@akemua why bother translating then? People who love manga should just learn Japanese. The thing is that otou-san etc is equivalent to pops etc. There is no reason to leave it untranslated, it's not typical suffix nor some complicated idiom. It's a damn, common word. It just feels lazy, like the "just according to keikaku" crap. And this comes from a person who hates most of the localisations.
Ogami-san Can’t Keep It In - Vol. 5 Ch. 25 - Yellow Bouquet of Happiness ~ To The Yaginumas ~
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@starburst98 @Akemua @Dankdevice I wouldn't have said anything, but as long as there's an argument--
I'm often in favour of not translating some relationship-words, particularly brother-sister ones, because you lose the honorifics and, with them, important info about tone and the kind of relationship you're dealing with. Onii-san is quite different from onii-chan and it's hard to capture that in English--heck, even just saying "brother" in English tends to feel weird, to the point where it almost flows better left in Japanese.
But otou-san doesn't really have that kind of thing going. It's pretty much just standard "father", and that's not an unnatural thing to say in English. And does anyone say "otou-sama" if they're not sitting on tatami in a big old-school Japanese mansion? Maybe if he did say "sama" you could consider not translating, but not when someone's just talking normally.
You don't gain anything as far as I can tell from not translating it, but you do lose something, such as a fair number of readers not knowing what it means, and loss of fluidity because you just stuck in an untranslated word. I've been reading large amounts of manga for more than 20 years, and I was still like "What? Oh, right, that means father doesn't it--pretty sure" rather than being able to read naturally.
And I think the argument "Oh, all the real manga-readers will know so screw the n00bs" is a stupid, elitist one. If a choice won't make things better for anyone but will make things worse for some, it's not a good choice. Sorry, but this is "all according to keikaku" type stuff as people have been saying. Doubtless the people who did that thought that somehow some important nuance was lost by translating "keikaku", but they were mistaken.
I'm often in favour of not translating some relationship-words, particularly brother-sister ones, because you lose the honorifics and, with them, important info about tone and the kind of relationship you're dealing with. Onii-san is quite different from onii-chan and it's hard to capture that in English--heck, even just saying "brother" in English tends to feel weird, to the point where it almost flows better left in Japanese.
But otou-san doesn't really have that kind of thing going. It's pretty much just standard "father", and that's not an unnatural thing to say in English. And does anyone say "otou-sama" if they're not sitting on tatami in a big old-school Japanese mansion? Maybe if he did say "sama" you could consider not translating, but not when someone's just talking normally.
You don't gain anything as far as I can tell from not translating it, but you do lose something, such as a fair number of readers not knowing what it means, and loss of fluidity because you just stuck in an untranslated word. I've been reading large amounts of manga for more than 20 years, and I was still like "What? Oh, right, that means father doesn't it--pretty sure" rather than being able to read naturally.
And I think the argument "Oh, all the real manga-readers will know so screw the n00bs" is a stupid, elitist one. If a choice won't make things better for anyone but will make things worse for some, it's not a good choice. Sorry, but this is "all according to keikaku" type stuff as people have been saying. Doubtless the people who did that thought that somehow some important nuance was lost by translating "keikaku", but they were mistaken.
@starburst98 and translator's job is to not use literal translation where it doesn't make sense. Your example shows two totally different usages. Both existing in English as dad, and father respectively (unless otou-sama is used by wife which also means something different).
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Complains about Otou being left unstranslated.
Meanwhile Squiggles exists and untranslated half the damn manga...
Meanwhile Squiggles exists and untranslated half the damn manga...
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@dankdevice - Oh, edgy bitch boi detected. It seems to me, that the only people incapable of understanding what was going on... Aren't the sharpest tools in the shed, though they try to be, lmao.
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a fucking harness????? his mother is batshit CRAZY!
For what it's worth I'm in the "just use 'Dad'" camp.
