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For generations, large swaths of the population, including those who are blind and partially blind, have been mostly marginalized from experiencing visual art at museums. In recent years, audio description (AD) has emerged to facilitate those individuals’ experience of museum artwork. However, such ADs are typically created solely by museum professionals, mostly without input from visitors. Thus, a team of multidisciplinary scholars and museum professionals investigated the development of AD collaboratively by museum professionals and visitors through a workshop at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC. A team comprising visitors who are blind, partially blind, and sighted along with museum professionals experienced the George Washington Carver portrait by the artist Betsy Graves Reyneau toward the development of AD. Subsequently, the museum professionals evaluated the workshop’s outcomes-four ADs from four different positionalities-virtually with English-speaking museum visitors. This research revealed that museum visitors who are blind, partially blind, and sighted can experience museum art meaningfully through a workshop on the inclusive co-creation of AD. We found that museum visitors prefer culturally diverse perspectives and contributions from lay and professional observers, a mixture we refer to as “pluripositional.” We also found that the museum visitors enjoyed simultaneous listening to AD of artwork when viewing the artwork in a web-based experience. These findings support the need for multimodal (digital and analog) museum experiences that engage blind, partially blind, and sighted museum visitors in the inclusive co-creation of ADs of artwork accompanied by open access to their pluripositional outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article serves as an introduction to the special issue on the practice of translating audiovisual content through an intermediate language or text. This increasingly common yet underexplored area presents numerous challenges and opportunities for research and training. By employing a broad definition of this practice, we aim to highlight its significance and complexity. We start by discussing the rationale behind focusing on this topic, noting the conceptual ambiguities and diverse terminology associated with it. Then, we review past, present, and anticipated developments in the field, and provide an overview of the contributions within this special issue. To conclude, we identify research questions and potential future directions, emphasising the need for continued exploration and reflection. Ultimately, with this introduction and the special issue as a whole, we aim to bring attention to this critical practice in audiovisual translation, encouraging further scholarly inquiry and practical advancements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates the use of pivot templates in audio description (AD), focusing on AD template translators' performance, strategies, and attitudes. Data was collected in a study where six participants, five audiovisual translators, and one describer, were asked to translate audio descriptions for five Spanish clips from a pivot English template into Polish. Following common subtitling practice, the templates were time-coded, and culture specific references (CSR) were not localized but explained in annotations. Three data types were collected: screen recordings, scripts translated into Polish, and post-task interviews. Quantitative analysis of the scripts revealed that the translated scripts retained most CSRs and, on average, transferred 94% of the CSRs from the pivot template and that translators rendered them via tactics known from subtitling. Thematic analysis of the interviews revealed that when deciding about a given tactic, translators took their own and the audience's frame of reference into account. They also considered how helpful the tactic might be in visualizing culture specific references. While the participants found CSRs to be the most challenging part of the task, they considered the task feasible mainly because of the identification and annotations, which they thought to be the main advantage of pivot templates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the following article I consider a catalog of audio description porn videos available on the online adult entertainment platform Pornhub. Attending to the visual and aural elements of the original source video and their simultaneous narration in the audio descriptive tracks, I argue that this transcription offers us, the viewer/auditor, an ekphrastic encounter with the pornographic moving image mediated by the acousmatic gendered voice of the audio describer. While academic scholarship on pornography informs my discussion of the source videos, theories of ekphrasis ranging from its usage in Ancient Greek rhetoric, to its formulation in twentieth-century anglophone literary theory, and finally to its application in digital visual culture, will underpin my analysis of the audio description. Through ekphrasis I ultimately distinguish the audio description of pornography as a creative genre in its own right, as well as offer an extensive and interdisciplinary approach that extends beyond the recursive or self-reflexive lens of porn studies scholarship, and newly positions hardcore film pornography within a larger body of academic inquiry in conversation with epic poetry and art history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the textual aspects of audio description as a visual literacy tool to promote accessibility for people with visual impairments (PVI) in physics teaching and assessment. This tool can ensure that PDV have the right to information contained in textbook images, written assessments, and blackboard drawings that was previously only visually available. In the discussion, aspects of the information essential for solving an ENEM physics problem are listed. The image presented in the item