Korean Language Professor Breaks Down Squid Game’s Subtitles | WIRED

That is one of the things that doesn't translate literally. Korean has an embedded status in so many of its words and linguistic constructions. Translation into English gets complicated because there's no true equivalent to reflect this. So, hyung connotes respect and familiarity that makes the betrayal worse.

true!

@@tiacho2893 it depends on the culture...in some English speaking countries people will use “Brother” to address non-related males...if they are close.
I think if they would have put “Call me Sang Woo or Brother” and then captioned him calling out Brother” it would have had a closer effect. I figured “Hyung” meant something similar to “Brother” or “Close friend” but the caption would have been nice.

@@ahub87 I agree. It would have been that much more powerful to have Ali call him brother. It seems like they didn’t think they show was going to be so popular so they didn’t spend much time on the true meaning of the dialogue.

@@ahub87 nonono. not sang-woo or hyung, it's a sang-woo hyung. different. '형, 누나, 언니, 오빠'는 정말 광범위한 의미를 내포하고 있습니다. 1. 가족간에 쓰일 때, 2. 인간관계에서 상대방과의 관계성을 나타낼 때(상대방이 나보다 나이가 많은지, 남성인지 여성인지), 3. 가족은 아니지만 가족처럼 깊은 관계를 맺을 때(의형제).
여기사 상우와 알리의 관계는 서로 쌍방통행이 아닙니다. 상우->알리 일 때 상우는 '형'을 2.로 받아들였고, 알리->상우 일 때 알리는 3.의 의미로 '형'을 사용합니다.

Wait a minute… why are you here

Good point. I have noticed that Squid Game isn’t actually more violent than a lot of other TV shows or movies in terms of number of people killed, but we feel the violence much more. The violence isn’t sanitized and the characters anonymized the way most other shows handle killings, which is why we feel such shock at each one. So it is interesting that any of the language translations would have sanitized the profanity.

@@Newfox2053 why is anyone anywhere? :o

I've noticed that before on a lot of subtitles. Someone will say the f word but in the subtitles it will skip it. If I have the ability to read and I'm watching an R rated movie who are they protecting? I never understood it.

ironic, isn’t it?

Welcome to the real world, if it comes to survival everyone turns animal

@@padmanavbora7653 Yea, but he betrayed the protagonist in the drawing part. He's really evil, I think.

What would you do? There is no friends in squid game that is implied at the start and when your life is on the line you will do anything to survive its human nature and has kept us alive so we should be thankful

@@annemaeromero1469 you're right he is EVIL but he did it for his own survival. he knows the protagonist is above the avg in the games and might be a threat to him, so he wants to take him asap.

You would do the same thing duh

I’m pretty sure we didn’t need more reason to be depressed

Agreed. This video didn't realy challenge my interpretation of the communication between the characters in the show. Except for the Ali stuff, that was very insightful!

@Dariel Rojas Homero diciendo "anda la osa". 😆

yeah, like they're cursing with all their might and the translations are like swearing nine year olds.

Bad words are for them poors eh. Bit classiest habitus

@Human Rights ur so racist

That "even" insinuates that the nudity would be worse than the slaughter, which is quite funny to me.

@@Ratzo123ify I mean in the film genre it's viewed as "worse" in the vulgar aspect.

@@unknowns78 Only in America

@@Ratzo123ify I guess

eh… the translators could have done better. I feel like the translators for squid game left out way too much meaning and nuance. I’m a Korean American myself and I constantly found myself being put off by how inaccurate some of the subtitles were. I really wish Netflix payed more attention to giving more accurate subtitles and added translation notes to those interested in learning more and translations of words that are in the backgrounds of scenes in addition to the dialogue, especially since Netflix has the money to do so

But they did a bad job with this one.. they could do better

This is how translation is , it's never 100% accurate .

@@mimoogreat9510 They really didn't. The one area they could have improved is the swearing, though.

I don't mind address terms. It's just hard. But everything else...I'm not fluent in Korean but I'm familiar with the most simple ones and there are phrases I'm familiar with that could've been translated better.

