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NEWS: 'I Became a Kuro-Gyaru so I F***ed My Best Friend' Anime Adds 2 Cast Members




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KENZICHI



Joined: 16 Oct 2010
Posts: 1101
PostPosted: Tue Mar 02, 2021 12:31 am Reply with quote
Ah... exactly how Crunchyroll should have translated this title.
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AmpersandsUnited



Joined: 22 Mar 2012
Posts: 633
PostPosted: Tue Mar 02, 2021 3:48 pm Reply with quote
KENZICHI wrote:
Ah... exactly how Crunchyroll should have translated this title.


By not translating it at all?
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Ataru



Joined: 04 Jan 2002
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 02, 2021 4:44 pm Reply with quote
Pretty sure it'll be easy since Crunchyroll doesn't translate hentai titles.
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Egan Loo



Joined: 25 Feb 2005
Posts: 1300
PostPosted: Tue Mar 02, 2021 8:08 pm Reply with quote
AmpersandsUnited wrote:
KENZICHI wrote:
Ah... exactly how Crunchyroll should have translated this title.


By not translating it at all?


Sometimes, the best way to translate a word in a title is not to, and let the story explain itself. For example, Japan localized the titles of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and My Fair Lady by simply phonetically spelling out the words (as was done here), since providing an (overly) literal translation would actually be an inaccurate translation (as it would be here).

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2014/05/18/language/translating-movie-titles-japanese-can-get-bit-wairudo/

After all, few people have an issue calling Gintama "Gintama," as opposed to its (overly) literal translation, "Silver Soul."
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That's Big!



Joined: 23 Jan 2021
Posts: 20
Location: Japan
PostPosted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 12:54 am Reply with quote
Egan Loo wrote:
Sometimes, the best way to translate a word in a title is not to, and let the story explain itself. For example, Japan localized the titles of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and My Fair Lady by simply phonetically spelling out the words (as was done here), since providing an (overly) literal translation would actually be an inaccurate translation (as it would be here).

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2014/05/18/language/translating-movie-titles-japanese-can-get-bit-wairudo/

After all, few people have an issue calling Gintama "Gintama," as opposed to its (overly) literal translation, "Silver Soul."


That's not why this was left untranslated though. They originally did translate Kuro Gyaru as the objectively correct "Black Gal" but people complained to Crunchyroll on Twitter how it was racist so they changed it to be left in Japanese so people unfamiliar with the language can pretend it's not a bad word or phrase, much like how a lot of Japanese slurs go untranslated or altered in American translations to avoid backlash. It's not really about accuracy so much as political backlash and marketing.
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Egan Loo



Joined: 25 Feb 2005
Posts: 1300
PostPosted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 1:10 am Reply with quote
That's Big! wrote:
Egan Loo wrote:
Sometimes, the best way to translate a word in a title is not to, and let the story explain itself. For example, Japan localized the titles of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and My Fair Lady by simply phonetically spelling out the words (as was done here), since providing an (overly) literal translation would actually be an inaccurate translation (as it would be here).

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2014/05/18/language/translating-movie-titles-japanese-can-get-bit-wairudo/

After all, few people have an issue calling Gintama "Gintama," as opposed to its (overly) literal translation, "Silver Soul."


That's not why this was left untranslated though. They originally did translate Kuro Gyaru as the objectively correct "Black Gal" but people complained to Crunchyroll on Twitter how it was racist so they changed it to be left in Japanese so people unfamiliar with the language can pretend it's not a bad word or phrase, much like how a lot of Japanese slurs go untranslated or altered in American translations to avoid backlash. It's not really about accuracy so much as political backlash and marketing.


Overly literal translations are neither accurate nor "objectively correct." As noted above, translating Gintama as "Silver Soul" is also overly literal, but not accurate or "objectively correct."
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SHD



Joined: 05 Apr 2015
Posts: 1752
PostPosted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 11:09 am Reply with quote
Egan Loo wrote:
That's Big! wrote:
Egan Loo wrote:
Sometimes, the best way to translate a word in a title is not to, and let the story explain itself. For example, Japan localized the titles of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and My Fair Lady by simply phonetically spelling out the words (as was done here), since providing an (overly) literal translation would actually be an inaccurate translation (as it would be here).