was audio-described by five physics teachers working at one or more levels of education. In the descriptions, too much information and too much personality were identified, and these factors were pointed out as negative in a description. The standards adopted for the evaluation of the aspects considered are those described in the MECDAISY platform and in other works. On the basis of what was identified in the transcripts, a set of textual aspects was compiled into a questionnaire with the aim of facilitating the teacher's work in evaluating items from physics and other natural sciences, in order to produce audio descriptions and/or literal descriptions in physics classes that contribute to the interpretation of images in different contexts by PVI and sighted people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers a practical and theoretical exploration of a (highly) specialised type of comics re-mediation, namely, audio described (AD) comics for the Blind and Partially Sighted (BPS). Building on relevant work in comics studies and translation studies, it is argued that translation activity, broadly seen to include interlingual as well as intersemiotic translation (Jakobson 1959), helps rewrite original works. Translation is defined as a blend, or a hybrid mental space combining characteristics of source and target contexts. As such, it entails the imbrication of personal memory, collective memory and the diffusion of a translator's memory in linguistic codes, social milieus, textual traditions and digital capabilities at play. AD exhibits the same blend logic in that it selectively contains visual source-text information in target-text audio performance. An exploratory comics AD pilot project at The Cartoon Museum (London) serves as an exemplar. The project consists of three phases: a focused interview with the creative team (describer, curator, comic artists); scripting and performance of three AD samples; and collecting feedback from BPS visitors. The project reveals how collective memory started to form in this dialogic process and, ultimately, which aspects of AD practice may be deemed to be effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is broad consensus that audio description (AD) is a modality of intersemiotic translation, but there are different views in relation to how AD can be more precisely conceptualised. While Benecke (Audiodeskription als partielle Translation. Modell und Methode, LIT, Berlin, 2014) characterises AD as 'partial translation', Braun (T 28: 302–313, 2016) hypothesises that what audio describers appear to 'omit' from their descriptions can normally be inferred by the audience, drawing on narrative cues from dialogue, mise-en-scène, kinesis, music or sound effects. The study reported in this paper tested this hypothesis using a corpus of material created during the H2020 MeMAD project. The MeMAD project aimed to improve access to audiovisual (AV) content through a combination of human and computer-based methods of description. One of the MeMAD workstreams addressed human approaches to describing visually salient cues. This included an analysis of the potential impact of omissions in AD, which is the focus of this paper. Using a corpus of approximately 500 audio described film extracts we identified the visual elements that can be considered essential for the construction of the filmic narrative and then performed a qualitative analysis of the corresponding audio descriptions to determine how these elements are verbally represented and whether any omitted elements could be inferred from other cues that are accessible to visually impaired audiences. We then identified the most likely source of these inferences and the conditions upon which retrieval could be predicated, preparing the ground for future reception studies to test our hypotheses with target audiences. In this paper, we discuss the methodology used to determine where omissions occur in the analysed audio descriptions, consider worked examples from the MeMAD500 film corpus, and outline the findings of our study namely that various strategies are relevant to inferring omitted information, including the use of proximal and distal contextual cues, and reliance on the application of common knowledge and iconic scenarios. To conclude, consideration is given to overcoming significant omissions in human-generated AD, such as using extended AD formats, and mitigating similar gaps in machine-generated descriptions, where incorporating dialogue analysis and other supplementary data into the computer model could resolve many omissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A surge in public availability of emerging GenAI-AD has brought back the promises of automated accessibility for people who cannot see or see well. This article tests those promises through a double-rendering method that asks GenAI-AD engines to describe a simple portrait of a person and then returns these generated texts into GenAI-AD engines for visualizations of what they earlier had described, revealing insights about GenAI efficacies, ethics, and biases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Audio description (AD) plays a crucial role in making audiovisual media accessible to people with a visual impairment, enhancing their experience and understanding. This study employs an event segmentation task to examine how people without sight perceive and segment narrative events in films with AD, compared to sighted viewers without AD. Two AD versions were utilized, differing in the explicitness of conveyed event boundaries. Results reveal that the participants without sight generally perceived event boundaries similarly to their sighted peers, affirming AD's effectiveness in conveying event structures. However, when key event boundaries were more implicitly expressed, event boundary recognition diminished. Collectively, these findings offer valuable insights into event segmentation processes across sensory modalities. Additionally, they underscore the significance of