Strategies in Subtitling Javanese Speech in “Sultan Agung: Tahta, Perjuangan, Cinta” into English

Abstract

This research discusses the subtitling strategy in translating Javanese speech levels into English subtitles in the film "Sultan Agung: Tahta, Perjuangan, Cinta." The Javanese speech level reflects the social hierarchy of speakers and their speech partners, while subtitling has space and time limitations that make it challenging to maintain this complexity. This study aims to analyze the relationship between the subtitling strategy proposed by Henrik Gottlieb and the nine sublevels of Javanese speech levels, as outlined by Soepomo. The research data comprise 171 Javanese utterances from movie transcripts and their corresponding English subtitles. This study employs a qualitative descriptive approach to analyze the classification of speech levels and identify subtitling strategies. The findings show that the most dominant speech level is Ngoko Lugu (61.99%), while the most used subtitling strategy is paraphrasing (35.45%). The findings also show different patterns of strategy use according to the sublevel of speech: Ngoko Lugu tends to be transferred through condensation, decimation, or resignation; Antyo-boso and Boso-antyo through paraphrase; Madyo-ngoko, Madyantoro, and Madyo-kromo through transfer and condensation; Wredo-kromo and Mudo-kromo through imitation and paraphrase; and Kramantoro through paraphrase and condensation. This study confirms that subtitling strategies are influenced not only by the technical limitations of subtitles, but also by the type of speech level. The higher the level of speech, the greater the tendency to use paraphrase, transfer, and imitation, while the lower level of speech is more often transferred with condensation, decimation, and resignation. This indicates that subtitling serves as a form of negotiation between the technical requirements of audiovisual media and the socio-cultural complexities of Javanese unggah-ungguh.