DIGITAL STORYTELLING: Is Stevie Wonder invited?

The Center for Digital Storytelling says that "A digital story has come to be defined as a short personal video, comprised of the author's voice telling a story, usually still images (as opposed to motion video), and, at times, music and titles."

So...what if a person does not see the video and images, what if a person does not hear the audio? How can we ensure participation by everyone?

This is not a trivial question as our population ages and greater numbers acquire disability and as millions have access only to older technology and/or low bandwidth - tech conditions that mimic disability.

Multi-media is a great way to share experience and I am defintely not advocating a return to plain text. But I would love to see digital storytelling projects tackle this question. There is great, free captioning software, audio description, and other ways to accomodate multimodal access to the wonderful stories being told.

Stevie Wonder and WGBH produced a very lively music video complete with audio description, captions and other inclusive accommodations. It's called "So What the Fuss," and you can learn more online about the
techniques to show the narrative arc to blind listeners.

Any thoughts about this issue from the digital storytelling community?

Sharron,

Again, we are not opposed to people taking the form and altering it for their purposes. As a DS facilitator, I hardly ever make digital stories. I write, blogs, yes, and journals and take pictures and so on.

And I've run workshops for people with developmental disabilities. Your question is not trivial at all.

Digital stories can be microsoft word docs, or postings on blogs like this, or audio stories or photo montages, or text on screen. Or anything you want them to be.

We have, at times, subtitled digital stories, or made them audio only, or made other adaptations of them, text-only accompanied with static pictures, to accommodate all type of audiences.

Just wanted to let you know that the issues you bring up are valid and are being addressed!

-Daniel

Daniel,

Thanks so much for your thoughtful reply. I have found, in the past several years of working in technology access for people with disabilities, that most barriers that keep people out can be minimized with some planning and conscious choices about inclusion.

I am so happy to know that the digital story telling community is thinking about access issues. After all, it is your medium so you are most likely to be the ones who know best how to use the tools in ways that address and solve these problems.

Hmmm.... I'm thinking a cool collaborative effort could be developed between y'all and the Media Access Group at WGBH.

What do you think?

that's a good lead, I'll let one of our colleagues in Boston know!

thanks,

daniel

We've had experience of making a story with someone who had no sight at all. He concentrated on the soundscape, but took some photos himself, and his sighted assistant decribed the pictures to him so he could choose where they went in the script. He had a laptop with accessible features so he could do the script himself. His story is called Swimming, on BristolStories.org
We also have the scripts on the site available as text, so deaf people can access the narrative while they watch the film. We decided against using subtitles, as that would make it less accessible for the majority of viewers.
Any other ideas for accessibility improvements?