything, etc. I just don't want that extra knowledge to interrupt the flow of the story. Footnotes should be a standard.

[TonyTheTiger]

I mean, if your biggest concern is that Little Jimmy won't understand something Japanese, why are you A- showing him something Japanese, and B- not showing him the dub? If avoiding culture-shock is priority #1, then why not show him something from his own culture?

That wasn't the point being made (as I understand it, anyway). The point isn't to make it easier for a foreign audience to understand, but to make the experiences of the foreign audience as similar to that of the original audience as possible.
Though I suppose your "why not anglocize it further?" comments still hold...

Bingo. As for the why not change even more things, there are eventually diminishing returns. Whether or not a random sign in the background is in Japanese or not isn't going to have much impact on the audience regardless. And that's not even taking into account the effort required to make such a change and not have it look like total shit.

On that note, why stop at anglicizing the script? Why not digitally paint over Japanese-centric images too? Those rice-ball things are super confusing, let's make 'em sandwiches, or doughnuts. Why are these characters sitting on the floor? Get some chairs under that table!

Not to mention this is a complete straw man. That's not the logical extension of anybody's argument. Conversational dialogue and the frame itself are two very different things.

[VegettoEX]

But it's a slippery-slope, isn't it? And isn't FUNimation's dub of the series a prime example of that slippery slope ranging from all the way up at the top of that hill to all the way at the bottom of that hill?

I do pretty heavily lean on the side of, "If you don't want any traits from the original version of an internationally-produced entertainment product shining through, watch something from your own, highly-localized area." I, too, get a little stuck on that whole argument of trying to translate/adapt/hide away that stuff -- it seems really silly, and bordering on xenophobic -- and almost counterproductive, since you border on writing a new show (see: Robotech).

The "answer" is that it is nigh-near-impossible to "translate" and "adapt" something in a way that every single last member of the audience, intended or otherwise is going to "like" or "accept" -- as a translator, you can only do the best that you can with the knowledge of the series at hand. There have been so many great examples brought up in this thread already where dropping the honorific actually changes the intent or even flat-out name of the character... so why try to universally impose some sort of "rule" on that language quirk?

(BTW, I thought the "abso-fucking-lutely" example was pretty genius, and I haven't seen any real answers to that from folks who lean more heavily on the side of writing away these language quirks... which is funny, Tony, 'cuz you tossed that out there )

[TonyTheTiger]

But it's a slippery-slope, isn't it? And isn't FUNimation's dub of the series a prime example of that slippery slope ranging from all the way up at the top of that hill to all the way at the bottom of that hill?

I think you're right to not see much clarity. I don't either. It's why I'm 100% against drawing lines in the sand because no matter where you draw them it's going to come off as pretty arbitrary. That's why I keep saying context matters. I'm not completely against leaving in honorifics. I just see it as more the exception rather than the rule where context would determine their importance. This is, for better or worse, not an exact science.

I do pretty heavily lean on the side of, "If you don't want any traits from the original version of an internationally-produced entertainment product shining through, watch something from your own, highly-localized area." I, too, get a little stuck on that whole argument of trying to translate/adapt/hide away that stuff -- it seems really silly, and bordering on xenophobic -- and almost counterproductive, since you border on writing a new show (see: Robotech).

Robotech has always been the black sheep. It's both loved for being what it is in and of itself and hated for being the extreme end of "let's screw with everything we can." My admittedly vague point of view always hovers around the audience's viewing experience. If a change causes the new audience to have a different viewing experience than the original audience I tend to consider that a red flag. But the reverse is true, too. That if something is left alone to the same result that is also a problem. Sometimes you just can't help it. It's just the nature of translation. But I think most of the time there are options. I don't think letting Robotech hang around everybody's neck like the albatross of localizations is very productive. At this point it's a boogieman that I don't think has any relevance anymore outside of stuff from 4Kids.

The "answer" is that it is nigh-near-impossible to "translate" and "adapt" something in a way that every single last member of the audience, intended or otherwise is going to "like" or "accept" -- as a translator, you can only do the best that you can with the knowledge of the series at hand. There have been so many great examples brought up in this thread already where dropping the honorific actually changes the intent or even flat-out name of the character... so why try to universally impose some sort of "rule" on that language quirk?

Again, I don't see it as a "rule" so to speak. We can go back and forth over what changes the intent more, keeping honorifics or leaving them out. What's most likely going to happen is each "camp" is going to start pulling out really specific examples that support their position. But those examples are going to have context within the shows themselves. Something like "Kami-sama" is not going to be quite the same thing as "Son-kun" in context even within the Dragon Ball universe itself, let alone what happens if you open the floodgates to anime in general.

(BTW, I thought the "abso-fucking-lutely" example was pretty genius, and I haven't seen any real answers to that from folks who lean more heavily on the side of writing away these language quirks... which is funny, Tony, 'cuz you tossed that out there )

Heh, I'm kinda surprised you interpreted it that way because what I was trying to imply was that if you left it "abso-fucking-lutely" then a Japanese viewer is not going to "get it" in quite the same way as they might if it were replaced with a conceptually equivalent phrase or exclamation in Japanese. What I'd be more concerned with is whether or not the Japanese viewer is organically "getting the point" in much the same way the American viewer did rather than make sure the Japanese viewer sees the specific middlefix. Since if you leave it "abso-fucking-lutely" stuck within otherwise ordinary Japanese then it draws odd attention to itself that it may not have when it was within otherwise ordinary English.

But these are all maybes. If "abso-fucking-lutely" were used as a lone exclamation then that might justify leaving it as is. If it were written into subdued dialogue between crude friends then changing it could be the better option. But, hey, feel free to use it to support your own point. Like I said, context and all. I actually like these conversations because as much as we never end up with an agreement, it's fun to try.