Swearing Adaptation in the Translation of English Monologues into Spanish: the Usage of Fuck

Abstract

[eng] This dissertation explores the nature of swear word translation by analysing how the expletive fuck is transferred into the Spanish subtitles of three one-hour special stand-up comedy shows from Netflix. The main aim behind this research is to vindicate the role of fuck, and swear words in general, in this specific oral context despite the possible taboo it may entail for translators. The analysis consists in the tallying of all instances of fuck, fucking, fucked, and fucker and the study of the different translations applied to each word form. Based on the results, the approaches taken by translators were deduced to describe a range of possible tendencies affecting translation. It may be argued that Spanish has enough linguistic resources to effectively translate swear words. However, the high incidence of omissions may suggest that there is hesitance in Spanish translation towards translating expletives, which removes rather distinctive characteristics of stand-up comedy rhetoric.