how AD presents event boundaries, influencing the perception and interpretation of audiovisual media for people with a visual impairment and providing applied insights into event segmentation, multimodal processing, and audiovisual accessibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Bulletin of the L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University. Philology Series is the property of L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Bulletin of the L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University. Philology Series is the property of L.N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study investigates the use of audio description (AD) and metaphors in enhancing foreign language learning. Data collection involved a convenience sample of 25 students who provided metaphorical descriptions of their AD experiences through a single-item questionnaire. The data analysis employed content analysis to categorize and interpret these metaphors. The findings underscore metaphors' cognitive and emotional benefits in making abstract concepts tangible, thereby enhancing the language learning process. The examination of the metaphors elucidates how students harness metaphorical constructs to explicate various facets of change within their English language learning trajectory. Encouragingly, affirmative responses are discernible within the metaphors, particularly pertaining to themes such as knowledge production, creativity, value, the transmission of knowledge, wisdom, and animacy. The utilization of metaphor, as delineated within this discourse, fosters an ongoing process of scholarly inquiry and comprehension. Future research should continue exploring these tools to further validate and refine their application in diverse educational settings.

In recent years, important advances have taken place to improve game accessibility for all types of players. However, audio description (AD), the access service that translates images into words, is yet to be widely implemented in mainstream games. This paper presents part of the results of the Researching Audio Description Project: Translation, Delivery and New Scenarios (RAD). One of the main objectives of the project is to investigate the potential inclusion of AD in video games in order to improve their accessibility and to contribute to a more enjoyable experience for persons with visual disabilities. First, the evolution of game accessibility is discussed, including the latest developments in the field, both from the industry and research perspectives. Secondly, the RAD Project is presented. Thirdly, the data collected from a survey addressed to blind and low vision persons in Spain is described, for which 106 valid answers were received. Survey topics include the game accessibility barriers encountered by participants, their desired solutions, and their interest in the potential application of AD. Finally, results are discussed regarding similar studies, limitations, and future research. Survey participants are interested in including AD in video games, particularly in non-interactive sections such as cutscenes. Other pressing issues for the game industry regarding accessibility are improving screen reader compatibility, enhancing sounds, and exploring the technical feasibility of game AD in real-time action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers a description and discussion of minority features in visual art audio description (AD). For this purpose, a qualitative analysis of a multilingual corpus of visual art ADs and their context of creation and implementation was carried out, drawing on Langacker's (Cognitive grammar: a basic introduction, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2008) and its further development by Croft and Cruse (Cognitive linguistics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2004). The results show that some ADs in the corpus conceptualize the artwork as a process, moving from a static to a dynamic description, utilize an internal and subjective viewpoint that places the describer and users in the space of the work, or shift the focus of attention to the subjective sensations elicited by the work. These minority features could facilitate users' multisensory experience of the work and enhance their understanding of contextual information. This could benefit blind and partially blind people, as well as other visitors to art museums and exhibitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Audio description (AD) enables access to blind/low vision audiences by translating visual content into narrated descriptions. This study examines AD translation approaches for the Oscar-winning animated short Feast.Methods: Chinese and English AD scripts from Feast were analyzed to compare priorities in content selection and patterns in translation techniques.Results: Both versions prioritized graphics and dynamic symbols when deciding what to translate. Shared translation techniques included compensation, iconic description, and substitution. Differences emerged with more reduction, adaptation, and technical descriptions in the Chinese AD, versus more generalization in the English AD.Discussion: Disparities highlight the linguistic and cultural factors integral to effective AD translation.Implications: This analysis offers practical customization guidelines for AD providers and theoretical insights into intersemiotic translation complexity. Further comparative research could support tailored AD practices and accessibility for diverse global audiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intersectional feminist translation provides visibility to the historically hidden or marginalized characters and narratives. This article interrogates the strategies we can apply to translate images into words, that is, to audio describe non-normative identities while adhering to the particularities of audiovisual productions. It poses the question of how to provide a feminist audio description that aligns with the