La sottotitolazione come tecnica di traduzione audiovisiva: traduzione e commento delle prime due puntate della serie televisiva "Please Like Me"

The aim of this dissertation is to provide an Italian subtitled version of the first two episodes of the Australian TV series Please Like Me, produced by Todd Abbot and broadcasted by the channel ABC2 in 2013. The series is written and directed by the Australian comedian and TV writer Josh Thomas, who also plays the leading role as himself on a journey about self-discovery and search for identity as a young homosexual teenager. The thesis is divided into three main chapters: the first one consists of a general introduction on the topic of audiovisual translation (AVT) and its main techniques, with reference to the technological revolution and globalization which has boosted the importance of the new media, thus making the world a much smaller place and allowing people from different places to interact more frequently. Chapter one focuses also on the audio-visual text as a complex medium and on the challenges for translators and the possible strategies to overcome linguistic problems, whereas chapter two focuses on the technique of subtitling, presenting more in details its main technical features and formal constrains. Finally, chapter three introduces the TV series and its characteristics from both a technical and linguistic point of view, with reference to the main translation difficulties regarding mainly the rendering of the so-called Extralinguistic Cultural References (ECRs), the translation of Verbally Expressed Humour (VEH) and of potentially disturbing elements such as swearwords and phrases containing sexual and blasphemous allusions. The final choices made to provide Italian subtitles for the episodes analyzed are explained in tables and attached in the final part of the dissertation.