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- From benshi to transmedial mediatorPublication . Martins, Cláudia; Ferreira, Cláudia Maria PintoThe transmedial turn, which works as the motto for this conference, is a concept that allows for media crossings foregrounded by technological advancements, perhaps on the verge of becoming the fifth turn to be added to the ones identified by Chaume (2018), namely the descriptive translation studies, the cognitive, the cultural and the technological turns. This understanding focuses on the idea that processes and products are in a continuous movement of media border crossings. In line with this, we aim to investigate some key transmedial practices from a historical perspective, namely from the Japanese benshi (Akihiro 2018) to the present transmedial mediators. In the era of silent movies, the masters of ceremonies would act as the intermediary elements between the new art form and the audience: they read the intertitles and often explained what was going on the screen. With the arrival of sound, this sort of mediation appeared to be at its deathbed, but, after a brief ‘flirt’ with multilingual versions (Gottlieb 1997), the European countries had to choose between subtitling and dubbing and later voice-over, as their national audiovisual translation modes, many of which are still in effect. These interrelations between ‘texts’ and audiences continued and have led to the mushrooming of numerous ‘new’ audiovisual translation modes, apart from the mainstream subtitling and revoicing practices. The fact remains that film directors, producers or simply distributors have always sought to make movies accessible to as many people as possible and if we leave the multiple screens available today, we have a myriad of venues where transmedial mediation could come into play. Bearing this in mind, we seek to reflect upon the evolution of mediation in the field of audiovisual translation, focusing more closely on subtitling, subtitling for the deaf and hard-of-hearing and audiodescription.
- Accessibility as far as the eye can see: an accessible film festivalPublication . Martins, Cláudia; Ferreira, Cláudia Maria PintoCurrently, we can no longer speak of monolingual societies but rather of a linguistic heterogeneity that cuts across every sector of society. In line with this, numerous international and national laws have been signed; however, few have come into actual effect, as it happens in Portugal. If, on the one hand, we all agree on the need for linguistic mediation for language minorities, e.g. people with sensory impairments, on the other, only scattered measures, initiatives or events can be pinpointed as far as cultural events are concerned, namely in the film industry. Accessible festivals showcase not only films made by people with disabilities, but also festivals that include such modalities as audiodescription, subtitling for the deaf and hard-of-hearing and/or sign language interpreting. Historically speaking, the first film festival to make use of audiodescription is said to be Cannes Festival in 1989 (Benecke, 2011). Others followed suit, but it has been a slow though steady progress to reach the stage where disability has become the focus of some festivals, for instance, in Brazil, San Francisco, USA, or Lyon, France. Therefore, our aim with this paper is two-fold: we seek to review the major national and international film festivals dedicated to disability and/or that provide accessibility so as to understand the array of choices they offer, and report on our accessible cinema festival, a joint organization of the Polytechnic Institute of Bragança and the Avanca Film Club.