Disability and Digital Television Cultures: Representation, Access, and Reception 9781138800069, 9781315755663

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Disability and Digital Television Cultures

Disability and Digital Television Cultures offers an important addition to scholarly studies at the intersection of disability and media, examining disability in the context of digital television access, representation and reception. Television, as a central medium of communication, has marginalised people with disability through both representation on screen and the lack of accessibility to this medium. With accessibility options becoming available as television is switched to digital transmissions, audience research into television representations must include a corresponding consideration of access. This book provides a comprehensive and critical study of the way people with disability access and watch digital TV. ­I nternational case studies and media reports are complemented by ­fi ndings of a user-focused study into accessibility and representation captured during the Australian digital television switchover. This book will provide a reliable, independent guide to fundamental shifts in media access while also offering insight from the disability community. It will be essential reading for researchers working on disability and media, as well as television, communications and culture; upper-level undergraduate and postgraduate students in cultural studies; along with general readers with an interest in disability and digital culture. Katie Ellis, Associate Professor, is the Director of the Centre for Culture and Technology at Curtin University. Her research explores the social and cultural dimensions of disability, television, and digital and networked media, extending across both issues of representation and active possibilities for social inclusion. She has authored and edited thirteen books and numerous articles on the topic, and is series editor of Routledge Research in Disability and Media Studies. Her most recent books include The Routledge ­Companion to Disability and Media with Gerard Goggin and Beth Haller, and Manifestos for the Future of Critical Disability Studies with Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Mike Kent and Rachel Robertson.

Routledge Research in Disability and Media Studies Katie Ellis, Curtin University

Disability and Digital Television Cultures Representation, Access, and Reception Katie Ellis

For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge. com/Routledge-Research-in-Disability-and-Media-Studies/book-series/ RRDMS

Disability and Digital Television Cultures Representation, Access, and Reception

Katie Ellis

First published 2019 by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 and by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2019 Taylor & Francis The right of Katie Ellis to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data CIP data has been applied for. ISBN: 978-1-138-80006-9 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-75566-3 (ebk) Typeset in Sabon by codeMantra

For Stella and Connor

Contents

Acknowledgements

ix

1 Introduction 1 Part 1

Representation

17

2 Screening Stereotypes or Cultural Accessibility: Stigma and the Representation of Disability on Television 19 3 Broadening Definitions: A Content Analysis of Disability on Australian Television Drama 40 4 Culturally Accessible Online Video: Bringing Television’s Sharedness Online 64 5 Collective Intelligence: Disability, Game of Thrones 86 Part 2

Access

105

6 Digital Diversity 107 7 Audio Description 125 8 Captions 145 9 Interpretive Flexibility 164 10 Conclusion 183 Index

199

Acknowledgements

While this book has my name alone as the author, it could not have been completed without a huge team of supporters, mentors, colleagues, students, friends, and family members. Disability occupies a marginal status in academia, just as it does in television and culture. I remember as a PhD candidate, meeting a s­ enior academic at a conference who told me disability was just ‘trendy’ and that as a field of research it wouldn’t last – I should look for a different topic. At the time I thought, that’s outrageous, disability is not trendy, disability has never been trendy. That was over fifteen years ago, and I  am pleased that critical disability studies as a field of research has lasted and I think maybe could be becoming trendy. But trendy is the wrong word – it was then, and is now. However, there were more champions than there were detractors. Too many critical disability scholars for me to list have paved the way for me to be able to produce this work or worked alongside and I thank them for their leadership. I am especially grateful to Gerard Goggin, Beth Haller, and Rosemary Garland-Thomson who have both advised me and collaborated with me. Elizabeth Ellcessor, Meryl Alper, Toby Miller, Shawn Burns, and Mike Kent your energy and your contributions drive this discipline. You have all shaped my thinking and made a huge difference to the lives of many. This book documents five years of research into Disabled A ­ ustralian television audiences. The research was primarily funded by an Australian ­Research Council Discovery Early Career Research Award (DE130101712) with other funding received through the Australian Communications Consumer Action Network, and Curtin University Teaching Innovation Funds. It was an honour and a privilege to receive my ARC fellowship and completing it has been the most satisfying job I have ever had. I thank Mick Broderick and Ingrid Richardson who gave feedback on my grant application and the anonymous reviewers and the college of experts for taking a chance on me, and disability television studies. My thanks also go out to Amna Siddiqui, Andrew Maclean and Mandy Downing for helping me navigate the institutional requirements.

x Acknowledgements Over the course of this work, I have had the opportunity to contribute to government policy reviews about disability, media and culture, most recently via my work on the Audio Description Working Group. My sincerest thanks to Wayne Hawkins and ACCAN for nominating me and to the Department of Communication and the Arts for including me in this important work. I have been fortunate also to work in an extremely supportive institutional context – Curtin University, who supported a huge team of research assistants over the period of research. Melissa Merchant, ­Kathryn Locke, Chris Mason, Leanne McRae, Gwyneth Peaty, Natalie Latter, Theresa Miller and Madison Maglardy, without you I would have achieved nothing. I also thank Ceridwen Clocherty for her editorial assistance in the final write up of this book. At Routledge, my deepest appreciation goes to Felisa Salvago-Keyes, Erica Wetter, and in the final stages, Suzanne Richardson, and Eleanor Catchpole Simmons. While my ethics clearances prevent me from thanking you by name, this book simply would not have been possible without the willingness of the disability community to talk with me and embrace me as one of their own. I thank you for your generosity and willingness to talk to me. Finally, I thank my beautiful family, Chris, Stella and Connor for putting up with my excessive screen time, both writing at the computer and watching television “for work”. Stella and Connor, who have grown from little babies into great kids as this research has progressed. And Chris, who despite knowing exactly what he was getting into, married me anyway.

1 Introduction

On 26 November 2017, in celebration of National Deaf Week, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s (ABC) 6pm news bulletin was interpreted live into Australian sign language (Auslan). It was a first-ofits-kind initiative on television that was described in completely different ways by the different players involved. For the ABC, it was an important awareness raising initiative, while VicDeaf, the community group who helped organise it, saw the translation as facilitating access for thousands of Deaf Australians in their first language (ABC News, 2017). Reactions on social media from both Deaf and hearing audiences of the ABC news were positive. For the Deaf community, access like this has been limited. Seven years prior to this news screening, it was reported that the technological advancements in digital television showed great promise, and while it was ‘not yet capable of adequate signing for television’ (Slater, Astbrink, & Lindström, 2010, p. 13), one day it would be possible to include a closed signing service on television programming. However, this promise did not eventuate and the 2017 ABC news bulletin was the first of its kind. Indeed, while the BBC, the public broadcaster in the UK, does provide some content in sign language (BBC, 2018), for Australian audiences, aside from emergency broadcasts and this one-off celebration of National Deaf Week, the only programme on Australian television purely in Auslan is an ABC Kids show, Sally and Possum. Other examples of Auslan on ABC children’s programming occur only on an ad hoc basis, for example on Playschool and The Wiggles. Access to television is similarly poor for other Australian audiences with disability. In 2012, the ABC conducted a 12-week trial of audio description – a track of narration which describes the important visual elements of a television show, movie or performance which are included between the lines of dialogue – by offering 14 hours a week of content accessible to its blind and vision-impaired audiences. However, despite positive feedback, the trial has not continued into an ongoing service. In addition, familiar predictions of the transition to digital television offering increased opportunities for improved access for all have, at least in Australia, been somewhat empty. To date Australia remains the only

2 Introduction English-speaking nation in the OECD not to offer audio description on television. In addition, audio description is not regulated in Australia and therefore continues to be stigmatised as a costly accessibility feature for a seemingly non-existent television audience. By comparison, closed captions – a feature that describes the audio components of television in text at the bottom of the screen for audiences who are D/deaf or hard of hearing – first became available on Australian television in the 1980s and are regulated according to the Broadcasting Services Act (BSA) (1992). Historically, captions have been produced for certain programming but have not always been made available on every platform. However, since their inception, quotas governing their use have progressively increased – today all programmes aired on Australian free-to-air primary digital channels must include closed captions, and they are even increasingly being represented as a mainstream tool anybody can use. Nevertheless, despite these advances, accessibility is still an issue. For example, the further transition of digital television towards online programming has yet to see a corresponding availability of captions in that sphere. Amid all this, there is a lack of understanding amongst the wider ­population of what these barriers actually mean to Australians with disability who require these accessibility features to fully enjoy television. Indeed, these groups are often framed within Australian popular culture and cultural identity not as at a disadvantage but rather as battlers, as people who are ultimately responsible for overcoming trials and adversary through a positive personal attitude. An Aussie battler perseveres despite the inhospitable environment and odds stacked against them. Disability advocate Quentin Kenihan personified the Aussie battler in his early life. Throughout the 1980s, he appeared in both documentaries and a current affairs programming documenting his experiences with osteogenesis imperfecta and his family’s desire that he learn to walk. Quentin, who has long been considered a source of inspiration to the Australian public, appeared as Corpus Colossus in the blockbuster movie Mad Max: Fury Road. Quentin described the movie was a turning point away from the Aussie Battler identity imposed on him from his youth: I’m not known as ‘that brave little boy’ anymore … people say ‘That’s that dude from the movie’…. I’m not just seen as a person in a wheelchair but as an actor, which is what I’ve always wanted. (Mott & Dillon, 2018) Australian actress Kate Hood takes aim at the inhospitable environment stacked against disabled actors in Australia. Hood had starred in the iconic Australian series Prisoner during the 1970s; however, after

Introduction  3 acquiring a disability in 2002, she was not sent on an audition until 2016 (Clements, 2015). In the interim, she became an activist and established the diversity committee of the Australian actors union Equity. She describes her vision for an Australian media inclusive of disability: In my ideal world, there would be a level playing field within our profession. We would see people with disabilities studying at drama schools, writing for television, directing for stage and film. It would be common place for the Australian public to see actors who were genuinely disabled on our stages and screens. (Hood, 2015) While Aussie Battlers are seen in a number of programs, it is typical to also find nondisabled actors portraying disabled characters in the way Hood describes above. In contrast to this tendency, following her work on Equity, Hood was cast on the iconic Australian soap opera Neighbours. Celebrating the casting on her Facebook page, Hood wrote ‘At last, a major Australian TV series, which is seen globally, has taken the step of casting a disabled actor to play a disabled person’ (Dow, 2016). Unfortunately authenticity in casting and disability diversity is still rare in the Australian television context. The United Nation’s Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (UNCRPD) recognises the importance of television to the human rights of disabled people. According to this convention, people with disability have a human right to be able to access television (Article 30) and encourage ‘all organs of the media to portray persons with disabilities in a manner consistent with the purpose of the… Convention’ (Article 8) (United Nations, 2006). Therefore, both representation on and access to television are an important site for analysis in disability studies. However, television, as a central medium of communication, has historically marginalised disabled people through both representation on screen and the lack of accessibility to this medium (Goggin & Newell, 2003). Therefore, in order to advance a social understanding of television’s role in disability as a complex identity involving both physical difference and social stigma, it is important to consider both representation and access in the same study. While disability analysis within media studies has historically focused on representation and the way this is shaped by policy and history, more recent theorisation recognises the mutually important area of access to digital platforms. Further, while it is true that accessibility options are becoming increasingly available – and normalised – as television transitions to digital formats, audience research into television representations must include a corresponding consideration of access. Technological creation is a social process in which disability is implicated in a set of social relations of power influenced by public policy and commercial decisions (Goggin & Newell 2003).

4 Introduction As such, Disability and Digital Television Cultures is a book about both representation and access and how these relate to television and disability. Yet how do we define television or even disability today? At some point in time, we would have been able to say with some certainty what both were and what both meant, yet this is no longer the case. For example, in the post-World War II period, television was seen as ­having a social function, it brought people together into the same space to watch a programme (Spigel, 1992). Towards the end of the 20th century, however, theorists saw this social function as operating in the domain of culture rather than physical space (Lorié, 2011; ­Newcomb & Hirsch, 1994). Others argued that television was a ­privatised and ­individualised experience rather than a social and collective one (Rodan, 2009) and only gave the illusion of being social (Bugeja, 2005; Hoynes, 1994). Television is so much more than an aesthetic ­object that sits in our lounge room addressing us as though we are a homogenous mass audience – television could now also mean our phones, or computers, or light projected onto the wall or, indeed, that aesthetic object in the lounge room. Beyond technology, television also refers to content, and this content is not targeted to a mass audience anymore. Instead, audiences are targeted as niche because, once combined, they now rival the traditional mass audience. More recently, the integration of social media with traditional forms of television viewing has seen a resurgence of claims that television is a social experience (Hartley, 2010; Vance, 2010; Williams, 2009). This notion of television as a social function is discussed in detail by Toby Miller, who observes three major scholarly topics of enquiry taken to the study of television across all disciplines. First, he considers the political economy of television via an investigation of television as a technology and who owns and controls it. For example, whereas Marxist critiques focus on the control the bourgeois media has over ­socio-political agendas, neoliberal approaches espouse the agency of media proprietors while endorsing limited state regulation. Second, the content of television, its textuality, is a key area of focus which can be further divided into content analysis, or identifying patterns across many texts, and the study of hermeneutics, which connects meanings of particular texts to wider socio-cultural environments. Finally, Miller argues that television audiences or publics are subject to scholarly analysis regarding both damaging media effects and celebrations of audience agency (Miller, 2010). Miller further delineates these areas of scholarly focus into three clear stages which he describes as television studies 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0 (Miller, 2010). Television studies 1.0 was concerned with the damaging effects of television and the totalising influence of television studios. This first era of television studies focused on production and the industry. Television studies 2.0, however, is characterised by a shift in focus from the

Introduction  5 influence of the industry to the agency of the audience. These traditions led to an environment by the end of the 1980s, whereby research focused on a specific area: It was generally agreed that the cultural and political function of the media could be assessed productively at the level of representation: precisely because the media ‘mediated’ between competing interests and sources of power, the analysis of texts revealed the negotiations of meanings required. (Turner, 2016) Miller posits the final era, television studies 3.0, as a way to bring together the disparate approaches to television – ethnographic, political, economical, environmental and geographical – into a comprehensive approach to the study of television. As he explains: Taking its agenda from social movements as well as intellectual ones, Television Studies 3.0’s methods will draw on economics, politics, communications, sociology, literature, law, science, medicine, anthropology, history, environmental science, and art, with a particular focus on gender, race, class, religion, age, region, and sexuality in everyday life across national lines. And it won’t privilege pessimism, optimism, audiences, owners, states, technology, or labor – but, rather, stress their mutual imbrication. (Miller, 2010, p. 187) Disability must be added to this list of focus points in everyday life. A disability studies approach to television has tended to favour a pessimism firmly located within a television studies 1.0 and 2.0 approach, favouring analysis of production or representation over audience agency or access to this medium. Throughout this book, I argue it is time to move beyond social model stereotypes of disability on television to consider the full circuit of culture, or the intersections and influences of representation, identity, production, consumption and regulation. Indeed, just as with television, the definition of disability has changed. At one point in time, disability would have been recognised as a medical problem within a socalled damaged body, it existed firmly within the realm of medicine not human rights. Over time, this has slowly begun to change – disability can now be seen to have a cultural identity or be socially created. This so-called social model of disability argues that people are disabled and disempowered, not by their bodies but by inflexible social practices and power imbalances that see these bodies as inferior. Proceeding from the UNCRPD, disability includes ‘those who have long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society

6 Introduction on an equal basis with others’ (United Nations, 2006). While the United Nations maintain they do not define disability in their convention, this description is useful in recognising both the impacts of impairments and social disablement. In analysing these key themes of representation on and access to television for people with disability, and privileging the aforementioned human rights approach, this book proceeds from a media and cultural studies framework. Within this, Du Gay et al.’s concept of the circuit of culture offers some useful insights to disability and digital television cultures. The circuit of culture is a five-point framework – ­encompassing representation, identity, production, consumption and regulation – through which to undertake cultural analysis (Du Gay et al., 1997). This approach has been recognised as enabling ‘the recognition of power, culture and identity, as well as the fluid nature of the construction of meaning’ (Tombleson & Wolf, 2017). This circuit holds relevance to a cultural study of disability and television. Disability is constructed through ­culture (­Shakespeare, 1994) – ‘the process by which meaning is produced, circulated, consumed, commodified and endlessly reproduced and renegotiated in society’ (Curtin & Gaither, 2007, p. 35). The circuit of culture is therefore applied throughout this book to both disability itself, representations of disability on television, insights obtained through interviews with people with disability, online ­discussions about television texts and technologies, as well as assistive technologies used to access television such as captions and audio description. The circuit of culture offers an opportunity to reflect on the intersections between the aforementioned five cultural processes, which, although distinct, intersect and influence each other in several ways to give meaning to disability and television in Australia. Within this circuit are other smaller circuits, for example, those related ­ ustralia are to captions and audio description specifically. Captions in A regulated according to the Broadcasting Services Act (1992). Historically, captions have been produced for certain programming but have not always been made available on every platform. However, they are increasingly being represented as a mainstream tool anybody can use to increase their comprehension of television. Conversely, audio description is not regulated and continues to be stigmatised as a costly accessibility feature for a seemingly non-existent television audience. Issues such as these are also recurrent themes in this book. The book focuses most of its research within an Australian setting. The transition to digital television in most Western nations has been heavily influenced by the state. As I discuss throughout this book, this was certainly the case in Australia. With its continuing government support of both public and commercial television, the Australian television landscape offers fertile opportunity for an examination of the role of the state and legislation to advance critical disability analysis of television.

Introduction  7 Yet while this book focuses on disabled people in Australia and their experiences of television as the technology shifts to digital platforms, it also retains an international focus, drawing from research conducted during digital television transitions internationally. For example, international case studies and media reports are complemented by findings of a user-focused study into both accessibility and representation captured during the Australian digital television switchover in, and further transition to, online platforms. The Australian context is particularly relevant to a global audience, because Australia introduced digital television after both the USA and the UK and so were aware of the problems people with disability had already experienced during those transition periods. Australian governments were therefore able to implement practices to avoid any documented problems reported by people with disability – or choose to ignore them and make the same mistakes. Australia is also a signatory to the UNCRPD.

