Thread by @neontaster

I'm not a JP translator but I have worked as a translator for years and also have a basic grasp of Japanese and I strongly disagree. Tolkein treated LOTR like a translated work and deliberately left words in "foreign" languages like Elvish. Translation isn't localization.

https://twitter.com/ZackDavisson/status/1332078991591710720

There is extreme value in preserving the cultural identity of the text you're translating. The more colloquialisms and idioms that you transpose, the further away you get from the true spirit of the text. Sometimes it's inevitable but the default should NEVER be 100% conversion.

You're not trying to make it an American product. You're trying to make it a Japanese product that Americans can understand, but maintaining its Japanese nature necessarily requires keeping some of the original linguistic elements. Otherwise it's cultural reprocessing.

Referring to people in a titular way like Senpai doesn't have an English equivalent, so trying to shoehorn the translation of that word into English creates something stilted and awkward just so that it can be informational, but that's not always a translator's role.

I love reading translated novels where you feel the original language peeking through the English. Sergei Lukyanenko's Night Watch novels are a beautiful example of this. They FEEL Russian even when you read them in English.

Another PS here - as someone who used anime as a HUGE tool for learning Japanese, the less processed nature of subtitles was a huge help for me. It makes those Japanese-isms more familiar to your ear. So yeah this guy's philosophy is totally ad odds with my own.

Missed these last tweets and here's where he crosses into gate keeper territory. Who are you to decide what entry points into Japanese culture people take? You're not there to serve as a filter between content and viewer. Your job is to be invisible.

https://twitter.com/ZackDavisson/status/1332081914782511104

If I had taken this dude's advice, I wouldn't have learned Japanese and fallen in love with Japan. Why would you discourage cultural discovery through entertainment?