MApping Arabic Subtitling Conventions: The case of Dubai One and MBC 2

Subtitling has a long history in the Arab world dating back to the 1930s, but current scholarship in this evolving field of audiovisual translation remains modest, with a focus mostly on micro matters such as cultural references, taboo words and euphemization. Specifically, effective training in subtitling and standard techniques is desperately needed across the Arab world. This chapter contributes to addressing this very need to improve the quality of Arabic subtitles produced by professionals and to guide novice subtitlers through their training journey. The chapter reports on a first of its kind project in the Arab world. The aim is to map the subtitling conventions approved and adopted by local production firms, satellite channels and individual subtitlers in the region. Additionally, it is hoped that the chapter will stimulate more research that will augment the accumulated literature on subtitling. The corpus discussed in this chapter consists of ten feature films subtitled into Arabic and broadcast by two of the most prominent Arabic TV channels, namely Dubai One and MBC 2, and was collected between February and April 2017. Using Arabic subtitles extracted from the corpus, the analysis explores issues related to the technical and linguistic aspects of subtitling, including timing, segmentation, colour, font and point size, song lyrics, numbers, hesitation and punctuation marks, with the aim of finding out whether or not these Arabic TV channels adopt common guidelines and strategies for subtitling into Arabic.