In an effort to further my understanding of the folks who create some of my favorite anime, I thought I’d attempt the Google Translate assignment on the Studio Gainax website.
… it went about as well as I’d expected.
Not sure if this is a stable link, but you can see the entire page I translated here. I decided to go with an info page for one of the staff members because the info pages for the animes themselves were, surprisingly enough, translated pretty well. The staff pages had more colloquialisms, presumably, and less carefully edited copy, so they proved a bit more humorous when poorly translated.
Finding a page in another language that had enough text (versus images with text as part of the image) was, interestingly, the hardest part of this assignment. It’s difficult to find a page in another language unless you know the exact page you’re looking for. That’s what eventually led me to Studio Gainax’s Japanese homepage—I know the domain for Japanese websites is .jp, so I figured the URL of a major animation studio would likely be the studio’s name followed by .jp, and fortunately I was correct.
This assignment brings to mind two things. First, a topic I’ve discussed in several of Prof. Zach Whalen’s classes: the way that glitches in games change the game’s narrative as a whole. A crappy translation strikes me as quite similar, in the sense that it’s altering the meaning of a given text and essentially creating an entirely new text for the reader to interpret. Ergo, in reading the altered, translated text from the Gainax staff member’s page, I’m accessing a completely different character than the individual he wrote into existence when he filled out this survey, as created by the crappy translation. It’s a fascinating concept, and pulls in the idea of reality, textuality, online identity, interpretation and the subjectivity of storytelling and information transfer.
It also brought to mind this classic translation fail, which will never, ever get old.
The majority of the translated text is below, just in case the link above decides to die (my favorite sections are in bold):
Ryouta Kiyohara Ryota Kiyohara
(Update History: 2010) [ Type B ] [ Employee GAINAX ] [ Hanamaru Kindergarten ] [ Gurren Lagann ] [ Shikabane Hime]
Production Affiliation: Born September 24 Birthday: Type B: blood type
? ? Internal work career
Production progress “Gen-Shikabane Hime Aka” progress “Production Gurren Lagann” “The Hanamaru Kindergarten” making progress20 ? ? Questions
What Is Fetish: Q01?
> I can not say here.Q02: When do you feel happy?
> When it is busy.What is the history of the industry: Q03?
> About 4 years.Q04: I wanted an opportunity to enter the animation industry?
> I know that the job of making progress.Why you came to Gainax does (I chose): Q05?
> Other companies did not know much.Q06: The first impression when I came to Gainax is it?
> I thought I’m free I wonder.Q07: Gainax work do you like? The reason?
> Work involved is all I like. Memories of struggled because there is.Since the beginning of the industry up to now, most work was fun: Q08? It was the situation like?
> Is any fun, when it is most busy.Q09: things that you can not be the work and do not have it?
> Vegetable juice.The thing on the desk of the company, I have it on the most important: Q10? Why is that?
> Vegetable juice. In order to keep the body like a teenager.Q11: anime for the first time you saw it? When there?
> It is from the time we arrived remember. “It Dorimogu Da!”Q12: (I want to draw) situations favorite anime?
> LOL You’re such a scene.I (OK even before birth) because now say, I wanted to participate in anime: Q13
> Great, assembled insert, Super Milk Chan, Li Azumanga dream Dream HunterQ14: I was afraid of the most happening until now?
> Neighbor’s fire.Q15: In the event was the happiest ever?
> I can put to work right now.What do you do to the earth explode tomorrow: Q16?
> As usual.What is the flow of his own maxim: Q17?
> And serious sex appeal is issued Choi.Word to me years ago 10: Q18!
> This is the cheers for good work.Word to me years later 10: Q19!
> This is the cheers for good work.What last word: Q20! !
> Thank you Gainax future.
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