Abstract
Extralinguistic Cultural References (ECRs) are certain elements in a source culture, which are difficult to translate to the target language. These elements refer to specific concepts in the source culture, such as people, brands, foods or institutions. ECRs are a well-known translation problem for subtitlers but are under-researched in English subtitles of movies from less-dominant languages. The aim of this thesis is to investigate how Norwegian ECRs are rendered in the subtitles of the two films Elling and Max Manus. The study has a descriptive approach and investigates which translation strategies the subtitlers use most frequently by comparing the transcribed dialogue with the English subtitles. Each ECR was classified according to the taxonomy presented in Pedersen (2011). Also, the study examines whether translators aim to preserve the foreign elements by using foreignization strategies in their translation, or if they domesticate the dialogue for the sake of the audience. The results show that the official equivalent is the preferred method to render Norwegian ECRs in the English subtitles. However, if there is no official equivalent, the frequency of the different translation strategies differs between the movies. Moreover, the study reveals that there is a tendency to domesticate the subtitles in Elling, while there is a tendency to foreignize the subtitles in Max Manus. This difference between the two movies could be genre depended or caused by how central specific ECRs are in the movies.