Translation and cultural mediation in the media paratexts of Green Book: localizing racism and friendship for a Chinese audience

ABSTRACT

Set in the segregated America of the 1960s, Green Book explores the theme of racism and discrimination through the concert tour of a Jamaican American pianist. When the film was introduced to China, it underwent significant cultural mediation and adaptation. On Sina Weibo, one of China’s largest social media platforms, Green Book’s Chinese marketing team posted film descriptions, highlights, flyers and posters to attract a potential audience. Through an analysis of these media paratexts, this article explores how the narrative in the original film was localized by the corporate sector when translated into a Chinese context. In multiple and intricate ways, the industry-created paratexts of Green Book reveal how a media product interacts with the target culture during its localization process. These interactions are interpreted in relation to China’s current sociocultural context to uncover the dynamics and complexities of the cultural mediation of media.

KEYWORDS:

• Green Book; paratext
• media
• mediation
• racism
• friendship

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

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Mingming Yuan

Mingming Yuan is an associate professor in translation studies at Shantou University. She received her PhD in translation and interpreting from Monash University. Her research interests include translation and identity, linguistic landscape in translation, the translation of children’s literature, translation and media, and global Englishes.