[ SECRET POST #5479 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5479 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 12 secrets from Secret Submission Post #784.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Look, I'm not saying don't use those honorifics and change them accordingly when you're writing in the language that uses them. I'm just saying if that's the only thing you do to indicate a relationship, such that when it gets translated and drops the honorifics nobody can tell the relationship has changed, then you're a terrible writer. Honorifics can be an indication but they should not be the only one. If something is written well then the audience consuming it in translation will not need honorifics to tell the relationship has changed because, you know, it'll still be there in the rest of how the characters are written regarding each other.

I would even venture to say I've noticed that sometimes changing honorifics is a lazy shorthand used by bad writers to tell and not show that two characters "have gotten closer," when as far as the rest of how they're written goes, they really haven't.

[(Anonymous)]

I think you're looking at this the wrong way.

If the characters are from that culture and are dropping the honorifics in-world, that is a big deal to them in the world, in the culture that the characters are from. "Can I call you by your first name or change what honorific I address you with?" is a huge deal in Japanese culture for example. Not to the authors, not to the readers, but to the characters themselves who see that in-world as a step closer to each other. To remove that would be to change what the characters are feeling or seeing as significant.

That's totally different from someone in English going hey Jonathan, can I call ya Johnny? Cool cool

[(Anonymous)]

... tell me you don't understand east asian languages without telling me you don't understand east asian languages

[(Anonymous)]

Tell me you don't understand translating without telling me you don't understand translating.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, no. There’s no indication that they don’t understand translation just because you don’t understand East Asian languages. If you’re trying for a gotcha or comeback, it’s important for it to be relevant or make sense.

[(Anonymous)]

This wouldn't be completely wrong if we were talking about stories set in those cultures, written in English but that's not what this is about. It's about translating.

[(Anonymous)]

Generally, when something is well-written, the narrative describes the relationship change and so does the dialogue. It's not an either-or situation. If the scene showed a sweeping change in the narrative and the characters have zero change in how they address each other, that can also be a sign of bad writing. It's almost like it's part of a whole that should be taken into account.

[(Anonymous)]

It's almost like you entirely missed the part at the beginning where I said I'm not saying an honorific change shouldn't ever happen if you're writing in a language that uses honorifics. It's not always bad writing, but it is if it's the only change. You're right, it's not an either-or that should be written, it's both. I said it's bad writing if only the "either" is written.

[(Anonymous)]

Cool, so you get that removing a change in language/dialogue can have a detriment in how the relationship change is presented, because both can be used effectively.

[(Anonymous)]

As someone who routinely reads things in Japanese, I have yet to encounter a work where honorifics are the only thing used to indicate a relationship. However, the other things that are typically used to indicate a relationship (choice of pronouns when speaking with the person, for example) are also things that do not have any English equivalent.

In modern English, we just have "I" and "you." Japanese has multiple different options with varying levels of formality/familiarity - for instance, one character in something I'm reading right now uses "watashi" and "anata" when speaking to his lord in public because those are the default formality pronouns. However, when the two of them are in private, he switches to "boku" and "kimi" as the two of them are childhood friends and that pronoun shift signals to the reader that now they are speaking to each other as close friends rather than as a lord and his knight. There is no grammatical equivalent to this shift in English because the overall politeness level of his speech doesn't change at all. He is still speaking politely, just using forms of "I" and "you" that have a more casual familiarity to them, which readers in the source language will pick up on right away.