creators' intent. The objective of this study is to analyse the strategies applied to create a gender-conscious AD of a documentary on lesbophobia where ten women share their experiences as non-normative persons. They are defined by a series of intrinsic features such as race, gender expression or age and present a myriad of differences that have irremediably influenced their experience of lesbophobia and how society reads and identifies them. The visual contents in this documentary provide essential information that complements the understanding of the problem by people with visual impairment. This action research study analyses the challenges emerged during the AD production. It aims to emphasize the mediating power of AD professionals and how they influence the understanding of blind audiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Audio description (AD) should satisfy the needs of people who are visually impaired; however, quality assessment in university training programs has rarely been based on feedback provided by AD users. Aiming to help students truly understand the needs of people who are visually impaired and their criteria for AD, this study adopted user-centered evaluation in an AD training program offered by a university in Hong Kong. Method: Three evaluators with visual impairment, representing the views of AD users, were invited to evaluate 29 students' film clips that included AD and discuss their evaluation criteria. Eleven students participated in focus-group interviews and were asked to comment on AD products and discuss their own evaluation criteria. The evaluation criteria of the two groups were compared qualitatively and quantitatively with the aid of the software NVivo. Results: The results showed discrepancies between the users' and the trainees' criteria as well as differences in their focuses when evaluating the AD products. The users' criteria were more numerous; however, certain criteria were perceived exclusively by the trainees. Discussion: Without sufficient knowledge of users' needs, AD trainees are inclined to provide redundant information (e.g., easily identifiable film sounds and speaker information) while neglecting some aspects of AD (e.g., the prudent use of pronouns and literary expressions), which are deemed important by the users. Implications for Practitioners: The results prompted AD instructors to integrate user feedback into AD training to improve students' understanding of how to produce AD that better meets its users' needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Iberoamericana de Educación (Version impresa) is the property of Organizacion de Estados Iberoamericanos (OEI) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In recent years, there has been increasing interest in the conversion of images into audio descriptions. This is a field that lies at the intersection of Computer Vision (CV) and Natural Language Processing (NLP), and it involves various tasks, including creating textual descriptions of images and converting them directly into auditory representations. Another aspect of this field is the synthesis of natural speech from text. This has significant potential to improve accessibility, user experience, and the applications of Artificial Intelligence (AI). In this article, we reviewed a wide range of image-to-audio conversion techniques. Various aspects of image captioning, speech synthesis, and direct image-to-speech conversion have been explored, from fundamental encoder–decoder architectures to more advanced methods such as transformers and adversarial learning. Although the focus of this review is on synthesizing audio descriptions from visual data, the reverse task of creating visual content from natural language descriptions is also covered. This study provides a comprehensive overview of the techniques and methodologies used in these fields and highlights the strengths and weaknesses of each approach. The study emphasizes the importance of various datasets, such as MS COCO, LibriTTS, and VizWiz Captions, which play a critical role in training models, evaluating them, promoting inclusivity, and solving real-world problems. The implications for the future suggest the potential of generating more natural and contextualized audio descriptions, whereas direct image-to-speech tasks provide opportunities for intuitive auditory representations of visual content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Canadian Journal of Disability Studies is the property of Canadian Disability Studies Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The need for audio-described audiovisual content is mainly growing due to statutory accessibility required in many countries. Regrettably, despite the popular and legal demand for audio description, broadcasters and producers perceive audio description (AD) as an expensive service with little profit potential. Audio Description Translation (ADT) is an alternative production model that can reduce the time and costs involved in AD production while maintaining quality and increasing the availability of audio-described content in multiple languages. Drawing on a widespread practice of using (pivot) templates in modern subtitling workflows, this article investigates the use of pivot templates in audio description, focusing on the advantages and disadvantages of this production model as perceived by audio description translators. Data was collected in an experiment where six participants, five subtitlers, and an audio describer were asked to translate audio descriptions for Spanish films into Polish via an English pivot template. Results based on the thematic analysis of post-task interviews identify two main advantages: (1) personal advantages for the professionals performing the task and (2) external advantages that can benefit, for example, the production workflow, product, and target audience. The personal advantages are reduced time, effort, and responsibility. The external advantages are enhanced script quality and consistency.

