THE TRANSLATION OF HUMOR AND IDIOMATIC EXPRESSIONS IN ENGLISH–UZBEK AUDIOVISUAL MEDIA: LINGUISTIC AND PRAGMATIC CHALLENGES

Abstract

Humor and idiomatic expressions are important components of audiovisual communication because they convey not only literal information but also emotional attitudes, interpersonal relationships, and stylistic effects. Translating these elements from English into Uzbek presents particular challenges due to differences in linguistic structure, idiomatic conventions, pragmatic norms, and the mechanisms through which humor is created. This article examines the linguistic and pragmatic difficulties involved in translating humor and idiomatic expressions in audiovisual media, with particular attention to subtitling and dubbing. Drawing on established approaches to humor studies, phraseology, and audiovisual translation, the article develops a conceptual framework for analyzing the relationship between idiomatic meaning and comic effect. It identifies several major challenges, including lexical ambiguity, wordplay, figurative meaning, pragmatic incongruity, and the constraints of audiovisual presentation. Illustrative examples demonstrate how literal translation, functional equivalence, paraphrase, substitution, and creative adaptation may affect the interpretation of humorous dialogue. The article proposes a qualitative analytical framework for evaluating semantic accuracy, idiomatic equivalence, preservation of humorous effect, pragmatic appropriateness, and audiovisual suitability. Rather than reporting unverified empirical findings, it establishes a methodological basis for future corpus-based research into English–Uzbek audiovisual translation.