As a fellow interpreter/translator, I totally agree with her. it's extremely difficult to tiptoe the line of providing too much and providing just enough, especially since there are character limits and how much a person can actually read when the subs are on screen.
Even in literary translation, there are professional debates about how much intext/footnote context should be given and how much should the translator allow the reader to discover for themselves.

Also one really good example of people believing the translation is true when someone gets a tattoo in a different language believing it says something like "bravery, courage" or some sort of thing like that but when someone of the native language see it and says "that says toaster"

I'm pretty sure this is something almost anyone with a moderate education (i.e. middle school) knows to be true. This is not a revelation to English speakers. Most English speakers had to learn the basics of a secondary language in school, and even if they didn't become proficient in (or even retain) that language, they still understood that translation between any two languages can be extremely challenging. This is especially true when it comes to cultural idioms and colloquialisms. We can even see this happen between two people of different generations who speak the same language.

"This is something MOST of the non English speaking people know for a fact : Translated movies are not accurate"
Absolutely hilarious that you would (seemingly) suggest native English speakers don't understand that translations aren't accurate. As if we can't immediately pick up on that when consuming foreign media.
🤦‍♂

The more I watch Kdramas and hear words which I can grasp, for example as she said- the curse words aren't normally translated directly to what they really mean and I get it, they're often sanitized for the sake of young audiences. But most of the time a huge chunk or part of the story vaporizes when the exact emotion is not conveyed through subtitles the way they should be. Sometimes, I am left confused at the English translations too lol 😂

Ohh that’s interesting. I didn’t know they refer to that part as “localization”

And with English your localisation is not limited to just one country like German would be for example. If you translate into English then nuances may still be well understood in the UK but get lost on an American audience for example.

I think if K-Dramas often translated the "Big Brother" (and other titles), the non-Korean speakers would start to pick up on the important use and meaning of those terms. So much is lost when they translate "Big Brother" into the simple first name. It can be done sometimes because it can get confusing if everyone is only using titles. Subtitle reader still needs to know who is being addressed.

real translation is never easy. neither is communication.

localization _is_ translation. Direct translation is not translation.

this is perfect description.

agreed

Perfectly agreed that’s exactly what I thought :)

한국인인 제가 느낀 것을 말씀드릴께요.
상대를 높이는 단어는 여러개가 있지만 뉘앙스가 다를 수 있습니다. 저는 알리가 상우를 "사장님"이라고 부를 때, 상황에 맞지 않는 단어 선택이라 생각했습니다. 그래서 그 케릭터가 한국 문화에 익숙하지 않을 것이라는 것과 공장에서 일하는데 필요한 한정된 단어를 사용하는 것을 보고 노동자라 유추할 수 있었어요.

@@user-ml6kw3kk6q you nailed it

Well not neccesarilly, if we switch to more formal older english we could find words. Although, we might need to revive some dead words.

Why would we need "baby animal" insults? That wouldn't have made any sense.

At the end of the day, does it make a huge difference? I think it's nitpicking. It's not just about translating, it's also about understanding the culture.
For example, I've seen old subtitled Chinese movies and the word Tofu was translated as bean curd.
Now, personally I prefer the word tofu (and tofu is popular now). But once upon a time maybe tofu was not popular, so that's why it was translated as bean curd.

@@bbcmotd in korean language 개(dog) is portrayed as something useless, fake, or worthless, like 개살구(dog+plum, which is a term for a fruit that isn't sweet and hard to eat, so fake plum) so 개새끼 means that you are a "fake" child, which means your mother had an affair whith somebody and...ya know.. thats what it first ment, but the nuances were faded as the language changed.

@@user-wb9fw4ny1p WHAT?????? 개새끼 Is calling someone a dog's child. In other words "son of a b****".

I cried watching this 😭😭😭

Seriously, over that level of manipulation? Anyone who falls for that level prior to 33 years old does not deserve sympathy.

@@joewas2225 deserving sympathy..

*more

@@joewas2225 who are you ranting about ?