The United Nations Convention The UNCRPD is an international convention that sets out 50 articles regarding the fundamental human rights of people with disability such as access to education, the community, healthcare and media – ‘access to television programmes’ is specifically mentioned in Article 30. Several articles also make specific connections to the media including Articles 4, 8, 9 and 21. A human rights approach to disability proceeds from the assumption that people with disability have the same rights as everyone else but acknowledges that environmental, attitudinal and organisational barriers create obstacles to the enjoyment of human rights. The media is central to the creation of the social environment in which these rights are not realised (Dimopoulos, 2017) and, as such, documents like the UNCRPD and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), which both establish access to television as a human right, play an important role in reducing these barriers. First, Article 19 of the UDHR establishes the right to freedom of expression, mentioning media as of particular value (author’s emphasis): Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers. (Article 19 United Nations, 1948) The media in general, and television in particular, have a key role in realising Articles 22 and 27 of the UDHR (Ellis & Goggin, 2015). Whereas Article 22 focuses on cultural rights, Article 27 mandates ‘Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the

8 Introduction community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits’. Article 21 of the UNCRPD: … extends the 1948 Declaration’s focus on the right to freedom of expression and participation specifically to people with disabilities. (Article 21 United Nations, 2006) Australia has ratified both the UDHR and the UNCRPD and so should be making efforts to meet certain obligations of these documents which specifically address television access and representation as a means to creating an inclusive society. In addition to this legislation, Australia’s National Disability Strategy 2010–2020 was endorsed by the Council of Australian Governments in February 2011, a strategy described as ‘a coordinated plan across all levels of government to improve the lives of people with disability, their families and carers’ (Australian Government, 2011). Within this strategy, access to television is aligned with access to public spaces via a focus on captions ‘on all visual material such as DVDs, television programs and videotapes’ (Commonwealth of Australia, 2011, p. 30). Access to television therefore fosters inclusion for people with disability in Australian society. Representation on Television – A Human Rights Issue Representation matters. In 1969, communications scholar Cedric Clark published the editorial ‘Television and Social Controls: Some Observations on the Portrayals of Ethnic Minorities’ in Television Quarterly. The article introduced an enduring rubric for considering the ways minority groups are represented in the media and particularly television. For Clark, representations progress through a four-stage evolutionary process – non-recognition, ridicule, regulation and finally respect (Clark, 1969). Although there are still problematic aspects to the representation of disability on television continuing to ignore social constructions of disability and instead presenting overly medicalised, inspirational or triumph-over-adversary narratives (see Chapter 3), this book also highlights examples of television narrative that embraces respect in their representation of disability (see Chapter 4). Analysis of the representation of disability has tended to stay at the level of meaning contained within the text particularly when it comes to television analysis. Problematic or absent media representations have long been identified as contributing to the social disablement of this group. For example, aspiring actor and model Julian Thomas describes the general lack of – not to mention stereotypical – representations of disability on television as making people with disability feel insignificant or non-existent (Thomas, 2016). Thomas illustrates his argument with a YouTube video outlining his difficulties breaking into the entertainment

Introduction  9 industry as an actor with disability. His video details the difficulties he faces in obtaining an audition when, in the photos he sends to casting agents, his impairment is visible, yet how he is invited to several auditions when images obscuring his impairment are distributed. Thomas then goes on to describe the typical roles available for people with disability as ‘some inspirational character, some villain or a war vet’ and says there are no opportunities to portray ‘regular guy[s] living their lives’. He reflects on the social impact of this lack of representation in terms of both the wider population’s exposure to diversity and the sense of selves of people with disability who are unable to see themselves represented on television. Michael Oliver makes the same point in his early articulations of the social model of disability – disabled people are never represented as ordinary people with ordinary problems, they are always represented as either more than or less than human (Oliver, 1990). One night of prime-time television viewing would likely confirm both Thomas’ and Oliver’s argument. Vic Finkelstein also explored this concept in his thought experiment of a community created for and by wheelchair users. When some people who do not use wheelchairs attempt to relocate there they find that they are disabled by the built environment, negative attitudes and find they are completely absent on television ­(Finkelstein, 1987). Throughout the 1990s, the disability media research agenda turned to stereotypes (Barnes, 1992), archetypes (Darke, 1998) and strategies of isolation (Norden, 1994). The UNCRPD recognises the impact of these stereotypes and through Article 8 encourages signatories to focus on removing attitudinal barriers to the realisation of human rights. Social disablement is initiated and sustained through people’s attitudes about the inherent dignity of the disabled. While a human rights approach to disability foregrounds the inherent worth of people irrespective of disability or impairment, attitudes circulating in society and culture promote inhospitable and inaccessible environments. Andrea Dimopoulos describes Article 8 as being concerned with the creation of attitudes or the social environment. She maintains that Article 8 should be approached in concert with Article 1 – The Purpose – of the Convention (Dimopoulos, 2017). Article 1 outlines the purpose of the Convention as: to promote, protect and ensure the full and equal enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms by all persons with disabilities, and to promote respect for their inherent dignity. (Article 1 United Nations, 2006) The significance of Article 8 therefore relates to social justice, social inclusion and the limits of broadcast media. It goes beyond the specific measures outlined in the Convention and points to the way attitudes can be changed to ensure the concerns of the convention are realised.

10 Introduction While there is currently no general comment related to Article 8, the drafting process related to awareness raising details an enduring concern with media representation. For example, during discussions in 2004, both Australia and Venezuela raised concerns about addressing media representation clearly and specifically in the Convention (Dimopoulos, 2017, p. 47). Strictly speaking, awareness raising is not a right; however, Article 8 obliges signatories to combat stereotypes as a way to facilitate human rights. Within the Australian television landscape, this is not typically approached via the mainstream media, and instead governments engage disabled peoples’ organisations to promote awareness raising campaigns. Access to Television – A Human Rights Issue Whereas most research into disability and television has focused on the potentially disabling prejudice that is perpetuated through onscreen ­representations that conflate disability with superheroes, villains or tragic individuals, the changing technology of digital television requires an engagement with how people with disability access television. While insights surrounding representation remain important, we cannot ignore the disabling impacts of the technology of television itself. People with disability know a lot about access and lack of access to public space, technology, and society in general. Access is central to the experience of disability. For example, if a wheelchair user attempts to enter a building accessible only by stairs, they are disabled by the absence of ramps, not their inability to walk. Likewise, television, as a visual and audible medium, disables people who cannot see and hear. The UNCRPD recognises that the built environment is always under the full control of society, and so inaccessibility relates to social and cultural factors including customs and attitudes. However, awareness-raising activities to address stigma and facilitate change could therefore potentially improve accessibility. Indeed, like the wheelchair and ramp, television can be accessed in different ways if such adaptations are understood and made available. As outlined above, it is this notion of accessibility which forms one of the key themes to this book. In Disability and New Media, with my co-author Mike Kent I argued that technology typically follows a threestep process to becoming more accessible to people with disability. First, technology begins as being relatively accessible, then, as it becomes more widely adopted by the general population, it begins to be designed in ways that exclude people with disability, before finally being retrofitted to allow access by this group (Ellis & Kent, 2011). However, television has followed a different path. It began as completely inaccessible to people with disability and then, as technology developed, it has become more accessible the more widespread its use has become. As we enter a

Introduction  11 period where television audiences personalise their experience through programming targeted to niche audiences and individualised mobile media accessibility enters the domain of choice, this digitisation has seen a personalisation of television. Watching television in 2018 is very different to how we viewed television in the 1920s, when it first became available in its most rudimentary form – indeed, ‘accessing’ rather than watching is perhaps a better description of how we approach television today. This new digital television arena also promises greater flexibility, in particular in the way it can be provided, and therefore accessed, in different formats. For example, people who are D/deaf or hard of hearing greatly benefit from the affordances of digital television through captions. Similarly, people who are blind or vision impaired benefit from audio descriptions of key visual information. Such translation and description benefit a sizeable portion of the community, including not only those with hearing or vision impairments but also people who predominately communicate in sign language or other alternative forms of communication, those with dexterity impairments (Pedlow, 2008) as well as people who form part of a more mainstream audience. However, although this environment represents great material, we cannot ignore the liberatory myth that surrounds both technology and disability (Goggin & Newell, 2003). While technology such as digital television is often presented as inherently liberating, disabling mechanisms continue to be reproduced into new technologies because disability is not considered to be a cultural identity in the same way as race, class and gender. Important work is therefore needed in the area of awareness raising.

The Australian Television Landscape In The World Television Industry: An Economic Analysis, Peter Dunnett describes the television industry as a case of unintended consequences characterised by a failure to anticipate new markets, and a miscalculation of anticipated markets which did not materialise. The industry has also failed to see the effects on their industry of new entrants using different methods (Dunnett, 1990). This is certainly the case in Australia, dating all the way back to the introduction of television after the World War II. The Postmaster-General’s Department, who were at the time responsible for broadcasting actively resisted the introduction of television predicting the medium would never become a ‘mass medium of communication’ (Curthoys, 1991). While a joint parliamentary committee was established in 1941 to discuss the implementation of television in Australia, it was not introduced until 1956. Today Australian broadcast television comprises of two public broadcasters (ABC, SBS) and three commercial stations (7, 9, 10).

12 Introduction A similar delay occurred with pay TV. Although pay TV had been operating in the USA since the 1970s, and government enquiries recommended its introduction in the 1980s, it did not become available in ­Australia until 1995. Likewise, due to ‘competing interests and conflicts of power’ involving politicians, media barons and television manufacturers (Tate, 2015), digital television, first introduced in 2001, was not fully available until 2013. As was the case with pay TV, the slow development of digital television in Australia was the result of industrial, social and policy agendas (Given, 2003). In a further example, subscription video on demand provider Netflix while established in the USA in 1997 was not allowed to legally operate in Australia until 2015. Today, the pay TV landscape consists of Foxtel and the broadcasters have branched into a number of digital multichannels. Finally, three subscription video on demand providers – Netflix Australia, Amazon Prime and Stan comprise that market. Historically, television broadcasters were required to pay a licensing fee to the government according to the Television Licence Fees Act 1964. However, since 2010, this fee has been steadily reduced and was finally abolished in 2016 following a number of submissions from the broadcasters to several government reviews. Today, the commercial free-to-air industry is represented by Free TV Australia, an industry body which promotes the interests of its members in relation to advertising and engineering standards. Free TV Australia has developed a Commercial Television Industry Code of Practice which reflects ‘Australia’s modern digital media landscape, upholds community standards and ensures appropriate viewer safeguards’ (Free TV Australia, 2010). This code includes advisory notes around representing disability on television which encourage producers to avoid portraying people with disabilities in stereotypical ways and identify several problematic stereotypes associated with pity, charity and inspiration (Free TV, n.d). Their position on access however is less inclusive. However, the Australian television industry still relies heavily on gov­ ernment support. As such, screen producers receive funding for dramas and other programs through the federal government agency Screen ­Australia Established under the Screen Australia Act in 2008, it defines an Australian program as one with significant Australian content or an Australian co-production with another country, and stipulates a focus on documentaries, children’s programs and ‘programs with a high level of artistic or cultural merit’. Screen Australia is tasked with the two focus points of this book – representation of and access to the ­Australian screen industry. In terms of representation, Screen Australia aims to focus on developing an Australian screen culture with a broad national identity and cultural diversity, including disability diversity. However, Screen Australia is often criticised for favouring a monolithic cultural identity. Similarly, its efforts towards improving access are not always

Introduction  13 realised on television. Despite policies stipulating the creation of captions and audio description, these access features do not make it onto every platform.

Outline The book is divided into two parts – representation and access. Like the circuit of culture, these two approaches to the study of television, while distinct, always intersect and influence each other to give meaning to disability and television in Australia. The analysis does not approach each part in isolation and draws on policy analysis and the insights obtained through interviews with disabled Australians throughout the course of the research. Part I, Representation, includes four chapters that address the representation of disability on television. Chapter 2, Screening stereotypes, considers the approach taken to disability media analysis as it has ­focused on content analysis and the identification of stereotypes. The chapter introduces employment and online discussion as important areas of analysis in the digital television environment as broadcasting has shifted towards narrowcasting and personalisation. Chapter 3, Broadening definitions, undertakes a content analysis of the representation of disability in Screen Australia-funded Australian television drama. While the analysis reveals a continued focus on stereotypes and, by extension, an inconsistency with the intentions of the UNCRPD, the chapter argues for a greater recognition of trauma within critical disability studies. Chapter 4, Culturally accessible online videos, turns to consider online video as an important avenue for disability representation as well as employment. This chapter focuses on three case studies – Netflix, TED talks and web series – as they reignite the sharedness of television in an age of spreadable media. Chapter 5, Collective intelligence, extends this discussion to consider the role of online discussion in meaning making, disability representation and the limits of the television text. The chapter argues that Game of Thrones (GOT) is a key example of a new form of television whereby digital audiences traverse geographical boundaries to engage with ­representations  – ­including disability representation – in online forums as a form of collective intelligence to assist one another in a process of meaning making. This holds great significance for the representation of disability on television because disparate audiences come together, drawing on their own experiences and world views to offer a more comprehensive representation of disability. Part II of the book then turns specifically to an investigation of access. Beginning with an overview of the changing digital television environment in Chapter 6 Digital diversity, focuses on the introduction of digital television throughout the world and the marked shift in

14 Introduction television reception towards an individualised model. Chapter 7, Audio description, explores the availability of audio description in Australia as a key policy issue and a continuation of medieval approaches to translation. The chapter focuses on interviews with people with vision impairment who have been advocating for the provision of audio description on ­Australian television for over 20 years. Chapter 8, Captions, then turns to analysis of the availability of captions both internationally and in Australia, finding that while legislation has been effective in initiating the provision of captions, it has not kept up to date with technological change or led to a change in attitude. This leads into Chapter 9, Interpretive flexibility, which shifts the focus from people with disability to the nondisabled population to consider the mainstream affordances of accessibility features such as captions, audio description and clean audio. The chapter recognises that innovative potential exists for a significant portion of the audience demographic as well as television producers seeking to catalogue audiovisual material, yet that access to television must remain a human rights issue. The book concludes by reflecting on the changes to television as a technology and cultural form that have taken place during this project. Predictions about the ultimate television as described by the ­people with disability interviewed for this book are matched with industry predictions.

References ABC News. (2017). ABC News Auslan interpreted in National Week of Deaf People. Retrieved from http://www.expression.com.au/files/editor_upload/ File/Newsletters/Communicate%2065%20Online%202.pdf Australian Government. (2011). National disability strategy 2010–2020. Retrieved from https://www.dss.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/08_2014/ nds_fact_sheet.pdf Barnes, C. (1992). Disabling imagery and the media: An exploration of the principles for media representations of disabled people. Retrieved from http://www. leeds.ac.uk/disability-studies/archiveuk/Barnes/disabling%20imagery.pdf BBC. (2018). BBC iplayer signed zone. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.co.uk/ iplayer/categories/signed/featured Bugeja, M. (2005). Interpersonal divide: The search for community in a technological age. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Clark, C. (1969). Television and social controls: Some observations on the portrayals of ethnic minorities. Television Quarterly, 8(2), 18–22. Clements, G. (2015, 2 April). Actors with disabilities. Retrieved from http://www. divine.vic.gov.au/arts-and-entertainment/film-tv-radio/actors-disabilities Commonwealth of Australia. (2011, May). 2010–2020 ­National  ­disability ­strategy.  Retrieved from https://www.dss.gov.au/our-­responsibilities/disabilityand-carers/publications-articles/policy-research/national-disability-strategy2010-2020 Curthoys, A. (1991). Television before television. Continuum, 4(2), 152–170.

Introduction  15 Curtin, P. A., & Gaither, T. K. (2007). International public relations: Negotiating culture, identity, and power. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications. Darke, P. (1998). Cinematic representations of disability. In T. Shakespeare (Ed.), The disability reader: Social science perspectives (pp. 181–200). New York, NY: Continuum. Dimopoulos, A. (2017). The representation of disability in the media in the UK and France: Implications for free speech and diversity in light of Article 8 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Cambridge International Law Journal, 6(1), 43. doi: 10.4337/cilj.2017.01.03 Dow, S. (2016, 24 September). Disability and the ‘new normal’: Why Australia needs to ramp up access to stage and screen. Retrieved from https://www. theguardian.com/society/2016/sep/24/disability-and-the-new-normal-whyaustralia-needs-to-ramp-up-access-to-stage-and-screen Du Gay, P., Open, U., et al. (1997). Doing cultural studies: The story of the Sony Walkman. London, England: Sage Publications in association with the Open University. Dunnett, P. J. S. (1990). The world television industry: An economic analysis. London, England: Routledge. Ellis, K., & Goggin, G. (2015). Disability and the media. New York, NY: ­Palgrave Macmillan. Ellis, K., & Kent, M. (2011). Disability and new media. New York, NY: Routledge. Finkelstein, V. (1987). Disabled people and our culture development. Paper ­presented at the Disability Arts Forum, London, England. http://­disabilitystudies.leeds.ac.uk/files/library/finkelstein-Cultural-Development.pdf Free TV Australia. (2010). Commercial television industry code of practice. ­Retrieved from http://www.freetv.com.au/media/Code_of_Practice/2010_ Commercial_Television_Industry_Code_of_Practice.pdf Free TV. (n.d). Advisory note the portrayal of people with disabilities. R ­ etrieved from http://www.freetv.com.au/Media/Advisory_Notes/THE_PORTRAYAL_ OF_PEOPLE_WITH_DISABILITIES.pdf Given, J. (2003). Turning off the television: Broadcasting’s uncertain future. Kensington: University of New South Wales Press. Goggin, G., & Newell, C. (2003). Digital disability: The social construction of disability in new media. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers Inc. Hartley, J. (2010). Digital futures for cultural and media studies. United ­K ingdom: Wiley-Blackwell. Hood, K. (2015). Equality of opportunity. Retrieved from https://issuu.com/ meaa/docs/equity_mag_autumn_2015_faf1214fa330ad Hoynes, W. (1994). Public television for sale: Media, the market, and the public sphere. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Lorié, Á. F. (2011). Forbidden fruit or conventional apple pie? A look at Sex and the City’s reversal of the female gender. Media, Culture & Society, 33(1), 35–51. Miller, T. (2010). Television studies the basics. London, England and New York, NY: Routledge. Mott, M., & Dillon, M. (2018, 8 October). Beloved South Australian entertainer and disability advocate Quentin Kenihan dies, aged 43. Retrieved from https:// www.news.com.au/national/south-australia/beloved-south-­a ustralian-

16 Introduction entertainer-and-disabilit y-advocate-quentin-kenihan-dies-aged- 43/ news-story/9b0eb77cbae1a272d03c80daae24f3a8 Newcomb, H., & Hirsch, P. (1994). Television as a cultural forum. In H. ­Newcomb (Ed.), Television: The critical view (5th ed., pp. 503–515). New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Norden, M. (1994). The cinema of isolation: A history of physical disability in the movies. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. Oliver, M. (1990). The politics of disablement. Basingstoke, England: M ­ acmillan Education. Pedlow, R. (2008). How will the changeover to digital broadcasting in 2009 ­influence the accessibility of TV for Americans with disabilities? Disability Studies Quarterly, 28(4). Retrieved from http://dsq-sds.org/article/view/130/130. Rodan, D. (2009). Large, sleek, slim, stylish flat screens: Privatized space and the televisual experience. Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, 23(3), 367–382. Shakespeare, T. (1994). Cultural representation of disabled people: Dustbins for disavowal? Disability & Society, 9(3), 283–299. Slater, J., Astbrink, G., & Lindström, J.-I. (2010). Broadband solutions for consumers with disabilities. Brisbane, QLD: Australian Communications Consumer Action Network (ACCAN). Spigel, L. (1992). Make room for TV: Television and the family ideal in postwar America. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Tate, J. W. (2015). The introduction of Australian digital television: Politics, policy and power. Australian Journal of Political Science, 1–18. doi:10.1080 /10361146.2015.1035694 Thomas, J. (2016, 10 February). Discrimination in the media. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8wqlvly-h4&noredirect=1 Tombleson, B., & Wolf, K. (2017). Rethinking the circuit of culture: How ­participatory culture has transformed cross-cultural communication. Public Relations Review, 43(1), 14–25. doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2016.10.017 Turner, G. (2016). Re-inventing the media. London, England and New York, NY: Routledge. United Nations. (1948). The universal declaration of human rights. Retrieved from http://www.claiminghumanrights.org/universal_declaration.html ­ isabilities. United Nations. (2006). Convention on the rights of persons with d Retrieved from https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/­conventionon-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities.html Vance, A. (2010). Watching TV together, miles apart. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/04/technology/­i nternet/​ 04couch.html?_r=0 Williams, B. (2009). Everyone gets a say: Changes in audience and community. In B. Williams (Ed.), Shimmering literacies: Popular culture & reading & writing online (pp. 29–62). New York, NY: Peter Lang.

