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Re: Best Practice for interaction between Closed Captioning and Audio

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From: Zdenek, Sean
Date: Sep 5, 2008 1:00PM

Becky,

Re: #1. I'd go with the standard practice of leaving the audio rolling even when captions are activated. Hearing/Deaf is not a binary opposition in which people who are hearing can't benefit from captions and people who are d/Deaf can't benefit from audio. Instead, there are a range of subject positions with varying preferences and needs: hearing, audiologically deaf (with varying degrees from profound to severe hearing loss), hard-of-hearing (with varying degrees from mild to moderate hearing loss), Culturally Deaf (i.e. but also able to pass for hearing).

Just as we double up when color is involved (Ensure that all information conveyed with color is also available without color -- WCAG 1.0, Guideline 2.1 & Section 508, section 1194.22c), we should do the same for captions (i.e. captions are available together with audio, rather than each on its own).

Re: #2. Whatever you do, it should not be a surprise to the user (like a pop-up window that a screen reader user doesn't know about).

Sean
---------------------------
Sean Zdenek, PhD
Assistant Professor
Technical Communication & Rhetoric
Department of English
Texas Tech University
806.742.2500 x284
Office: 472 English Building
<EMAIL REMOVED>

http://cms.english.ttu.edu/zdenek
http://seanzdenek.com