I mean, I don't really care either way - people don't have to go out of their way to translate this stuff, and I'd rather be able to read it than not be able to, so it is what it is - but I generally stopped finding untranslated JP terminology charming a few years ago. Now it just comes off as a bit of an archaic holdover from the old scanlating days.
Again, not a bit deal, but my two cents since people are talking about it.
I mean, I don't really care either way - people don't have to go out of their way to translate this stuff, and I'd rather be able to read it than not be able to, so it is what it is - but I generally stopped finding untranslated JP terminology charming a few years ago. Now it just comes off as a bit of an archaic holdover from the old scanlating days.
Again, not a bit deal, but my two cents since people are talking about it.
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Damn, kids. It's not much to infer a bit of vocab, surely? When honorifics are concerned they do convey meaning in ways English cannot. Call me old fashioned, but I like my localisation to retain meaning where possible, and this is one of those cases. Plus, even the terms "dad" and "father" carry inaccurate connotation, because how those terms are used in English vary wildly across English-speaking cultures. However, that's a bit further than the scope of a simple localisation issue (but it is where you sometimes find differences in published material between the UK and US).
@Purplelibraryguy I think you're being a tad disingenuous for the sake of argument here. If you've been reading for 20 years, I find it difficult to believe you'd struggle or be unsure over "otou-san". And given the context, even if you've suffered retrograde amnesia it isn't difficult to figure it out.
And all this discussion has overshadowed another great chapter. I'm interested to see whether the mother's mental illness will be addressed more directly, but I doubt it. Even so, it's lead to an interesting dynamic, and now with the father in the picture more of the family skeletons are bound to fall out the closet.
@Purplelibraryguy I think you're being a tad disingenuous for the sake of argument here. If you've been reading for 20 years, I find it difficult to believe you'd struggle or be unsure over "otou-san". And given the context, even if you've suffered retrograde amnesia it isn't difficult to figure it out.
And all this discussion has overshadowed another great chapter. I'm interested to see whether the mother's mental illness will be addressed more directly, but I doubt it. Even so, it's lead to an interesting dynamic, and now with the father in the picture more of the family skeletons are bound to fall out the closet.
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@jokerxhisoka
Are you being sarcastic or have you never actually seen child harness/leashes before lol
Also the honorifics are fine, I prefer them to 100% localization tbh
Are you being sarcastic or have you never actually seen child harness/leashes before lol
Also the honorifics are fine, I prefer them to 100% localization tbh
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@tikibo - Seriously, what is your point? You're essentially saying that if we like manga so much, we should just learn the language, or otherwise have it translate completely over to our language in its entirety to understand it more easily. All because you believe it's lazy writing to say "Otou" instead of "dad", "father", "daddy"? What a joke.
Mein Gott, you people are genuinely bothered a translator for illegal manga used "Otou" instead of "dad". You guys are hilarious.
Mein Gott, you people are genuinely bothered a translator for illegal manga used "Otou" instead of "dad". You guys are hilarious.
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People complaining about "otou-san" but not "phased" (fazed). 
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@gronkle In fact, I was not disingenuous, thanks all the same for calling me a liar. Nor did I say I "struggled". But it broke the flow, made me stop and think uhhh, that means such-and-such, right? Breaking the flow like that is one of the things a good translation should avoid. And to be frank, it took me a moment precisely because few translators refrain from translating this word, probably for the kind of reasons I outlined: It's pointless. And so it doesn't come up much because usually, people translate it.
As to "father" having different connotations in different parts of the English-speaking world, oh, come on, give it up. All English words have different connotations in different parts of the English speaking world, and for that matter otou-san probably has different connotations in different parts of Japan, so even failing to translate does not get you an unambiguous result. We could go all deconstructionist and point out that everyone reads a text differently; you could post the whole flippin' chapter in Japanese in Roman alphabet, and every reader capable of reading the resultant mess would still interpret it slightly differently. Neither translation nor refusal to translate allow you to escape from the nature of language and communication.
