Exploring multimodal meaning-making features in social media video translation: the subtitling of culture-loaded words

Abstract

The role of video content on social media platforms is increasingly pivotal in shaping personal, professional, and educational spheres, necessitating effective translation to engage a global audience. While current translation studies in the digital context often rely on monomodal methods, this study addresses this limitation by applying a Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL)-based multimodal framework. This study systematically investigates the intricacies of multimodal meaning-making in social media video translation through culture-loaded words. Employing a multimodal transcription methodology, this study analyzes the translation techniques and their incurred intersemiotic relations in instances of culture-loaded words translation. Upon analysis of the collected data, three key features of multimodal meaning-making have been identified: (1) Multimodality complements ideational representation; (2) Multimodality supports the establishment of abstract concepts; (3) Multimodality expands narrative potentials. Finally, multimodal translation principles of culture-loaded words are proposed to guide future translation practices.