No place like home – but how to speak about it? Rules for providing the audio description of architectural objects

Abstract

Audio description is a translation technique designed to make visual content available to visually impaired people. It combines certain aspects of lingual and intersemiotic transfer, which places it among new means of translation, such as audiovisual or multimedia translation. The description of the appearance of a multidimensional object, such as a building, requires using methods of presenting visual content belonging to various categories of description, accompanied by measures allowing visually impaired people to “see” a vast multitude of forms of expression that architecture employs. The purpose of this paper is to introduce consecutive stages of creating audio description of an architectural object.

Literature research on the subject demonstrates that audio description of architecture remains the least discussed variant of this technique in Polish expert publications. Due to the insufficient literature database, the author attempts to conduct an autonomous study of this topic. The analysis includes a comparison of selected examples of audio description as well as comments on descriptive strategies and their connection with established audio description standards.

Due to the wide scope of the subject, the research is concentrated on the audio description of the architecture of exterior structures. Firstly, the definition and position of architecture as a variety are considered. Secondly, what follows is a brief description of architectural details, which visually impaired persons are unable to comprehend without audio description. The main part of the analysis is focused on the description of each phase of script creation / recording. In compliance with the aforementioned assumptions, this paper should be considered as a guideline for the correct use of this particular audio description variety.