HUMOR IN ENGLISH ANIMATED FILM TEXT AND ITS UKRAINIAN TRANSLATION

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of humor in English-language comedy animated film text and the analysis of its translation strategies into Ukrainian. Modern animation is a reflection of world cultural universals. Animated film text is often saturated with humor which serves not only as a means of creating comic situations but also as a tool for disclosing characters, strengthening dramaturgy and establishing an emotional connection with the viewer. The object of this investigation is humor in English-language comedy film text. The subject is the translation strategies of English-language humor into Ukrainian. The research material covers humor from the American animated television series «Gravity Falls» [1] and their translation, made by the Ukrainian TV channel PLUSPLUS [2]. The analysis of humor in the animation «Gravity Falls» shows that the main mechanism for implementing the comic effect is the use of verbal elements. At the phonetic level, this is achieved by the peculiarities of the characters’ speech, non-compliance with orthoepic norms, and the use of non-literary language variants; at the morphological level – by the wide use of word-formation devices; at the lexical level – by the use of unusual or unexpected lexical elements that create contrast or irony in the context, repetitions, tropes; at the word combination level – by incorrect word agreement, periphrase, phraseological expressions; at the sentence level – by alogisms, ironic contrasts, too complex or simple sentence structure; at the text level – by context, repetitions, citations, allusions, and a mixture of registers and speech styles.Translating humor in audiovisual content is a challenging task, as the comic effect is often lost due to linguistic and cultural differences. The lack of universal solutions forces translators to approach each case individually and apply different strategies. Omission is used when humor cannot be adequately conveyed by means of the target language or it is not critically important for rendering. Humor preservation involves literary or approximate translation. Adaptation involves a creative rethinking of humor, taking into account the cultural characteristics of the target audience. The choice of the strategy depends on the context, the importance of the humorous element and its function in the text. Despite the inevitable losses, translation can enrich the target text, or completely rethink the content of the original.