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2014/05/18/language/translating-movie-titles-japanese-can-get-bit-wairudo/

After all, few people have an issue calling Gintama "Gintama," as opposed to its (overly) literal translation, "Silver Soul."


That's not why this was left untranslated though. They originally did translate Kuro Gyaru as the objectively correct "Black Gal" but people complained to Crunchyroll on Twitter how it was racist so they changed it to be left in Japanese so people unfamiliar with the language can pretend it's not a bad word or phrase, much like how a lot of Japanese slurs go untranslated or altered in American translations to avoid backlash. It's not really about accuracy so much as political backlash and marketing.


Overly literal translations are neither accurate nor "objectively correct." As noted above, translating Gintama as "Silver Soul" is also overly literal, but not accurate or "objectively correct."

Thing is, why use "gyaru" when there's a perfectly good word for it in English, "gal"? I mean, it's not just a random Engrish word, gals are an existing fashion trend/subculture and have been for decades now, as are "kuro gals", ie. "black gals" who are called such for tanning themselves really dark, with ganguro and yamamba going the extra mile to have really dark skin and wear light make-up and hair as contrast. And it's because gals are often stereotyped as being sexually promiscuous, that our hero turns into "a black gal", specifically, as opposed to just "a girl". Obiously this connotation won't be obvious to most people, so frankly I would've just left it out altogether from the translation and used "girl" or "chick" or something instead - but if they decided to keep the word why can't they just use "gal" instead of "gyaru"? (It's like people calling the movie Ring "Ringu". Yes, that's what it says in katakana, but come on.)

If "black gal" is misleading, or people parse it as racist because of "black" (I don't think it's necessarily racist in this context, but I'm white as a sheet so it's not my place to argue about that) then they could've just translated it as "dark" or "tanned" or hell, "I turned into a sexy chick". Or something. But "gyaru", let alone "kuro gyaru"?

(In this post: thinking way too much about a silly porn manga/anime.)
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Egan Loo



Joined: 25 Feb 2005
Posts: 1300
PostPosted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 11:22 am Reply with quote
SHD wrote:
Egan Loo wrote:
That's Big! wrote:
Egan Loo wrote:
Sometimes, the best way to translate a word in a title is not to, and let the story explain itself. For example, Japan localized the titles of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and My Fair Lady by simply phonetically spelling out the words (as was done here), since providing an (overly) literal translation would actually be an inaccurate translation (as it would be here).

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2014/05/18/language/translating-movie-titles-japanese-can-get-bit-wairudo/

After all, few people have an issue calling Gintama "Gintama," as opposed to its (overly) literal translation, "Silver Soul."


That's not why this was left untranslated though. They originally did translate Kuro Gyaru as the objectively correct "Black Gal" but people complained to Crunchyroll on Twitter how it was racist so they changed it to be left in Japanese so people unfamiliar with the language can pretend it's not a bad word or phrase, much like how a lot of Japanese slurs go untranslated or altered in American translations to avoid backlash. It's not really about accuracy so much as political backlash and marketing.


Overly literal translations are neither accurate nor "objectively correct." As noted above, translating Gintama as "Silver Soul" is also overly literal, but not accurate or "objectively correct."

Thing is, why use "gyaru" when there's a perfectly good word for it in English, "gal"? I mean, it's not just a random Engrish word, gals are an existing fashion trend/subculture and have been for decades now, as are "kuro gals", ie. "black gals" who are called such for tanning themselves really dark, with ganguro and yamamba going the extra mile to have really dark skin and wear light make-up and hair as contrast. And it's because gals are often stereotyped as being sexually promiscuous, that our hero turns into "a black gal", specifically, as opposed to just "a girl". Obiously this connotation won't be obvious to most people, so frankly I would've just left it out altogether from the translation and used "girl" or "chick" or something instead - but if they decided to keep the word why can't they just use "gal" instead of "gyaru"? (It's like people calling the movie Ring "Ringu". Yes, that's what it says in katakana, but come on.)

If "black gal" is misleading, or people parse it as racist because of "black" (I don't think it's necessarily racist in this context, but I'm white as a sheet so it's not my place to argue about that) then they could've just translated it as "dark" or "tanned" or hell, "I turned into a sexy chick". Or something. But "gyaru", let alone "kuro gyaru"?

