subtitles or dubbing?

The last few years have seen a boom in the popularity of foreign films and television shows, especially in English. As a result, non-English-speaking audiences are getting used to subtitles and dubbing in their own languages. That is why, it seems interesting to discuss the reason why, in my opinion, it’s better to watch foreign movies with subtitles rather than the dubbed ones.

I have seen both subtitled and dubbed films, but I can tell that I find subtitling to be better. There are many reasons why I prefer this way of watching films, but the most important is  the occasion to learn some new language. In my opinion, subtitles can help a lot in learning new words and in acquiring a good accent. Understanding foreign speech is difficult and subtitles provide some lexical information.

Moreover, for me, it’s really distracting watching movies and hearing the sound which doesn’t correspond to the lip movements of the actors. The words coming out are often not synchronized and the dubbing voice doesn't match to the actors' characters.

But on the other hand, dubbing a program means that the audience doesn't have to read the dialogue while watching the show, so the attention is focused only on the image. However, according to me,  there is one particular situation where dubbing is the better method - cartoons for young children. There's a good reason for this: children can't read fast enough to understand the subtitles. That’s why, movies designed for them have to be dubbed.

To sum up, as far as I’m concerned, subtitles are better when it comes to watching foreign movies because they help in learning new language at the same time as enjoying the movies.

And what is your opinion about it? Do you think that it’s possible to learn a new language from watching foreign movies? Or do you prefer dubbed movies? J