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The TVTropes Trope Finder is where you can come to ask questions like "Do we have this one?" and "What's the trope about...?" Trying to rediscover a long lost show or other medium but need a little help? Head to Media Finder and try your luck there. Want to propose a new trope? You should be over at the Trope Launch Pad.

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MetaFour MOD (Old Master)
2025-01-29 22:55:28

There is Bilingual Dialogue where two characters speak different languages in a single conversation and still manage to communicate. Beyond that, the broader concept of "Characters speak their own language and the audience hears them speak it" isn't considered tropeworthy, because it's just what you'd naively expect from an audiovisual medium. Instead, we have tropes for all the other ways to handle dialogue from foreigners:

  • Translation Convention: The dialogue is rendered in English for the audience's benefit, but the characters are canonically speaking their own language.
  • Poirot Speak: A character canonically speaks English, but peppers their speech with foreign words and phrases to remind the audience of what language they should be speaking.
  • Just a Stupid Accent: Instead of their own language, the character speaks English with a funny accent. They may canonically speak this way, or it may overlap with Translation Convention.
  • As Long as It Sounds Foreign: The character canonically speaks their own language... but the author doesn't know that language, and just writes some foreign-sounding gibberish instead.

Iyionaku Since: Sep, 2020
2025-01-30 09:17:09

Got it, thank you!

Follow-up question on that: I know that aversions are generally not listed, unless the trope is ubiquitous for a type of medium and its aversion is a rare occurrence. Would you say then that my examples would warrant a mention of Translation Convention being averted, as the latter is basically done in 99% of foreign media?

Edited by Iyionaku
MetaFour MOD (Old Master)
2025-01-30 21:31:09

Personally I don't think Translation Convention is omnipresent enough that aversions are notable. But that question might be better suited to the "Is this an example?" thread on the forums.

Iyionaku Since: Sep, 2020
2025-01-31 03:59:03

Thank you a lot for your elaborate answers! I am going to close the discussion now. I don't think this one example of a rather obscure video game is worth it creating another thread. I'll just drop the idea of mentioning it.

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