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MANGA, ANIME AND VIDEO GAMES: GLOBALIZING JAPANESECULTURAL PRODUCTIONDr Minako Oóhagan a

a Centre for Translation and Textual Studies, Dublin City University,

Online Publication Date: 24 July 2007

To cite this Article Oóhagan, Minako Dr(2007)'MANGA, ANIME AND VIDEO GAMES: GLOBALIZING JAPANESE CULTURALPRODUCTION',Perspectives,14:4,242 — 247

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MANGA, ANIME AND VIDEO GAMES:GLObALIzING JAPANESE CULTURAL PRODUCTION

Special Issue Editor Dr Minako O’HaganCentre for Translation and Textual Studies, Dublin City University

This special issue of Perspectives is devoted to translation questions arising from the globalization of the Japanese popular cultural production of manga1, anime2 and video games. In his article Japan’s Gross National Cool, McGray (2002) drew attention to the collective power of Japanese popular culture permeating through the rest of the world. His observations highlight the globalization process undergone by these areas of Japanese cultural production and as such serve to raise the question of the role played by translation – a topic little explored in Translation Studies (TS). Widespread popularity of these genres beyond Japanese shores is evident in that the Japanese terms manga and anime together with associated but rather obscure culture-specific concepts such as otaku3 have come into the vocabulary of an increasing international audience. Examples of the influence of manga and anime range from Hollywood films such as The Matrix and Kill Bill to a UK publisher’s recent launch of a Manga Shakespeare series4 turning Romeo and Juliet into a contemporary story set in Japan with Japanese characters depicted in a distinctive manga style. The latter is an example of the emergence of so-called Amerimanga and Euromanga, i.e. the adoption of manga form by comic artists in the US and Europe, adding to the deep-seated impact of manga and creating a domain of its own. Similarly, the popularity of Japanese video games has long ago crossed the national border to produce best selling games in the global market (Roturier 2003). Japanese role playing games (RPGs) are known for introducing a completely new story-driven, rather than action-driven, dimension and winning international fans for their unique characteristics. According to the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) the Japanese game export market is over 80 times that of the import of overseas games (cited in Nakamura 2006a: 16) with an implication that the localization direction is predominantly from Japanese rather than into Japanese.

The extent of the international influence of these products can indeed be inferred from some statistics. In terms of international dissemination anime occupy 60% of the TV animation broadcast worldwide with the ratio in Europe exceeding 80% (Nakamura 2006a: 30). The US forms the single biggest anime market and accounted for US$ 48.4 million (€ 35.6 million) in 2004. This apparently equates to several times the value of steel exported from Japan to the US. Anime sales as a whole are reported to be as much as US$ 4 billion a year in the US, with leading Japanese anime studios earning up to 35% of their revenues on foreign markets (Brown 2006: 6). The worldwide export of Japanese video games, including hardware and software, was approximately ¥ 560 billion (EUR 3.5 billion) in 2004. Japan is considered to be the second largest video game market, following the US which is estimated at € 5.8 billion in 2004 (ESA

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2005). Overseas sales of manga in 2006 were estimated at roughly ¥ 3 billion (€ 18.5 million) (‘Practical Guide to Publishing in Japan’ 2006: 12). Although the smallest in economic terms among the three genres, the importance of manga lies in their subsequent multiple use as source material in the secondary market, which includes books, TV anime, films, direct-to-video anime known as OVAs and character merchandise (Nakano 2004: 2). Furthermore, these areas are now regarded as a strategically significant sector in Japan because of their potential to provide attractive content for a plethora of digital media platforms (Nakamura 2006b).

While their economic significance undoubtedly contributes to motivation for research into these areas of Japanese popular culture, what makes them particularly promising subjects for TS, in my opinion, is the unique process of cultural negotiation they undergo through translation. Despite anime’s characteristic dimension of mukokuseki literally meaning “without nationality” often discussed among anime scholars (e.g. Napier 2000: 14) a focus on translation perspectives only highlights how anime constitute a battlefield of cultural negotiation for professional and amateur translators alike. While the question of how translation has played its role in globalizing these areas remains underexplored in TS, a small enclave of TS researchers is taking up the challenge. This special edition attempts to further promote these subjects as promising areas of translation research by introducing a diverse range of perspectives across the three areas.

Defining the Research DomainThe location of research in the three areas under study in this issue needs to be addressed in order to chart the territory, although a comprehensive description of each genre is beyond the scope of this introduction. These areas have so far attracted scholarly interest from Asian studies, cultural studies, film studies, media studies and communication studies as well as computer science. Furthermore, for obvious reasons they have attracted researchers with Japanese language competence across different disciplines. A difficulty with grasping their entire scope owes to the fragmentation of scholarly interests due to the multidimensional nature of these genres, considered variously as visual art forms, a subculture, new entertainment media, or under the generic umbrella of Japanese popular culture. These subjects were once the cause of moral panic (Kinsella 2000: 131ff), both in Japan and elsewhere, and suffered a severe lack of interest in academia. However, they are now beginning to gain academic attention due to their diverse culturally-rich content as well as their affinity with new technology platforms for entertainment and also for education.

