Subtitling in the classroom: Il secondo tragico Fantozzi (1976)

Abstract

Several studies in the recent past have proven that subtitling is undoubtedly beneficial in foreign language acquisition.1 This project aims to prove the same for a New Zealand context, a country where the scope of audio-visual translation is rather limited and among students who have had little to no exposure to subtitling audiovisual material. The current project is based upon two separate studies, one undertaken by Jennifer Lertola and Cristina Mariotti, the other by Jennifer Lertola and Laura Incalcaterra-McGloughlin.2 The project involved 23 second-year students of Italian at Victoria University of Wellington who, as part of their course work during their second semester of study, where tasked with subtitling the Italian comedy classic Il secondo tragico Fantozzi into English.