Empowering novice describers can reduce costs and expand access to high-quality audio descriptions (ADs). This study explored differences between novice and professional practices by analysing their ADs for a 3:42-minute scene from a Japanese fictional film. A film producer rated both the overall quality and volume quality of ADs. The perceived AD volume quality reflects the comprehensive volume experience within ADs beyond loudness. The assessment revealed that ADs created by ten novices using speech synthesis reached approximately 60% of both the overall quality and volume quality of published ADs with human voice. Kernel density estimation showed significantly lower mean loudness in published ADs than in novice ADs. Additionally, a significant negative correlation existed between perceived AD volume quality and mean film loudness during AD presentation across all AD sets. However, published ADs had longer durations compared to novice ADs. Contrasting cueing strategies were observed. Published ADs relied on film sounds, whereas novice ADs leaned on visual cues. Consequently, we developed a professional technique: carefully curating the film information to be heard and balancing AD placement to ensure the audio experience of both ADs and film sound without abrupt AD loudness increases. This sonic approach empowers novices to craft impactful ADs.

“Dancing with Dharma”: making wise choices in audiovisual translation in the first Students’ Symposium “Wise Choices in AVT”. During the First Student Symposium on Audiovisual Translation, organised by the West University of Timișoara, five universities, including the University of Turin, were asked to work on the 2022 British short film “Dancing with Dharma” (Sukanya- Devika.K. Jhala). In February 2023, the students involved were asked to produce subtitles, SDH (subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing) and audio description (for the blind and visually impaired) in their mother tongue. The team decided to use the subtitling software Ooona Tools, the AD software ADauthor, and the Netflix guidelines. The final aim of the project was to promote the teaching of audiovisual translation in Universities and to evaluate the different results in various languages: Chinese, English, Hungarian, Italian and Romanian. After 5 months, the results were discussed at a conference held in Timișoara, Romania, on June 13th, 2023. In this paper, two of the Italian students involved in the project discuss the translation challenges encountered (the problem of textual fidelity and loss of information, and the translation of humour, wordplay and cultural references) and comment on the final result.

Despite the existence of audio description (AD) in China from 2005, little is known about how AD is conducted in China due to the scarcity of studies on this subject. This article, based on semi-structured interviews with six Chinese AD providers from Shanghai, Wuxi, and Guangzhou, aims to narrow this knowledge gap and present how AD is performed in Mainland China, as seen by some of the key agents involved. The interviews were conducted between April 30 and July 13, 2020, through voice calls on WeChat. Results can be grouped under the following three topics: the current state of AD in China, how AD is conducted in China, and the feasibility of AD translation from Spanish into Chinese. This study has reached two main conclusions. First, AD in China is, now, full of opportunities and challenges, with the copyright issue as its main problem and the objectivity versus subjectivity dichotomy as one of the most debatable concerns in the scriptwriting process. Second, almost all the interviewees showed a positive attitude towards the proposal of AD translation to promote this service in China, in our particular case from Spanish into Chinese.