Part 1

Representation

2 Screening Stereotypes or Cultural Accessibility Stigma and the Representation of Disability on Television

Article 8 of the United Nations Convention of the Rights of People with Disabilities sets out to ‘combat stereotypes, prejudices and harmful practices relating to persons with disabilities’ by ‘encouraging all organs of the media to portray persons with disabilities in a manner ­consistent with the purpose of the present Convention’ (United N ­ ations, 2006). However, television is consistently criticised for perpetuating stereotypes, prejudices and representing disability outside the boundaries of normality. Disability dominates on television – it is represented in every television genre. As a progressive medium, these television representations offer a cultural database in which we can identify shifting societal attitudes to the creation – and ­u nderstanding – of disability. With Gerard Goggin, I described the media’s approach to disability as ‘spectacularly crap’ (Ellis & Goggin, 2015, p.  117). Similarly, Joe Schatz and Amber George explain that media representations ‘reinforce ableism’ (Schatz & George, 2018). For example, in her discussion of the US television series Oz, Petra Kuppers argues that decisions to represent disability are ‘determined by the meanings of disability in our culture’ (Kuppers, 2013), and that, as noted in the opening comments, the meanings attributed to disability in our culture can be problematic. Indeed, many theorists have noted the way disability is stigmatised, underrepresented and portrayed in stereotypical ways on television. Indeed, Bill Kirkpatrick and Elizabeth Ellcessor describe television representations as ‘complicated’ and urge media studies and disability studies to join together in a productive conversation because ‘the issue [of disability representation] is becoming more urgent’ (Kirpatrick & Ellcessor, 2017, p. 2). Diversity is a key concern in contemporary discussions about media representation as evidenced by the number of popular tests that have been developed to critique the lack of diversity practices in both film and television. For example, the Bechdel–Wallace and Mako Mori tests are used to indicate whether female characters in a film play an active role in the narrative, or simply serve as accessories. The Bechdel–Wallace test evaluates gender equality according to three criteria – does the film have two females in it, who talk to each other, about something other

20 Representation than a man? Likewise, the Vito Russo test notes whether characters with diverse sexualities and genders are integral to the plot or are characterised exclusively in terms of their sexuality. All three tests consider both the numbers of characters who appear and the context in which they appear. While there is no popular test for disability diversity, several US ­organisations – from the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Discrimination (GLAAD) to the Ruderman Family Foundation – have undertaken content analyses of the number of disabled characters appearing on television. Likewise, in Australia, Screen Australia has recently undertaken a content analysis of disability on Australian broadcast television drama. While GLAAD undertook a strict content analysis, both the Ruderman Family Foundation and Screen Australia also included interviews with disabled people working in the industry. Despite the absence of a Bechdel–Wallace style popular test, content analysis has been a favoured methodology for researchers interested in disability representation. This chapter introduces the history, reflecting on the dominance of content analysis within disability studies. The chapter focuses in particular on the concept of stigma and its influence on three key sites of disability media analysis – the employment of disabled people in media-based industries in relation to inaccessible work environments, the stereotypical framing of representation on television and, drawing on cultural approaches to disability, narrative and media, how society affects these representations. The chapter then moves to consider contemporary approaches to monitoring disability representation on television and the resurgence of content analysis via analysis of the aforementioned three organisations – the US-based GLAAD and Ruderman Family Foundation and Screen Australia – as a case study. Online discussion is then offered as a fourth area of analysis to the study of television’s textuality, particularly how this form of television’s reception and representation has been considered with disability studies. The chapter then revisits Colin Barnes’ stereotypes in the context of the UNCRPD to illustrate their continuing relevance but equally the need to analyse media texts in depth beyond the level of stereotypes. Reflecting on television as a progressive medium, the chapter concludes with a discussion of the importance of considering the full circuit of culture – ­representation, production, consumption, identity and regulation.

Television’s Textuality in Relation to Disability Stereotypes and Stigma Television is predominately a visual medium; it is made up of a series of moving images joined with sound. It is also a rather domestic medium, with its traditional place being the family lounge room. We are close to our television; however, we are constantly reminded not to get too close, for fear it will negatively impact on our lives. Indeed, television’s role in

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  21 our relationships and its influence on our lives has long been an issue. We must be careful about where in the house the television is located, and what times of the day it is on – we are told to be very concerned about who is watching it, and how these images, sounds and messages might influence them. Health-wise, we are warned to not spend too much time indoors watching television when we (or our children) should be outside, to be mindful that its emanating light does not disrupt our sleep patterns or the biofeedback we give to our newborns as we feed them in the night. Television is also getting both larger and smaller. On the one hand, we have a proliferation of large screen televisions, projectors and theatre rooms built into contemporary houses initiating competition with both venturing outside of the house to the cinema and space for other things inside our homes. On the other hand, mobile media means people can watch television anywhere, anytime on their smartphones and tablets. In this way, television is now dominating both our homes and our portable devices. In addition, while television has long had a bad reputation of being unthinking entertainment fodder for the masses, it is now experiencing a never before seen level of respect, a golden age, due to the emergence of so-called prestige television, viewing which dominates our identities and our conversations with other people. For all this importance in our lives, our homes, our handbags, what effect is television having on the way we understand the world and the diversity of people in it? The study of television’s textuality attempts to give us some answers as to the meanings of the images and sounds we encounter both on and through television. Erving Goffman’s Notes on Stigma is an important starting point for an investigation of disability and television (Goffman, 1974). For ­G offman, ‘stigma’ refers to an attribute that is ‘deeply discrediting’; whether this is a physical impairment, a ‘blemish of character’ (for example criminality) or a tribal stigma (for example, a certain race), stigma impacts the way individuals and groups interact. Goffman ironically distinguishes between normal and ‘notnormals’ to map out the differences and tensions that occur as a result of stigma. Stigma is therefore an ideology that has been created to rationalise the fears the normals have about notnormals. Television plays a key role in both reflecting and challenging the stigma experienced by disabled people in society. David Bolt (2012), in his review of disability in the humanities, adopts Goffman’s terminology to reflect on ‘what happens when so-called ­normals and stigmatised people are in one another’s company’. For Bolt, this interaction is deeply influenced by cultural representations. His discussion of the ways stereotypes about disability are ­performed in everyday life is reminiscent of Barnes’ (1992) analysis of the potential effects of stereotypical media representation discussed in the next section (Bolt, 2012).

22 Representation This notion of stigma and its relationship to disability and television can be further broken down into three key areas– the inclusion of people with disability in the fast-paced and often inaccessible media workforce, stereotypical representations on television, and the impact that cultural accessibility could have in opening up a more inclusive television environment via a process of representation and participation. Stereotypical Framing of Disability on Television Paul Longmore’s essay Screening Stereotypes, first published in 1985, and republished at regular intervals – including most recently in 2017 – has been particularly influential in disability media studies. He begins by nothing two ‘striking facts’ (Longmore, 1987, p. 131). First, the significant number of disabled characters in film and television and second, the way audiences fail to notice them. As other theorists have gone on to analyse the many and varied media and cultural representations of disability, certain stereotypes and the ways these perpetuate stigma against disabled people have been noted. People with disability are often depicted in stereotypical ways on television to reinforce a medical model – disability as something which needs to be cured – rather than the more recent social and cultural models of disability. Content analysis is a popular approach because it is both a qualitative and quantitative research technique that involves the systematic coding of themes or images across a variety of texts. Content analysis allows for the collection of both ‘manifest’ content, or that which is directly observable, and ‘latent’ content, that which requires interpretation by the researcher or viewer (Haller, 2010, p. 26). Content analysis has been the preferred method of media analysis in disability studies since the 1980s (Zhang & Haller, 2013). The approach taken to content analysis and the types of themes or images coded depends on the theoretical stance of the researcher. Typically, analysists within disability studies approach content analysis from either a directed or summative approach. Researchers proceeding from a directed approach are guided by existing theory and practice to develop both their research questions and thematic coding. Similarly, a review of the literature in conjunction with the researchers’ own interests will guide the coding in summative approaches to content analysis (see Hsieh & Shannon, 2005). The dominance of the social model of disability, particularly in contrast to a medical model, has seen the emergence of similar themes or stereotypes across several studies, and two key studies have had significant influence on content analysis within disability media studies. Firstly, Colin Barnes expands upon Longmore’s groupings in his report on media representations of disability in the UK (1992). His approach is firmly located in a social model of disability and sets out, in part, to

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  23 identify the commonly occurring stereotypes of disability portrayed in the media. He identified the following 11 categories: • • • • • • • • • • •

The disabled person as pitiable and pathetic The disabled person as an object of violence The disabled person as sinister and evil The disabled person as atmosphere or curio The disabled person as super cripple The disabled person as an object of ridicule The disabled person as their own worst and only enemy The disabled person as burden The disabled person as sexually abnormal The disabled person as incapable of participating fully in community life The disabled person as normal.

Barnes argues these stereotypes are constantly reproduced and arise from misinformation about the disabled community. As a result, he argues the media is responsible for the social disablement of disabled people. These stereotypes remain clearly recognised on television across genres and locations and will be discussed further in Chapter 3. Barnes’s report concludes with recommendations for improving the portrayal of disabled people in the media. His recommendations included checking the accuracy of representations before putting them in the public sphere and recruiting disabled people to work with mainstream media outlets. However, prior research suggests this is easier said than done. In an attempt to redress to the focus on representation in communications research, some important early work on disability and the media identified this industry as an inaccessible work environment (Popovich, Willis, & Blevens, 1988). Drawing on the observation that disability media studies literature has focused on four areas of concern when it comes to employing people with disability in the media – opportunities, job performance, profiles of working professionals and finally, a discussion of the media’s role in shifting public attitudes about disability and therefore potentially improving employment possibilities – Jeffrey Alan John identifies attitudes as the ‘far bigger problem’, with perceived time- and costdriven pressures creating stigma against employing potentially disabled employees (John, 1993, p. 9). Indeed, recent work in this area shows that negative attitudes continue to persist despite advances in technology that should make media work much easier for this cohort (Ellis, 2016; Sgroi, 2016). A second key study from the 1990s, this time coming from the USA, has also had an enduring influence on the study of disability representation across every media form and format, from newspapers to Twitter. John S. Clogston examined the language used, issues covered and

24 Representation overall portrayal of disability in 363 newspaper articles about physical disability. He identifies two models through which newspapers covered ­disability – traditional and progressive. Traditional approaches focus on the individual’s differences, whereas progressive stories focus on society’s inability to deal with difference. Broadly, these frames can be categorised as ascribing to either individual or social models of disability. An individual model of disability (traditional frames) locates the problem of disability within the individual who then becomes responsible for their own disablement. Alternatively, the social model (progressive frames) emphasises society’s role in creating disability through inaccessible environments and negative attitudes (Oliver, 1990). Clogston’s frames remain an important part of disability theorisation and others, most notably Beth Haller, have built on them in the intervening years. Between September and November 2013, an online survey of A ­ ustralians with disabilities was undertaken to understand potential benefits and challenges of the digital television switchover for Australians with disabilities. The survey asked questions about accessibility, representation, media participation and online media. Participants were recruited through an email invitation sent to disability organisations in Australia, tertiary disability officers as well as advertising on literservs and social media groups. A total of 341 people took part in the survey. This survey sought to investigate whether television audiences with disability agreed with the disability academics – that disability was represented via stigmatising stereotypes – by asking a number of questions about representation. These questions were divided between entertainment television and television news. The survey responses reinforce existing research into disability and television in that most respondents felt that television was not doing a good job of portraying disability in either the news nor in entertainment programming. Over 80 per cent disagreed or strongly disagreed that entertainment television portrayals were doing a good job of helping the public understand the experiences of people with disabilities. Similarly, 80 per cent felt that television news portrayals were not doing a good job of helping the public understand the social issues that face people with disabilities. In general, television was seen as offering inaccurate portrayals, not providing objective information, nor covering disability issues fairly and fully. The respondents therefore saw television as failing to reflect how people with disabilities are in real life. To return to the prior research informing this project, another major study of disability on television took place in 1988 when Guy Cumberbatch and Ralph Negrine conducted a content analysis of disability on British prime-time television over a 6-week period (Cumberbatch & Negrine, 1992). Their quantitative and qualitative study highlights stereotypes and inconsistencies. For example, they found a stark contrast between the portrayal of disability in soap operas (only 8 per cent) and the portrayal of other social issues. They argue that social change will

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  25 only occur when people with disability became amongst the leading characters on television, that only in this way will disability be seen as an ordinary experience by the general public. They also argue that if people with disability were to be seen as ‘people first’, television representation must adopt the same strategy. However, Cumberbatch and Negrine were criticised for following the people’s first ethos and not embracing a strict social model approach where disability is located in society and impairment in the body (Barnes, 1992). All of these studies occurred quite some time ago, and there has been no comprehensive follow-up to consider the impacts of advances in both legislation and media studies. Following the introduction of disability legislation in most Western societies, media and cultural studies began to acknowledge disability as a central cultural identity and organising axis of power. Indeed as I demonstrate in Chapter 5, people with disability have become amongst the leading characters on television since their study, yet the social position of disabled people has not undergone the radical transformation Cumberbatch and Negrine predicted. Barnes, Clogston, and Cumberbatch and Negrine approach the impacts of disability representation from a cumulative perspective. Through their sheer repetition, they will have an impact on cultural ­understandings of disability. However, in 1999, Farnall and Smith posited an alternative to the model of cumulative effects (Farnall & Smith, 1999). They suggested portrayals can instead have a ‘drench effect’ on audiences, with some representations being more important than others. For example, some portrayals prompted audiences to recognise disability discrimination and feel less uncomfortable around disabled people. Cultural Accessibility: Making Meaning Elizabeth Ellcessor’s recent theorisation of cultural accessibility offers a useful framework for theorisation of disability in terms of production, consumption and representation: Mainstream media representation is not sufficient for incorporating disability into popular culture. Access to images of disability is undeniably important and it allows people with disabilities to form identifications and take up identities in mediated democracies, while exposing able-bodied audiences to different forms of embodied identity. However, when considering access to media – and its cultural and political benefits – it is crucial to move beyond representation to consider accessibility as well as access to production. (Ellcessor, 2017, p. 34) Ellcessor therefore posits cultural accessibility as an important direction in disability media studies. Culturally accessible media is in fact a

26 Representation reimagining of disability within both the norms of media production and representation. Collaboration and participation are key to this reimagination. While seeking out negative stereotypes of disability has become a popular, and valuable, tool within disability scholarship, some theorists caution that the constant identification of stereotypes works to limit representation into a categorisation of acceptable and unacceptable (Ellis, 2015b; Mallett, 2009; Shakespeare, 1999; Wilde, 2004). Two additional approaches to disability media analysis are clear, firstly the influence of literary analysis and cultural studies of meanings contained within texts, and secondly analysis of the audience’s perceptions regarding representation. The disabled body is central to our culture’s definition of normalcy. For example, in Disability studies: An interdisciplinary introduction,  Dan Goodley argues disability is often used as ‘a metaphor for sinister, evil, ungodly, lacking, brave, fragmented and unviable’. These negative associations with disability reflected and reinforced in popular texts reflect ‘deep-seated cultural conflicts’ (Goodley, 2011). As such, we are culturally trained to react to the disabled body with a combination of sympathy, awkwardness and disidentification (Davis, 1995). Disability challenges what it means to be human, it exists outside the boundaries of normality. This ideology of normality is particularly noticeable in television drama. David Mitchell and Sharon Snyder put forward a theory of disability ­representation that suggests disability works as a narrative prosthesis: … a character-making trope in the writer’s arsenal, as a social category of deviance, as a symbolic vehicle for meaning-making and cultural critique, and as an option in the narrative negotiation of disabled subjectivity. (Mitchell & Snyder, 2000, p. 1) Their analysis reveals the way narratives rely on disability to prop up the story. Significantly, Mitchell and Snyder also reflect on the way representations are tied to the historical context in which they were created, and that historical shortcomings always come into play in any analysis of disability representation. They also highlight the potential for disability representation to engage in a process of transgressive reappropriation. As Mitchell and Snyder explain, transgressive reappropriation offers disabled people an opportunity to reclaim their position in the cultural imaginary, for example by the reclamation of previously damaging terminology such as gimp (discussed in Chapter 4 via the web series My Gimpy Life). This is a notion which has influenced other researchers. For example, Rebecca Mallet (2009) examines what happens when disabled characters transgress established boundaries such as those discussed by Longmore and Barnes. In an attempt to offer an in-depth analysis of disability, television and representation, Mallet analyses how the writers

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  27 of the television show South Park subvert disability stereotypes. In one episode, disabled children form a club and then refuse the able-­bodied children entry. When the children declare that entry into the club is only allowed to those with congenital disabilities – thereby excluding Christopher Reeves (who is specifically named in the episode) because his disability was the result of an accident – the episode also challenges the supercrip stereotype identified earlier by both Barnes and Clogston (see Table 2.2). Such a narrative echoes important early theorisation within disability studies such as Vic Finkelstein’s oft-cited thought experiment of a world designed for, and by, wheelchair users that turns out to be a disabling environment for some able-bodied visitors who attempt to relocate there and find themselves disabled by the environment (­Finkelstein, 1987). Robert McRuer also offers an important contribution to culturally accessible television analysis in his framework of compulsory able-­ bodiedness. His investigation of the pleasures of television viewing via Queer Eye for the Straight Guy takes media analysis beyond stereotypes to explore the ways representations reinforce compulsory able-­ bodiedness. In particular, McRuer is concerned with the intersections between ­disability and queer identities. He demonstrates how, when representations of disability and queerness become normalised, they also become streamlined or reduced to a specific type(s) of representation. In doing so, alternative identities or meanings of queer or disabled are reduced. Continuing the analysis of indicative television texts, Kathleen ­L eBesco combined both content analysis and hermeneutics to explore the dominance of disability representation on The Sopranos as ‘just another fact of life’ (LeBesco, 2006). Similarly, Walters (2013) approaches The Big Bang Theory and Community as transformative texts. For Walters, each offers new and unexpected ways of understanding and blurring categories such as ‘autistic’ and ‘neurotypical’, ‘nondisabled’ and ‘disabled’(Walters, 2013). However, Belt’s analysis of The Wire identified only two minor characters used to ‘teach a lesson to the main characters’. The analysis locates disability within discourses of fear, vulnerability, medicalisation and infantalisation (Belt, 2012). While there have been many analyses of television programming, studies of disabled television audiences are not as common in disability media studies. However, a 2015 special issue of the Journal of Popular Television made significant strides in addressing this gap. The majority of papers included some engagement with either disabled television audiences or producers. From audiences of the television crime drama selecting this genre for is accessibility and predictability (Ellis, 2015b) to disabled comedians perspectives of British television comedy (Lockyer, 2015), to the employment of disabled people in the Australian screen industry (Barton, 2015).

