Researcher

Gert Vercauteren

Research Expertise:My research is situated in the field of media accessibility and focuses more in particular on audio description (AD) of film and television. In my research I look at the question of how narratological principles can be used to decide what narrative constituents from the original film or television programme should be prioritized in the AD. I approach this question both from the point of view of the audio describer (how do you decide what (s)he should describe?) as from the point of view of the target audience (what narrative elements does the audience need to be able to understand the film or programme?). Initially I looked at the visual components of the film or television programme, but recently my research moved towards the aural/oral component in AD, taking its cue from two questions: - what role does sound play in AD? In this part of my research I look at the narrative importance of sound in the original film or television programme and I study what happens with/to these sounds in the AD: what types of sounds are described and how? What effect does this have on the narrative told by the original? What happens to those sounds that are not described? - what effect does an AD (as a purely aural story composed of the dialogues, sound effects and music from the original combined with the AD that is added post-factum) have on the cognitive load imposed on the target audience and how can this load be optimized by adapting specific features in the AD?

Keywords:MEDIA ACCESSIBILITY, TRANSLATION STUDIES, AUDIOVISUAL TRANSLATION, Language and literature (incl. information, documentation, library and archive sciences)

Research techniques:qualitative research by means of textual analysis; reception research by means of questionnaires; reception research by means of eye-tracking; reception research by means of secondary task response times;