Making room inside the doughnut: European audiovisual subtitling in non-hegemonic languages as an opportunity for global language justice

• Published in: Language & communication Vol. 81; pp. 93 - 102
• Main Authors: Castelló-Mayo, Enrique, Ledo-Andión, Margarita, López-Gómez, Antía María
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford Elsevier Ltd 01-11-2021; Pergamon Press Inc
• Subjects: Antidotes; Audiovisual policies; Audiovisual subtitling; Audiovisual translation; Cinema; Consumption; Cultural differences; Cultural diversity; Education policy; Language diversity; Languages; Linguistics; Metaphor; Minoritised languages; Multiculturalism & pluralism; Subtitles & subtitling; Europe; Minoritised languages; Cultural diversity; Audiovisual policies; Cinema; Audiovisual subtitling
• ISSN: 0271-5309; 1873-3395
• DOI: 10.1016/j.langcom.2021.10.001

Based on Suzanne Romaine's metaphor “making room inside the doughnut”, the practice of audiovisual subtitling in non-hegemonic languages is proposed as a catalyst for cultural diversity and an antidote to the “flattening of cultural-linguistic diversity”. That is why it is urgent to reorient the prevailing audiovisual consumption habits in Europe towards ways of consumption that guarantee the original integrity of the audiovisual work, through non-short-term educational and cultural policies, aimed at understanding European linguistic diversity, not as a series of barriers to overcome, but as opportunities for cultural diversity.
•The present work supports Romaine's effort to “making room inside the doughnut for global language justice”.•Under the name “Minoritised Languages”, we refer to those languages that are marginalised, or in danger of extinction.•We can conclude that the incorporation of the OVS to audiovisual works is revealed as a facilitating resource for intercultural communication.•There is a directly proportional relationship between the practice of subtitling and the normalisation on the use of non-hegemonic languages.•Now we are developing a protocol to improve the quality of subtitling of films in the Galician language.