A Comparative Study Of Creating Coherence In Chinese And English Audio Description

As a form of audiovisual translation,Audio Description(AD)“translates” the image information in the movie into verbal information and conveys the verbal information to visually impaired audiences.As a significant multimedia art form,not only can it help visually impaired people satisfy their desire to watch movies,but also its cross-modal translation from image to language and text has increasingly attracted the attention of translation studies and translation studies.Based on the model of how to create coherence in AD proposed by Sabine Braun,the paper takes the Chinese AD and English AD of the film: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button as the research materials.The paper compares and analyses how to create coherence in Chinese and English AD separately and discusses the similarities and differences reflected in creating coherence in Chinese and English AD on the grounds of three levels,i.e.From sound-image coherence to coherence between sound and AD;From dialogue-image coherence to dialogue-AD coherence;From intramodal visual coherence to intramodal coherence in the AD text.The findings of this paper are as follows: It can be unfolded that the English version focuses on the faithful and detailed description of the image information.It enhances the target audience’s awareness of the factual picture and then guides them to understand and infer everything that happens in the film.The Chinese version pays more attention to the interpretation of the storyline of the original film.It intensifies the understanding of the content of the film and the sense of contentment and satisfaction of watching films.The similarity between Chinese AD and English AD in both versions of AD is mainly reflected in the selection of image information in the film.And the difference is mainly revealed in the description of the image in the film.In terms of similarity,three aspects are involved:(1)The coherence between sound and AD is created primarily by the description of the object and action from the image emitted by the sound.(2)The coherence between dialogue and AD is mainly created by the description of the participants from the image in the dialogue.(3)The intramodal coherence in AD text is created principally by describing visual clues within an image.In the light of difference,three aspects are uncovered:(1)In the process of creating coherence between sound and AD,the Chinese version uses general verbs when describing the action of making a sound.The English version mostly utilizes more precise verbs.These verbs not only indicate the state of action in which the action is issued but also emphasize the specific characteristics of the action.(2)In the process of creating coherence between dialogue and AD,the Chinese version mainly describes the gender and names of the participants from the image in the dialogue.The English version pays more attention to the description of the physical characteristics and personalities of the participants.(3)In the process of creating intramodal coherence in AD text,based on describing some visual clues,the Chinese version also subjectively explains part of the image information.In this way,the real meaning behind the image information will be unfolded;The English version,on the other hand,objectively and faithfully describes the visual clues in the image without adding any subjective knowledge other than the description of the factual picture.The results show that both Chinese and English versions of AD realize cross-modal translation from images to language by describing image information.Although differences in creating coherence have been caused by disparities in thinking patterns and language expressions,both of them have always been committed to serving the visually impaired in a befitting way.They are devoted to helping the target audience in their home country to embrace and “hear” the film in a more effective way.