this post was submitted on 10 Mar 2026
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[–] I_Jedi@lemmy.today 25 points 1 week ago (14 children)

Having done it myself, I find several big issues with Japanese -> English translation:

  • Honorifics. Referring to someone with -kun or -chan or -sama or -bucho all have very different connotations. Sure, you could just include the honorifics as is but I don't think that many people unfamiliar with the Japanese language know what -kohai means.
  • Culture: Even if the translation is perfect, characters may act in bizarre ways for Westerners. "He knows that guy is evil, so why doesn't he shoot him?" "Shooting people is very serious shit in Japan." "Well no one told me!"
  • Puns: The big one. To give an English -> Japanese example, how do you translate the joke, "I no that!"? Joke being, the "no" implies that the speaker doesn't actually know what "that" is, with the "no" taking the place of "know" since they sound the same. "No" in Japan is "iie", and "know" is "shiru". They don't sound alike at all, so how do you do it? Japanese is filled with puns like this, and most of them are completely lost on Westerners.

That said, I do support translators for giving Westerners a variant of the Japanese version. But there's no mistake that a lot is lost.

[–] Wolf314159@startrek.website 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Sounds like a skill issue. Bad translations are bad because they don't find good ways to translate these kinds of things. As you say, translation isn't just about the words, it's about cultural context. But, bad translations aren't inevitable just because good translations are difficult.

[–] I_Jedi@lemmy.today 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Have you done Japanese -> English translations yourself? For example, if a character is named "79", how would you subtly show that the character's name is literally "Earth", in English? (地球 = ちきゅう = ち*きゅう = 7*9)

[–] Wolf314159@startrek.website 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Sounds like a skill issue. Good translation is hard and is rarely a literal one to one mapping of syntax and diction. It's an interpretive art.

[–] I_Jedi@lemmy.today 0 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Interpretive art nullifies the claims of skill issue. I could write some fanfiction and claim it's an accurate translation of the original because "art".

Since translations can't be done 1:1, some of the value of the original will necessarily be lost in translation. Attempts to reintroduce nuance in the translation is fanfiction, whose faithfulness to the original is quite subjective.

[–] Wolf314159@startrek.website 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I disagree on ever single point you've said here.

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