Audiovisual Translation of Humor

When trying to offer a survey of audiovisual translation and humor, it will be useful first of all to briefly outline what we generally mean by the former and to delineate its scope. Variously referred to as audiovisual translation (henceforth AVT), screen translation, multimedia translation, or even constrained translation, this sub-discipline of Translation Studies encompasses the study of the linguistic and cultural transference of meaning in texts of a multimedia nature, which in other words imply a polysemiotic, simultaneous relationship between verbal and visual information. The types of multimedia texts that are potentially subject to this kind of interlingual adaptation include, for example, films and film trailers, television programs ranging from TV series to cooking shows and infomercials, DVD special features, websites and online content of various nature – including for example web series – videogames, stage plays, and news reports and documentaries.