Translating Chinese Comics Titles into the Thai Language

Comics have been a popular entertainment medium throughout the years. The Chinese cartoon has developed continuously since the late 19 century to early 20 century, imported into Thailand both in book form and online from around 2000, and has been translated into the Thai language for Thai readers. The translation of a comic's title has a profound impact in terms of attracting readers to that particular comic. This research is to study the translation of Chinese comics titles into Thai language. The objective is to study strategies for translation problems and solutions to problems arising from such translations. According to the research results, it was found that the giving titles method using the source language as a conductor of transmission was the most popular. The least popular method is giving titles by dynamic transmission.


Introduction
Currently, Chinese cartoons are very popular with Thai readers. Thailand imports Chinese cartoons, both in the form of a booklet and online Chinese cartoons. Chinese cartoons began to appear in Thailand in the year 2000. The first publisher of Chinese cartoons was Burapat Publishing House. In the beginning, Chinese cartoons in Thailand were translated into book form. But at present, accessing information on the internet is simple and easy. Thus, access to current Chinese comics can be done by searching online. The most popular platforms for reading Chinese comics are wecomics (https://www.wecomics.in.th/comics), comico (https://www.comico.in.th) and mangatoon ( https://www.mangatoon.mobi), etc. When Chinese cartoons are brought into Thailand, the challenge is how to make the reader in the target language understand them? We must have a translation. In marketing, interpreting cartoon titles to be attractive will influence the reader's interest in the cartoons.
The study of translation of Thai titles into Chinese or Chinese into Thai has resulted in both the translation of the titles of movies, dramas and series by using different theories. Ekachai Saengjantanu (2020) studied the strategies of translating the titles of Thai dramas and series into Chinese, using Newmark's concept and additional references from Pinpongsab (2018). Kullayanee Kittopakarnkit (2020) studied and analyzed the translation strategies of Thai horror film titles into Chinese using Memes of Translation theory as a framework. Jindaporn Pinpongsub (2018) analyzed the method of translating the title of Thai movies into Chinese, using the Skopos theory, with further reference from the research on "Translating American Comedy Film Titles into Thai; Strategies and Analysis" by Supawan Thongwan. The results of these three studies were similar. The most common translation tactic was regiving titles and the least common was transliteration. From this translation of movie titles research, it emerged that there are many ways to translate them. In this research, the theories of translation are used as a framework for the study. The purpose of this study was to analyze the translation of cartoon titles from Chinese into Thai.

Objectives
The objective is to study strategies for translation cartoon titles from Chinese into Thai.

Scope of research
In this research, the researcher studied the method of translating cartoon titles from Chinese into Thai. The population scope used in the research was 102 cartoons that were sourced from (1)  (2) Meme translation. Translation in meme theory is the process that represents the transmission of the source language meme to the target language meme. It applies to all translation-related practices, formats, principles, concepts and theories (Andrew, 1996). In this paper, the giving titles strategy is based on the transmission of the source language to the target language which can be divided into (1) giving titles by using the source language as the conductor (2) giving titles using the target language as the conductor of transmission (3) Giving titles by dynamic transmission

Results/Findings
The results of the study on translating Chinese cartoon names into Thai can be divided into the characteristics of giving titles Chinese cartoons and translating Chinese cartoon titles into the Thai language.

Giving titles Chinese cartoons
The characteristics of giving titles Chinese cartoons are divided into fantasy, horror, romance, homosexual, comedy. The number of syllables in Chinese cartoon titles ranges from 2 syllables to 13 syllables as shown in Table 2. in the form of short phrases rather than sentences.

Giving titles Chinese cartoons in Thai
Giving titles of Chinese cartoons in Thai 102 titles, divided into categories of giving titles Chinese cartoons in the Thai language as follows:

Giving titles by using the source language as the conductor of transmission
Giving titles Chinese cartoons in Thai by using the source language as the conductor, translators must have a conceptual and the cultural background of the cartoon names in the source language (Chinese), which then becomes like a new data container to transform information by using the target language (Thai). Giving titles Chinese cartoons in Thai by using the source language as the conductor can be divided into (1) Literal translations to the Thai language; 30 titles (2) Literal translations by omitting some words; 3 titles and (3) Literal translations by changing some words; 17 titles. Total of giving titles Chinese cartoons in Thai by using the source language as the conductor is 50 titles.

(2) Literal translations by omitting some words
Literal translation by omitting some words in the title in the Thai language that are the same or similar to Chinese. Some words in Chinese were omitted but did not affect the understanding of the target language. Using this translation method in this research has 3 titles; Romance/High School Love 2 titles and Homosexual (BL/Yaoi) 1 title.

(3) Literal translations by changing some words
Literal translations by changing some words if titles in Thai are the same or similar to Chinese. Some words in Chinese have been changed in the Thai title, but do not affect the understanding of the target language. Using this translation method in this research has 17 titles; Fantasy/Sci-Fi/Alternate Dimension, 3 titles, Horror/Murder, 1 title, Romance/High School Love, 12 titles and Comedy, 1 title. Giving titles by using the target language as the conductor of transmission in this research is giving the new title in the target language. Total of giving titles Chinese cartoons in Thai by using the target language as the conductor of transmission is 39 titles; Fantasy/Sci-Fi/ Alternate Dimension, 4 titles, Horror/Murder, 2 titles, Romance/High School Love, 28 titles, Homosexual (BL/Yaoi), 4 titles and Comedy, 1 title.

Conclusion
When researching the strategies of translating Chinese cartoon titles into Thai from 102 Chinese cartoons, it was found that 3 types of translation strategies were used as follows: (1) Giving titles by using the source language as the conductor of transmission include Literal translations to the Thai language, Literal translations by omitting some words and Literal translations by changing some words, all of this totals 50 titles (2) Giving titles by using the target language as the conductor of transmission, 39 titles and (3) Giving titles by dynamic transmission, 13 titles. As a result, it can be concluded that Thai translators still prefer the method of translating to match the source language rather than giving titles a new name or dynamic giving titles.  Table 8, if divided by type of cartoon, it was found that fantasy cartoons, horror cartoons and comedy cartoons are named by using the source language as the conductor of transmission the most. Romance and homosexual cartoons use the Giving titles by using the target language as the conductor of transmission the most. To conclude, it was found that there are different methods for giving titles Chinese cartoon titles in Thai. This research data can be used by cartoon title translators and those interested in translation. However, this research studies only the translation method. If anyone is interested in learning more, they can study the translation of the cartoon title with factors for choosing to read the cartoon. Such information will be extremely useful in translation and marketing.