Manga, anime and video games each forms its own domain of research, and clustering them together may appear to be unproductive as well as unduly ambitious. However, there is a certain insight to be gained by observing them side by side as versatile media content subject to different modes of translation. From a commercial point of view, a close link between the three essentially derives from the strategy of making successful content in one form available in another. For example, Pokémon went from the original video game medium to manga and then TV anime5 before being released as a feature anime film. This media mix approach seems to be a global trend, but the particularly close link

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between manga and anime is noteworthy, with 60% of anime being based on popular manga (Onouchi 2006: 101). From the TS viewpoint, these can all be treated as polysemiotic texts which need to be mediated in consideration of the particular platform for which they may be deployed (Gottlieb 2005). Emergence of new media platforms further makes their content an exciting new area of TS research, pushing the conventional boundary of divisions of research. For example, translation issues pertinent to video games are classified under games localization akin to software localization, given the nature of games as a piece of software. However, other aspects of games translation can only be illuminated by drawing on the body of knowledge available in audiovisual translation (AVT). While AVT and localization have not come together explicitly in sharing insights, the new media content such as digital games demands to be placed between the two (O’Hagan 2005). As noted by many AVT scholars (Díaz Cintas 2003; Orero 2004) this particular branch of TS is seeing its boundary blurring due to developments of media technology. The focus on manga, anime and video games only brings home this observation.

However, the last and by no means the least challenge is that of language. While it is possible to embark on research in these areas without a knowledge of Japanese, studies focusing on the micro issues of translation as explored in this volume by Howell and also by Ortabasi and Mangiron do necessitate consideration of the specific features of Japanese language. Furthermore, the linguistic skills affect the ability to access reference materials which are often only available in Japanese, particularly in the area of manga. Translation-related articles (e.g. Ono 2003) are appearing in Japanese in the journal Manga Studies by the Nihon Manga Gakkai [Japan Society for Studies in Cartoon and Comics]. Similarly, the useful resources such as the Encyclopedia of Contemporary Manga (2006) chronicling manga in the period 1945-2005 remain locked in Japanese. Much of such works remains inaccessible to the outside world as no translation is available, and this in itself is a translation problem that may ultimately be tackled by the TS community with the uptake of research into these areas.

Research AvenuesGiven the multidimensionality of these genres as demonstrated in the interest from a wide range of disciplines, there is also ample scope for translation research. This section aims to present the focus chosen by each contributor in this volume, moving from a macro to a micro perspective, making connections between their points of view where possible.

Jüngst observes a particular way in which the significant impact of the globalization of manga has manifested itself in the target culture. In Germany cultural and commercial forces seem to have combined to lead to the creation of “fake manga” produced by local German artists. As opposed to the direction of world comics, which take in different elements from comics of different origins, the former strictly adheres to the manga form, in particular following manga’s dominant translated style even to the extent of adopting the recently popular back-to-front book format and, in some cases, using Japanese onomatopoeia for sound effects. Jüngst argues that these otherwise German language manga are therefore simulacra, prompted initially by translated manga, but then taking off without them. The role of translation here then can be seen as influential in

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disseminating the “form” of manga while the translated content itself becomes irrelevant. This line of investigation in turn can be related to the long-standing fan activities such as fanfic or fan fiction in which fans produce their own fictions using the characters or settings from the original film, and now from anime, manga and video games. The insight provided by media studies scholars such as Henry Jenkins (1992, 2006) is useful in interpreting such committed fan participation in media, which links closely to the topic of fansubs.

The contribution by Pérez González focuses on fansubs, which are unsolicited translations produced by fans notably for anime productions, and highlights the unique way in which anime are globalized through this alternative set of practice. The phenomenon of amateur translation emerged linked to a resistance to transformations imposed on some anime when they were broadcast in the US market mainly through the mode of dubbing. Given that their rationale is not profit making, but rather meaning-making and authenticity-seeking, fansubs can be viewed as a legitimate act of intervention albeit undertaken “outside” the law. Pérez González also refers to the indispensable role played by technology, which has afforded the means for fans to become such a committed party in the otherwise professional activity of subtitling. In an analogy to the butterfly effect discussed in chaos theory, this contribution alludes to uncertainties about the future of translation modes and norms challenged by these alternative practices in the changing media landscape.

The subject of fansubs recurs in the contribution by Ortabasi, who uses anime as a platform to discuss limitations in the current translation mode of subtitling, which does not cater adequately to cultural references embedded in films in the form of nonverbal visual code. Coming from a film studies background, Orta-basi’s concern is the treatment of visual messages woven to form intertextuality and presented independent of the verbal message. By taking the case of Kon Satoshi’s less known and culturally-loaded anime Millennium Actress Ortabasi questions the degree of attention given by AVT scholars to resolve this dilemma arising from the visual dimension of film, and suggests technological solutions with film itself as an interface to enable a desired viewing.