28 Representation Two theorists have also been particularly influential in the study of disabled television audiences’ perception of representation – Karen Ross and Alison Wilde. For both researchers, identification and media literacy appear as a key concern. Like my survey respondents, the participants in Ross’ study display an in-depth understanding of television stereotypes and call for producers to begin respecting the diversity of disability. In light of these findings, Ross argues that producers must consult with disabled audiences and make concerted efforts to more accurately portray their experiences (Ross, 1997). By comparison, Wilde interviewed disabled audiences of the television soap opera genre. Wilde (2004) also reports her participants did not identify with the experiences of characters with disability as represented on television. Her work also displays an understanding of the construction of normality as articulated by the US critical disability theorists (Davis, 1995; Garland-Thomson, 1997). Like Mallet, Wilde urges theorists to go beyond the identification of negative imagery: […] rather than focussing upon stereotypes […] the central question about better portrayals and the social engagement with disability issues, is about how to achieve cultural recognition on equal terms, to work towards cultural images where being depicted as good, evil, wise, ordinary, extra-ordinary or changeable, is as possible for people with impairments as it is for other people. (Wilde, 2004) This argument has been particularly influential to my own work in disability and television which has sought to acknowledge both the pleasures of television and popular culture and the ways representations reinforce and challenge dominant cultural conceptions of disability (Ellis, 2012, 2015a, 2015b). This approach to television representation is particularly relevant in the current era of prestige television where audiences become deeply committed to programming, narratives and extended backstories that can only be discovered through extended engagement with online resources. Whereas prior to this era, characters were not permitted to develop and grow across a series because audiences could not be relied upon to return every week, today characters can and do develop and grow across a series. These new opportunities for growth are discussed alongside stereotypes throughout this book.

Monitoring Representation Recent attempts have been made to monitor the representation of disability on television via a renewed focus on content analysis. The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) was formed in 1985 to protest against homophobic reporting on the AIDS crisis in the

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  29 New York Times. Initially called the Gay & Lesbian Anti-Defamation League, the group monitored representation of homosexual people in the media and agitated for changes in the type of language used. Described in its early years as ‘defending a group that it’s still respectable to attack’ (Larry Gross quoted in Zonana, 1990), it began noting the number of gay and lesbian characters on television in 1996 in their Where we are on TV report. In its first year, the report identified 34 LGBT characters on television in the 1996–1997 period. GLAAD continued this important work in content analysis, progressively adding other minority groups to the study; disability was added in 2010. The research is undertaken in conjunction with the Screen Actors’ Guild (SAG), the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) and the Actors’ Equity Association’s I AM PWD campaign to include people with disabilities in the arts and media. The researchers first note the total number of series regular characters occurring on network television in the USA and then note how many have a disability according to the Americans with Disability Act (ADA). In 2015, the methodology was broadened to include characters appearing via the streaming services Amazon, Hulu and Netflix original programming. Table 2.1 documents how the percentage has changed since GLAAD first started counting characters with disability in 2010. Three things are noticeable looking at these figures. First the number of series regular characters overall has increased dramatically, from 587 to 901 between 2010 and 2017, and has increased each year. However, series regular characters with a disability has stayed relatively stable, at around 1 per cent, with the exception of the last 2 years when the figure veered closer to 2 per cent. Given the percentage of people with a disability in the US population has remained relatively stable – at around 20 per cent throughout the entire period – this figure is unacceptably low. Similarly, the American-based Ruderman Family Foundation conducted research into how often people with disability were cast in

Table 2.1  Series regular characters according to GLAAD analysis Year

Total number of series regular characters

Percentage with a disability

2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

587 647 701 796 813 881 895 901

1% 0.8% 0.6% 1% 1.4% 0.9% 1.7% 1.8%

30 Representation televised roles portraying characters with disability. For their study, the Ruderman Foundation selected the top 10 rated television shows according to Neilsen ratings along with the most popular streaming series according to Tom’s Guide, a popular television review blog. In the network series, they identified 21 representations of disability according to the ADA, ranging from social anxiety to multiple sclerosis. Only three had a visible disability, so the researchers incorporated both manifest and latent meanings. The streaming content resulted in 16 instances. However, they found that only 5 per cent of characters with disability were portrayed by actors with personal experience of disability (­Woodburn & Kopić, 2016), and conclude their content analysis with a call to action: It is a matter of social justice to have a large segment of our population authentically represented in the mass entertainment that is television and scripted, dramatized stories. It is necessary to create an environment where actors with disabilities have access to play characters with disabilities. It is also necessary to reduce stigma surrounding ‘invisible’ disabilities such as addiction and mental illness. Only by having actors who are open about those disabilities will we slowly create a society that doesn’t shun or shame a vast segment of its population. We have to tell stories about people with a variety of disabilities and we have to be fair in representing them accurately. Only then will we have more realistic stories that reflect our society. (Woodburn & Kopić, 2016, p. 26) In Australia, Screen Australia conducted a diversity review of Australian television drama across a 5-year period (2011–2015). Their report focused on three areas of diversity – cultural backgrounds, sexual orientation and gender identity, and disability. It also cites that, although ‘just under one in five people report having a disability’ (Screen ­Australia, 2016, p. 1), which equates to approximately 18.3 per cent of the ­Australian population (p. 7), this is not reflected in the number of characters with disabilities seen on Australian television. Indeed, the report claims that disability is ‘very much under-represented in TV drama compared to the Australian population’ (p. 4). For example, the report identifies that only 4 per cent of main characters – or 71 out of a total of 1,961 main characters in 199 Australian television dramas screened between 2011 and 2015 – were identifiable as having a disability (p. 15). Of these, 25 had sensory or physical disabilities and 47 had psychiatric, neurological or cognitive disabilities (p. 15). Furthermore, 77 per cent of these characters appeared on just two programmes – Neighbours or Home and Away. While the figures from these content analyses offer much food for thought, the reports typically do not delve into a significant amount of analysis about how disability is actually represented and in what context

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  31 the characters appear. Indeed, the 2015 GLAAD report refers to the Australian television soap opera Neighbours which is screened via Hulu in the USA for depicting a character with PTSD (GLAAD, 2015, p. 24). Television studies scholar Jonathan Gray argues that statistical research obtained by organisations such as GLAAD should be compared with other depictions in the same show and to intertextual depictions on similar shows (Gray, 2008). For example, in the case of Zieke Kinski, the Neighbours character with PTSD noted by GLAAD in 2015, a more comprehensive analysis would consider his representation relative to his contemporaries on Neighbours and perhaps intertextually to Home & Away, a soap opera similar in style. Taking into account the global ­context in which Neighbours operates, it might likewise be useful to compare the characterisation to a US or UK soap opera. Similar moves to document television diversity are being undertaken in the UK via the activities of the Diamond initiative. Diamond is a collective established by competing broadcasters the BBC, ­Channel 4, ITV and Sky, and supported by Pact and Creative Skillset through the Creative Diversity Network (CDN) to better monitor on- and off-screen diversity across the UK Television Industry. Intended to be a long-term monitoring body, Diamond released its first year of results in May 2018. While the report provides a snapshot of diversity during a clearly defined period of time, it is intended that this monitoring will continue. Like the Screen Australia report discussed throughout this book, Diamond takes a broad approach to monitoring diversity noting instances of gender, age, ethnic origin, sexual orientation and disability. This report p ­ rovides a comprehensive breakdown of diversity within particular genres, approaching the issue from both the perspective of people working in the industry and the perception of television audiences. Broad figures ­suggest the percentage of disabled people on-screen is 6.8 per cent while off-screen is 4.5 per cent (Creative Diversity Network, 2018). Following this report, the UK regulator Ofcom released its second diversity report and reported similar findings. While the workforce percentage of disabled people working in television had doubled from 3 to 6 per cent in only 1 year, this was still well below the UK population average of 18 per cent (Ofcom, 2018). This lack of representation – the aforementioned 2 per cent in the USA, 6 per cent in the UK, and 4 per cent in Australia – means a lot rides on any portrayals of disability which do make in to our screens. As Gray also explains, ‘where television provides so little representation, those few characters that do exist become densely loaded with expectation and representational weight’ (Gray, 2008). Some key studies in the USA have identified progressive television representations that are significant for having Farnall and Smith’s (1999) so-called ‘drench effect’ on audiences. Beth Haller notes several important examples, including Geri Jewell’s performance on Facts of Life from 1980 to 1984. Jewell was the

32 Representation first person with a disability to be featured in a regular role on primetime television (Haller, 2018). Similarly, some researchers in the 1980s conducted research into the impacts of the representation of disability and blindness through a minor character that appeared on Mork and Mindy. The researchers used a 1984 episode of that television show which featured Tom Sullivan, a blind actor to discuss misconceptions and stereotypes about blindness. This discussion, in conjunction with viewing the episode, created a non-threatening environment in which participants could shift their misconceptions and allow them to accept accurate information about disability (Elliott & Byrd, 1984). While still useful, these methodologies were established in a pre-digital era where broadcast television courted a mass rather than niche audience and dramatic limitations impacted on character and story development. Recent research suggests a final fertile site of analysis that is also explored throughout this book, that of online discussion (Hartley, 2010). These discussions offer significant cultural insight and are an integral part of contemporary television fandom. Television today is often structured to reward both multiple viewings of the same episode and paratext engagement with both official and unofficial internet texts. As I discuss throughout this book, in the age of prestige television, backstories are long and complicated and as such these are rarely given in the television text itself. Instead, viewers and fans must engage with documents or each other online to gain a comprehensive understanding of the television show. With representations of disability appearing often in prestige programming, these overflows of the television text are particularly important. For disability theorists, this raises important questions about when the moment of representation and reception begin and end. Social Model Stereotypes and Disability Human Rights Barnes’ social model stereotypes, although identified 25 years ago, are still clearly evident in the media today, including on Australian television during this period of research (see Chapter 3). The stereotypes coded in this study are explicitly and implicitly addressed in the UNCRPD. Article 8 of the UNCRPD discusses the need to combat stereotypes by encouraging the media to portray disabled people in a manner consistent with the wider goals of the Convention (United Nations, 2006). These social model stereotypes were selected for analysis because they are ­recognised as informing much of the research that has followed (­Ellis & Goggin, 2015; Mallett, 2009; Mitchell & Snyder, 2000; Nelson, 2000). Additionally, although they were initially developed for the UK c­ ontext, they have been used in several Australian studies (Ellis, 2008; Ellis & Goggin, 2015; Goggin & Newell, 2005). Similarly, they have been applied to different historical periods – from the 1920s to the 1970s (Baldwinson, 2012), the early 2000s (Ellis, 2008) – and in various media

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  33 forms such as photography (Baldwinson, 2012), film (Ellis, 2008), television (Nelson, 2000) and radio (O’Malley, 2009). These stereotypes also form the basis of more recent popular culture investigations of disability such as the popular www.tvtropes.org website. Addressing these stereotypes within the context of the human rights of people with disability illustrates the importance of television in achieving the goals of Article 8 of the UNCRPD in raising the awareness of the human rights of people with disability to further achieve the goals of the Convention itself. As outlined in Table 2.2, these stereotypes link to relevant articles in the UNCRPD. Approaching stereotypes in this way offers an opportunity for in-depth discussion that can be applied intertextually, intratextually and similarly to television overflow. Table 2.2  Relationship between stereotypes and UNCRPD Articles Barnes’ stereotypes

UNCRPD Article

Burden: Disabled people are helpless and must be ‘cared’ for by non-disabled people Better off dead: For disabled people death is preferable to a life with disability Unable to adjust: Disabled people are portrayed as full of self-pity while others see them as feeling sorry for themselves Empty life: For disabled people the acquisition of impairment results in the end of social life, sexual life and employment prospects

Adequate standard: The right to an adequate standard of living Right to life: Every human being has the inherent right to life Living independently: The right to live in the community, with choices equal to others,

Incidental or background character: Main characters are rarely disabled; rather, it is the supporting characters who are ‘allowed’ to be portrayed as such

Supercripple: Disabled people are linked to narratives of inspiration and overcoming. In this stereotype, the disabled person rises above their physical impairments(s) to achieve great things

Habilitation and rehabilitation: The right to attain and maintain maximum independence, full physical, mental, social and vocational ability, and full inclusion and participation in all aspects of life Purpose: Persons with disabilities include those who have long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others Definitions: Discrimination on the basis of disability means any distinction, exclusion or restriction on the basis of disability

(Continued)

34 Representation Barnes’ stereotypes

UNCRPD Article

Angry or bitter: Disabled people are portrayed as angry and bitter at becoming disabled, thereby preventing full participation

Purpose: The right to promote, protect and ensure the full and equal enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms by all persons with disabilities, and to promote respect for their inherent dignity Recognition before the law: The right to ensure that all measures that relate to the exercise of legal capacity provide for appropriate and effective safeguards to prevent abuse in accordance with international human rights law General principles: Respect for inherent dignity, individual autonomy including the freedom to make one’s own choices, and independence of persons;

Victim: Disabled people are portrayed as overly dependent people who exhibit endearing qualities designed to evoke sentimental feelings in others Ordinary: Disabled people are portrayed as ordinary members of the community, when social disablement is glossed over or negated

As discussed in the next chapter, approaching these stereotypes in concert with the UNCRPD reveals a number of impairment categories not identified during early social model theorisation. In their recent report under the UNCRPD, the Australian government addressed their ongoing work under Article 8 as focusing on supporting disability organisations to conduct awareness raising campaigns; however, no mention was made of any activities of the mainstream media (Australian Government, 2018). Yet, according to the UNCRPD, the mainstream media has an integral role in combatting stereotypes. Indeed, Barnes’ stereotypes used throughout this chapter and the next have a direct relationship with the goals of the UNCRPD.

Conclusion When Frances McDormand accepted the Oscar for Best Actress at the 2018 Academy Awards for her performance in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, she emphasised the importance of diversity in screen media, claiming ‘we all have stories to tell and projects we need financed’. She finished her rousing speech with two words, ‘inclusion rider’ (Berman, 2018). As people all over the world googled the words to find out what she meant, those in the know took to Twitter to explain. The initiative had originally been developed by Dr Stacy Smith from the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative to increase diversity in filmmaking and

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  35 television – an inclusion rider is a clause added to contracts to ensure equitable hiring practices that are reflective of the general community. For example, if actors negotiated an inclusion rider clause in their contract, then if 50 per cent of the population are female, 50 per cent of the cast and crew should be female too. While the inclusion rider initially concentrated on typical diversity indicators such as race, gender and sexuality, several disability activists have since encouraged the inclusion of disability. With 20 per cent of Western populations having a disability, an inclusion rider clause would require 20 per cent of people hired to work on a production to also have a disability. Therefore, if A-list actors demanded inclusion riders in their contracts, there would be a massive increase in diversity in screen media. However, as I have also argued throughout this chapter, it is imperative to look behind the statistics to consider the context in which characters with disability appear on television and reflect on the potential for transgressive reappropriation via both on-screen representation and online discussion. While disability media studies, and the investigation of television within this, is still called an emerging field, it is over 30 years old. New research is always appearing, making new and important contributions in both quantitative and qualitative studies. GLAAD’s inclusion of disability in its annual content analysis of diversity for example has brought significant attention to the issue, prompting other similar studies from organisations such as the R ­ uderman ­ ustralia. The Family Foundation, Diamond in the UK and Screen A Ruderman’s focus on people with disability being employed in the industry in particular is reminiscent of the earliest research in this discipline as it considered a lack of employment opportunities as directly attributing to stigma. In addition, reflecting on arguments presented by people undertaking disability media analysis since the 1980s, there are two especially compelling features to the representation of disability on television that will be explored further throughout this book. First, that the numbers are indeed unacceptably low. In this chapter, I have briefly considered the importance of content analysis to disability television studies in both the historical and contemporary sense. While early disability and television theorisation embraced content analysis and focused on the difference between the social and medical models of disability, proceeding from a Marxist perspective, this theorisation also made calls for television producers to ascribe to the social model, likewise making radical calls to overthrow the mode of production. While such an approach was useful in identifying common stereotypes of disability, the analysis must be expanded to address changes in society and to the ways these are reflected in the representation of disability on television. Second, considering the context in which characters with disability are represented on television both intertextually and intratextually illustrates the way normality is

36 Representation reproduced in culture and television. Disability, by existing outside the bounds of normality, helps to shore up these very boundaries. Representations of disability can have negative cumulative effects on audiences but they can also offer an opportunity for reflection. It is important however not to limit analysis to representation of disability within the text itself; it is also vital to expand the full circuit of culture to consider how production, consumption, regulation and identity contribute to the cultural construction of disability. As Ellcessor articulates in her framework of cultural accessibility, the analysis of disability and television must take in multiple influences, from representation to access to the creation of texts by disabled people. The next chapter will elaborate on the Screen Australian Seeing Ourselves report and Barnes’ stereotypes in the context of Article 8 to investigate the numerical incidence of disability in Australian television drama and to take into account that the full circuit of culture and disability on television involves a complex mix of representation, production, consumption, identity and regulation.

