The Dynamics of Japanese Literature Translation in Indonesia ：Focused on Publishers, Translators, and Readers

PASARIBU, Rouli Esther

doi:2020.11.1.73

The Journal of Japanese Language Literature Studies > Volume 11(1); 2020 > Article

Special Issue

Border Crossings: The Journal of Japanese-Language Literature Studies 2020;11(1): 73-99.
doi: https://doi.org/10.22628/bcjjl.2020.11.1.73

The Dynamics of Japanese Literature Translation in Indonesia ：Focused on Publishers, Translators, and Readers

Rouli Esther PASARIBU

Japanese Studies Program/Department of Literature Faculty of Humanities Universitas Indonesia

The Dynamics of Japanese Literature Translation in Indonesia ―― Focused on Publishers, Translators, and Readers

ロウリ·エステル·パサリブ

(インドネシア)インドネシア大学人文科学部日本学科講師。近現代日本女性文学、ジェンダー学。

Correspondence Rouli Esther PASARIBU ,Email: rouliesther@ui.ac.id

Published online: 30 December 2020.

This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

ABSTRACT

This study aims to understand the dynamics of the Indonesian translation of Japanese literature from the 1970s to 2020, focusing on the publishers, translators, and readers involved. It entailed studying selected Japanese fiction, examining the social media activities of book publishers and social media platforms of readers who reviewed these translations, and interviewing the translators and editors who prepared the translations for publication. The research results show that from the 1970s to the present, there have been significant changes in the process of translating Japanese literature to Indonesian. From the 1970s to the 1980s, the Japanese works translated into Indonesian were mostly texts which were also widely translated in the West. During this period, these works were translated from their English translations into Indonesian, and the translators were Indonesian literary scholars or ‘sastrawan’. During the 1990s, the translation of literary works was conducted for the purpose of fostering Japanese literary studies at the university level. Moreover, in 1990s forms of Japanese popular culture such as animations and manga comics started to become widespread in Indonesia through private television channels and manga publishers. This trend became the embryo of the Indonesian translation of Japanese literature during the 2000s, which produced texts that are particularly popular among the younger generation. This is illustrated by the establishment between 2012 and 2020 of publishers who specialize in Asian literature, and also those who specialize in Japanese literature in Indonesia. In addition, after the 2010s the relationship between publishers, translators, and readers became closer and more accessible with the help of social media. The dynamics of the situation which led to the Indonesian translation of Japanese literature are inseparable from the social and cultural relationships between Indonesia and Japan, especially the reproduction and consumption of Japanese popular culture in Indonesia.

Keywords: Translation, Japanese Literature, Indonesia, Popular Culture

キ―ワ―ド: 翻訳, 日本文学, インドネシア, 大衆文化