It's not a huge deal. The effect is very marginal; it is just one word and you can make a good guess from context even if you don't know it. So as mistakes go, it's only a bit worse than a significant misspelling. But a mistake is basically what it is--an error in judgement rather than typography. All the arguments in favour of doing it that way boil down to either snobbery or claims that, taken seriously, confound the whole notion of translation.
As to "father" having different connotations in different parts of the English-speaking world, oh, come on, give it up. All English words have different connotations in different parts of the English speaking world, and for that matter otou-san probably has different connotations in different parts of Japan, so even failing to translate does not get you an unambiguous result. We could go all deconstructionist and point out that everyone reads a text differently; you could post the whole flippin' chapter in Japanese in Roman alphabet, and every reader capable of reading the resultant mess would still interpret it slightly differently. Neither translation nor refusal to translate allow you to escape from the nature of language and communication.
It's not a huge deal. The effect is very marginal; it is just one word and you can make a good guess from context even if you don't know it. So as mistakes go, it's only a bit worse than a significant misspelling. But a mistake is basically what it is--an error in judgement rather than typography. All the arguments in favour of doing it that way boil down to either snobbery or claims that, taken seriously, confound the whole notion of translation.
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Stop using weeb language, translate properly.
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@DeProgrammer I read the chapter again only to find the "phased" part. 🤣hahahahahaha 🤣
You are one of a hell a sharp-eyed person!
Thank you very much to the translators for sharing this wonderful manga! Please keep up the good work!
As @DeProgrammer pointed out, we believe the correct term in the context for "phased" should be "fazed" at second panel of page 16.
Thanks again @leakybucket!
You are one of a hell a sharp-eyed person!
Thank you very much to the translators for sharing this wonderful manga! Please keep up the good work!
As @DeProgrammer pointed out, we believe the correct term in the context for "phased" should be "fazed" at second panel of page 16.
Thanks again @leakybucket!
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@Purplelibraryguy I didn't accuse you of lying, I said I found your claim hard to believe. Important nuance there.
And as for nuance, retaining nuance is what I'm referring to, not your reductio ad absurdum deconstruction of language argument. I again feel you're being somewhat disingenuous or sophist by claiming not to see the difference, because you come across as intelligent otherwise.
Not all words carry such significance in meaning as the difference between, for example: "pa", "pops", "pappy", "father", "dad", "daddy", "dadda/dada" and "pater". Every one of those carries a different nuance depending on where you are in the world, what class you were brought up in, and the context in which it is used. The same can't be said of, for example: "parent". The differences in those nuances do not match up to the uses of honorifics in Japanese, and so it would lose or alter meaning if used as a substitute. Effectively it is the thinking that replaces "otou-san" with "dad" that leads to onigiri becoming "jelly donuts", and that's no argumentum ad absurdum because it really happened.
You mention snobbery, and here I agree that it could be seen as elitism or gatekeeping towards newcomers to the hobby. However, I think a simple TN would solve that.
And as for nuance, retaining nuance is what I'm referring to, not your reductio ad absurdum deconstruction of language argument. I again feel you're being somewhat disingenuous or sophist by claiming not to see the difference, because you come across as intelligent otherwise.
Not all words carry such significance in meaning as the difference between, for example: "pa", "pops", "pappy", "father", "dad", "daddy", "dadda/dada" and "pater". Every one of those carries a different nuance depending on where you are in the world, what class you were brought up in, and the context in which it is used. The same can't be said of, for example: "parent". The differences in those nuances do not match up to the uses of honorifics in Japanese, and so it would lose or alter meaning if used as a substitute. Effectively it is the thinking that replaces "otou-san" with "dad" that leads to onigiri becoming "jelly donuts", and that's no argumentum ad absurdum because it really happened.
You mention snobbery, and here I agree that it could be seen as elitism or gatekeeping towards newcomers to the hobby. However, I think a simple TN would solve that.