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38 Representation John, J. A. (1993). Integrating the student with a disability into student media. Paper presented at the AEJMC Interest Group on the Status of Persons with Disabilities, Kansas City. Kirpatrick, B., & Ellcessor, E. (2017). Disability media studies. New York, NY: New York University Press. Kuppers, P. (2013). Disability and contemporary performance: Bodies on edge. New York, NY: Routledge. LeBesco, K. (2006). Disability, gender and difference on The Sopranos. Women’s studies in communication, 29(1), 39–59. Lockyer, S. (2015). ‘Its really scared of disability’: Disabled comedians’ perspectives of the British television comedy industry. The Journal of Popular Television, 3(2), 179–193. Longmore, P. (1987). Screening stereotypes: Images of disabled people in television and motion pictures. In A. Gartner & T. Joe (Eds.), Images of the disabled, disabling images (pp. 65–78). New York, NY: Praeger. Mallett, R. (2009). Choosing ‘stereotypes’: Debating the efficacy of (British) disability-criticism. Journal of Research in Special Educational Needs, 9(1), 4–11. doi:10.1111/j.1471-3802.2009.01111.x Mitchell, D., & Snyder, S. (2000). Narrative prosthesis: Disability and the dependencies of discourse. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press. Nelson, J. (2000). The media role in building the disability community. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 15(3), 180–193. O’Malley, M.-P. (2009). Falling between frames: Institutional discourse and disability in radio. Journal of Pragmatics, 41(2), 346–356. doi:10.1016/j. pragma.2008.07.008 ­ etrieved Ofcom. (2018). Diversity and equal opportunities in television 2018. R from https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0021/121683/­diversityin-TV-2018-report.PDF Oliver, M. (1990). The individual and social models of disability. Paper presented at the Paper presented at Joint workshop of the Living Options Group and the research unit of the Royal College of Physicians on people with established locomotor disabilities in hospitals. Retrieved from http://­disabilitystudies.leeds.ac.uk/files/library/Oliver-in-soc-dis.pdf Popovich, M., Willis, S. C., & Blevens, F. (1988). Editing accuracy and speed by handicapped students, nonjournalism and journalism majors. Newspaper Research Journal, 10(1), 53–60. Ross, K. (1997). But where’s me in it? Disability, broadcasting and the audience. Media, Culture & Society, 19(4), 669–677. Schatz, J., & George, A. (2018). The image of disability: Essays on media representations. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company Inc. Screen Australia. (2016). Seeing Ourselves: Reflections on diversity in Australian TV drama. Retrieved from https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/getmedia/ 157b05b4-255a-47b4-bd8b-9f715555fb44/TV-Drama-Diversity.pdf Sgroi, M. (2016). ‘I should at least be given a chance to try’: The experience of media workers with disabilities in the United States during postsecondary education and early career. Disability & Society, 31(1), 64–83. doi:10.1080/ 09687599.2015.1127213 Shakespeare, T. (1999). Art and lies? Representations of disability on film. In M. Corker & S. French (Eds.), Disability discourse (pp. 164–172). ­B uckingham, England: Open University Press.

Stigma and Representation of Disability on TV  39 United Nations. (2006). Convention on the rights of persons with disabilities. Retrieved from https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/­conventionon-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities.html Walters, S. (2013). Cool aspie humor: Cognitive difference and Kenneth Burke’s comic corrective in The Big Bang Theory and Community. Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies, 7(3), 271–288, 356. Wilde, A. (2004). Are you sitting comfortably? Soap operas, disability and audience. Discover! 2. Retrieved from http://disability-studies.leeds.ac.uk/files/ library/wilde-Alison-Wilde-Dis-cover-2-Adapted-Paper.pdf Woodburn, D., & Kopić, K. (2016, July). The Ruderman White Paper on Employment of Actors with Disabilities in Television. Retrieved from http:// www.rudermanfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/TV-White-­ Paper_7-1-003.pdf Zhang, L., & Haller, B. (2013). Consuming image: How mass media impact the identity of people with disabilities. Communication Quarterly, 61(3), 319–334. doi:10.1080/01463373.2013.776988 Zonana, V. F. (1990, 22 February). Monitoring the media activist ­alliance exercises clout in fighting anti-gay images. Los Angeles Times (pre-1997 Fulltext), p. 1. ­Retrieved from https://search.proquest.com/docview/280979233?​ accountid=10382

3 Broadening Definitions A Content Analysis of Disability on Australian Television Drama

Australian bodies and national identities have been made and tested at war, on the front line, and often in opposition to a dominating and constraining British figure. As such, being victorious in war against both physical enemies and forbidding environments has become central to Australian national identity. We even celebrate our defeats. For example, the battle between the ANZACs (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) and the Ottoman army at Gallipoli Cove in April 1915 resulted in a large number of causalities, yet established a collective Australian identity which is still commemorated in media and popular culture today. These representations of Australian identity are mostly based on the concept of a strong, masculine, fighting body. As such, it is sometimes hard to imagine where – or even if – disabled images fit in, both in an historical context and also in today’s understandings of national character. This chapter therefore interrogates the role of disability in Australian national identity by drawing on a content analysis of disability in the Australian television drama genre. The analysis encompassed the six highest-rating Screen Australia-funded television drama series and one film shown on both free-to-air and subscription television throughout 2015. Although obvious representations of disability, for example, people who used wheelchairs or that had a vision or hearing impairment, were not frequently represented in these dramas selected for analysis. However, five of the series (as well as the one film) depicted historical representations and, as such, the analysis focused on any impairment effects related to wartime trauma and on contemporary Australian concerns relating to the mental health of returning soldiers at the time these dramas were made. Narratives of the returned soldier such as those explored in this analysis offer fertile grounds for both disability studies and critical trauma studies to collaborate in the production of new scholarship. The Australian television industry relies heavily on government support via Screen Australia funding. Screen Australia aims to focus on developing an Australian screen culture, that is, one with a broad national

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  41 identity and cultural diversity, including diversity in disability. The emphasis is on ensuring: … the development of a diverse range of Australian programs that deal with matters of national interest or importance to Australians, or that illustrate or interpret aspects of Australia or the life and activities of Australian people. (Australian Government, 2008) However, its success in this area has been of longstanding concern. In 2016, Screen Australia released research into the diversity of characters in Australian television drama over a 5-year period between 2011 and 2015 (Screen Australia, 2016b). The Seeing Ourselves report was a quantitative content analysis of 199 dramas undertaken along with survey research and in-depth interviews with members of the industry. Throughout the report, three areas of diversity are focused on – cultural/ racial backgrounds, sexual orientation and gender identity and disability. The research was the first of its kind in Australia and was developed in response to ongoing criticisms about the lack of cultural diversity in Australian television drama (see Table 3.1). Graeme Mason, CEO of Screen Australia, said he hoped the research would ‘empower the industry with a baseline of data that could become a springboard for change’ (Screen Australia, 2016a). The results indicate a significant lack of diversity in Australian television drama when compared to population demographics, and a particular divergence with regard to representation of people with disability. According to the report, disability is ‘very much under-represented in TV drama compared to the Australian population’ (p. 4). In the study, 71 out of a total of 1,961 main characters in 199 Australian television dramas were identifiable as having a disability (p. 15). Of these, 25 had sensory or physical disabilities and 47 had psychiatric, neurological or cognitive disabilities (p. 15). The majority, 77 per cent of these characters, appeared on the soap operas Neighbours and Home and Away. The content analysis discussed in this chapter therefore sought Table 3.1  Diversity in Australian television drama Diversity marker

Percentage of characters in television drama

Percentage of general demographic

Backgrounds other than Anglo-Celtic LGBTQI Indigenous People with disability

18%

32%

5% 5% 4%

11% 3% 18%

42 Representation to add to this critique using an in-depth consideration of the drama genre and the narratives it favoured during a 1-year period in which the broader ­Australian community was engaging with the physical and mental impairments acquired by Australian soldiers. In this way, the chapter undertakes both an intratextual and intertextual analyses to offer an in-depth discussion of disability, television and Australian national identity.

Study Outline This chapter reports on a study of disability in the highest rating Screen Australia–funded shows aired on free-to-air television in 2015 – ­C atching Milat, Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door, House of Hancock, The Doctor Blake Mysteries and Winter (Clive, 2015). That year in its ratings information, Screen Australia also gave honourable mentions to The Water Diviner, being the highest rating Australian film screened on television, and season 3 of A Place to Call Home, a high-rating drama series that had migrated from broadcast to subscription television. Across the six series and one film selected for analysis, 31 possible episodes were available for coding. As miniseries, Catching Milat, Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door and House of Hancock each had two episodes. Of the longer series, The Doctor Blake Mysteries and A Place to Call Home contained ten and eight episodes, respectively, while Winter had six. The programmes were analysed for both the frequency with which disabled characters appear and the way the characters are represented. When determining what impairment could be identified as a disability, the study, like the Screen Australia research, followed the definition of disability offered in the Australian Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) (DDA): 1 2 3 4



Total or partial loss of bodily or mental function; or Total or partial loss of a part of the body; or The presence in the body of organisms causing disease or illness; or The presence in the body of organisms capable of causing disease or illness; or 5 The malfunction, malformation or disfigurement of a part of the body; or 6 A disorder or malfunction that results in the person learning differently from a person without the disorder or malfunction; or 7 A disorder, illness or disease that affects a person’s thought processes, perceptions of reality, emotions or judgement or that results in disturbed behaviour, and includes a disability that: presently exists; or previously existed but no longer exists; or may exist in the future; or is imputed to a person. (Australian Government, 1992)

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  43 Table 3.2  Disability representations in Catching Milat Disability represented as: Category of disability according to DDA

Burden Better off dead Unable to adjust Empty life

Background character Supercripple Bitter/angry Victim Ordinary member of community

Part I

Part II

– – – 7: Detective Paul Gordon:

– – – Same as Part I

– – – – –

• Unknown mental health condition • Seeing psychologist • Nothing in life but work

– – – – –

While I acknowledge the limitations of this definition and join in calls for the DDA to be updated, it was important to use this existing definition of disability because Australians with disability must use it to establish whether they have been discriminated against under the law. However, to further assist in coding the different representations of disability seen in these programmes, specific stereotypical representations were also adapted for use based on 11 identified by Colin Barnes in his 1992 study of British television (Barnes, 1992) and listed in Table 3.2. The 25-year gap between when these stereotypes were established and our use of them in this study is also significant given our research coincides with the 25th anniversary of the DDA. The analysis also revealed new impairments that were not considered or explained by the social model in Barnes’ study.

The Dramas The highest-rating Screen Australia-funded television series in 2015 were Catching Milat, Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door, House of ­Hancock, The Doctor Blake Mysteries, A Place to Call Home, The ­Water Diviner and Winter. Except for Winter, each offers a representation of Australia during an historical period. Trauma is a key theme that traverses each drama. Catching Milat and The House of Hancock are both relatively contemporary narratives, taking place in the 1980s and 1990s, and each is based on a true story. While Catching Milat chronicles the investigation and capture of serial killer Ivan Milat, The House of Hancock offers a quasi-fictionalised representation of the Hancock

44 Representation family dynamics focusing on the relationships among mining magnate Lang Hancock, his daughter Gina and his second wife Rose. However, it is the historical dramas that reveal the greatest engagement with trauma and in each of them war is a precipitating factor. Whilst the focus of Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door is the entertainer Peter Allen and the impacts his relationships had on his rise to fame, in both The Doctor Blake Mysteries and A Place to Call Home, the psychological impact of war is seen in both main and peripheral characters. The Doctor Blake Mysteries is set in Ballarat in the late 1950s and follows the investigations of police surgeon and general medical practitioner Dr Lucien Blake. Whilst Dr Blake is frequently erratic in his behaviour, relying on alcohol to help him deal with problems, he is surrounded by a cast of characters who display disturbed behaviour, or who are suffering from the consequences of a traumatic event which affects their thought processes, their perceptions of reality, or their emotions. Likewise, in A Place to Call Home, also set in a 1950s Australian country town, the traumatic impact of war, both physical and psychological, is represented. Here, characters have flashbacks, disturbed thought processes, and altered perceptions of reality as well as physical impairments because of trauma. Finally, the one film selected for analysis The Water Diviner is the story of an Australian man searching for his three sons who did not return from Gallipoli. Across the selected texts, the most commonly represented stereotype was the disabled person as ‘bitter/angry’, of which there were 21 examples. The most commonly depicted disability or impairment as defined by the DDA across these texts was category 7, ‘A disorder, illness or disease that affects a person’s thought processes, perception of reality, emotions or judgment, or that results in disturbed behaviour’ (­Australian Government, 1992) – this was commonly shown through the effects of trauma and was a key theme throughout each drama. Indeed, there were 33 instances of this impairment across the 31 episodes. Most of the examples were found in The Doctor Blake Mysteries, A Place to Call Home, Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door and The Water Diviner. These narratives reflect contemporary concerns with the impact of war on returning soldiers and their families. See Tables 3.3–3.8 for full coding details. Catching Milat Between 1970 and the mid-1990s, serial killer Ivan Millat terrorised young tourists hitchhiking in remote areas of the Belanglo State forest in NSW. Catching Milat is a two-part miniseries that aired on Channel 7 in May 2015 chronicling the police investigation into the murders of seven backpackers and Milat’s eventual arrest. Partially funded by both Channel 7 and Screen Australia, the series focuses on Milat and

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  45 Table 3.3  Disability representations in Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door Disability represented as:

Burden Better off dead

Category of disability according to DDA Part I

Part II

– 7: George Woolnough (father):

– –

• Alcoholism • Depression • Suicide Unable to adjust Same as above Empty life – Background – character Supercripple –

Bitter / angry

Victim Ordinary member of community

7: Judy Garland (friend): • Pills • Drug overdose (accidental or deliberate?) • Angry at Liz (a rival?) 7: George Woolnough (father) 7: Judy Garland (friend) –

– – – 3: Peter: • During his final show he insists going on again and again – he has to say goodbye to his fans 3: Greg (long-term partner): • At the clinic he is initially angry and pushes Peter away – –

Detective Paul Gordon, a junior member of the taskforce assigned with his capture. The broader cultural story of serial killer Ivan Milat draws on several tropes integral to Australian national identity such as hypermasculinity, the isolating and inhospitable landscape inciting murderous insanity, and uncompromising, uncaring authoritative figures. In the Australian context, uncaring and uncompromising authority figures, driven by their own desire for success, and disregarding the mental and physical health of their subordinates, have also been a key narrative trope. In this series it is really the strained relationship among the head of the taskforce, Superintendent Clive Small, and Detective Gordon in this series which drives the narrative. Additionally, ­Gordon’s vulnerability, Small’s drive for power and control, as well as Milat’s ­hypermasculinity are often juxtaposed in this narrative. Indeed, ­Gordon’s empty life is in direct opposition to Milat’s which is full of people who love him. Where the former is introverted, the latter is extroverted.

46 Representation As Gordon is consumed by work on Christmas Eve, Milat enjoys himself at a backyard party drinking and signing karaoke with his family, and although both characters come from large families, Gordon is frequently depicted alone. While Gordon is depicted as having a ‘possible’ mental health condition, a disorder which affects his thought processes, therefore pertaining to the DDA category of 7, the incident is only alluded to so that it operates entirely as a narrative prosthesis (Mitchell & Snyder, 2000). Early in Part I, he listens to a message left on his answering machine from a psychologist confirming his appointment as he eats pizza alone in front of the television. A bravery award is on his mantelpiece. The audience is left speculating if he has been involved in some police incident that has resulted in PTSD? Indeed, while numerous characters ask Paul if he is alright, or how he is going, and he is clearly kept at arm’s length by some of the officers he works with, the viewer is never informed as to what has led to this. Throughout the narrative, the combination of Milat’s extended social and family connections and Small’s reactions to ­Gordon’s mental health conditions thwart the police investigations in this dramatised version of events – Milat evades police as the officers engage in seemingly petty squabbles. Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door Another two-part miniseries, Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door aired on Channel 7 in September 2015. Based on the book Peter Allen – The Boy from Oz by Stephen McClean, the miniseries follows the life of flamboyant entertainer Peter Allen beginning with his formative years in rural Australia through his rise to fame and Hollywood career to his death in 1992, aged 48. Several key relationships are featured throughout the series as integral in shaping Peter as a person and a performer, including those with his parents and with Judy Garland, Liza Minnelli and his long-term partner Greg Connell. The series also prompts a subtle investigation of stigma by contrasting social reactions to two ­conditions – mental illness and HIV/AIDs. Whereas both were stigmatised in the time periods in which the series is set, more recently concerted moves have been made to de-stigmatise both. Part I focuses on the DDA category 7, a disorder which affects a person’s thought process, via representations of depression, anxiety, alcoholism, drug addiction and suicide of both Peter’s father Dick Woolnough and his friend Judy Garland. Similarly, DDA category 4, the presence in the body of organisms capable of causing disease or illness, is shown via representation of HIV/AIDS and is a key theme in Part II using the characters of Greg Connell, several background characters and Peter himself. Like several other series discussed in this content analysis, Peter ­Allen: Not the Boy Next Door begins in an immediate post-war period. Peter’s father is a returned serviceman unable to cope with re-entering society

