Open AccessWhich Sounds are Significant? Towards a Rhetoric of Closed Captioning
Author(s) -
Sean Zdenek
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
disability studies quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2159-8371
pISSN - 1041-5718
DOI - 10.18061/dsq.v31i3.1667
Subject(s) - closed captioning , rhetoric , rhetorical question , context (archaeology) , perspective (graphical) , criticism , style (visual arts) , set (abstract data type) , hollywood , linguistics , narrative , quality (philosophy) , sociology , computer science , art , literature , history , epistemology , artificial intelligence , philosophy , archaeology , art history , image (mathematics) , programming language
This article offers a way of thinking about closed captioning that goes beyond quality (narrowly defined in current style guides in terms of visual design) to consider captioning as a rhetorical and interpretative practice that warrants further analysis and criticism from scholars in the humanities and social sciences. A rhetorical perspective recasts quality in terms of how genre, audience, context, and purpose shape the captioning act. Drawing on a range of Hollywood movies and television shows, this article addresses a set of topics that are central to an understanding of the effectiveness, significance, and reception of captions: overcaptioning, undercaptioning, subtitles vs. captions, the manipulation of time, non-speech information, series awareness, and the backchannel.