What it's like to be a porn subtitler - according to the Leeds woman translating German pornographic material

Eden Gibbons, 24, had been working in the translation industry for over five years after falling in love with languages in high school. Yet even with all those years of experience across the world, she was intrigued when she received a job offer for Berlin-based porn company Ersties.

"I was sure I wouldn’t hear back [about the job] when I applied,” Eden told the YEP. “Usually with subtitling jobs, the advert is an afterthought and by the time you apply you’re already too late. But they got back to me on Friday, and were like ‘can you start on Monday?’ – so I just said yes and that was pretty much it.”

Under the job title of ‘porn subtitler’, Eden works each day to translate videos from German into English, taking care to accurately transcribe each clip. The videos she subtitles are then uploaded onto the website, which is run entirely by women and operates behind a paywall.

"It’s great because [the videos] are made from a female lens,” Eden explained. “All of the directors are women and so are most of the performers. I feel like a lot of ‘for women’ porn is synonymous with soft porn and it’s like, women do watch porn and a lot of different kinds of porn. It’s also a great way to honour the performers by paying [for porn], a lot of big companies don’t [use a paywall].”

Not only does Ersties focus on porn that caters to women, the company also works to remove stigma associated with sex, showing important parts of intimacy such as practicing safe sex and showing consent. “What I like [about Ersties] as well is that in the videos you see them putting on a condom, or you see them saying like ‘No, I don't want to do that actually’,” Eden added.

"It just feels a lot more like real life sex, you know, rather than Hollywood-esque.”

Through her work, Eden has also been able to pinpoint some of the biggest cultural differences between English and German people. She told the YEP: “I think Germans are, in a really good way, more direct than British people. I think it’s nice that the communication style is so different, it’s quite refreshing.

"It’s also funny to see what English words they use [during filming],” she added. “You know, sometimes a performer will forget the German word for blindfold or something and then just say it in English instead – it’s funny to see what words they use!”

So how do people react to Eden when they learn about her job?

"It’s quite a good ice breaker,” she laughed. “It's quite a good way of judging people too I think. Based on their reaction I can tell what kind of person they are, or what kind of dynamic there is going to be between us, because generally speaking everybody says ‘oh, that's cool!’ or they are a bit confused. A lot of people actually say to me ‘Oh, that is so you!’ which I think is funny, I like it.”