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  47 and self-medicates with alcohol. He is violent towards his wife and children and is unable to hold down a job. He is deeply ashamed that his 9-year-old son must help to support the family by performing at the local pub and refuses to watch his act. Shortly after hitting Peter, he kills himself, and following the suicide, Peter and his mother and sister are shunned from their community. As Peter goes on to develop a career in entertainment, he meets Judy Garland and forms a close friendship with her. Unlike his father, she is a high-functioning alcoholic but, like his father, she exhibits traits of anxiety and depression. There is evidence on her neck of where a tracheostomy has been made following a possible suicide attempt. Peter forms a strong bond with her daughter Liza Minnelli whom he eventually marries. Through Liza, we learn that Judy’s drug addiction goes back to her years as a child star when the studios gave her stimulants and sedatives to get her through her Hollywood commitments in the early days of her career. Liza goes on to reveal the impacts on her own childhood as she had to control Judy’s dosage by emptying the capsules and putting only half the dose back. The pair bond through their similar experience of ‘handling’ parents with drug and alcohol dependencies stemming from mental illness. After several years of marriage, the pair divorce and Part II focuses on stigma towards HIV/AIDs. The episode begins in 1992 with ­Peter exhibiting symptoms of HIV/AIDS but keeping it a secret from his family. While Part I focused on Peter’s relationship with the important women in his life, Part II focuses on the important men in his life – his longterm partner Greg who is diagnosed as HIV positive and successive managers who encourage him to hide his homosexuality to pursue a successful career in entertainment. Although Greg and Peter clash over his lack of gay politics, Greg’s illness prompts moments of tenderness and caring between the couple. However, there are also scenes of tragedy with young men in hospital with lesions on their faces, holding hands with their partners and generally looking anxious. As Peter tries to be supportive, Greg is constructed as angry and bitter, pushing him away. Greg’s disease progresses quickly, and he soon dies at home – Peter’s song Don’t Cry Out Loud plays in the background of the scene in which Peter discovers Greg has died. The lyrics reinforce Peter’s philosophy of keeping everything inside and putting on a best face – a lesson he learnt from his mother. The final episode chronicles the heights of Peter’s career. However, he also acquires HIV/AIDS and, just as he did about Greg’s illness, influenced by cultural expectations of compulsory ablebodiedness, he lies to his family and tells them that he has cancer. Whereas Greg was constructed as angry, Peter embraces the supercripple stereotype. During his last show at the Hilton Hotel in Sydney, his assistant urges him to stop giving encores as he is too ill. Peter ignores his advice as he has not said goodbye yet. Throughout his performance Peter is seen ‘overcoming’ his illness in a representation that personifies the ‘Aussie battler’ – an Australianised

48 Representation version of the supercripple. The goodbyes between Peter and his mother the following day have a tone of finality – they both know it will be the last time they see each other. As she stands on her driveway watching Peter leave in a taxi, I Still Call Australia Home plays in the background. The song continues as Peter lies in a hospital bed with Liza by his side. When his deceased lover Greg enters the room, Peter takes his last breath and the song ends. The story then enters the afterlife, with Peter and Judy Garland dancing through the Australian countryside towards a rainbow singing Peter’s ‘theme song’ Rio. The story therefore ends on a high note, remembering Peter’s life rather than his death. This ending plays into the several concepts central to disability media studies. First, the idea of inspiration is porn to which Stella Young refers in her Tedx Talk (Young, 2014) and discussed in Chapter 4. Here, Young draws the audiences’ attention to the wide range of social media memes that suggest that the only disability in life is a bad attitude. While Peter Allen obviously does not overcome AIDs and dies from the disease, he overcomes the negative emotional attitudes that were witnessed in his father. The House of Hancock The House of Hancock is a two-part miniseries that aired on Channel 9 in February 2015. Based on the book of the same name, it tells the story of the bitter feud that consumed one of Australia’s richest families for several decades. The series begins in 1967 with a young Gina Hancock enamoured with her father mining magnate Lang Hancock. Together they dream about a future Hancock family mine that will make them millionaires. The story picks up again in 1980 with Lang and Gina still close, albeit with Lang slightly overshowing Gina’s rise in the family business, yet the business is thriving and Gina is hard working and dedicated to her father. However, a series of events cause the relationship to break down – Gina meets and marries Frank Rinehart, a man 37 years her senior whom Lang disapproves of, then Hope, Lang’s wife dies. Gina, concerned for her father’s well-being, hires Rose Lascon, a housekeeper from the Philippines, to clean and prepare meals. This then sets the scene for the feud that will consume Lang for the rest of his life and Gina and Rose for several decades. There is no specific representation of disability in this series. However, several characters experience disabling effects from chronic health conditions and illnesses. For example, Hope Hancock is described as being ill since Gina was an infant, and is constructed as weak and inactive, possibly due to heart problems. Lang Hancock has heart and kidney problems and uses a walking stick and oxygen mask from time to time. Frank Rinehart has heart problems, and Rose Hancock becomes addicted to pethidine to cope with chronic back pain.

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  49 However, unlike The Sopranos’ treatment of similar conditions (discussed in the following chapter), this series uses the disabling effects of chronic illness and drug addiction as a narrative prosthesis to give depth to the three main characters. Lang and Gina are well-known personalities to Australian audiences as shrewd and uncompromising business figures, while Rose has a reputation as a flamboyant gold digger. However, Lang’s relationship with Hope, and Gina’s relationship with Frank portray their caring sides. Similarly, Rose’s experiences with Frank as he declines further into ill health prompt a sympathy for Rose who has never been considered this way in the Australian popular zeitgeist. Public sentiment towards Rose Hancock was low during the period in which this drama is set – 1980s and 1990s Australia (Table 3.4). Table 3.4  Disability representations in The House of Hancock Disability represented as:

Burden Better off dead Unable to adjust

Empty life Background character Supercripple

Bitter / angry Victim

Ordinary member of community

Category of disability according to DDA Part I

Part II

– – 7: Rose Lascon:

– – Same as Part I

• Addiction to pain killers • Unable to cope with back pain and migraines

– 5: Hope Hancock:

– Same as Part I

• Heart problems • Ill since Gina an infant 5: Lang Hancock:

Same as Part I

• Heart problems • Playing tennis when has first heart attack, seen struggling to get  upstairs when Hope dies, walks  with a stick

– 5: Lang Hancock:

– Same as Part I

• His wife and daughter arguing over Lang while he was alive and when he was dead 5: Frank Rinehart:

Same as Part I

• Heart problems • Mentions his heart problem near the beginning but until his death from a heart attack we do not see or hear it mentioned again

50 Representation The Doctor Blake Mysteries (Season 3) The third season of The Doctor Blake Mysteries, set in late 1950s ­Ballarat, follows the eccentric police surgeon Dr Lucien Blake as he solves crimes in unconventional ways. The series explores social issues relevant during both the 1950s and contemporary Australia such as women in the workforce, the displacement of indigenous people, police brutality, war time fear of the other, and the generational changes post-war. The principle character, Dr Blake, has returned from World War II where he had been a prisoner of war (POW) in Thailand. The experiences of being a POW, and the loss of both his wife and daughter, continue to haunt him and account for his excessive alcohol consumption. He is supported each week by his housekeeper, Mrs Jean Beazley, herself a war widow, and his lodgers district nurse Mattie O’Brien and Police Sergeant ­Charlie Davis. While he has strong interdependent relationships with these three characters, his unorthodox methods see him at odds with senior police. Throughout the season, his working relationship with the new police superintendent, Superintendent Munroe, becomes increasingly strained as the superintendent investigates him for communist alliances and Blake himself become obsessed with solving the 40-year-old murder of his own mother (Table 3.5). Given both the period in which the series is set immediately follows World War II and the visual nature of the television medium, it is somewhat surprising that physical disability is almost entirely absent in this series. Superintendent Munroe, who is frequently depicted as bitter and angry, is perhaps the closest example of a representation of physical disability when it comes up in conversation that Munroe was prevented from joining the war effort because of a shoulder injury. Contrasted with Munroe in one episode is Roy, a character with a chronic back condition unable to work. While Roy was seen fighting with a man later discovered murdered, he is ultimately found not to be the culprit. However, Roy is looked down upon and humiliated by Superintendent Monroe perhaps as a way to negate his own emasculation. Several characters throughout the season exhibit chronic health conditions, including heart arrhythmia, psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis and asthma. However, each condition is used as a narrative prosthesis or Hitchcockian MacGuffin to throw investigators off the case due to the stereotypical reactions they incite. For example, a young waiter with psoriasis is suspected of poisoning a theatre performer because he wears gloves and is quiet and reserved, while Dr Blake is able to solve a murder of a talented young athlete when he discovers the boy had a heart condition and his father had been giving him steroids so that his son could achieve his own failed sporting goals. Finally, the disabling impacts of mental health conditions and the effects of trauma are explored in depth through characters who have anxiety and depression. Dr Blake himself is a somewhat mysterious

Table 3.5  Disability representations in The Doctor Black Mysteries (series 3) Disability Category of disability according to DDA represented as: Episode 1

Episode 2

Episode 3

Episode 4

Episode 5

Episode 6

Episode 7 Episode 8

–

–

–

–

1: Clarrie

–

Better off dead – Unable to – adjust

– 7: Ruth Dempster

– –

– –

5: Stewart White – –

– –

– 7: Anna Baker

Empty life

–

–

–

–

–

–

Background character Supercripple

–

7: Ruth Dempster –

7: Claire Llewellyn – 7: Edward Tyneman 7: Dr Blake –

–

5: Roy Quinn –

1: Clarrie

–

–

4 & 5: Dennis and Herbert Goodman 5: Herbert Goodman

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

7: Ruth Dempster

1: Winston Cummings

7: Sergeant Nelson

–

7: Anna Baker

7: Edward Tyneman

Victim

–

–

–

–

–

–

5: Jean Beazley (Blake’s housekeeper)

–

5: Stewart White –

–

Ordinary member of community

5: Superintendant Munroe 5: Georgie Bromley –

–

–

–

Burden

Bitter / angry

52 Representation character who only hints towards his trauma, yet he is shown throughout the series as becoming increasingly dependent on alcohol, including to get through the work day, while feeling estranged from his daughter who has resurfaced in China. As such, while in many ways, Dr Blake ascribes to the eccentric detective trope seen in popular television crime dramas, his characterisation is uniquely tied to the Australian context of war trauma and a rapidly changing society. Winter Winter is a spin-off series from the film The Killing Field, which follows Detective Sergeant Eve Winter as she investigates a serial killer in a NSW country town. In The Killing Field, there is a clear indication that Winter suffers from PTSD; however, there is no mention of this in Winter, so viewers who had not seen the film nor the trailer for the series would have no knowledge of this having been a part of her history. Winter focuses on Eve’s investigation of the murder of 23-year-old mother and housewife Karly Johansson in Rocky Point, a fishing town south of Sydney. Detective Winter’s colleague Detective Inspector Lachlan ­Mackenzie believes the case is linked to one of his cold cases, a murder that occurred in the same town 8 years earlier. Connections are also made to a hit and run accident injuring Karly’s one-time foster sister Indy who now has amnesia. As the series progresses, the murder plot is complicated by a federal investigation into a human trafficking and prostitution ring. Representations of illness and disability are conflated in Winter. In the first episode, we learn that the murdered woman’s parents moved out of the family home when her father, Bjorn Johannsson, was diagnosed with cancer and the property became too big for them to manage. This is described as an illness by his wife, but Bjorn does not appear in this episode. He appears in the next episode at Karly’s funeral in a specially adapted vehicle with a hoist for his wheelchair. He is being lowered out of the vehicle and assisted by an unknown man. He looks small in the wheelchair and is jerking and twitching invoking images of the ‘better off dead’ stereotype, particularly as the detectives surveilling the scene remark ‘have they got a coffin ready for him’. Later at the wake, he comments that he will see his daughter soon enough as he has only been given 2 weeks to live. Over the following episodes, Bjorn becomes increasingly weak, angry, bitter and pathetic until we learn that he raped both Indy ­ auren and Karly’s sister Lauren when they were teenagers. In fact, it was L who killed Karly to prevent the secret coming out that her son was fathered by her own father. In light of the rape, Bjorn’s cancer is reframed as a punishment, an outward manifestation of his inner corruption. This disability trope has a long history – it can be found as far back as Greek mythology where Oedipus blinds himself for his incestuous relationship with his mother, or in Shakespeare where Richard III’s physical deformity is seen as an outward manifestation of his evil character (Table 3.6).

Table 3.6  Disability representations in Winter Disability Category of disability according to DDA represented as: Episode 1

Episode 2

Burden Better off dead

– –

Unable to adjust Empty life Background character Supercripple

Bitter / angry Victim Ordinary member of community

Episode 4

Episode 5

Episode 6

– –

– –

– –

5: Luke Thomson – –

– – 3: Bjorn – Johannsson (father) – 5: Luke Thomson – – – –

–

–

–

– –

– –

– –

–

–

7: Eve Winter

1: Detective Inspector Lachlan Mackenzie:

–

–

Episode 3

–

• Shot • In hospital

3: Bjorn 3: Bjorn – – Johannsson Johannsson (father) (father) 1: Indy Hope – 1: Indy Hope 1: Indy Hope 1: Indy Hope (foster sister) (foster (foster sister) (foster sister) sister) – – – – –

7: Lauren Macintyre (sister) 7: Lauren Macintyre (sister) –

54 Representation A Place to Call Home (season 3) Set in Inverness, a fictional regional Australian town A Place to Call Home is another post World War II period drama. However, this series offers more of an investigation of the potential for a new life in Australia in contrast to the focus on changing social mores in The Doctor Blake Mysteries. Also in its third season in 2015, A Place to Call Home centres on Sarah Adams, a nurse who returns to Australia after 20 years in ­Europe. Sarah converted from Catholocism to Judaism when she married a French Jewish doctor, René, in Europe during her War deployment. She suffered great atrocities during the war and when she first returns to Australia she believes her husband to be dead and embarks on a relationship with wealthy widower George Bligh. However, during series two, she discovers her husband to be alive but deeply physically and psychologically affected by the war. Season 3 begins with René living with Sarah in Inverness but still suffering from the trauma he experienced during the war. Again, there is little representation of physical disability in A Place to Call Home, when it does appear it is something that happens to the lower classes. For example, aside from Sarah’s husband René who is consistently depicted as a burden, characters with disability come in the form of background characters such as men attending the returned servicemen leagues events or homelessness shelters. These men make Elizabeth Bligh, matriarch of the Bligh family, feel uncomfortable and uncertain about embarking on a future away from her family. Conversely, both George and Elizabeth Bligh are shown throughout the season recovering from serious injury and illness but can rely on their contacts and money to ensure a good recovery through the best possible healthcare money can buy (Table 3.7). The Water Diviner The Water Diviner is an historical war drama set in the aftermath of World War I. Joshua Connor, an Australian farmer whose three sons did not return from Gallipoli, travels to Turkey to find their graves following his wife’s suicide. While the British and Australian military attempt to thwart his search, he meets several locals who encourage him, including a Turkish woman, Ayshe, whose husband also died at Gallipoli. After much searching, he finds the graves of two of his sons and discovers that his oldest son Arthur is alive but deeply traumatised by his experience of war. The film, Russell’s Crowe’s directorial debut, contemplates the traumatic effects of war at a national and individual level. Crowe as Connor is the quintessential Australian man channelling his emotions into action. Throughout the film, he is shown both in flashbacks and in the current period to have a deep connection with his sons and to the land.

Table 3.7  Disability representations in A Place to Call Home (series 3) Disability Category of disability according to DDA represented as: Episode 1

Episode 2

7 & 5: René (Sarah’s husband) –

Same as – Episode 1 – –

–

Unable to adjust

–

–

–

–

Empty life Background character Supercripple Bitter / angry

– –

– –

– 7 & 5: René (Sarah’s husband) 1: George Bligh (Sarah’s partner) –

– –

– 7: RSL men – –

– 7: RSL men – –

7: Sarah

–

–

–

5: Peg – (Sarah’s aunt)

Burden Better off dead

Victim Ordinary member of community

Episode 3

Episode Episode 4 5 –

Episode 6

Episode 7

Episode 8

Episode Episode 9 10

Same as Same as Same as – – Episode 1 Episode 1 Episode 1 – – – 7 & 5: René (Sarah’s – husband): –

7 & 5: René (Sarah’s husband) – – – 5: RSL man 7: Maid – – – 7 & 5: René (Sarah’s husband) 7 & 5: René – (Sarah’s husband) – –

–

–

– –

• René’s surgery

– –

–

–

– –

– –

– –

– –

– –

– 5: Boy at hospital – –

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

56 Representation By comparison, his wife Lizzy is consumed with emotion, grief and ­ epression, to the point she is completely detached from reality. Her d grief ultimately leads her to suicide. Whereas Lizzy’s grief drives her to depression and ultimately suicide, Connor is driven to act. He travels to Turkey to find his sons so that he can bury them with their mother. Several minor characters appear throughout the film to demonstrate the devastating effects of war on minds and bodies. A soldier with an amputated leg is at Lizzy’s funeral and in Turkey there is a shot of a man on the beach with severe burns on his back. Ayshe, the woman Connor meets in Turkey, cares for her elderly father, who has dementia. He is in the film only a handful of times; however, in each scene he appears disorientated and confused. Other characters in the film have conversations about him, giving some insight into this dementia as an atmospheric narrative choice within the film. As Ayshe’s late husband’s brother urges her to become his second wife, he tells her that her father was wrong about the world and she cannot pretend to be a European, that she should follow Muslim traditions. Later, Ayshe tells Connor that her father encouraged her to defy her mother’s arranged marriage for her and instead marry for love (Table 3.8). The most significant representation of the disabling impacts of trauma however is Connor’s oldest son Arthur whom he comes to discover is alive having been taken prisoner. Connor has recurring dreams Table 3.8  Disability representations in The Water Diviner Disability represented as:

Category of disability according to DDA

Burden

7: Ayshe’s father:

Better off dead Unable to adjust

• Dementia – 7: Lizzie (Joshua’s wife):

Empty life Background character

• Cannot adjust after losing her boys in war • Angry at her husband for being able to find water but not their sons 1 & 7: Arthur (Joshua’s son): • Injury to leg and PTSD – 2: Soldier at Lizzie’s funeral:

Supercripple Bitter / angry Victim Ordinary member of community

• Lost a leg 5: Soldier on the beach: • Burns – 7: Lizzie (Joshua’s wife) – –

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  57 of Arthur dancing amongst a group of men in a church. There is a stick on the ground near him suggesting a leg injury. Later, when Connor finds his son in the church, he appears subdued, vulnerable, apologetic and afraid. His mental trauma becomes evident as he explains to his father that one of his brothers survived the attack that killed the third brother but that he bled out for hours, cried for their mother and begged Arthur to kill him. Arthur did and explained to his father that is why he could never go home. He believes he does not deserve a place in society after what he did in war. Arthur limps when he runs as they leave the church. The physical impairment works within the visual screen language to communicate Arthur’s mental progress. Connor is ultimately able to convince Arthur to come home. When they return to Ayshe’s hotel in Istanbul 3 weeks later, Arthur has acquired a more robust walking stick, and both men are clean shaven and have new clothes. These new clothes signal towards both men’s readiness to re-enter society with their outward appearance reflecting their inner feelings. As Connor goes to profess his love to Ayshe, Arthur is led upstairs by a woman, suggesting he is no longer punishing himself for the death of his brothers. While the film offers a sensitive, albeit largely fictionalised, examination of Australia’s experiences of trauma at Gallipoli, it has been criticised for ignoring the Armenian genocide which took place in Turkey the same year as the battle of Gallipoli (Dawson, 2015; O’hehir, 2015). A social media boycott was organised and garnered 15,000 likes on ­Facebook. The boycott suggested ignoring this genocide was akin to setting a film in Germany during World War II and ignoring the Holocaust, then releasing the film on ‘Yom HaShoah, the annual Jewish day of remembrance’ (O’hehir, 2015). While these critiques are beyond the scope of this chapter, Crowe’s defence that the film is about ‘an Australian man who travels to Turkey at a certain time and has X experiences, none of which crosses over to [the Armenian genocide]’ (Dawson, 2015) offers a telling insight into the film’s focus on Australian cultural identity.

