Conclusion: Learning Implications and Directions for Future Research

Up until now, research on SLA and audiovisual translation has devoted scarce attention to the quantitative and qualitative features of subtitled input that are liable to have an impact on language acquisition. Research rather shows a main concern with the general cognitive and af fective ben-efits relative to this resource or the empirical testing of dif ferent subtitling modalities on the acquisition of dif ferent types of L2 knowledge.

In the context of reception of subtitled audiovisual input, learning can be enhanced by operating on the quantitative and qualitative input vari-ables of frequency, perceptibility, imageability and perceptual salience as they can emerge from images, dialogue, subtitles or combinations among the three. The outcomes can be several: a stimulus to increased processing (Ghia forthcoming-b); a stimulus to increased cognitive comparison (Pavesi 2002) or the enhancement of input components through the creation of perceptual salience patterns (Ghia 2011). Recently, Ghia (forthcoming-b 2011) found empirical evidence for the positive impact of perceptual sali-ence of audiovisual input (in the form of a translational contrast) on both noticing and learning processes among learners. The intrinsic complexity of such input, however, makes the definition of forms of perceptual sali-ence peculiar to audiovisual text far from straightforward, and in constant interaction with variables of frequency and perceptibility (Ghia 2011).

A stress on the qualitative dimension of subtitled input, as opposed to the single frequency factor, may be especially relevant in non-subtitling countries, where subtitling is not used as the mainstream screen translation modality and frequency of exposure may not be an option among learn-ers. Along the qualitative line, further aspects may be addressed by future research in an acquisitional perspective. These may include more specific analysis of film genre, dialogue contextualization and speech rate in their

impact on L2 learning and in their role as input easifiers,6 or empirical research on the acquisitional impact of subtitle segmentation as a possible source for easification and perceptual salience.7

The research for this article has been carried out within the international project ‘English and Italian Audiovisual Language: Translation and Lan-guage Learning’, generously funded by the Fondazione Alma Mater Ticin-ensis, University of Pavia, with Professor Maria Pavesi as the Principal Investigator.

References

Balota, D.A., Yap, M.J. and Cortese, M.J. (2006). ‘Visual Word Recognition: The Journey from Features to Meaning’. In Traxler, M.J. and Gernsbacher, M.A.

(eds), Handbook of Psycholinguistics, 285–375. San Diego: Elsevier.

Baltova, I. (1999). ‘Multisensory Language Teaching in a Multidimensional Curricu-lum: The Use of Authentic Bimodal Video in Core French’, Canadian Modern Language Review, 56(1), 32–48.

Bird, S. and Williams, J.N. (2002). ‘The Ef fect of Bimodal Input on Implicit and Explicit Memory: An Investigation of Within-Language Subtitling’, Applied Psycholinguistics, 23(4), 509–33. <http:// www.cus.cam.ac.uk/~jnw12/subtitling.

pdf> accessed 2 December 2011.

Bubel, C.M. (2008). ‘Film Audiences as Overhearers’, Journal of Pragmatics, 40, 55–71.

Bybee, J. (2008). ‘Usage-Based Grammar and Second Language Acquisition’. In Rob-inson, P. and Ellis, N.C. (eds), Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition, 216–36. New York: Routledge.

Catford, J.C. (1965). A Linguistic Theory of Translation. An Essay in Applied Linguis-tics. Oxford: OUP.

6 See Perego and Pavesi (2007) for theoretical ref lections on the topic.

7 See Perego (2008) and Perego et al. (2010) for the impact of subtitle segmentation on viewers’ eye movements.

Chaume, F. (2004). Cine y Traducción. Madrid: Catédra.

d’Ydewalle, G. (2002). ‘The Mind at the Crossroad of Multiple On-going Activities:

A Challenge to Cognitive Psychology’. In Bäckman, L. and von Hofsten, C.

(eds), Psychology at the Turn of the Millennium. Cognitive, Biological, and Health Perspectives, 153–78. Hove: Psychology Press.

d’Ydewalle, G. and Pavakanun U. (1997). ‘Could Enjoying a Movie Lead to Language Acquisition?’ In Winterhof f-Spurk, P. and van der Voort, T.H.A. (eds), New Horizons in Media Psychology, 145–55. Opladen: Westdeutcher Verlag.

d’Ydewalle, G. and Pavakanun U. (1996). ‘Le Sous-Titrage à la Télévision Facilite-t-il l’Apprentissage des Langues?’ In Gambier, Y. (ed.), Les Transferts Linguistiques dans les Médias Audiovisuels, 217–23. Villeneuve d’Ascq: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion.

d’Ydewalle, G., Van Rensbergen, J. and Pollet, J. (1987). ‘Reading a Message When the Same Message is Available Auditorily in Another Language: The Case of Subtitling’. In O’Regan, J.K. and Lévy-Schoen, A. (eds), Eye Movements: From Psychology to Cognition, 313–21. Amsterdam: North-Holland.