Audio description (AD), which renders images into words, is an important subject in the field of translation studies. Audio describer training (ADT) is provided in university translation programmes. However, research on AD pedagogy remains limited, and there are even fewer studies on AD learners. Based on the commonalities between AD and interpreting, especially in terms of quality assessment criteria, this study explored students' perceptions of ADT and interpreter training in a postgraduate programme in Hong Kong of China. An Audio Description Rating Scale (ADRS) was designed to collect students' perceptions of ADT, with a focus on quality assessment criteria. Thirty-six students participated in the study. The results show that three particular criteria of AD were identified as the most difficult to achieve: "no unjustified addition," "appropriate language styles," and "synchronisation with images." Furthermore, significant correlations were found between students' perceptions of certain AD and interpreting criteria, and between interpreting proficiency and AD learning. Individual differences were also recognised in AD learners. The findings shed light on the interactions between the learning of AD and interpreting. The study is expected to inspire trainers to develop more diverse and refined integrations of ADT into existing translation programmes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report on a comparative analysis of two approaches to live audio-describing (AD) visual art in museums: the first case is a tour with scripted AD (the guide reads written descriptions out loud), and the second case is spontaneous AD (AD is intertwined with the guide's talk). As previous studies have mostly analyzed pre-recorded AD, our aim was to describe how AD occurs in and as direct interaction between a museum guide and visitors, and how interaction affects the art experience of the (blind and partially sighted) visitors. Data were collected from two authentic settings in which groups of blind, partially sighted, and sighted people visited art museums on guided tours. The data consist of video recordings of the tours and retrospective interviews with visitors. The analysis revealed how the interactive constitution of the tour and the AD format enables or disables the visitors' participation in experiencing visual art. Most importantly, we show how AD-enriched interaction between the guide and visitors facilitates joint meaning-making about vision and art, in which visually disabled visitors actively participate with multifaceted communicative practices and resources. Our study contributes to the research on (live) AD, demonstrating the role of interaction in the process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gender gets socially constructed in many visual ways, but people who are blind or who have low-vision want to know the gender of those around them, too, as well as other salient positionality details. Like with age, race, fashion, etc., a person's appearance can provide a lot of information about them and their character. Audio description, as a form of audiovisual translation, is a way to make that appearance accessible to those who cannot see it. Yet empirical research about audio description of gender - a complicated and highly contested arena of public discourse - is underdeveloped. This study addresses that issue through a Grounded Theory approach, constructivist in nature, that both generated self-descriptions of portrait images and piloted a model way to analyze them. This process prompted 179 new selfdescriptions written during three hackathon-like events over multiple years, illuminating compositional gender-construction strategies as well as fertile paths for audio description research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of HIKMA: Revista de Traducción is the property of UCOPRESS Editorial Universidad de Cordoba and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article focuses on the possibilities of using audio description as a teaching aid in teaching Russian on university degree programmes. The author proposes a set of exercises for practical learning of Russian using the animated series Masha and the Bear. The structure of the proposed exercises includes several stages of student activities (including observation, language exercises, text editing, recording of a ready-made audio description), which makes it possible to adapt them to different levels of language proficiency of the learners. The proposed exercises do not focus only on verbal description itself, but also force the student to engage in in-depth analysis and reflection that requires reading the scene in a broader context, e.g. using the cultural background that can be seen while watching the series. Audio description is an attractive teaching aid, a tool that allows the simultaneous use of authentic material, such as the animation Masha and the Bear, and new technologies, including: applications for recording ready-made audio descriptions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last decades, Cognitive Translation Studies (CTIS) have witnessed a growing expansion of Audio Description (AD), with emphasis on experimental studies examining the psychological factors that influence the creation and reception of AD. While most studies have focused on the creation phase of AD, recent reception research has explored emotions, immersion, and presence in the context of AD. A study by Rojo et al. (2021) investigated the impact of AD on the reception of porn, comparing the psychophysiological response of sighted participants watching audiovisual content with blind and sighted participants listening to AD without images. The results indicated no significant differences in physiological and subjective responses. The present study aims at providing further evidence on the participants' emotional response by analyzing their facial expressions using the FaceReader software (Noldus Information Technology). Unlike cardiac and cortisol responses, the analysis of the participants' facial expressions reveals some intriguing differences between the groups that point to some emotional differences in the reception of porn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of e-Scripta Romanica is the property of Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Lodzkiego and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of CIRCULO de Linguistica Aplicada a la Comunicacion is the property of Universidad Complutense de Madrid and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Audio description is a technique that was first introduced in the early 1970s by the American professor Gregory Thomas Frazier. Its aim is to describe the visual elements of a cinematographic or audiovisual work for blind or visually impaired individuals, providing them with essential information to understand the piece, including decors, characters, actions, and the actors' gestures. This technique has found success in the field of cinema. This success holds promising perspectives in the field of education, particularly in classes designed for blind and visually impaired students, as well as in inclusive classrooms with diverse needs. In this context, our contribution seeks to present and discuss the results of an integration experiment of audio description conducted with approximately twenty students from the Alaouite Organization for the Promotion of the Blind in Morocco, in the Fès-Meknès region. The objective of this experiment is to enhance pedagogical presentation and develop the visual, linguistic, and artistic capacities of students in inclusive classes, especially those who are blind or visually impaired. The project will be detaily presented, including its implementation and the key benefits it offers for the advancement of learning in Moroccan inclusive classrooms.

