Audio description of audiovisual programmes for the visually impaired in Hong Kong

Audio description (AD) is a means of translating visual and sound elements in audiovisual programmes, as well as in the performing and visual arts, into verbal elements, thus making these materials accessible to viewers with visual impairments. It has been a major area of interest within the field of audiovisual translation studies in recent years and a considerable amount of literature has been published on end users’ reception in Western countries. When it comes to the Chinese speaking world, little literature is available on AD reception studies and no previous works have investigated the media uses and gratifications of the blind and the partially sighted in Hong Kong. The main purpose of this research is to examine the media use behaviour and motivations as well as the reception and preferences of the visually impaired audiences when consuming AD. After examining the main characteristics of AD and its history in Hong Kong, the study focuses on a media accessibility survey under the uses and gratifications framework, and an AD reception study. The views of 44 blind and partially sighted participants are elicited through individual face-to-face interviews. During the reception study, a pre-questionnaire, a questionnaire proper, experimental clips with different versions of AD, and a post-questionnaire were used to identify their AD preferences. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected. The results reveal that the participants are not satisfied with the current provision of AD services, they demand higher volumes of materials with AD, and have certain AD preferences that if taken properly into account by the industry could help improve their comprehension of audiovisual programmes. The findings offer important insights into the situation of AD in Hong Kong and recommendations are put forward for future developments to serve the community, especially in terms of training audio describers

Photography, production, design and editing

The formal features that have made Spanish cinema what it is and the technical processes behind them (camerawork, production design, editing) have passed through the same stages of trial and error, hurdles, crises, and conflicts as has been the case with other national cinemas. The notion of the exceptionalism of Spanish cinema is not supported by evidence, unless by “anomaly” we just mean “cultural specificity.” Cultural specificities there have been, as there are today: the highly idiosyncratic set designs of popular adaptations (of zarzuelas, of literary texts) in the 1920s; the enforced experimentation of the Civil War; the claustrophobic atmosphere of the postwar years; the prolongation of the studio age perhaps longer than in any other country; and the modest impact of lightweight cameras and direct sound in the modernizing phase that began in the late 1950s. But are these cultural specificities any greater than those represented by 1920s German expressionism and Soviet montage, 1930s French poetic realism, the New York underground, or the cyclical recurrence of genres in Japan? A good case can be made for giving Spanish cinema back its normality; that is, its unsurprising singularity

Television Viewing, Satisfaction and Happiness: Facts and Fiction

Despite the increasing consumption of new media, watching television remains the most important leisure activity worldwide. Research on audience reactions has demostrated that there are major contradictions between television consumption and the satisfaction obtained from this activity. Similar findings have also emerged in the relationship between TV consumption and overall well-being. This paper argues that television viewing can provide a major example where consumption choices do not maximize satisfaction. We review the evidence on the welfare effects of TV consumption choices, focusing on two complementary dimensions: consumption satisfaction and overall well-being Within each of these two dimensions, we consider both absolute and relative over-consumption, referring to quantity and content of television viewing, respectively. We find that research in different social sciences provides evidence of overconsumption in television viewing. The relevance of these findings for consumption of new media is discussed in the conclusions.satisfaction, rationality, media consumption, television

Sonali Fernando\u27s Mary Seacole: The Real Angel of the Crimea as Successful Cinematic Adaptation of Post-Colonial Voices

This honors thesis will explore the thematic relationship between Jamaican-British pioneer Mary Seacole’s autobiography, The Wonderful Adventures of Mary Seacole in Many Lands (1857) and the BBC docudrama Mary Seacole: The Real Angel of Crimea (2005) directed by Sonali Fernando. In this paper, critical conversations around race, gender, class, and citizenship in both literature and cinema will contextually add to the dynamic between literature and film adaptations, while contextually contributing to the lack thereof for intersectional experiences in narrative media. Moreover, the paper will consult both literary and film theorists such as Homi Bhabha and bell hooks to understand postcolonial voices framed through the perspective of a black woman, in both text and screen. By looking at this adaptation through a literary and cinematic lens, this paper intends to uncover the film’s veracity in honoring the legacy and tenacity of the woman who has been called England’s best black Briton

Towards a structure of feeling: Abjection and allegories of disease in science fiction', 'mutation' films

This article considers differences between the representation of mutation in science fiction films from the 1950s and the present, and identifies distinctive changes over this time period, both in relation to the narrative causes of genetic disruption and in the aesthetics of its visual display. Discerning an increasingly abject quality to science fiction mutations from the 1970s onwards—as a progressive tendency to view the physically opened body, one that has a seemingly fluid interior–exterior reversal, or one that is almost beyond recognition as humanoid—the article connects a propensity for disgust to the corresponding socio-cultural and political zeitgeist. Specifically, it suggests that such imagery is tied to a more expansive ‘structure of feeling’, proposed by Raymond Williams and emergent since the 1970s, but gathering momentum in later decades, that reflects an ‘opening up’ of society in all its visual, socio-cultural and political configurations. Expressly, it parallels a change from a repressive, patriarchal society that constructed medicine as infallible and male doctors as omnipotent to one that is generally more liberated, transparent and equitable. Engaging theoretically with the concept of a ‘structure of feeling’, and critically with scientific, cinematic and cultural discourses, two post-1970s’ ‘mutation’ films, The Fly (1986) and District 9 (2009), are considered in relation to their pre-1970s’ predecessors, and their aesthetics related to the perceptions and articulations of the medical profession at their respective historic moments, locating such instances within a broader medico-political canvas

Style in Swiss Newsreels 1940-45

There exists an unique word in the German language, particularly as it is spoken and written in Switzerland: «Heimatstil», «Heimat style». The word «Heimat» is not translatable. It means something akin to «fatherland» or «motherland» but implies much more and is full of emotional overtones, if not outright sentimentalism. It implies mountains, the rustic life, the back-to-earth syndrome. «Heimatstil» indicates a style stemming from the basic and morally solid pleasures in life: carved furniture made from native fir -trees, highly decorated traditional costumes, the classical chalet and yodelling. «Heimat» and anything that goes with it is particular! y called upon - and popular- during moments of crisis. It helps to mentally strengthen the readiness for national resistance, Switzerland likes to promote the reflection on «Heimat» which, according to Paul Nizon, «expresses itself with preference in any form of 'Heimatstil '»1 • It is worthwhile noting that Germany and Austria know of the «Heimatstil» as well but not so France or Italy. «There exists an unique word in the German language, particularly as it is spoken and written in Switzerland: «Heimatstil», «Heimat style». The word «Heimat» is not translatable. It means something akin to «fatherland» or «motherland» but implies much more and is full of emotional overtones, if not outright sentimentalism. It implies mountains, the rustic life, the back-to-earth syndrome. «Heimatstil» indicates a style stemming from the basic and morally solid pleasures in life: carved furniture made from native fir -trees, highly decorated traditional costumes, the classical chalet and yodelling. «Heimat» and anything that goes with it is particular! y called upon - and popular- during moments of crisis. It helps to mentally strengthen the readiness for national resistance, Switzerland likes to promote the reflection on «Heimat» which, according to Paul Nizon, «expresses itself with preference in any form of 'Heimatstil '»1 • It is worthwhile noting that Germany and Austria know of the «Heimatstil» as well but not so France or Italy