Danan, M. (2004). ‘Captioning and Subtitling: Undervalued Language Learning Strategies’, META, 49(1), 67–77.

de Linde, Z. and Kay, N. (1999). The Semiotics of Subtitling, Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing.

DeKeyser, R.M. (2005). ‘What Makes Learning Second-Language Grammar Dif ficult?

A Review of Issues’, Language Learning, 55(1), 1–25.

Díaz Cintas, J. and Remael, A. (2007). Audiovisual Translation: Subtitling. Manches-ter: St. Jerome Publishing.

Ellis, N.C. (2003). ‘Constructions, Chunking and Connectionism’. In Doughty, C.

and Long, M. (eds), The Handbook of Second Language Acquisition, 63–103.

Malden: Blackwell Publishing.

Ellis, N.C. (2008). ‘Usage-Based and Form-Focused Language Acquisition. The Asso-ciative Learning of Constructions, Learned Attention, and the Limited L2 End-state’. In Ellis, N.C. and Robinson, P. (eds), The Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition, 372–405. Routledge: New York.

Ellis, N.C. and Cadierno T. (2009). ‘Constructing a Second Language’, Annual Review of Cognitive Linguistics, 7, 111–39.

Ellis, R. (1999). ‘Factors in the Incidental Acquisition of Second Language Vocabulary from Oral Input’. In Ellis, R. (ed.), Learning a Second Language through Interac-tion, 35–61. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

Gass, S. (2003). ‘Input and Interaction’. In Doughty, C. and Long, M. (eds), The Hand-book of Second Language Acquisition, 224–55. Malden: Blackwell.

Ghia, E. (2007). ‘A Case Study on the Role of Interlingual Subtitles on the Acquisi-tion of L2 Syntax – Initial Results’. In Baicchi, A. (ed.), Voices on TranslaAcquisi-tion.

Linguistic, Multimedia, and Cognitive Perspectives. Special Issue of RILA, Rassegna Italiana di Linguistica Applicata, 167–77. Roma: Bulzoni.

Ghia, E. (2011). Patterns of Perceptual Salience in Audiovisual Input. An Acquisitional Study. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Pavia.

Ghia, E., ‘The Acquisition of L2 Syntax through Audiovisual Translation’. In Şerban, A., Matamala, A. and Lavaur, J. (eds), Audiovisual Translation in Close-Up: Prac-tical and TheorePrac-tical Approaches (Bern: Peter Lang, forthcoming-a).

Ghia, E., ‘The Impact of Translation Strategies on Subtitle Reading’. In Perego, E.

and d’Ydewalle, G. (eds), Broadening the Horizons in AVT. Eye-Tracking-Based Studies on the Perception and Accessibility of Subtitled Films (Amsterdam: Ben-jamins, forthcoming-b).

Goldschneider, J.M. and DeKeyser, R.M. (2001). ‘Explaining the ‘Natural Order of L2 Morpheme Acquisition’. In ‘English: A Meta-Analysis of Multiple Determi-nants’, Language Learning, 51(1), 1–50.

Gottlieb, H. (1992). ‘Subtitling – A New University Discipline’. In Dollerup, C. and Loddegaard, A. (eds), Teaching Translation And Interpreting 1: Training, Talent And Experience, 161–70. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

Karamitroglou, F. (1998). ‘A Proposed Set of Subtitling Standards in Europe’, Trans-lation Journal, 2(2), 1–15.

Kozlof f, S. (2000). Overhearing Film Dialogue. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Levelt, W.J.M. (1989). Speaking. From Intention to Articulation. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Markham, P. and Peter, L. (2002). ‘The Inf luence of English Language and Spanish Language Captions on Foreign Language Listening/Reading Comprehension’, Journal of Educational Technology Systems, 31(3), 331–41.

Øverås, L. (1998). ‘In Search of the Third Code: An Investigation of Norms in Liter-ary Translation’, META 43(4), 571–88.