Audio description is one of the sub-branches of audiovisual translation, which has achieved significant growth in recent years. The current study examined the description of characters’ facial expressions of emotion in Persian audio described films. Facial expressions of emotions were initially analyzed based on Ekman and Friesen’s (2003) model. Next, we designed a questionnaire based on the proposed model and asked 50 participants to answer the questions. It was found that 60.18% of the emotions were lost in translation. The most frequently described emotions were sadness, surprise, anger, happiness and fear, in that order. The results of the first and second phases were consistent since the participants mentioned that the description of emotions were insufficient.

Compared to the short history and low growth of subtitling for the deaf and hard of hearing and audio description on TV in New Zealand, accessibility services provided for audiences in museums, art galleries, theatres, and live events have been developed well by New Zealand local communities supported by the government, though no relevant legislation has been established. Arts Access Aotearoa, a New Zealand charitable trust focusing on increasing New Zealanders' access to arts, has been established for 28 years with a vast group of Arts For All Network members all over the country as well as many patrons, funders, supporters and donators from governments, organisations, or communities. Drawing from the Actor-Network Theory, an inclusive and extensive network of actors is mapped out to explore how it contributes to developing arts accessibility in New Zealand, which has been acknowledged internationally. A documentary research method is adopted to collect data stored on Arts Access Aotearoa's and other related actors' websites as well as any concerned information published online. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, researchers have noticed similarities between audio description (AD) and interpreting in training and quality assessment. Drawing on an AD training programme for interpreting students at a university in Hong Kong, this study explored the similarities and differences between AD and interpreting in terms of quality assessment and learner perception. Macrocriteria and microcriteria in AD and interpreting training were compared. It was found that AD and interpreting shared three macrocriteria: accuracy, language, and delivery. Meanwhile, a number of microcriteria and a macrocriterion were identified as exclusive either to interpreting or AD. The differences may be partly explained by the interlingual nature of interpreting, the intersemiotic nature of AD, and the relevant training arrangements. A survey was also conducted among 42 students to investigate learners’ perceptions of assessment criteria in AD and interpreting. The results show that the students identified some criteria as more difficult to achieve separately in AD and in interpreting, and they ranked some criteria as more important in AD and others as more important in interpreting. The findings of this study may help trainers better understand the needs of learners and develop more diverse and refined approaches to AD and interpreting training. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Audio description is one of the sub-branches of audiovisual translation, which has achieved significant growth in recent years. The current study examined the description of characters' facial expressions of emotion in Persian audio described films. Facial expressions of emotions were initially analyzed based on Ekman and Friesen's (2003) model. Next, we designed a questionnaire based on the proposed model and asked 50 participants to answer the questions. It was found that 60.18% of the emotions were lost in translation. The most frequently described emotions were sadness, surprise, anger, happiness and fear, in that order. The results of the first and second phases were consistent since the participants mentioned that the description of emotions were insufficient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]