Discussion Some of the common themes and attitudes that traverse the series discussed here include a disrespect for authority, a nostalgia for less complicated times, triumph over adversary (the Aussie battler), a beautiful but punishing landscape, and trauma because of social upheaval or war. The series also hail back to a period of Australian filmmaking during the 1970s when the Australian government heavily invested in ­re-establishing an Australian national cinema via the activities of the Australian Film Commission (AFC). The government support led to a unique genre of filmmaking, the so-called AFC genre. These films were often adapted from novels or plays, featured period settings, and were driven by clearly

58 Representation recognisable ‘Australian’ characters. Dermody and Jacka suggest that the conventions of the AFC genre films were so obvious that filmmakers followed protocols including voice-overs, scenic landscapes and period settings (Dermody & Jacka, 1987). These films tended to represent the past in nostalgic terms and fitted neatly into the Australian content requirements. Prior to this period of filmmaking, little production had taken place in Australia – consequently, if an Australian film could not secure funding from the AFC it did not get made. Similarly, the Screen Australian-funded programming discussed in this chapter also acknowledge this time in Australian national identity as constructed through screen culture, using nostalgia to deal with contemporary concerns. For example, these programmes feature multiple representations of the returned soldier and, although set during historical periods, offer a reflection of the social context of mid-2010s ­Australia. Australian troops began to be withdrawn from Afghanistan in 2015 and the period 2014–2018 marks the centenary of the ANZAC legend in Australia – an event widely remembered across the country. Alongside this festival of commemoration and celebration, Australians began to question the mythological status of the ANZAC in ­Australian culture. For example, Paul Daley questions the Australian national identity outlined earlier in this chapter, particularly as it manifests in popular culture as tough, fearless and egalitarian soldiers, arguing that it ‘denies our soldiers a rounded human complexion with its capacity to accommodate courage and cowardice, compassion and cruelty, stoicism and vulnerability’ (Daley, 2010, pp. 46–47). Similarly, John Bale, the cofounder of the veteran support agency Solider On, urges a shift in focus from commemorating a century old war to assisting today’s returning soldiers as they experience debilitating health effects following their service (Bale, 2016). This focus on the effects of war on returned soldiers has been the subject of several recent Australian inquiries. In 2009, the Review of mental health care in the ADF and transition through discharge report (also known as the Dunt report) recommended that a prevalence survey of mental health conditions in the ADF be carried out as a high priority (Recommendation 12.1) (Dunt, 2009). Another report, the Mental health in the Australian Defence Force 2010 ADF mental health prevalence and wellbeing report, compared the prevalence of mental health disorders in the ADF with those in the general community (McFarlane, Hodson, Van Hooff, & Davies, 2011). The report found that while the overall rates of mental health disorders in the ADF were similar to the Australian community, the rates of anxiety disorders, PTSD and depression were significantly higher (p. xiv). In 2015, the senate began an inquiry into the mental health of ADF personnel who had returned from overseas deployment. The report was published in March 2016 and recommended, among other things, annual mental health checks,

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  59 counselling services to be extended to include all current and former members of the ADF and their immediate families, and that trained mentors assist veterans through the transition process to return to the general community. These recommendations are in some way reflected in the outcomes for the characters experiencing mental health concerns in the Screen Australia series under discussion here – those who are able to make the strongest connections to personal relationships and professional pursuits are the most successfully reintegrated into society. We can use this analysis to therefore make some intersections between critical disability studies and critical trauma studies. Disability studies challenge the view of disability as an individual deficit or defect that can be remedied solely through medical intervention, and rather sets out to explore the social construction of disability. This content analysis revealed impairment of the mind as the most commonly represented disability in the most popular Screen Australia-funded television drama on Australian television in 2015. However, early proponents of the social model of disability elected to exclude any disability other than physical disability in their original manifesto (Union Of The Physically Impaired Against Segregation, 1976). Such a focus led to certain aspects of disabled living, and certain types of impairment including psychological trauma, being ignored, minimised or overlooked. The ‘denial of pain and loss in much work of disability studies’ has seen several theorists ‘argue for a merger with trauma studies’ (Torrell, 2016). There is now a significant call from within disability studies to re-evaluate the dominance of the social model of disability and to, in some way, return to the body (­Davidson, 2016). These themes also appeared frequently across the television samples discussed in this chapter. Indeed, narratives of the returned solider are ideally positioned at the intersection of disability and trauma studies and, while soldiers continue to return from conflict zones with various physical traumas, it is those with PTSD that are of particular interest at the intersections of critical disability and critical trauma studies (Slater, 2017). The most popular Screen Australia-funded programming of 2015 has taken up these concerns via representations of flashbacks, decreased social interactions, reckless behaviour, sleep disturbances, distressing emotions and feelings of self-blame. Moving Beyond the Medical v Social Model Although critical disability studies is still often described as an emerging field and the theorisation of disability in the media, especially so, there has been some recent moves to expand the field of analysis beyond the limitations of the social model. For example, early scholarship approached media as ascribing to either a social or medical model of

60 Representation disability, with critical disability scholars arguing for recognition that disability arose not from the body but from the social and cultural barriers to society. Critical disability in seeking to challenge the view of disability as an individual defect that can be remedied solely through medical intervention, positioned disability not within the individual body but rather in the social environment, the physical barriers disabled people experience in accessing their communities and the stigmatising attitudes they frequently encounter. As a result, critical disability studies seek to explore the social, political, cultural and economic factors that define disability and interrogate the way in which these are represented across time and place. The taxonomy of stereotypes Barnes discusses arises, in part, from these attitudes. However, in 2008, Tobin Siebers urged disability studies to ‘develop a theory of complex embodiment’ as a way to raise awareness about socially created environmental limitations but to recognise also that ‘chronic pain, secondary health effects, and aging, derive from the body’ (Siebers, 2008, p. 25) and can have a disabling impact. Similarly, Allegra Stout and Ariel Schwartz (2014) questioned the on-going separation of the medical and social model in light of the fact many people with a disability actively move between both models in their everyday life for example by seeking treatment or a cure for their disabling illness or chronic condition yet remaining active in society. These calls to develop a theory of complex embodiment are particularly pertinent to a consideration of trauma within disability studies. Due to the focus on social disablement, the effects of trauma remain under-theorised in disability studies (Kafer, 2016). Reflecting on his experience of PTSD, Michael Davidson likewise argues that it is time to re-evaluate the emphasis on the social model in disability studies, particularly with reference to the experience of trauma, stating: … [t]he argument that disability is not lodged in the individual but in social barriers to full inclusion now seems a rather blunt instrument for describing the wide spectrum of disability experiences (Davidson, 2016, p. 434) An awareness that the medical and social model are entwined, and that disability frequently arises from, or is associated with, a traumatic incident that leaves a physical and emotional imprint on the body will enable us to re-think disability media analysis. This return to the body within disability studies has the potential to prove useful when examining representations of disability on television particularly when they intersect with trauma. Given the high incidence of disability as a result of trauma in the television series examined in this chapter, recent calls to integrate an awareness of trauma studies into our understanding of disability and the way in which it is represented are of vital importance.

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  61

Conclusion The Screen Australia Act stipulates a mandate to fund television dramas that reflect the diversity of Australian society and explore key social concerns. However, a content analysis conducted by Screen Australia itself discovered an abysmal focus on diversity over a 5-year period. Indeed, when it came to disability, only 4 per cent of characters had a disability as defined by the DDA, in contrast to an estimated 18 per cent of the population. In response to this statistic, this chapter reported findings of a content analysis of the representations of disability on the most popular Screen A ­ ustralia-funded television dramas aired during 2015 – Catching Milat, Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door, House of Hancock, The Doctor Blake Mysteries, Winter, The Water Diviner and A Place to Call Home. The dramas tended to ascribe to an AFC genre style of filmmaking, being set in historical periods against beautiful yet haunting landscapes. While representations of disability as they are typically understood within critical disability studies which focus on physical impairment were notably absent from each drama, the seventh category mentioned in the DDA – ‘A disorder, illness or disease that affects a person’s thought processes, perception of reality, emotions or judgment, or that results in disturbed behaviour’ – was represented in each. Trauma therefore emerges as a key concern in Australian representations of disability on television during the period of analysis. Perhaps this is because at the time these dramas were produced and aired, the Australian society and governments were engaging in policy discussions around how best to support the mental health of returning soldiers. This discussion took place at the same time as the 100-year anniversary of the failed attempt by the ANZACs to take Gallipoli during World War I. This chapter concludes by joining calls for disability studies to return to the body via an investigation of the ‘disabling sociocultural and personal impacts of ableism’ (Derby, 2014) via a productive conversation with critical trauma studies. The following chapter extends the discussion of representations of both disability and trauma via the online video format focusing on Netflix, TEdx and web series formats.

References Australian Government. (1992). Disability Discrimination Act. Commonwealth Consolidated Acts. Retrieved from http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/ consol_act/dda1992264/ Australian Government. (2008). Screen Australia Act. Retrieved from https:// www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2008A00012 Bale, J. (2016, April 25). Anzac Day 2016: Spending on centenary is ignoring needs of recent veterans, opinion. Retrieved from http://www.theaustralian. com.au/opinion/anzac-day-2016-spending-on--centenary-is-ignoring-needsof-recent-veterans/news-story/567f5107cc4dc2b8d5f442300fd2bf37

62 Representation Barnes, C. (1992). Disabling imagery and the media: An exploration of the principles for media representations of disabled people. Retrieved from http://www. leeds.ac.uk/disability-studies/archiveuk/Barnes/disabling%20imagery.pdf Clive, F. (2015, 22 December). Top-rating TV drama in 2015.  ­Retrieved from https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/sa/screen-news/2015/12-22-top-ratingtv-drama-in-2015 Daley, P. (2010). ANZAC: Endurance, truth, courage and mythology. Meanjin, 69(3), 10. Davidson, M. (2016). Cripping consensus: Disability studies at the intersection. American Literary History, 28(2), 433–453. doi:10.1093/alh/ajw008 Dawson, A. (2015, 20 April). Russell Crowe makes directorial debut with ‘­Diviner’. Retrieved from http://frontrowfeatures.com/features/film-features/ russell-crowe-makes-directorial-debut-with-diviner-11598.html Derby, J. (2014). Violent video games and the military: Recruitment, training, and treating mental disability. Art Education, 67(3), 19–25. doi:10.1080/00 043125.2014.11519269 Dermody, S., & Jacka, E. (1987). The screening of Australia volume II. ­Melbourne, VIC: Currency Press. Dunt, D. (2009). Review of the mental health care in the ADF and ­transition through discharge. Retrieved from https://www.dva.gov.au/sites/default/files/ files/consultation%20and%20grants/healthstudies/­ReviewofMentalHealth1 May2009.pdf Kafer, A. (2016). Un/Safe Disclosures: Scenes of Disability and Trauma. Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies, 10(1), 1–20. doi:10.3828/ jlcds.2016.1 McFarlane, A. C., Hodson, S. E., Van Hooff, S. E., & Davies, C. (2011). Mental health in the Australian Defence Force: 2010 ADF Mental Health and ­Wellbeing Study: Full report. Retrieved from http://www.defence.gov.au/ Health/DMH/Docs/1MHPWSreport-Frontmatter.pdf Mitchell, D., & Snyder, S. (2000). Narrative prosthesis: Disability and the dependencies of discourse. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press. O’hehir, A. (2015, 21 April). What Armenian genocide? “The Water Diviner” Ruissell Crowe’s disgraceful Turkish fantasy. Retrieved from https://www. salon.com/2015/04/21/what_armenian_genocide_“the_water_diviner”_­ russell_crowes_disgraceful_turkish_fantasy/ Screen Australia. (2016a, 24 August). Milestone study of diversity on television released. Retrieved from https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/sa/media-centre/ news/2016/08-24-study-of-diversity-on-tv-released Screen Australia. (2016b). Seeing ourselves: Reflections on diversity in ­Australian TV drama. Retrieved from https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/­getmedia/157b0 5b4-255a-47b4-bd8b-9f715555fb44/TV-Drama-Diversity.pdf Siebers, T. (2008). Disability theory. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Slater, M. (2017). A quiet conflict: Post-traumatic stress disorder. In M. J­ arman, L. Monaghan, & A. Quaggin (Eds.), Barriers and belonging: Personal narratives of disability (pp. 163–168). Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. Stout, A., & Schwartz, A. (2014). It’ll grow organically and naturally: The reciprocal relationship between student groups and disability studies on college campuses. Disability Studies Quarterly, 34(2). Retrieved from doi:10.18061/ dsq.v34i2

Analysis of Disability on Australian TV Drama  63 Torrell, M. R. (2016). Interactions: Disability, trauma, and the autobiography. Life Writing, 13(1), 87–103. doi:10.1080/14484528.2016.1129572 Union of The Physically Impaired Against Segregation. (1976, 9 August). ­M ission statement. Retrieved from http://disability-studies.leeds.ac.uk/files/ library/UPIAS-UPIAS.pdf Young, S. (2014). I’m not your inspiration, thank you very much. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/stella_young_i_m_not_your_inspiration_thank_ you_very_much/transcript?language=en

4 Culturally Accessible Online Video Bringing Television’s Sharedness Online

As discussed in the previous chapter, Screen Australia-funded television dramas do not have a good track record when it comes to diversity. In the case of disability, the Screen Australia report – titled Seeing ­ourselves – claims only 4 per cent of main characters on broadcast television identified as having a disability (Screen Australia, 2016), a low percentage compared to the general population figure of 18 per cent (ABS, 2013). The report also claims that diverse producers are not pitching to traditional broadcasters at all, due to a real or perceived lack of diversity. However, while their analysis focuses on broadcast television, the same report also signals the impacts of online content, in particular the potential for both audiences and producers to seek out this format as an avenue for greater diversity: Many people we spoke to suggested that online was much more diverse in terms of practitioners, content and the kinds of audiences they can build around content that may not be perceived as ‘broad’ enough for network television, at least initially. (Screen Australia, 2016, p. 24) An earlier Screen Australia report also suggests more people are turning to online video to access television (Screen Australia, 2014). However, online video is a very broad category, yet which particular sections the Seeing ourselves report encompasses is never clearly defined – it could be taken to mean Netflix or another video-on-demand site such as STAN, or possibly even web series or other forms of participatory online video. Although unlikely in the context of Screen Australia’s report, the term online video could also refer to Technology, Entertainment and Design (TED) talks that are shared via social media. However, for many, these platforms might not strictly be considered as television. This brings up another underlying question of this book – what is television and how can disability studies integrate broadening understandings of this medium in its analysis of disability? As such, this chapter uses case studies of three distinct online video formats – Netflix, TED talks and web series – to explore the role of online video in the

Culturally Accessible Online Video  65 context of disability and digital television cultures, focusing on three underlying themes. Firstly, the ways these representations can offer alternative images of disability and, secondly, how they are able to critique problematic and one-dimensional approaches to disability representation on television. Lastly, the chapter explores the way online video is able to provide an opportunity to reimagine disability within television cultures in a culturally accessible way. Additionally, this chapter continues the approach taken throughout the book that disability analysis of television must move beyond textuality and content analysis to consider other influences such as the regulatory environment, local distribution models and audiences’ use of spreadable media. The chapter begins by reflecting on the changing approach to notions of sharedness and risk in the contemporary television environment before moving on to three specific case studies of online video – Netflix, TED talks and web series. The aforementioned case studies are then outlined which, in recognition of the global nature of online video distribution, cover both local and international productions. Each has had an impact, both on the representation of disability on television and within the Australian disability community or the wider local and international media sphere by contributing to the broader discourse of disability. The first case study begins with a discussion of Netflix and the ways this platform has contributed to recasting disability within a culturally accessible television landscape. The focus is Nanette, an ­Australian comedy show that became a Netflix special and therefore worldwide sensation. Through a focus on social justice and critiquing problematic institutions, Nanette and Netflix have reinvigorated and redefined the ‘sharedness’ of television. Continuing this theme, the chapter moves to a case study of the TED talk phenomena, focusing on Stella Young’s 2014 TEDx I’m Not Here for Your Inspiration Thank You Very Much and the influence it has had on the Australian disability community as articulated to me during interviews with this community. The impact of this video is also evident in the third case study, a key group of disability web series including My Gimpy Life, as they both critique existing television representations and offer new ones that display an understanding of the way disability is socially and culturally constructed.

Television’s Sharedness Writing in 2000, John Ellis identified three stages of television – scarcity, plenty and, at the time of his writing at the turn of the millennium, infinite choice. These three eras also saw a progression of programming, from definitive and targeted towards a mass audience (a characteristic of broadcasting) to targeting niche audiences with choice, diversity and a working through of ideas (characteristic of narrowcasting) (Ellis, 2000). Whereas broadcasting relies on advertising as their source of revenue,

66 Representation narrowcasters’ profits derive from subscriptions. In addition, the broadcasting model is often described as targeting the ‘lowest common denominator’ which in turn has resulted in a bias against minority group interests (Chae & Flores, 1998). The more recent introduction of fast and ubiquitous broadband – prompting broadcasters and audiences to embrace time-shifting television such as video-on-demand and online streaming services as well as app-based content such as online video – has seen television enter a fourth period of transformation, that of accelerated infinite choice. As Phil Napoli explains: ….we find ourselves in an environment of unprecedented abundance, with the constraints associated with the storage and exhibition capacity limits of traditional bookstores, record stories, movie theatres, and cable systems replaced with the expansive menus of Amazon, iTunes, Netflix, digital cable, and the Web. …Their significance if further ­enhanced …. by another key characteristic of the contemporary media environment—the extent to which it provides audiences with a variety of tools for navigating this landscape of increased choice. (Napoli, 2011) In an attempt to understand the relationship between the industrial practices of video-on-demand providers such as Netflix and Amazon and those of traditional network television, Michael Wayne argues, ‘although rumours of TV’s demise have been greatly exaggerated, it is difficult to deny significant industry-wide shifts are reshaping American television as a medium and as a cultural form’ (Wayne, 2018, pp. 1–2). While Wayne refers to the USA, similar cultural impacts are also taking place in ­Australia. This has also led to change from a disability perspective. As discussed throughout this book, this new television environment is characterised by binge-watching and the personalisation of devices, both of which hold significant potential for people with disability wanting to engage with television. As discussed in Chapters 6 to 9, this personalisation has created opportunities for features such as captions and audio description to become more widely available and, in turn, for television to be more widely accessible. This fourth period has also seen a marked impact on the representation of disability, with producers now seeking to attract niche audiences through high-quality prestige productions and subscription platforms. However, these rapid technological shifts, while embraced by many, have also been linked to predictions of television’s ultimate demise. Such predictions had been surfacing from time to time, beginning in the 1980s when VHS technology first enabled time-shifting viewing. However, a decade later, despite the studios’ initial resistance to the DVD box set, people began to not only time-shift but also binge-watch, although it was not until Netflix moved from DVD mail order to streaming platforms in 2007 that binge-watching became an entrenched viewing practice.

