Title
Audio description of culture-specific items. The case study of the Lithuanian series "Laisves kaina. Disidentai"
Conference name
Intermedia. 5th International Conference on Audiovisual Translation
City
Country
Poland
Modalities
Date
20/09/2019
Abstract
This report presents the development of the audio description (hereafter AD) methodology and the distribution of audio described audiovisual products in Lithuania. Till the end of 2017 there was only one audio-described television product in Lithuania – the Lithuanian classic film “Grazuole” (“The Beauty”), its version with AD was accessible through the website of Lithuanian National Radio and Television. In addition there were some other audio-described Lithuanian products: short films and animated films, sports events, fashion shows, dance performances, music videos, visual works of art, audio guides for the blind etc. However their AD was either live or accessible exclusively through the Lithuanian Library for the Blind. However until the end of 2018 the AD of theatre performances was considered as more developed in comparison to other types of AD in Lithuania. An intense discussion about TV content adaptation for the Lithuanian visually impaired audience led to some results: at the end of 2018 the National Television began broadcasting the TV series “Laisves kaina. Disidentai” (“Price of Freedom. Dissidents”) with AD, and at the beginning of 2019 the Lithuanian Parliament Seimas issued a law that imposed a mandatory quantity of TV production adapted for blind and deaf people.
In this report special attention will be paid to the AD of the above mentioned TV series “Laisves kaina. Disidentai”. It is the first television project in Lithuania with additional AD audio track, which can be turned on in the settings of the TV or the digital receiver.
The series “Laisves kaina. Disidentai” has been broadcasted on the National Television for twelve weeks. It consists of twelve episodes with an average duration of about 56 minutes per episode. The series depicts a difficult period in Lithuania between 1956 and 1986 when the partisan movement was suppressed by the Soviet regime and the resistance to occupation gained other forms – a dissident struggle emerged. Since the series is based on historical facts of the occupation of Lithuania and the Soviet era, as a core problem emerges the fact that a range of subjects and objects do not exist nowadays. This report focuses on the AD of culturespecific items (CSI) which are hard to perceive not (only) because of vision loss but also because the new generation of TV viewers hardly understands the political, legal and administrative system of the former Soviet era, hardly knows the everyday life of that period. In this sense AD is helpful to better understand the historical situation and the idea of the series itself. Hence, it is possible to state that AD serves as a compensatory tool which provides a better access to cultural content and other kinds of information both – to the visually impaired audiences and / or to sighted people that have insufficient historical knowledge, thus AD expands the potential audience and can undoubtedly facilitate dissemination of such national products as well as possibly help to accelerate the development of the AD methodology in general.
In this report special attention will be paid to the AD of the above mentioned TV series “Laisves kaina. Disidentai”. It is the first television project in Lithuania with additional AD audio track, which can be turned on in the settings of the TV or the digital receiver.
The series “Laisves kaina. Disidentai” has been broadcasted on the National Television for twelve weeks. It consists of twelve episodes with an average duration of about 56 minutes per episode. The series depicts a difficult period in Lithuania between 1956 and 1986 when the partisan movement was suppressed by the Soviet regime and the resistance to occupation gained other forms – a dissident struggle emerged. Since the series is based on historical facts of the occupation of Lithuania and the Soviet era, as a core problem emerges the fact that a range of subjects and objects do not exist nowadays. This report focuses on the AD of culturespecific items (CSI) which are hard to perceive not (only) because of vision loss but also because the new generation of TV viewers hardly understands the political, legal and administrative system of the former Soviet era, hardly knows the everyday life of that period. In this sense AD is helpful to better understand the historical situation and the idea of the series itself. Hence, it is possible to state that AD serves as a compensatory tool which provides a better access to cultural content and other kinds of information both – to the visually impaired audiences and / or to sighted people that have insufficient historical knowledge, thus AD expands the potential audience and can undoubtedly facilitate dissemination of such national products as well as possibly help to accelerate the development of the AD methodology in general.