fanlation

English

Alternative forms

• fanslation

Etymology

Blend of fan +‎ translation.

Noun

fanlation (countable and uncountable, plural fanlations)

1. (fandom slang, uncountable) Translation by fans.
   • 2010 January 15, Robert Ewing Finnegan, “ENC: The 157th Tool Kit - Standard Edition”, in Google Groups (TRADNORTE)‎^[1], archived from the original on 6 August 2023:

     I liked his catch of the clever combination of "fan" and "Android" to describe staunch defenders of the Google operating system for smart phones. I especially liked it because I had just suggested that we use a new term for the kind of crowdsourced translation that the likes of Twitter and Facebook do when they engage hordes of enthused users to translate their products: fanlation. Though this may be not as clever as fandroids, it might still serve a very noble purpose: to separate professional translation from the eager-beaver fanlation efforts of passionate users.

   • 2013 November, Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, volume 128, number 5, →ISSN, page 1200, column 2:

     519. Thinking Fanlation / 12:00 noon–1:15 p.m., Michigan B, Sheraton Chicago / Program arranged by the Discussion Group on Translation and the Division on East Asian Languages and Literatures after 1900.

   • 2015, 廖佳慧(Chia-Hui Liao), “Fanlation in the Digital Age”, in SPECTRUM: NCUE Studies in Language, Literature, Translation, →DOI, pages 39–62:

     Fanlation is influencing the way translation studies moves towards. This paper will discuss the following two issues concerning fanlation: creative rewriting and intellectual property infringement.

   • 2023, Jieun Kiaer, Ben Cagan, “[Fan Translation] What Is Fan Translation?”, in Pragmatics in Korean and Japanese Translation (Routledge Studies in East Asian Translation), Routledge, →ISBN, page 99:

     Fan translation or “fanlation” started in the 1990s on the Internet.

2. (fandom slang, countable) A translation made by a fan or fans.
   • [2005 September 18, Sarah Glazer, “Manga for Girls”, in The New York Times Book Review, page 17, column 1:

     Some publishers have expurgated manga for the American market. But they run the risk of outraging fans, many of whom buy the books in the original Japanese and find fan translations online (known as “fanlations”) to make sure they’re getting their manga pure.]

   • 2006 June 6, sp...@deathquaker.org, “Happy B-day to the Best, Broody, Blue-eyed, Bishounen Bad Boy”, in alt.fan.utena (Usenet):

     And I've heard that once they finish the "Read or Die" manga they'll start "Read or Dream" so we'll get the Paper Sisters story too (I have some fanlations of the first volume; it's kinda cute).

   • 2006 August 8, KimbaWLion, “10 years behind.”, in alt.fan.furry (Usenet):

     There have been at least a couple of fanlations, one of which was available online until a couple of months ago, taken down at the request of the Tezuka company. Does this indicate that something commercial may be developing for English language readers? I haven't heard.

   • 2006 October 24, Damien Sullivan, “Good Anime. Bad Ending.”, in rec.arts.anime.misc (Usenet):

     I've read the novel fanlations though and if anything the anime padded out the ending a bit.

   • 2007 August 8, Kaoru Shimitsu, “The Ranma 1/2 Manga Scan Project”, in Google Groups (The Ranma 1/2 Mailing List)‎^[2], archived from the original on 6 August 2023:

     While the link name itself looks kinda bad, I assure you, there's nothing on this section of the website but good, clean Ranma manga scans and fanlations.

   • 2009, Thomas LaMarre, “[Notes] 15. Full Limited Animation”, in The Anime Machine: A Media Theory of Animation, Minneapolis, Minn., London: University of Minnesota Press, →ISBN, page 342:

     I am citing from a “fanlation” and commentary on Sadamoto, accessed July 18, 2007, at http://eva.onegeek.org/pipermail/evangelion.2006-November.

   • 2015, Beverley Curran, “Death Note: Multilingual Manga and Multidimensional Translation”, in Beverley Curran, Nana Sato-Rossberg, Kikuko Tanabe, editors, Multiple Translation Communities in Contemporary Japan (Routledge Advances in Translation Studies; 10), New York, N.Y., London: Routledge, →ISBN, page 3:

     Death Note has been retold in published translations and fanlations; […]

   • 2015 winter, Griseldis Kirsch, “Japan in the Global Context- (Some) Challenges in the 21st Century”, in Romanian Economic and Business Review, volume 10, number 4, pages 205–206:

     Self-published spin-offs of actual series, fanlations¹⁴ into English or other languages, circulate freely, are negotiated by fans, looked at, scrutinised.

     ¹⁴Fanlations is a neologism consisting of the word fan and translation. The term fanlation thus refers to translations made by fans and published on the internet.

   • 2020 September 5, Timothy Donohoo, “Crunchyroll’s New Tiered Membership Is a BIG Step Forward to Combat Piracy”, in Comic Book Resources‎^[3], archived from the original on 24 September 2022:

     The official subs and translations will also likely be of a much higher quality than what was found on KissAnime, where oftentimes "fanlations" were stolen from other groups.

Further reading

• Fan translation on Wikipedia.Wikipedia