This is from the movie Space Sweepers (2021) on netflix. It’s a Korean film that features a very multicultural cast who speak several different languages.
I thought this scene was super interesting. The man is speaking a Caribbean English dialect (I’m not sure which), that sort of straddles the line between dialect and sister-language. The subtitles have translated his dialogue into Standard American English (SAE).
My parents speak Trinidadian English, which is close enough to this dialect for me to do an analysis of the diction and grammar. Let me draw your attention to the line at 0:14:
SAE subtitles: “A sickness that ravaged her nerves.”
Real Dialogue Transliteration: “Da sickness diwat com fokup nerves.”
- da - the
- diwat - from SAE ‘thē what’; meaning: ‘which’ or ‘that’
- com - from SAE ‘come’; meaning: ‘has come to’ - adv. conveying that the verb is a result, or completed action
- fokup - fuck up
Note: Some of my spelling choices here reflect pronunciation differences while others (com instead of come) indicate that, even though it sounds like the SAE word it derives from, it is a different word with different usage/meaning.
So an alternate translation of the line would be “The sickness that (has) come (to) fuck up (her) nerves”
On a side note, I’m learning Mandarin Chinese right now, and in Mandarin, the verb “到” dào - to arrive, is frequently paired with other verbs for a similar purpose, to convey that the action in the paired verb has completed/come to a result. Example: “找” zhǎo - to search; “找到” zhǎodào - to find
I’ve been noticing that a lot of quirks of Mandarin Chinese grammar seem to follow similar logic to AAVE (African American Vernacular English) grammar or Caribbean English grammar, to the point that it’s sometimes easier for me to interpret sentences in AAVE first, before figuring out how to say them in SAE.
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To explain what I mean about this dialect’s similarities with my parents’ Trinidad dialect, this is how you might convey the same thought in Trinidadian English:
“Dat sickness fi don fokup she nerves”
~or~
“Dat sickness fi gwanan fokup she nerves“
Dat = that, of course. The character in the movie doesn’t use ‘fi’ in this specific sentence, but uses it in other sentences. It’s kind of an all-purpose preposition that’s used in a lot of Caribbean dialects.
In Trinidad ‘she’ means both she and her, and is both a regular and a possessive pronoun.
The word ‘don’ (done) serves a similar function to ‘com’ (come) in the actual dialogue.
Alternately, “gwan”/”gwanan” is a Trinidadian verb that can, depending on the context, mean:
- Past: (has/have) gone and
- Future: (am/is/are) gonna (going to)
- Imperative: go on and
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I picked this line in particular to analyze because I thought it was an interesting choice to translate “fokup” as “ravaged.”
The word he uses is clearly derived from the SAE expression “fuck up” but the translation choice, along with the character’s manner and tone of voice when he says it, implies that the term has lost any implication of profanity. It’s not considered a curse word, or even a slang term. It’s fully incorporated into the standard lexicon of his language.
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ETA: Just to further expand on ‘fi’ which I mentioned earlier, let me break down one other line, from 0:04:
SAE subtitles: “Why not Earth?”
Real Dialogue Transliteration: “Why tin fi sta f’us.”
- tin - from SAE ‘didn’t’
- fi - all purpose preposition; can also function as a pronoun referring back to a previously mentioned subject
- sta - from SAE ‘start’
- f’us - contraction of ‘fi us’; meaning: to/with/for/about us
So an alternate translation of the line would be “Why didn’t (they) start with us.”