Moving from the visual to the narrative of film dialogues and from macro to micro questions, Howell focuses on the treatment of character voice reflected in subtitles, in particular addressing the Japanese source text of anime productions. Howell’s contribution is particularly refreshing considering the paucity of work in TS discussing the nature of Japanese language in terms of pragmatics in socio-cultural contexts. The evidence produced on different translation strategies used in different DVD versions of the same film, one for the learners of English in Japan and the other for wider markets of English native speakers, proves something which may be perceived but has not been so compellingly proved: The former shows more neutralized character voice, rendering it into stylistically flat dialogues whereas the latter shows compensatory procedures in operation in an attempt to re-create a character voice stylistically equivalent to that of the original. His reference to the quantitative differences between the two versions of English subtitles would provide a further scope for corpus-based AVT research. Howell also makes reference to amateur subtitles with their penchant for blunt foreignization. The final findings on the marked and effective use of orthographic and typographic devices as translation procedures

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are illuminating, leading to Howell’s suggestion that “the technical constraints of subtitling on stylistic functions has sometimes been overstated”. Howell’s contribution also provokes a number of further lines of investigation in relation to anime dubbing and manga translation in comparison with anime subtitling.

In parallel with domesticating tendencies in dubbed anime and manga translation suggested by Howell, Mangiron’s contribution on localization of Japanese video games argues that extensive domesticating procedures are at work with this translation mode to the extent that it should be referred to as transcreation. The nature of the medium affords an extreme form of adaptation, not possible for cinema for example, where not only textual manipulation but visual manipulation of various images is possible. In transcreation Mangiron stresses translation gain, rather than loss from such changes in retaining the pleasure of game play, which constitutes the skopos of games localization. The specific areas of translator competence required for games localization provide a concrete guideline for translator training in this expanding area of entertainment and also invite TS scholars to dwell on new translation issues that are arising from this new audiovisual text type.

Conclusions and future workGiven their significant media exposure as well as some academic interest out-side of TS, notably since the late 1990’s, presenting these Japanese cultural artefacts as something new may appear naïve to some readers. And yet, as stressed throughout this introduction the TS community has not yet shown any serious sign of embracing these culturally-rich areas of, what some call, media content. In fact, almost belatedly they have come to be recognized as a strategically important area at a governmental level within Japan with the establishment of an Intellectual Property Strategy under the auspices of the Cabinet Secretariat (see details in Nakamura 2006b). As suggestive in the name of the strategy, one particular area on which the government is focusing is protection of intellectual property, which has long been neglected, allowing pirating activities. While the sector may possibly have benefited from a wider distribution by turning a blind eye to certain fan activities (Leonard 2005), with a matured and ready market, the protection of the original artists’ rights, especially in new digital media contexts, is considered to be an urgent and important long-term goal to further promote the development of these areas of creative expression. As the editor of this special issue, one mission I set for myself was to investigate the issue of legality and tolerance of fan-produced translation materials when it comes to publishing them in print as requested by some of the contributors in this volume. Whose permission should we be seeking? Profound uncertainty surrounding the copyright issues made discussions with some major copy-holder Japanese publishers the only way to resolve this issue.

This special issue is merely a first step towards establishing solid research in TS on these areas of Japanese popular culture production. As the guest editor, I hope the collection presented here will indeed act as a catalyst to spur exciting and new research from the wider community of scholars of Translation Studies.

In this special issue, all references are found in the reference section on pp. 318-323.

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Notes1. Manga is a Japanese word meaning comics in general. However, the term is now widely used elsewhere to specifically refer to Japanese comics, and the usage in this article follows this convention. 2. Anime in Japanese is a collapsed form of the English term “animation” and means all kinds of animation films. However, in this article, the term is used to refer only to Japanese animation films.3. Otaku in Japanese refers to people who are introverted and, rather than socializing, prefer to stay home to play games, watch anime or read manga. As such there is an undeniable negative connotation associated to this term. However, the same is not necessarily true in the usage among non-Japanese fans of these genres, who may proudly describe themselves as otaku to indicate a certain expert status within this field. 4. In March 2007 the UK publisher SelfMadeHero launched the Manga Shakespeare series, where the distinctive manga form is being used to re-tell Shakespeare’s stories. While Richard Appignanesi’s adaptation closely preserves Shakespeare’s original language in dialogues, in the case of Romeo and Juliet the setting is changed to contemporary Tokyo, with all characters being turned into Japanese and the story evolving around the feud between two Yakuza (Japanese mafia) families.5. Pokémon first appeared as a game for Nintendo’s Game Boy in 1996 in Japan, eventually achieving global sales of 140 million units for the entire series of games (Nakamura & Onouchi 2006: 30). This was followed by its manga version and made into a TV anime series in 1997 which enjoyed a phenomenal success and was broadcast in 67 countries.

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