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ABSTRACT
This article aims to analyse the role of translation in the tabloidization of the New York Times in Spanish. Drawing on the findings of a previous study that compared the English, Chinese and Spanish versions of the online newspaper, I hypothesise that the Spanish version focuses on human-interest news items translated from English originals and, therefore, translation may be used in a tabloidization process of the source texts in order to cater for the needs of the target audiences, that is, Spanish speakers of Spanish-speaking origin living in the United States or in Latin America. To study the process, I gathered two constructed weeks, a methodology widely used in communication studies, to analyse the differences between the two versions both in terms of content and format. The analysis, shows a tendency towards the ‘diminution of seriousness’, which can be explained as the result of the attempts to attract a readership belonging to different news traditions.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. I would like to express my gratitude to Melissa Torres and Elda Cantú, of the New York Times, for kindly replying to my questions.
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Notes on contributors
Roberto A. Valdeón
Roberto A. Valdeón is full professor in English and translation at the University of Oviedo, Spain, honorary professor at South China Business College (SCBC), Guangzhou, China, and research associate at the University of the Free State, South Africa. He is a member of the Academia Europaea, editor-in-chief of Perspectives and general editor of the Benjamins Translation Library. He has recently edited a special issue of Journalism devoted to journalistic translation.