Transferring Culture on Screen: Subtitling Constraints and Strategies in Netflix's KPop Demon Hunters

Abstract

This study examines cultural specific items and subtitling strategies using Newmark's (1988) theory for categorizing culturally specific items and Gottlieb's (1992) theory for subtitling strategies in the subtitles of the film KPop Demon Hunters. This study uses descriptive analysis to examine the cultural specific items that emerge from data classification and to describe the patterns of subtitling strategies frequently used in movie subtitles. The results of the study found that the Social Culture category dominates with 23 items. The results of the study also found that all 10 subtitling strategies by Gottlieb were used with Transfer with 847 data (55%), followed by Condensation with 163 data (11%), Imitation with 144 data (9%), Paraphrase with 95 data (6%), Resignation with 84 data (5%), Dislocation with 62 data (4%), Expansion with 56 data (4%), Transcription with 31 data (2%), Deletion with 29 data (2%), and Decimation with 26 data (2%).