It's hard to get romanized korean on a first look though.
There's many different pronouns in Korean so it's tricky shifting those pronouns in alphabet. You have to know the rules (or patterns) of it to read it right way.

@@kentpaper958 As a non-native-englisch speaker i find it very hard to read the romanization, because in german i would pronounce it VERY differently. I now learned the korean alphabet and find it even easier to "translate" the englisch romanized names to hangul in my head and then try to pronnouce it correctly :D And yes, this sounds very stupid

I’ve noticed this often in Korean tv and movies, so it’s nice to learn why (and start learning the specific terms used so I can understand them).

lol i can imagine you thinking 'huh, i didn't know sangwoo is pronounced as hyung....'

I imagine you were extremely confused during the scene when the detective says "Hyung" but the subtitle says "InHo" 😂😂

Absolutely right.
I've seen some fansubs with footnotes, as someone who's curious about the culture footnotes are interesting to me.
But they are incredibly tedious for my family who's just trying to follow what's going on on screen. LOL

I don't think that is necessary to give English speaking viewers the gist more completely than these subtitles did

I came here to say something similar! I can’t help but feel like the video would go differently if they would’ve had a translator talk about the subtitles instead of a teacher. Translation is about conveying meaning & not necessarily in a literal sense

I disagree. I would prefer as literal a translation as possible. So much can get lost because of one translator’s subjective opinions about meaning and cultural differences. That’s how we end up with things like biased Odyssey translations. And a global audience could have learned sooooo much more about Korean culture with just a slightly more literal translation. That’s a huge missed opportunity.

@@toast7948 what would a literal English translation of a word like “hyung” even look like?

Totally agreed! That's how I learned about Korean terms like hyung etc

That's the ideal way as we are people of culture (😂) but mainstream consumers hate even normal subtitles with a passion, that's why I doubt this revolutionary idea will ever make is past fansubs or fantranslations. These fantranslators deserve the best tho. 👑

I mean there's English subs for people that are hard of hearing so why not English subs for people who are just linguistically interested

This might be more doable with written media like manga or novels, but with a TV show, the subtitles are only on screen for a few seconds, which makes it more difficult for the audience to read the translation notes.

it really made me remember and appreciate the informality of fansubs. When I was consuming a lot of anime in my teenage years, fansubs probably taught me more about Japanese cultural nuance than the things I learned in my school classes. Same for k-dramas.

same here. i can save time on explaining to my friends why the subs aren't that good, and my friends don't have to listen to me rant for like 10 minutes lol

@@madeofcastiron should i watch the dub instead?

@@gamingparadise3390 in my honest opinion, don't watch it in dub. the dubbing is really subpar (lacking emotions, awkward delivery, strange translations).
though the english subs (not english cc, the cc is the caption of the english dubbing) may lack nuance, the meaning is good enough. also, listening to the original korean actors' voices will help convey the heaviness of their words at the emotional scenes.

@@madeofcastiron i agree ..i dont like watching the dubbed version of foreign movies it just feel weird ..:D

@@user-ev2hk7lt3r "rant" means "talk angrily and complain about something for a long time"
e.g. my friend *rant* to me about her terrible manager many times. i think she should just quit her job.
i hope the explanation is clear!

Non Korean women have recently hijacked that word to fetishize korean men. (👁👄👁 Oppaaaaa)

@@rosean374 fact

as a Korean who helps out foreign learners of Korean, I see so many of them came to know 'oppa' as a romantic address term FIRST (and only). Actually what's worse is when they ask what it is (in a context with such uasge) I've seen many Koreans simply say "it's what you call your boyfriend" (or even husband) and don't explain it further… 😩

Well as a Korean who speaks 4 languages but fails miserably translating for others give you mad respect for translating korean to german.... I was fine with most of the subtitles as we all know it is impossible to translate anything 100% in accuracy(since language lives with culture and history) I find dumbing down their swearing was questionable choice in my opinion...

wait so you speak english, korean AND german? Cool!

