[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]
Live Text Access: Training for real-time intralingual subtitlers
Unit 2. Linguistic competence
Element 1. Functionality: Accuracy, readability and legibility.
Non-verbal elements. Created by UAB
The learning outcomes for this unit
are to identify when non-verbal elements need to be described.
and to produce legible and readable transcriptions
while creating the transcripts for the live situation.
In this video lecture we will deal with the following points:
Non-verbal elements
Speakers identification
Paralinguistic features, Music
and at the end of the lecture a summary will be provided.
Non-verbal elements
Importance of information.
According to Neves: "offering information
such as speakers identification, sound effects, music
or paralinguistic information, it means giving more rather than less."
Language needs to be manipulated to accomodate technical constrains,
such as space or font size and shape
according to the textual features of the working context.
Speaker identification, paralinguistic features and music
are relevant elements that should be provided to our audience
and adapted to each working context
as different settings will require different needs.
Speakers identification
The real-time intralingual subtitler is responsible for identifying speakers.
There are two main methods to identify a speaker.
Colours and labels.
It will mainly depend on the working context
and also the country in which the subtitling is provided
in terms of colours white, yellow, cyan and green are common colours used
for speaker identification in many countries
and mainly for the TV working context.
In other working contexts such as conferences and parliaments
it is more common the use of labels
in which the name of the speaker it is inserted usually in brackets
and capital letters.
In some cases the use of dashes or hypens
might be used to indicate the speakers' change
Paralinguistic features.
Paralinguistic features include accent, pronunciation, intonation
vocal non-verbal information and pauses and hesitations.
These features may also be included if they are significant for the viewer.
Accents and pronunciation
Some paralinguistic features are accents and pronunciation
that in some cases might cause an added problem
to the real-time intralingual subtitler
due to a very close accent, the use of a localism
or the use of non standard words such as "gotcha" or "kinda"
but this information might be relevant to convey the message of the speaker
and must be indicated
according to Zárate
it is worth bearing in mind that reading the words
with an indication of their pronunciation is not something we normally do
so it might require some extra reading time
Intonation
In terms of intonation it is important to convey the meaning to the audience
as in some cases loud speech, sarcasm or lyrics
might be important to understand the intended message of the source text
these features should be subtitled
when the professional considers them important
and they are conveyed exclusively through the voice
without any visual reference
Non-verbal sounds
Vocal non-verbal sounds are those produced by a human voice
and are non-verbal such as coughing, crying or laughing
the use of the simple present tense to subtitle sounds
follows conventional grammar principles
Non-vocal sounds linked to action can be an applause
which should also be indicated in the subtitle.
Pauses and hesitation
In real-time intralingual subtitling is often the case that the speaker
does not follow a proper path
and pauses and hesitations often interrupt the flow of speech
specially in spontaneous speeches.
In the case of hesitations, the use of three dots
between and within words might be used
also for sentences that remain unfinished.
This is specially the case for verbatim subtitles
also in the case of stutters
which may have a corresponding orthographic transcription
in the form of an interjection like hum.
In the case of sensatim or edited subtitles
the use of three dots and stutters might be omitted
but if a sentence remains unfinished
it is recommended to include three dots at the end
otherwise the audience may think that they are losing some information
Music
Real-time intralingual subtitlers need to make music
accessible to the audience.
The importance of music is generally underestimated
perhaps there is a misconception
that Deaf and HoH audiences do not enjoy music
but they might perceive music in a different manner.
The inclusion of the name of the instrument
or the style in the descriptive label
is often adviced if the artist is unknown.
In the case of a famous song
it might be better to indicate the style, the name of the song
and/or the name of the group.
Summary
As a summary we would like to stress the following points
First, offering non-verbal information to the viewers
means more rather than less.
Second, language needs to be manipulated
to transfer the non-verbal elements of the source text.
Third, speakers identification, paralinguistic features and music
are essential for some users.
Exercises
The exercises for this video lecture are in the Trainer's Guide
and in the PowerPoint file.
[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]