Paivio, A. (1986). Mental representations: A Dual Coding Approach. New York:

Paolinelli, M. (1994). ‘Doppiaggio: La Traduzione Odiata’. In Baccolini, R. and Bollet-OUP.

tieri Bosinelli, R.M. (eds), Il Doppiaggio: Trasposizioni Linguistiche e Culturali, 151–5. Bologna: CLUEB.

Pavesi, M. (2002). ‘Sottotitoli: Dalla Semplificazione nella Traduzione all’Apprendi-mento Linguistico’. In Caimi, A. (ed.), Cinema, Paradiso delle Lingue. I Sotto-titoli nell’Apprendimento Linguistico, special issue of RILA, Rassegna Italiana di Linguistica Applicata, 34(1–2), 127–42.

Pavesi, M. (2005). La traduzione filmica. Roma: Carocci.

Pavesi, M. and Perego, E. (2008). ‘Tailor-Made Interlingual Subtitling as a Means to Enhance Second Language Acquisition’. In Diaz-Cintas, J. (ed.), The Didactics of Audiovisual Translation, 437–63. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

Pavesi, M. (2010). ‘The Potentials of Audiovisual Dialogue for Second Language Acquisition’, paper presented at the 1st International Language Conference, NUI Galway, 10–11 December 2010.

Perego, E. (2003). ‘Evidence of Explicitation in Subtitling: Towards a Categorisation’, Across Languages and Cultures, 4(1), 63–88.

Perego, E. (2005). La traduzione audiovisiva. Roma: Carocci.

Perego, E. (2008). ‘Subtitles and Line-Breaks: Towards Improved Readability’. In Chiaro, D., Heiss, C. and Bucaria, C. (eds), Between Text and Image. Updating Research in Screen Translation, 211–23. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

Perego, E., Del Missier, F., Porta, M. and Mosconi, M. (2010). ‘The Cognitive Ef fec-tiveness of Subtitle Processing’, Media Psychology, 13(3), 243–72.

Perego, E. and Pavesi, M. (2007). ‘Subtitles and Audiovisual Genres for the Language Learner’. In Baicchi, A. (ed.), Voices on Translation. Linguistic, Multimedia and Cognitive Perspectives, special issue of RILA, 39, 147–66.

Py, B. (2004). ‘L’Apprenant, le Chercheur et le Discours. Quelques Réf lexions sur la Notion de Saillance’. In Jeanneret, T. (ed.), Approche Critique des Discours:

Construction des Corpus et Construction des Observables, special issue of Tranel:

Travaux Neuchâtelois de Linguistique, 40, 117–31.

Quaglio, P. (2008). ‘Television Dialogue and Natural Conversation. Linguistic Simi-larities and Functional Dif ferences’. In Ädel, A. and Reppen, R. (eds), Corpora and Discourse. The Challenges of Dif ferent Settings, 189–210. Amsterdam: Ben-jamins, Amsterdam.

Rossi, F. (2002). La Lingua in Gioco. Roma: Bulzoni.

Taylor, C. (2004). ‘Subtitling, Filmese and MCA’. In Taylor Torsello, C., Grazia Busà, M. and Gesuato, S. (eds), Lingua Inglese e Mediazione Interlinguistica. Ricerca e Didattica con Supporto Telematico, 3–18. Padova: UNIPRESS.

Tomaszkiewicz, T. (2009). ‘Linguistic and Semiotic Approaches to Audiovisual Trans-lation’. In Freddi, M. and Pavesi, M. (eds), Analysing Audiovisual Dialogue. Lin-guistic and Translational Insights, 19–29. Bologna: CLUEB.

Van de Poel, M. and d’Ydewalle, G. (2001). ‘Incidental Foreign-Language Acquisi-tion by Children Watching Subtitled Television Programs’. In Gambier, Y. and Gottlieb, H. (eds), (Multi)Media Translation. Concepts, Practices, and Research, 259–73. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

Vanderplank, R. (1990). ‘Paying Attention to the Words: Practical and Theoretical Problems in Watching Television Programmes with Uni-Lingual (CEEFAX) Subtitles’, System, 18, 221–34.

Zabalbeascoa, P. (2008). ‘The Nature of the Audiovisual Text and its Parameters’. In Díaz Cintas, J. (ed.), The Didactics of Audiovisual Translation, 21–37. Amster-dam: Benjamins.

Filmography

You’ve Got Mail, Nora and Delia Ephron (1998).

Notting Hill, Roger Michell (1999).

Saving Grace, Nigel Cole (2000).

Ocean’s Eleven, Steven Soderbergh (2001).