(In this post: thinking way too much about a silly porn manga/anime.)


Now we're getting into interesting nuances of Japanese/English localization issues. While "gal" is a perfectly good English word, it already comes with a lot of general denotations and connotations that do not apply to the specific denotation of the Japanese subculture "gyaru."

Put in another way, why use "anime" when there's a perfectly good word for it in English, "animation"? For similar reasons as above.
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SHD



Joined: 05 Apr 2015
Posts: 1752
PostPosted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 1:57 pm Reply with quote
Egan Loo wrote:

Now we're getting into interesting nuances of Japanese/English localization issues. While "gal" is a perfectly good English word, it already comes with a lot of general denotations and connotations that do not apply to the specific denotation of the Japanese subculture "gyaru."

And that is why I said that the best decision would've been just ditching the word/concept "gal" altogether, and use "girl" or "chick" or whatever. But since they didn't, they might as well have used "gal" (which is also what the Japanese subculture is named, not "gyaru") instead of a word that the majority of the audience can't parse. And on top of that they also left the word "kuro", ending up with a title that has something that for most people equals an unintelligible bunch of letters in its most prominent part (well, second most prominent, I guess, if we put consider "F**k" the most prominent one...).

Egan Loo wrote:
Put in another way, why use "anime" when there's a perfectly good word for it in English, "animation"? For similar reasons as above.

Because "anime" is an existing word that is widely used in English. "Gyaru" isn't, let alone "kuro gyaru" that is guaranteed to make even some anime fans stop and wonder what it even means. The title of a show is supposed to somehow indicate what the show is about, but this title is basically "I Became a ds&#x?ü! so I F***ed My Best Friend".

(Then again, I suppose the point is f**king the best friend, the reason is secondary... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ )
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Egan Loo



Joined: 25 Feb 2005
Posts: 1300
PostPosted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 7:29 pm Reply with quote
SHD wrote:
Egan Loo wrote:

Now we're getting into interesting nuances of Japanese/English localization issues. While "gal" is a perfectly good English word, it already comes with a lot of general denotations and connotations that do not apply to the specific denotation of the Japanese subculture "gyaru."

And that is why I said that the best decision would've been just ditching the word/concept "gal" altogether, and use "girl" or "chick" or whatever. But since they didn't, they might as well have used "gal" (which is also what the Japanese subculture is named, not "gyaru") instead of a word that the majority of the audience can't parse.


Wikipedia seems to suggest otherwise:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyaru

SHD wrote:
And on top of that they also left the word "kuro", ending up with a title that has something that for most people equals an unintelligible bunch of letters in its most prominent part (well, second most prominent, I guess, if we put consider "F**k" the most prominent one...).


And that's not uncommon for localized titles --- see above for examples of similar titles from English to Japanese. Indeed, we're getting releases that keeps words like "JK" and "isekai" in the English titles:

animenewsnetwork.com/news/2021-02-28/seven-seas-adds-jk-haru-is-a-sex-worker-in-another-world-manga/.170052

Isekai Quartet

SHD wrote:
Egan Loo wrote:
Put in another way, why use "anime" when there's a perfectly good word for it in English, "animation"? For similar reasons as above.

Because "anime" is an existing word that is widely used in English. "Gyaru" isn't, let alone "kuro gyaru" that is guaranteed to make even some anime fans stop and wonder what it even means.


Anime was being used to descrbe works and store shelves years before it entered English dictionaries. The same goes for manga, otaku, shōnen, shōjo, and more recently, isekai and JK. The beauty of languages, particularly English and Japanese which incorporate so many loan words, is that they evolve. The evolution starts when certain obscure terms enters the lexicon of a particular group or fandom. Eventually they get less obscure, then get Urban Dictionary and Wikipedia entries, and finally get entries in print dictionaries.


SHD wrote:

The title of a show is supposed to somehow indicate what the show is about, but this title is basically "I Became a ds&#x?ü! so I F***ed My Best Friend".

(Then again, I suppose the point is f**king the best friend, the reason is secondary... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ )


The title of a show is supposed to get people interested in the show — which, as demonstrated by the buzz generated on this show, seems to have worked!
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