redwoodalchan (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
redwoodalchan) wrote2018-12-12 04:28 pm
redwoodalchan) wrote2018-12-12 04:28 pm
Entry tags:
The problem with anime names in English
Soooo, in the many, many years I've spent as an anime fan, I've come across many, many people who complain about the fact that English-dub voice actors just can't seem to get anime characters' names right. And, inevitably, if you try to point out that Japanese people mispronounce English names all the time there's always someone ready to say "But Japanese has so many fewer syllables than English so OF COURSE they can't be blamed for mispronouncing the names, unlike we English-speakers!!!" I've always been bothered by this response, but I've never really had much in the way of a counterargument--until now.
Here's the thing: the reason why English-speakers struggle with Japanese names isn't just or even primarily about syllables. The problem is more fundamental than that. What it really boils down to is that Japanese names were never meant to be spoken in English, and therefore any attempt to render them in English is necessarily going to be fraught. In particular, there's two major problems I see with attempts to translate and adapt Japanese names to an English-language context:
1) The actual sound of the names. Many Japanese names contain collections of consonant and vowel sounds that just aren't common in English. What, for instance, is an English-speaker supposed to do with names like "Genkaku," "Furuichi," "Fujibayashi," "Masao," or "Tsutomu?" What all these names have in common is that they contain combinations of sounds that just don't come naturally to English-speakers, in much the same way that English has syllabary that wouldn't come naturally to a Japanese-speaker.
2) Accents. In Japanese, accents tend to be subtle overall, and don't matter very much. In English, though, accents are a lot more noticeable and can matter a great deal (see, for instance, how the different ways of pronouncing "affect" change its meaning). In fact, even when Japanese names are accented, they might not be accented in ways that would occur to a native English-speaker: for instance, when I took a trip to Japan, I was surprised to find the Japanese pronouncing Osaka and Yokohama as "O-sa-ka" and "yo-KO-ha-ma," as opposed to "o-SA-ka" and "yo-ko-HA-ma," which is how every English-speaker I've ever heard has done it. You see this problem with Japanese names all the time: does an English-speaker pronounce Genkaku's name "GEN-ka-ku" or "gen-KA-ku" (you could, conceivably, also put the accent on the third syllable, "gen-ka-KU," but that just sounds wrong)? The problem is especially acute when dealing with names that have more than two syllables, for obvious reasons.
Now I know what some of you are thinking: why don't the voice actors just look up the Japanese way of pronouncing the names and do that? But it's not that simple. What the English-dub voice actors, directors, and scriptwriters all say is that they want to make the viewers' experiences as immersive as possible. They're not really doing their job unless they can fool you, if only briefly, into thinking that the story you're watching was always meant to be spoken in English. That means that the voice actors not only have to use these Japanese names over and over again; they also have to make them sound as natural as possible in English. This, as I've outlined above, is no easy task. I don't doubt that many of the voice actors who appear in the English dubs I've watched could, if they wanted to, say the Japanese names I've mentioned flawlessly in Japanese; some might even speak Japanese fluently. But they're not going to do that because tossing a Japanese pronunciation of a name into an English-language television show would be even more awkward and jarring than trying to say the name in English, even if imperfectly.
Of course, this is not to say I think mispronunciations of Japanese names are never a problem. They certainly can be plenty jarring themselves, particularly if more than one pronunciation is used over the course of the series. However, I do think weird pronunciations of names are more or less a given when dealing with languages as different as Japanese and English, and I can't fault the directors and voice actors who dub our anime for trying their best. To me, it's worth it for the immersive experience of being able to watch these great shows in a language that I can actually understand.
Here's the thing: the reason why English-speakers struggle with Japanese names isn't just or even primarily about syllables. The problem is more fundamental than that. What it really boils down to is that Japanese names were never meant to be spoken in English, and therefore any attempt to render them in English is necessarily going to be fraught. In particular, there's two major problems I see with attempts to translate and adapt Japanese names to an English-language context:
1) The actual sound of the names. Many Japanese names contain collections of consonant and vowel sounds that just aren't common in English. What, for instance, is an English-speaker supposed to do with names like "Genkaku," "Furuichi," "Fujibayashi," "Masao," or "Tsutomu?" What all these names have in common is that they contain combinations of sounds that just don't come naturally to English-speakers, in much the same way that English has syllabary that wouldn't come naturally to a Japanese-speaker.
2) Accents. In Japanese, accents tend to be subtle overall, and don't matter very much. In English, though, accents are a lot more noticeable and can matter a great deal (see, for instance, how the different ways of pronouncing "affect" change its meaning). In fact, even when Japanese names are accented, they might not be accented in ways that would occur to a native English-speaker: for instance, when I took a trip to Japan, I was surprised to find the Japanese pronouncing Osaka and Yokohama as "O-sa-ka" and "yo-KO-ha-ma," as opposed to "o-SA-ka" and "yo-ko-HA-ma," which is how every English-speaker I've ever heard has done it. You see this problem with Japanese names all the time: does an English-speaker pronounce Genkaku's name "GEN-ka-ku" or "gen-KA-ku" (you could, conceivably, also put the accent on the third syllable, "gen-ka-KU," but that just sounds wrong)? The problem is especially acute when dealing with names that have more than two syllables, for obvious reasons.
Now I know what some of you are thinking: why don't the voice actors just look up the Japanese way of pronouncing the names and do that? But it's not that simple. What the English-dub voice actors, directors, and scriptwriters all say is that they want to make the viewers' experiences as immersive as possible. They're not really doing their job unless they can fool you, if only briefly, into thinking that the story you're watching was always meant to be spoken in English. That means that the voice actors not only have to use these Japanese names over and over again; they also have to make them sound as natural as possible in English. This, as I've outlined above, is no easy task. I don't doubt that many of the voice actors who appear in the English dubs I've watched could, if they wanted to, say the Japanese names I've mentioned flawlessly in Japanese; some might even speak Japanese fluently. But they're not going to do that because tossing a Japanese pronunciation of a name into an English-language television show would be even more awkward and jarring than trying to say the name in English, even if imperfectly.
Of course, this is not to say I think mispronunciations of Japanese names are never a problem. They certainly can be plenty jarring themselves, particularly if more than one pronunciation is used over the course of the series. However, I do think weird pronunciations of names are more or less a given when dealing with languages as different as Japanese and English, and I can't fault the directors and voice actors who dub our anime for trying their best. To me, it's worth it for the immersive experience of being able to watch these great shows in a language that I can actually understand.