I am amazed by german language, because some words when are spoken often sounds like swearing while you're sneezing, like Sehnsucht, Brötchen and Kreuzschlitzschraubenziehe

Haha I totally understand XD we had whole debates over it during Translation classes in grad school .

If you are a translator you should differentiate between "then" and "than"..

So when Mi-nyeo called Gi-hun 'oppa', what is it? What does it mean, or what is she trying to accomplish?

@@lavane26 she was doing the exact same thing to what she was doing to Duksoo.
cmiiw, I think she was trying to become his partner at the time, if that was correct, then she just trying a short cut to get a partner

@@lavane26 She wanted a strategic alliance with someone to protect her.If possible, a strong person would be suitable.What she calls OPPA and approaches intimately is the first essential action to achieve that goal.

So like PAPI

@@lavane26 Agreed. She’s trying to force intimacy and act like they’re close when they are not, in an attempt to build relationships that may help her survive - and then you can see it makes Gihun uncomfortable because he’s like ?? I literally don’t know you, ma’am-vibes

I saw it a week ago and I'm still not okay.

thank you oppa

it is is important. The eng sub/dub was trash.

@@TomNook. ㅋㅋㅋ

@@TomNook. oh no...

@@TomNook. lol

I totally agree but also, since this went so viral worldwide even to a huge audience that had never watched korean shows, I think they'd confused by these words

@@mari-ut6rb yes it is hard, idk if they can add "Hyung (Older Brother)" at the very first use, that the more use it has, the more people catch what that means

Ikr. And some people in the comments are saying 'oh why don't they just the direct translation?' but I really just think it will sound weird. Like when Ali got betrayed by Sangwoo in the marble game and he is calling out to sangwoo like 'hyung, sangwoo hyung!' (sad scene ik) if you direct translate it in the translation it will sound like 'brother! Sangwoo brother!' or if it is really direct translated 'older brother! Sangwoo older brother!' it just sound weird lmao

They should have used the above with an asterisk, like hyung* so that in the ending credits they could explain what the terms mean, same for Ahjumma and hearing “nim” a lot to guess that the convo has become more formal.

@@elmosanica Even then, people with zero real exposure to any Asian culture would find it confusing and inaccessible. They wouldn’t understand why they’re using “big brother” instead of first names. The implied hierarchy and respect might even feel stiff and formal, which is the opposite of the actual meaning. It’s difficult to translate all those social rules in a way that makes any sense to someone with a completely different set of social rules.

Lmao

Same😅

Me

It's the translation vs localization problem. For example, the scene at 1:46. A more accurate translation would be "Then just call me bro." But it wouldn't make sense for Sang-woo to use that kind of language.

@@RNGeeGee the thing is that localization *is* translation (speaking as a translator myself)

@@pauwula Kind of... Localization is a part of translation, but translation does not always involve localization; you can translate things very literally.

aaaand it still doesnt convey the romantic side of the term lool
US viewers might mistaken get sweet alabama vibes too lmaoo

There was basically no way to accurately translate “Oppa” without a footnote because there is no equivalent term in English that carries the exact same familial and romantic implications

the subtitle says 'babe,' not older brother

Do u study korean? It sounds good, i like the honorifics

Same!!

So true!

same

Same

same

@@djisar-official definitely not th

@@djisar-official using daddy would just be weird. Oppa is used very commonly, whereas daddy seems more like an exclusive term, if that makes sense

“Oppa” is also used among relatives where the man and woman are related

It’s legit not. It literally means older “brother” or a dude who is close to you but older than you. That’s why it’s interesting how, she refers to others as oppa even tho a.) she is older, and b.) not close to them

Don't spread misinformation.

so i am supposed to learn the language of every foreign show i watch cmon

어쩔티비

We don't need to know the real Language to understand that he was looking up to the guy like a brother. And seen the betrayal and that sadness at the end of the scene. We got it in the acting. Language is not everything.

@@RabbitsInBlack not all but a lot and it helps to convey the message even further.

@@loveitftw BTW because of the Acting in the FIRST EPISODE, I figured out who was the BAD GUY. They gave you so many clues that I guess not everyone picked up. The Smile on that man's face, fun old games. (Hint)

@@RabbitsInBlack yeah small and subtle details are the cherry on top imo👌

Lean into me, shawty.

