#accessibilty

The Nurse Shark || Beth Riley When she first meets someone, she tries to speak as perfectly polished “Haole” {regular American English}. When she starts to relax with a person, she also relaxes and starts to slip into pidgin, which is way easier for her and less taxing in a way that she doesn’t have to think about. Which lets her communicate faster, if not clearer. The hardest part of most English for her are consonant digraphs {th, ch, etc}. She tends to drop certain digraphs, or substitute letters she thinks she’s heard. EX: Breath is more likely to come out as “brea’d” if she’s being “lazy” or “casual” or as “breat’” if she’s trying harder to express herself.

She might engage in conversation with weird, random non-sequiturs, likely due to mishearing/misinterpreting something spoken to her. There are also certain words or terms that she may not even realise she’s incorrectly pronouncing. {{Granberries rather than cranberries, Bads instead of bats.}}

Peter Adjaye is a contemporary conceptual sound artist, specialising in cross-disciplinary collaborations. He is a musicologist, composer, DJ-producer, musician with an academic background in mathematics and engineering. He publishes his music through a limited amount of vinyls. This physical and conventional form of music reproduction seems old-school to those of other modern formats such as digital formats uploaded on Spotify and Apple Music.

Tessa, one of our trainees, was particularly concerned about the accessibility of art as she grew up in an area without much exposure to art. When Peter was asked about if he would publish his music in a digital format, he answered with a definite “No”. It seemed that this response triggered some dissatisfaction from other trainees who cared about social causes and especially art education. 

My question is, should artists be respected for their preferred medium or be critiqued on the art medium? The pandemic and recent social issues has raised awareness of 1) accessibility, 2) opportunity of artists who are POC (people of colour), and 3) sustainability. In this blog post I will address the first issue that was raised multiple times from this year’s trainees. 

As the situation of the pandemic still changes day by day, is our concern safety or accessibility? If we simply define accessibility as something like - so more people can see the art - how would we be able to achieve it. Would it be the form of decreasing ticket prices, introducing free admissions, or producing a virtual reality gallery? 

Some mediums are meant to be for real life observation. These mediums may include anything that is three-dimensional, which requires the audience to interact with it. Most common ones are sculptures and architectures. Of course you will be able to take a photograph or scan it into a virtual reality model, but it will always lack a certain depth. Humans are sensory creatures: we see, feel, and hear;  the immersiveness of a physical experience is completely different from a two-dimensional presentation. Sometimes art cannot be made accessible and is not meant to be accessible. If we were critiquing Peter’s work for not being accessible enough, have we considered how his music worked?

During our visit at the Barbican Centre, we were able to listen to his work in the Curve Gallery that was exhibiting Toyin Ojih Odutola’s work. Peter had to compose the music according to the structure of the Curve Gallery as it did impact audio in real life. However, would it be appropriate to ask an artist to change its medium so it is more accessible when accessibility was not its priorities? Or must every artist be pressurised in doing so because he brings a greater social impact?

I’d like to bring in my background in Economics, which I think might bring in another point of view. The purpose of art nowadays is mostly related to some form of impact, but the real question is does accessibility bring more impact? I would like to bring in the concept of the Law Of Diminishing Marginal Utility. It states that all else equal as consumption (in this case, accessibility of art) increases the marginal utility derived from each additional unit declines. Marginal utility is derived as the change in utility as an additional unit is consumed. Utility is an economic term used to represent satisfaction or happiness. Marginal utility is the incremental increase in utility that results from consumption of one additional unit. For example, based on this law it means that if all forms of art were more accessible, the audience will be less satisfied per observation/exhibition as they become too available. I do believe this law works in real life to a certain degree if we consider the audience’s price elasticity (how sensitive they are to admission prices). This law is particularly relevant because one way of measuring impact is through audience satisfaction.

There were several free concerts and virtual events done during lockdown. However, how many people willingly attended? Will the same group of audience still attend these online events if there wasn’t a lockdown or a pandemic? Will the audience feel more satisfied to attend during a pandemic because they were made safe (another form of accessibility)? There are so many other elements involved when we want to measure if accessibility actually increases the amount of audience and impact. 

The artists have chosen a medium that they think is suitable for the piece. Some art is created for the public and some are not. Must we force all artists to consider accessibility before creating art, or would that be restricting creativity? Will making art accessible actually bring more impact to the society? Will people appreciate art more if it were made free and public, or will it be the opposite? If the former were true why do we still purchase limited edition items, celebrity concert tickets, and luxury brands when there are similar substitute products at a lower cost? Does it mean if something is less accessible/available, it will bring more satisfaction when it is purchased? So does this mean if an exhibition was in a major city with an acceptable admission fee, will the experience be more memorable than if it was next door to your flat with a free entry? Do you have a stronger impression of something when it was less accessible? Chances are you have never tried your local restaurant just around the corner, because it is simply too accessible. 

While masks are a vital health care tool for many people, they also present a new set of challenges for the deaf community. When people wear masks, including trending DIY masks, they muffle their voices and prevent people from reading their lips. For people who are hard of hearing, that's a problem.

I took to social media to see how Covid-19 is impacting people in the real world. Non-deaf medical professionals and deaf people alike have experienced unexpected communication issues during Covid-19. These problems range from my inconveniences when shopping to potentially life-threatening medical misunderstandings.

Lauren Sugrue was born hard of hearing. Sugrue says, "Lip reading has been more difficult because you don't want people to take off their masks or other face coverings for protection. But when you can't see their lips, it's extremely difficult to know what they're saying. I've had to find new ways to communicate even before Covid-19, but the pandemic has thrown new hurdles in our way." Sugrue effectively used a whiteboard to communicate with doctors before coronavirus began to spread; however, many people in the deaf community now cannot pass a piece of paper or a whiteboard back and forth to a person who is standing six feet away.

Deva Darnell, a non-deaf nurse in an emergency room, says "I have a hard time communicating with my patients. People who could normally read my lips now can't understand me." Darnell can't take off her mask when she works. Even if she could, her patients with vision impairments can't read her lips if she stands far away. "I feel guilty, like I can't serve some of my patients as well or as quickly as I need to."

We are three people. But our stories represent thousands, if not millions, of people around the globe who are struggling to connect with others during Covid-19. The Deaf/Hard of Hearing Technology Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center published strategies for deaf people to use when they navigate public or medical spaces, such as by downloading speech-to-text apps or preparing a written script before leaving their home.

Hi, critters! Here’s the description document for the most recent fanart gallery, Freefall. Feel free to jump in and start describing that art!

If you’d like to help us describe all the fanart galleries that Critical Role posts, you can check out the master doc here! We’re currently trying to work backwards and get the most recent galleries completed first, so that’s always a good place to start. Please reference the Image Description Guide for more info and helpful tips.

1) I love beeline reader

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