Linguistic and Cultural Mediation in Subtitling Three Films into Indonesian

Abstract

Film subtitling is a form of audiovisual translation in which linguistic transfer, cultural mediation, and technical compression operate simultaneously. This study examines how subtitle translation into Indonesian negotiates these demands across three films with contrasting registers and narrative styles: Pride and Prejudice (2005), Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), and Little Women (2019). Using a qualitative descriptive design, approximately 200 source-target subtitle pairs were examined through thematic coding of translation strategy, functional adequacy, pragmatic equivalence, multi-modal support, and technical constraint. The analysis shows that effective subtitling is not governed by literal fidelity alone. In Pride and Prejudice, poetic and functional reformulation helps preserve period register and interpersonal nuance; in Portrait of a Lady on Fire, compression and reliance on visual context support restrained dialogue and emotional silence; and in Little Women, explication and functional adaptation help maintain ideological and interpersonal force. Across the three films, domestication and source-oriented retention operate as complementary rather than mutually exclusive choices. The findings further show that subtitles depend on image, sound, gesture, and timing to distribute meaning across modes. The study concludes that subtitles function as linguistic and cultural mediators whose decisions must balance semantic accuracy, cultural accessibility, register, and audiovisual economy.

Keywords:

Audiovisual translation; cultural mediation; Indonesian subtitles; multimodality; subtitling