Just like she said, there's just not enough time to explain the concept in a way that's normal while also having a translation that feels somewhat natural. Like with "Oppa", "Babe" is probably one of the most accurate translations they could have picked but even then, the comment about age seemed to come out of left field when I viewed it because we lack that context in the translation.

Could've just kept the "oppa" and "hyung" and explain context on top of the screen. Like they do on illegal streaming websites

Yeah same problem in Chinese and Japanese translations. Do you keep honorifics or not?

@@pango9519 Coulda picked "daddy" like it's used sexually.

@@moonlight-im8ik You need to pause the show to understand it then, and this is not good practice in subs. The mainstream audience does not want that. Well, the mainstream audience often hates any kind of subs, but the ones you need to pause for especially. So sadly when you watch in translation you just need to accept that some things are going to be lost. It's basically impossible for nothing to be lost, especially when you translate between very different cultures.

It's as simple as the lip flaps fitting 'Old man' best. It's not the most accurate translation, but the dub actors have to match the syllables to the original and the script has to reflect that.
Not to defend the Squid Game dub because it's, er, special. But that's just a general rule of dubs, and is much stricter in live-action than animation.

@@AkunoRaion ENG [CC] was a different kind of sub. I always watch with cc subs because they're for the hearing impaired, they're usually more accurate and don't shorten things out etc. I prefer Old Man over Babe but only because it lowkey grosses me out less but I did cringe every time I read it. I watched it with my mum and brother and I kept pausing to explain why the subs didn't really capture what was up but they got annoyed with me after a while and soon enough you realize that people understand well enough what's happening even if the subs don't always make sense or are a 100%

@@littlemissmello The CC captions are meant for the English dub whereas the subs are for the original Korean. I personally have not watched Squid Game at all, to be perfectly honest, but that's what closed caption vs subs means.

That's terrible 🤣

LMAO I understand it's confusing for non-english speakers. In that scene, Fury doesn't call out to his mother nor did he called Captain Marvel "mother". That's him swearing, he was going to say "mother-f*cker" but he vanished before finishing the word.
TLDR: it's an unfinished swear word.

@@hezkycahyadi4121 It even became meme 'Devoted Son, Fury' which goes like: "He worried about his mama at the moment of death. What a devoted son🥺"

Guess the translator missed the beginning of the f sound. Or the script (or subs) was written as "mother" instead of "mother f~"

아 시발… 또는 아 썅으로 번역 됬어야했음

I make related contents just like The Wired... i bet 100% you'll like them if not come here to let other people know that. btw amazing content Wired

"mon lapin" (my rabbit) is one way of saying "babe" in French

@@kulik03 But it’s really cringy and outdated

You can call someone "Hase" (bunny/rabbit) as a pet name in german, too. But its typically used by parents or grandparents and not in a romantic way.

@@tilschulz94 I wonder if that's like "pet" in UK shows/movies; usually said in period pieces or by the older generation. As a speaker of Canadian English, I could never really understand it growing up.

😂

I hope so

Done by people who aren't professional translators, resulting in fan sub levels of bad translation? I hope not.

Too complex for your average viewer 😂

I have seen some anime where they translate a word that just doesnt exist in English. But it has to be brief, because you are also watching action/listening to dialogue. Sounds like for these examples that might be more challenging. I wish they had at least tried! 😭 Some nuance is better than none.

No I remember seeing that in English subs too. Smaller type in a different color that would pop up like a footnote explaining what "kouhai" was or something. Only issue was that it went by too fast so I'd have to pause to read it. The lady in this video was right about the limitations of reading speed lol

You might be in favor of honorifics, but they just seem odd to keep in English, since we don't have postposition honorifics. And I don't think it's necessary to keep that nuance, as it doesn't apply to the language you're translating to. You might keep it for a different reason, like it's hard to show changing attitudes in any other way, but I view them as poor ways to do translation.

