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Why can't Sam and Dean speak Sunda?
1. Hello, Merlin fans, by any chance could any of you be so kind as to Britpick/beta 2100 words of SPN fusion AU wherein Arthur and Morgana drive around the UK killing monsters and have family drama? I would be much obliged. :D
2. I'm crossposting this from Dreamwidth because I think there are maybe some folks here to whom the following might be of interest.
When I was writing Indonesian SPN fic, I found myself wanting to write Dean lapsing unthinkingly into Sunda. Sunda is the local language in west Java (WEST SIIIIIIDE), and my family on my mother's side would always lapse into it from Bahasa Indonesia when they are excited or surprised. Because of this (and systemic bias), it's a language I associate with intimacy and high emotion. Sunda!Wikipedia! I mean, I can totally see Dean going, "Dahar euy!" when Sam comes back with take-out.
I dunno how much sense it would make even if it's just a translation trying to capture the 'feel' of things. In the hypothetical world where the Winchesters speaking Sunda makes sense, though, I see Sam speaking less Sunda than Dean. Maybe when they were growing up, Sam and Dean used to speak more Sunda to each other and to their dad, but when Sam went to Stanford, Sunda was one more thing to distance himself from as he embraced the standard language and a standard life. Also, when Sam and Dean are pretending to be cops or whatever, they'd probably have their furtive exchanges in Sunda.
In the USA, this kind of multilingualism seems to be associated almost exclusively with immigrant/multicultural families, which Sam and Dean are kind of not. In Indonesia, people who also speak Sunda, Javanese, Batak, etc. have been there for centuries, but their language has been minoritized and deemed informal anyway. And so maybe this is why Sam and Dean can't speak Sunda, haha -- the sociolinguistic foundations just aren't the same, and the implications of being multilingual are different.
I wonder if this is one of the reasons why there are so many terrible Indonesian translations of things. It seems there is a higher percentage of multilingual people in Indonesia, but literary/translating conventions seem to favor monolingual stories, thus bringing up issues of how to best capture ~authenticity~. Perhaps this is changing, though. A recent Indonesian soap opera, Muslimah, had their characters speaking FOUR languages: Bahasa Indonesia, Sunda, English, and Arabic. There were subtitles. It was glorious, and utter crap, and my mother never missed a single episode.
I still want Dean yelling, "Kumaha atuh!" in frustration when butting heads with Sam, though.
3. Here are some things I read that I enjoyed and agree with: cultural appropriation, ally arrogance, 'strong female character' bullshit.
ETA: JIM BEAVER TWEETING IN INDONESIAN. MY WORLDS ARE FOREVER COLLIDING. \o/
This entry was originally posted at http://whynot.dreamwidth.org/17036.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
2. I'm crossposting this from Dreamwidth because I think there are maybe some folks here to whom the following might be of interest.
When I was writing Indonesian SPN fic, I found myself wanting to write Dean lapsing unthinkingly into Sunda. Sunda is the local language in west Java (WEST SIIIIIIDE), and my family on my mother's side would always lapse into it from Bahasa Indonesia when they are excited or surprised. Because of this (and systemic bias), it's a language I associate with intimacy and high emotion. Sunda!Wikipedia! I mean, I can totally see Dean going, "Dahar euy!" when Sam comes back with take-out.
I dunno how much sense it would make even if it's just a translation trying to capture the 'feel' of things. In the hypothetical world where the Winchesters speaking Sunda makes sense, though, I see Sam speaking less Sunda than Dean. Maybe when they were growing up, Sam and Dean used to speak more Sunda to each other and to their dad, but when Sam went to Stanford, Sunda was one more thing to distance himself from as he embraced the standard language and a standard life. Also, when Sam and Dean are pretending to be cops or whatever, they'd probably have their furtive exchanges in Sunda.
In the USA, this kind of multilingualism seems to be associated almost exclusively with immigrant/multicultural families, which Sam and Dean are kind of not. In Indonesia, people who also speak Sunda, Javanese, Batak, etc. have been there for centuries, but their language has been minoritized and deemed informal anyway. And so maybe this is why Sam and Dean can't speak Sunda, haha -- the sociolinguistic foundations just aren't the same, and the implications of being multilingual are different.
I wonder if this is one of the reasons why there are so many terrible Indonesian translations of things. It seems there is a higher percentage of multilingual people in Indonesia, but literary/translating conventions seem to favor monolingual stories, thus bringing up issues of how to best capture ~authenticity~. Perhaps this is changing, though. A recent Indonesian soap opera, Muslimah, had their characters speaking FOUR languages: Bahasa Indonesia, Sunda, English, and Arabic. There were subtitles. It was glorious, and utter crap, and my mother never missed a single episode.
I still want Dean yelling, "Kumaha atuh!" in frustration when butting heads with Sam, though.
3. Here are some things I read that I enjoyed and agree with: cultural appropriation, ally arrogance, 'strong female character' bullshit.
ETA: JIM BEAVER TWEETING IN INDONESIAN. MY WORLDS ARE FOREVER COLLIDING. \o/
This entry was originally posted at http://whynot.dreamwidth.org/17036.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
no subject
OMG LOL ROTF LMAO. *envisions JDM snarling in Bahasa Indonesia*
The dilemma you propose here wrt the Winchesters being 2nd and 3rd gen immigrants can work. Of course if we work in the context of Indonesia and the general acceptance of the supernatural in Indonesia it will be wildly AU but with great promise. Sundal bolong transplanted would give la llorona a run for her money. :D And of course working with mantera and kemenyan and sharpened yellow bamboo would make things slightly difficult, y/y?
And would he be a womanizer to the extent that Dean is? COULD he be?
Interesting point. If Dean were to adhere to the cultural norms of Indonesia (re his romanticisation) it would make things difficult. Flirtatious, yes but sexual engagement? *rubs chin*
And would he be a womanizer to the extent that Dean is? COULD he be?
OMG YES!
The Indonesian sinetron commonly use modern Bahasa Indonesia which is similar but very different to Bahasa Melayu used in Malaysia. Like the "word "kapan" used to mean "when" in Indonesia, means burial shroud in Malaysia. And the use of verbalised acronyms is something not usually done in Malaysia; some is downright comical (e.g.Pundek = Penolong Direktur; in Bahasa Melayu it means genitalia). So mos def subtitles. *grin*
no subject
I think
DeanDimas would sexually engage. I think he'd resort to prostitutes more than Dean does though. His romanticization of Indonesia is not manifested in a dedication to social mores, I think, but in a dedication to his family, and the perpetuation of the feeling of family (or at least an attempt at it). So he'll speak more Indonesian thanSamSatri, he'll tease Satri in Sundanese, he'll follow his dad to the ends of the earth, he will be quick to play the blame-the-bule game, but he is also unrelenting in his adaptation to this American life, because he has to be, because Dimas is a survivor and a fighter and to be between two worlds is, after all, nothing new.