Interviews & Articles
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Multilingual Radio in Australia: How a "Rare Beast" Celebrates Diversity
"Once a gamer, always a gamer" - Training Video Game Translators
Making Music TV Accessible to the Hard-of-Hearing Audience
Multilingual Subtitling – The Machine Translation Revolution
Making Music TV Accessible to the Hard-of-Hearing Audience
Providing deaf and hard-of-hearing audiences with access to music television is still a relatively new area and one that has garnered further interest and attention from both broadcasters and regulators. Currently in the UK, MTV, 4Music and Box TV provide subtitling and / or sign language interpreted content on their UK channels under obligations set by the local broadcast regulator Ofcom. The regulator sets annual targets which dictate the percentage of the total output which must carry subtitles for the hard-of-hearing and deaf viewers.
Mark Harrison, MTV Networks UK, is heavily involved in these processes. His background is translation and project management of DVD and other non-linear content subtitling. When he joined MTV, he soon realised that this was an audience that was not yet well catered for and so quickly turned his attention to the provision of subtitles for music content. In an interview with Languages & The Media, Mark Harrison explains how deaf and hard of hearing people are being given access to music programmes.
L&M: When you talk about accessibility at MTV, what kind of content do you mean?
Mark Harrison: The access services at MTV are found specifically on the two types of media that we transmit: music videos and longform programming. Some of our UK channels broadcast a combination of both shows and music video blocks (e.g. Viva and MTV Base), some are 100% music blocks (e.g. MTV Dance, Vh1) and some are mainly shows (e.g. MTV Shows). At present, we subtitle a wide range of content for a wide range of channels. Audio description is also provided for longform shows on MTV.
L&M: Is it all about music or are there are other formats that are subtitled or sign-interpreted?
Mark Harrison: Our main focus is music; after all, contrary to popular belief, we are a music channel. But when deciding what to provide access for, we have to consider several criteria. We need to ensure that we have a wide range of content with subtitles, that our subtitled content is spread evenly across the schedules and that we aim to provide subtitles on the highest rating shows and most popular music videos as soon as they become available.
L&M: For a person with no hearing impairment, it is difficult to imagine how music TV can be made accessible to hard-of-hearing audiences. How does this work in practice?
Mark Harrison: I am always asked, “Why would anyone with a hearing impairment want to watch music on TV?” The fact is that the vast majority of subtitle users have lost their hearing gradually over time or later in life, leaving them missing music a great deal. The whole point of subtitling for the hard of hearing on television is, of course, to create a textual representation of the audio track and subtitling for music television is no different. Technically, subtitling music videos is extremely straightforward. Accurate song lyrics are formatted and timed to shot, colours added to denote different speakers (we allocate colours to all band members to ensure consistency between videos by the same artists) and we fill the gaps between song lyrics with labels indicating other audio elements such as echoing, dialogue, sound effects, etc. While it’s true that this process rarely renders the actual feel of the music very well, a recent survey I conducted showed that the technical elements of subtitling on our channels are well received and appreciated. Access services provision is about promoting inclusion and allowing people with hearing impairments to be entertained in the same way as their friends or family who may not be hearing impaired.
L&M: What are the differences between subtitling for Music TV and subtitling for films?
Mark Harrison: When subtitling for films, traditional subtitling strategies are always employed, editing text down for reading speed being one of the main ones. When subtitling music content, any editing can render the lyrics meaningless and can also contravene strict copyright rules governing music publishing rights. All music content is subtitled verbatim. Most genres of music actually come out with an overall reading speed lower than that of the average adult (180 wpm), but genres such as urban music (covering rap, grime, garage, etc.) frequently hit reading speeds well over 300 wpm. Interestingly, however, most of the survey respondents who said they watched subtitled music on MTV Base (an urban music channel) also said that they considered the speed of subtitles to be just right. This could be partly to do with the way music videos are edited. They generally have very short shots and shot changes which match the lyrics of the song – which actually makes the subtitler’s job easier too!
L&M: What does the hard-of-hearing audience expect from music television in terms of accessibility?
Mark Harrison: Overall, the main thing that we are always asked for is more subtitled content. Our Ofcom quotas are set relatively low compared to a lot of other specialist channels, but the viewers always want more. And rightly so. Music has such a wide reach and covers so many tastes that it will always be hard for us to please everyone. Our aim is always to subtitle music to create an even spread of popular music across our channels as soon as possible.
Mr Harrison, thank you very much for your time.
All UK broadcasters with an audience share of 0.05% or more are required to provide some level of access services. Most satellite and cable broadcasters are on a 10-year plan to reach 80% subtitling – the portion of which is determined by a levels-based system. For example, in 2011, Viva UK is required to provide 33% of its total subtitling quota as it is at Level Three, meaning the total subtitling provision required is 23.33% (the total for Level One would be 70% for the seventh year of provision). More information on this can be found on the Ofcom website: http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/binaries/broadcast/other-codes/ctas.pdf
At present, MTV does not provide any sign-interpreted content. In 2009, many UK broadcasters signed up to a new service where contributions are made to a central pool and a board of trustees decide on and commission sign-presented content to be aired on the digital channel The Community Channel. This group is called the British Sign Language Broadcasting Trust: http://www.bslbt.co.uk/
Mark Harrison will give an insight into the topic on Friday, October 8th from 14:30 to 16:00.
