Translating the Postmodern: A Qualitative Analysis of Intertextual References in the Turkish Subtitles of Mad Men

This study investigates how the U.S.-based television series Mad Men (2007–2015) employs intertextuality, including literary, commercial, historical–political and popular culture references, and how these intertextual references are translated into Turkish. The study builds upon theoretical models of intertextuality, specifically Julia Kristeva’s model that describes each text as composed of prior texts, and Leppihalme and Pedersen’s models for the translation of allusions. A qualitative analysis is conducted of a purposeful sample of six episodes selected from the first two seasons of Mad Men, accessed via Amazon Prime Video in Turkey. 35 intertextual references were identified, of which nine representative examples were selected for detailed comparative analysis. The results indicate that the translators predominantly employed retention as the main translation strategy when rendering intertextual references in Mad Men. While this strategy preserves intertextual meaning to some extent, it has notable implications for audience reception. When references are unfamiliar or obscure to audiences with a different cultural background from the writers’, the degree of intertextual resonance may be significantly reduced among Turkish audiences. The study further identifies cultural embeddedness as a secondary variable that determines the effectiveness of the official-equivalent strategy, suggesting that the availability of an established translation is insufficient if it is not widely recognized by the target audience. Finally, it introduces the notion of graduated intertextual access to account for cases in which evaluative language affords target audiences differential rather than purely dichotomous access to intertextual meaning.