Problem is Netflix has so many international shows and if like me, you’ve watched many, having to read notes becomes homework every time you watch a show. I love the notes though when I’m interested in a culture. I love Chinese period pieces and the fan subs with notes really do shed color but sometimes you have to pause videos to read it and it requires patience. There are too many idioms that just aren’t translatable.

One of the most frustrating things about Netflix's subtitles for me it that, as a Swedish person, I've noticed that swedish subtitles for non-english language shows are translated using the english translation, creating some kind of chinese whispers situation. It's ridiculous and I've stopped trying to watch anything with swedish subtitles, just opting for english instead. It's especially frustrating when watching shows in languages I have enough knowledge about to be able to pick up on mistranslations, but don't know well enough to skip the subtitles.

In my personal experience, the Spanish subs are way better than the English ones

Professional translators mostly do worse job than fans. Problem with official subbtitles is that it's done by people who are just like workers in factory, but they do translations.

@@Annaonesun Yeah... it's a problem. I understand, unfortunatelly.

@@paulaecheverriasuarez7577 Yes! We have a good industry that has been going on and perfecting over the years.

In the same principle, 'hyung' is similar to 'oppa', and in social relationships other than family, it is used only in intimate relationships. The difference between 'hyung' and 'oppa' is that men use the word 'hyung' for older men ('oppa' is a word women use for older men). Ali called Sang-woo 'sajangnim'. In addition to its original meaning, it is often used for individuals who are not personally intimate but of unknown status (usually higher than me). This is also the context of expressing changes in intimacy using Korean words.

Another interpretation is that Ali is a foreign worker and the only higher social status-person he has come across is his real 'sajangnim' (literally the boss). so he may be misrepresenting anyone who appears to have a higher social status than him as 'sajangnim' . The status system in Korean word is very complex and difficult for foreigners. Calling a stranger 'sajangnim' is maybe a very safe choice to Ali as a foreigner.

would "daddy" be a good translation?

In that case ‘babe’ would be the proper translation.

you cant expect people to learn of a culture before watching a tv show, the subbed is enough imo

Honestly, It would be good to learn the culture after watching the show. If you are really interested into it

​@@doplmu4671 I think the better expectation would be for people to learn about the culture before opening their mouth to critique it. Multiple times I've seen people write stuff about Korean shows like "it doesn't make any sense that he assumed she was flirting with him, this writing is so bad", because they don't know what "oppa" means. If someone wants to give a legit critique they'd better get their facts straight imo.

translators should translate it in a way that conveys the characters are flirting

Same except I knew some of the swear words because of BTS (specifically DKDKTV's breakdown of Bapsae) and other kdramas.

I make related contents just like The Wired... i bet 100% you'll like them if not come here to let other people know that. btw amazing content Wired

@@WoodyPerfect shut the fōk up no one asked you to ask subscribers here earn it yourself no matter how good your content is you will get there someday but not like this

@@sabhinbougia4303 LMFAOO

@@WoodyPerfect your content just screams incel eww

Dubbing should be illegal.

Why do we have to bother to look it up? We're not watching the show to learn Korean!

How are we gonna listen with heart when we don't have ears on our heart?

@@aniota_god I am talking about trying to see the expression of the actor. That's how we can distinguish.

Assuming you're Vietnamese, you should be able to compare translations and how cultural differences make for difficulties in translation.

I've often found if you have literally zero or every minimal knowledge of a language, you often cant pick apart the start and end of a word. It would be like trying to put spaces in a sentence not knowing the language i guess. Unless a word is repeated a bunch in a sentence and is decently long I cant recognise it...theres also the issue of because you have an inaccurate translation you wont pick up on nuances that a word may have. I know chinese, french and english, and mannn there are some words that you just cant translate accurately. It's like the word awkward in English, it's tough to find translations that captures the feeling of that word

Lol

Yes, "babe" is a proper English substitute to call a husband or boyfriend. So, to Deok-su, that's okay. But to other guys, it should have been "sugar", which is super friendly, flirtatious and offensive at the same time. Minyeo was in adult entertainment business.