Author(s): Abderrahman BOUKHAFFA
Though widely examined in film industry, Audio Visual Translation (AVT) of political discourse in the new media remains largely unexplored. This article tackles the audiovisual mode of translating Middle Eastern political narratives in North American digital media with a focus on Morocco. This paper’s case study is the AVT of the online TV channel of the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). The choice of this medium is motivated by the accusations of MEMRI for being partial and biased in its reporting about Middle Eastern narratives. The aim of this paper is to investigate the role that AVT’s technical constraints can play in any possible distortions or (re)framings. My other aim is to go beyond the purely technical manipulation to identify any possible ideological manipulations at the textual and paratextual levels. This is because AVT is not only a textual translation but also a semiotic composite as cited by Diaz-Cintas (2012). At the meta-level, I will draw upon the narrative theory framework advanced by Baker (2006) to examine the overall contextual conditions surrounding the production and dissemination of those AVTs. I will analyze a limited corpus of four subtitled videos about Morocco extracted from MEMRI’s official website.
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