Section 4: Experience of Other Cultural Products

This section, the last of the questionnaire, compares linguistic practices regarding playing video games with practices when it comes to consuming other cultural or entertainment products, written or audiovisual.

5.5.1 Linguistic Stance towards Written Products

When reading a foreign cultural product in the written form (novel, newspaper, or comic book, among others), a small majority (52.63% - 30 participants) of the 57 remaining respondents read in the original language, provided they understood it.

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A few people gave their motivations for reading in French: two of them (3.51%) declared that for them it was less tiring and enabled them to relax more, especially if they read in the evening, when they were already tired. One person said they read the French translation because it was available, and another one said they used this language for translations of very high quality, like those Patrick Couton made of Pratchett’s works. Yet, another respondent mentioned having learnt English to a high level in order to enjoy all the subtleties of Pratchett’s novels in the original language, which basically consists of the opposite attitude. On the other hand, one person commented reading in the original language when the translation had the reputation of being of poor quality. Another respondent, a translator, mentioned reading half in English and half in French to improve both languages. Another one explained they read novels in French but other products in the original language, maybe because they deemed novels to be more complicated and more tiring. One participant specified using English for the second read when they liked the book in French. To sum up, answers provided echoed those obtained when analysing reasons for a specific linguistic stance towards playing games: bad reputation of the translation, will to enjoy the richness of the original, will to learn/improve English (vocabulary or phrases – two mentions, 3.51%), earlier availability (no translation yet) and tendency to criticise French translations.

Now, let us compare these stances with that adopted by players towards audiovisual products.

Figure 30. Language in which respondents mostly read foreign written products

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5.5.2 Linguistic Stance towards Audiovisual Products

Regarding audiovisual products, respondents mostly watched series and movies in the original language (respectively 87.71% and 84.21% of respondents, which represented 50 and 48 people). Around 70% of the total (40 respondents out of 57) watched the original version of both programs using subtitles with, in both cases, a slight preference for subtitles in French.

Still, there was a small difference worth mentioning (see Figure 30 below): slightly more respondents tended to watch a series in its original version than a movie. This may be because, as one surveyed mentioned, movies seen at the cinema are not always available in their original version, whereas series tend to be watched at home, where more options may be available.

As was the case with some previous questions, respondents justified their practise through comments that will now be analysed. First, it is worth stressing that remarks regarding series were the same as those regarding movies. For instance, one respondent (1.75%) who enjoyed watching movies and series in French mentioned that it helped them to relax and to enjoy the program more, which chimes in with some of the reasons given earlier for playing video games in French and reading translated books. One participant also said that, although a dubbed version is less faithful to the original, it makes it a lot easier to understand programs in which many words are spoken.

Figure 31. Language in which respondents mostly watch foreign series and movies

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These reasons paralleled some of the explanations given for playing a game in one’s mother tongue in section 5.3.3. On the other hand, the explanations given by tenants of the original version also mirrored those evoked when talking about video games, for instance more authenticity, the will to hear the original voices of the actors, as well as the opportunity to learn the language and its pronunciation. Two respondents (3.51%) also mentioned that French dubbings of series and movies are usually “ridiculous”, with voices that do not match the characters. One participant emphasised that dubbed dialogs are “artificial” due to lip-sync constraints. Another person said they got tired of hearing the same voices in all programs dubbed into French, an element that did not appear when considering games.

Also, in their comments, three participants (5.26%) insisted on the fact that they preferred using subtitles in case they did not hear or understand something. Two respondents mentioned that they used subtitles in the original language when the movie or series featured specific accents that they had more trouble understanding. For that matter, they quoted Scottish, Texan, and Irish. Another respondent was radically against subtitles, arguing that they deviate the spectator’s attention from what is happening on the screen. There was a wide array of linguistic attitudes and practices within our sample.

Other comments also reflected some insightful attitudes. For example, two participants (3.51%) explained that they watched audiovisual programs in the original language without subtitles when said language was English and with subtitles for other languages, in which they were less proficient. Also, two respondents said they switched the language of the subtitles (back to French) if they were watching the program with other people. This echoed a previous answer in which a player said he switched the video game to English to play with someone who did not understand French. This could indicate that linguistic practices may vary depending on the social context surrounding the consumption of the product, i.e. if it is used solo or together with other people.

The following table gives an overview of the quantitative results obtained regarding the linguistic practices of respondents when faced with various cultural or entertainment products originally created in a foreign language they know.

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56.14% (32 respondents⁴⁵) 43.86% (25 respondents) Written

product

52.63% (30) 47.37% (27)

Series 17.54% (10) 33.33% (19) 36.84% (21) 7.61% (7)

Movie 14.04% (8) 33.33% (19) 36.84% (21) 9.78% (9)

Table 16. Summary of respondents’ linguistic practices regarding various cultural/entertainment products

The table clearly shows that, for the four cultural/entertainment products identified, the 57 participants mostly favoured original versions. This clearly rejects our third hypothesis. Indeed, although we were right in positing that respondents would mostly read or watch a program in its original language, we also believed that they would do the opposite with video games (i.e. play in their mother tongue), which was not the case here.

After analysing in detail all the different aspects examined in the study, the following part will look for a relationship between them by having a closer look at correlation coefficients.