Valo, Avikka, Frägi: Translations, anglicisms, and other bilingual features in Finnish Counter-Strike terminology

Abstract

Video games have become one of the most influential cultural products in the world and are consequently enjoyed in many ways. One of these ways is by treating them as a sport, and so the phenomenon of e-sports has been born. Many different games are played competitively, but the game series Counter-Strike has always had an especially notable Finnish playerbase. This thesis aims to analyze how English terminology used in the video game series Counter-Strike has been translated and adapted into Finnish by the Finnish Counter-Strike community. The relevance of this study is in learning about how a community translates language as a group and within a longer period of time, as opposed to a single person or group translating a lexicon with the specific aim of creating a translated set of terminology. The research material consists of three online sources, which all provide a set of Finnish Counter-Strike terms. These terms are divided into different categories based on their type of adaptation into Finnish. They are then analyzed within their own groups in order to highlight any prevalent similarities or differences between them. The findings from these analyses are then discussed as a whole, leading to final conclusions about the study. What the results show is that an uncoordinated community still follows consistent rules in the ways that it treats language. Anglicisms are created from words that share phonetic traits and would be unnecessarily complex if translated. Acronyms are kept in their original forms but are read according to Finnish grammatic rules. Translated terms seem to be used when an adequate Finnish translation is available and is not longer than the English alternative. Nicknames are also discussed, but the ways they have formed are not deducible utilizing the data in this study.