Culturally Accessible Online Video  67 This shifting environment has prompted researchers to question whether television is dying or if it is in fact merely changing and integrating with new technologies. As Elihu Katz explains: … is television really dying? For the television some of us knew in the 1960s and 1970s, the answer is yes. The television of ‘sharedness’ – of nation-building and family togetherness – is no longer with us, having made room for a television of hundreds of channels, of ‘niche’ broadcasting, of portability, one that is part of a system that integrates with the Internet and the other new media. One might say that television is retracing the footsteps of radio, which, miniaturised and modulated, has now become everyman’s personal companion, where, to exaggerate, no two people are attending the same program at the same time. These are changes in technology and contact. They are accompanied by the collapse of public regulation in the maze of technological change and commercial investment along with changes in content reflecting a public opinion that has turned against the professionals who claimed to know, better than we do, what’s good. (Katz, 2009, p. 6) In an attempt to ‘help to reinvigorate our awareness about the resilience and the adaptability to change of an old medium that “has been and is always becoming”’ (Newcomb, 1996, p. XIX quoted in Buonanno, 2016), the open access journal Media and Communication devoted an entire issue debating these predictions in 2016. While most papers rejected the notion, they did agree that television had undergone a startling transformation – the hold of the old studios has declined and so too the hold of broadcasters to determine what gets on screen, when, where, and how it is watched has loosened. What has changed is the way in which television is being delivered and who has control over how it is received. For people with disability, this affords both opportunities and challenges, particularly in the two key areas of focus in this book – ­access and representation. For example, the digitisation of television has seen a rise in narrowcasting or the targeting of programming to niche/specialised audiences. Returning to Ellis’ television eras, the era of plenty was characterised by pay television taking risks and commissioning programming that would appeal to a small but dedicated audience. HBO picking up The Sopranos after Fox, CBS and ABC had all passed on it is often held up as an example of this. The Sopranos is an example of ‘quality’ television, a type of television programming characterised by audience loyalty: … ‘quality’ series – especially dramas – typically demand a commitment to their detailed and constantly evolving stories from week to week, season to season. (DeFino, 2013)

68 Representation Significantly, the representation of disability in The Sopranos constantly evolved from week to week, season to season. A significant number of characters with disability were included in this show and given storylines that present disability as something everyone will have experience with, as Kathleen LeBesco explains: Characters exist with cancer, stroke, Borderline Personality Disorder, food poisoning, developmental disabilities, depression, panic attacks, Epstein-Barr disease. Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, sore backs, gunshot wounds to the spleen, Attention Deficit Disorder, low vision, heroin addiction, learning disabilities, obesity, amputated legs, and other conditions that are feared or reviled to different degrees in everyday life. On the show, they’re mostly just another fact of life-except, of course, when they are faked. With its sharp writing and masterful acting, The Sopranos makes physical limitation, loss of ability, distance from body ideals, and pain comprehensible to its audience. This accomplishment brings us one step closer to having less fear of the negative body, less fear of our own weaknesses and ‘imperfections,’ of our inevitable deterioration and death. (LeBesco, 2006, p. 55) This notion of risk and targeted niche audiences also pervades the discourse of online video. While we do not have access to Netflix ratings information, the substantial online discussion regarding original programming such as Nanette discussed below suggests significant impacts on their audiences. TED talks that are shared and discussed online are another example of media that matter to their audience. Likewise, the web series online video format makes critiques of traditional television representations and as a format effectively courts its audience to likewise contribute financially to its production. This notion of risk provides an important starting point to the inherently conservative Australian television landscape. As a country, we seem to accept that certain things will never make it on television, especially regarding diversity.

Case Study: Netflix Netflix initially launched as an online pay-per-rental digital distribution scheme in 1997 and expanded to monthly subscription in 1999. Their business model is now based on unlimited online streaming and its services are offered globally. Netflix members subscribe to the service monthly and can watch as much as they want, anytime, anywhere, on nearly any internet-connected screen. It has also developed an ­extensive personalised video recommendation system. As such, Netflix has had a major impact on network television in the

Culturally Accessible Online Video  69 USA, particularly since venturing into original programming (Lotz, 2018). Netflix first became legally available in Australia in 2015. The delay can be attributed to the regulatory environment in Australia and licencing agreements that favour legacy broadcasters. Indeed, ­Australian broadcasters continue to lament the introduction of Netflix in this country, and the impact it has had on their business model. In a recent government review, broadcasters used the situation to call on the government to reduce local content regulations which they argue are imposing financial pressures and rendering them uncompetitive in a global marketplace. I could have selected any number of television shows distributed via Netflix to discuss in this chapter in relation to traditional disability research; however, I have selected Nanette because of its cultural impacts both in Australia and internationally. Nanette is a one-off comedy special by Australian comedian Hannah Gadsby, filmed at the Sydney Opera House. While Nanette has received almost universal widespread international acclaim, what has gone significantly under examined is the ways Nanette comments on the disabling Australian national identity, introduced in the previous chapter. The public reaction to Nanette is illustrative of television overflow onto online forums and its reinvigoration of aspects of the notion of sharedness of television in a new era, therefore making it an important text to both disability and digital television cultures. Nanette Hannah Gadsby is an Australian comedian, writer and television personality. She has appeared in various comedies on the ABC since 2010. However, her one-off Netflix special Nanette brought her to international attention, prompting The New York Times to describe her as ‘a major new voice in comedy’ (Zinoman, 2018). In Nanette, Gadsby claims she is giving up comedy, demonstrating throughout the hour how comedy relies on trauma and does not challenge audiences towards social change, thereby reinforcing the dominance of white, male and heterosexual subjectivities. The realities of mental illness, trauma and stigma are written out of culture and the stories we focus on in such a way that disempowers the already marginalised. Nanette has a 100 per cent positive rating on the review aggregator Rotten Tomato, putting it on par with classics such as Citizen Kane. The Netflix special has received almost universally positive critical acclaim; however, most reviews neglect to consider the piece in terms of Australian identity and culture. Granted, Nanette, like contemporary Australian national identity, has many international influences, as evidenced by the #metoo references and Trump jokes throughout. Yet,

70 Representation it must be recognised that Australians have built a national identity on self-depreciation, of which Nanette is particularly critical. This has been attributed to our convict roots and apparent refusal to embrace the class system. However, despite Australia’s claims to egalitarianism, this self-depreciation has empowered one group above others, the straight white male, who Gadsby describes as ‘top-shelf normal, king of the humans’. Gadsby begins Nanette with self-depreciating jokes about small town Australia, her sexuality, her relationship with her mother and her general energy levels, but then flips the format, revisits the jokes and shows how she cut off her stories before the end, freezing her trauma in joke format. She takes aim at self-depreciating humour and the way it is used to give people permission to speak while silencing others: I have built a career out of self-deprecating humor and I don’t want to do that anymore. Do you understand what self-deprecation means when it come from somebody who already exists in the margins? It’s not humility, it’s humiliation. I put myself down in order to speak, in order to seek permission to speak, and I simply will not do that anymore, not to myself or anybody who identifies with me. If that means that my comedy career is over, then, so be it. As Gadsby explains, comedy relies on two things, a setup and a punch line – a question with a ‘surprise’ answer. Comics artificially insert tension into the question to give their audience release when the answer comes. By comparison, stories have three acts, a beginning, a middle and an end. Gadsby revisits and deconstructs her jokes, now providing the third act – their endings, such as the time she was beaten up for flirting with a young man’s girlfriend and nobody did anything to stop him. She revisits these newly inserted endings to demonstrate that ‘You learn from the part of the story you focus on’. As a result, Gadsby’s experiences of gendered and homophobic violence in Australia is no longer suspended in joke form, it is on display for the international arena. Australian commentators have reflected on the ways self-depreciating humour, a style so central to Australian comedy and identity marginalises people: While it may be a tool to [foster] a sense of mateship and comradery, it can also be a mechanism for the powerful to stay on top and to keep the marginalised in the margins. And for individuals in the margins, self-deprecation can be downright unhealthy, leading to a sense that to be accepted and liked they need to become a parody of themselves. It becomes their responsibility to reduce the tension. (Bastian, 2018)

Culturally Accessible Online Video  71 Gadsby reflects on the ways men are empowered to have ‘opinions’ while lesbians ‘give feedback’ and notes a particular occasion where she refuted one audience members problematic beliefs about mental illness and creativity by being urged to stop being ‘so sensitive’. However, sensitivity is her strength Gadsby declares. Central to Gadsby’s manifesto is that as a society we do not know how to talk about sensitive things. She again reflects on her upbringing in Tasmania at a time when 70 per cent of the population voted to keep homosexuality illegal, and describes staying in the closet for 10 years. But the closet did not protect her from shame which she internalised and has carried with her to the point she has never come out to her grandmother. Gadsby, who has a degree in art history, also takes her audience through an extended set on art history that encompasses the social construction of normality as it includes and excludes gendered bodies. She explains that art history helped her understand the world and her place in it, reinforcing that she had no place according to historical representation. Although she does not broach this area in her set, the same insights can be applied to people with disability who are also excluded, kept in a closet, shrouded in shame and encouraged to embrace limited possibilities – parodies of themselves – such as the inspirational identity discussed later in the chapter. Gadsby make a clear and direct link to ­Erving Goffman’s Notes on Stigma discussed in Chapter 2 when she says, ‘this tension is what not-normals carry inside them all the time, being different is a punishable offence’. Gadsby demonstrates throughout her show the ways some groups are empowered to speak while others are delegated to the margins. She begins the set speaking about how she feels uncomfortable in small town Australia. Being at a distance from is fine, because she is mistaken for a ‘good bloke’ but once up close, people are not really sure how to interact with her. Gadsby describes herself as gender not-normal. To use Rosemary Garland-Thomson’s words, she has an extraordinary body that by not fitting in works to shore up the boundaries of the normate (­Garland-Thomson, 1997). The same toxic masculinity that empowered men to physically and sexually assault Gadsby is the same toxic masculinity that in this country empowered thousands of Australians to descend on Cronulla Beach in December 2005 to attack Lebanese youth accused of trying to ‘pick up’ their women. As discussed in the previous chapter, while masculinity, as it pertains to strength and perfect bodies, is central to Australian national identity; people with disability are perpetual outsiders able only to access a parody version, that of the little Aussie battler. While mental illness and childhood trauma are key themes throughout Nanette, Hannah Gadsby has since reflected on the ways having both autism (Valentish, 2018) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) (Wright, 2017) alongside homosexuality contributed to her

72 Representation feelings of difference. Although it is situated within the comedy genre, Nanette is not exactly a comedy, it is a narrative about diversity, strength and difference made by a disabled person. As Gadsby proclaims, ‘diversity is strength, difference is a teacher’. While Hannah Gadsby’s Nanette is a recent example of media made by a disabled Australian, 4  years ago, another comedian, Stella Young contributed to the international discourse about disability media representation, again invoking the ­Australian sense of humour, this time via the TED talk format.

Case Study: TED Talks The first TED conference was held in 1984 and showcased the compact disc, the e-book, 3D graphics from Lucasfilm, and a demonstration about fractal geometry from mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot. However, despite the impressive line-up, organisers suffered a financial loss and it was not until 1990 that the organisers attempted the format again. Since then the conference has been held annually in Monterey California and has branched out to a number of other affiliated conferences across the globe. In 2006, TED talks began to be distributed via the internet and the TED talk phenomenon became a key example of spreadable media. Henry Jenkins defines spreadable media as a process and environment whereby ‘audiences are making their presence felt by actively shaping media flows, and producers, brand managers, customer service professionals, and corporate communicators are waking up to the commercial need to actively listen and respond to them’ – put simply ‘if it doesn’t spread, it’s dead’ (Jenkins, 2013). Shaped by the mantra ‘ideas worth spreading’, TED talks are highly choreographed presentations that must come in under 18 minutes and communicate a new idea. While TED talks adopt a broadcast model, being freely available to the broadest possible audience their popularity within what Henry Jenkins describes as spreadable media has transformed them into a form of peer-recommended narrowcast. I cited Katz’s observation that television was losing its ‘sharedness’ earlier, yet, conversely, this style of online video is ushering in a new era of sharedness. I am not attempting to argue here that TED talks are a form of television, I am however concerned with the ways these videos are embraced by specific communities and shared within networks as media that matters. Disability is a popular topic amongst TED presenters with talks covering a variety of topics from redesigning human to remove disability to redesigning the built environment, from inspirational narratives to criticisms of inspiration porn (see https://www.ted.com/ topics/disability). Online videos such as these, taken together with television representations which many Australians with disability believe have not improved very much have resulted in an unprecedented number of people with

Culturally Accessible Online Video  73 disability being represented in the media. However, as discussed in Chapter 2, increasing numbers will do little to improve cultural understandings if the type of representation does not similarly change. For example, in 2014, Australian comedian and editor of the ABC affiliated disability website Ramp up Stella Young gave a TEDx talk that went viral in the disability community and beyond. Young was able to clearly and cleverly explain an experience most people with disability could empathise with, the way people with disability were constructed as inspirational by the media and society. She described this typical representational inspirational discourse as ‘inspiration porn’ (Young, 2014). Young had already pondered the media’s role in the creation of this inspirational discourse in an earlier article published by Ramp Up: I can’t help but wonder whether the source of this strange assumption that living our lives takes some particular kind of courage is the news media, an incredibly powerful tool in shaping the way we think about disability. Most journalists seem utterly incapable of writing or talking about a person with a disability without using phrases like ‘overcoming disability’, ‘brave’, ‘suffers from’, ‘defying the odds’, ‘wheelchair bound’ or, my personal favourite, ‘inspirational’. (Young, 2012) Young’s TEDx talk and earlier article introduce how the media, both mainstream and online, have perpetuated the view that people with disability are a symbol of reassurance to the non-disabled community. As Young argued, consuming and sharing inspirational images of children with disabilities via social media does little to improve their actual lives, that this was in fact a problematic approach to disability representation, and instead further marginalises and objectifies disabled people. She looked to the media to offer an alternative image of disability. When Young passed away unexpectedly in 2014, 8 months after her TEDx talk, the community felt a profound sense of loss, with some describing struggling to continue doing any form of media work. Yet her advice – to ‘take a second to consider why you’re really clicking that button’ (Young, 2014) – continues to resonate as short videos are shared via social media by both ordinary people and the mainstream media. Indeed, some clear and recognisable themes have emerged regarding contemporary inspiration porn popular on social media such as the nondisabled student taking their disabled peer to the prom or fast food workers feeding people with disability. The dominance of inspiration porn has resulted in an increased reluctance to engage with the media amongst the disability community. Many people I spoke to suggested more disabled people working in the media would address this issue, ‘… it’s more necessary [now] than ever because with social media being really easily accessible [there has

74 Representation been an] exponential increase in those sorts of pity-porn stories [that are designed to]… restore [our] faith in human nature’. The term ‘inspiration porn’ has entered the popular lexicon and has given energy and purpose to both the Australian and international disability community’s engagement with media discourse. Young’s critique of inspiration has influenced the Australian disability community’s engagement with the media in three key ways – it has prompted a general mistrust of the media, has resulted in increased attempts to educate media practitioners about disability and how it should be represented and, finally, has further empowered the community to retain control of their own stories and images. Firstly, the people I interviewed displayed a general mistrust of the media. As one artist and journalist who used a wheelchair explained to me, ‘… editors are not used to thinking of disability in political/social terms, they are used to narratives of tragedy or inspiration’. This is a long-standing criticism of the media and has influenced disability analysis of representations of disability on television. For example, as discussed in Chapter 2, John Clogston identified media frames of disability such as the ‘supercrip’. Young’s inspiration porn critique has given new life to the supercrip stereotype identified by a number of disability theorists since the 1990s. The format of the TED talk being a short shareable video has propelled this criticism into the international arena and beyond disability communities. Secondly, members of the Australian disability community have also discussed a willingness to start to criticise the media in an attempt to educate them about how best to represent disability in a culturally accessible way. The journalist I interviewed explained: I have had reporters call me for interviews and been really clear about the importance of language, not using terms like ‘wheelchair bound’, not reporting the story as inspirational. I have spent time clearly and slowly explaining all this to them. I have sent through journalistic guidelines on reporting about disability and language – and STILL had them release a story portraying disability as tragic or inspirational! Finally, people with disability are embracing opportunities to tell their own stories, one interviewee claiming: I am very protective about my own story because I know […] anyone else will tell it through the prism of their non-disabled experience and I’ll most probably come out as ‘inspiration porn’! These two quotes suggest that, while the disability community understands the problem with inspiration porn, the media still has a long way

Culturally Accessible Online Video  75 to go. Young’s TEDx has without a doubt helped to advance the conversation both by introducing the concept to the nondisabled TEDx audience but also by providing a discourse for others to advance her critique even further. Continuing the theme of telling their own story and deconstructing the workings of inspiration porn, the next section considers the importance of web series to a culturally accessible disability television culture.

Case Study: Web Series Web series are emerging as an important avenue for disability in the ­context of representation, production, consumption, reception and critique. This section looks at the appearance of web series as a result of converging digital technologies and the ways these new modes of communication and representation both include and exclude people with disability. Also discussed are the techniques used in a number of web series in an attempt to offer a different representation of disability than the one commonly seen on broadcast television. As discussed above, the television industry is changing – the availability of accessible formats and programming styles means the marketplace is becoming wider but also more fragmented. This has facilitated the emergence of web series, episodic narrative videos distributed via the internet. While on the one hand, web series can be defined in purely technical terms; that is, as an episodic video distributed via the internet, on the other, web series have several similar textual features as Stephanie van Schilt explains: … [a web series] lends itself to comedy rather than drama, and tends to attract time-starved, attention-deprived, gif-obsessed audiences. But it’s also an experimental space filled with sharp observational humour and insightful explorations of the inconsequential moments of everyday life. (Van Schilt, 2014) As such, a utopian discourse focusing on creative freedom, diverse content and an absence of the traditional constraints of the film and television industry surround the production of these web series (Monaghan, 2017). However, the web series is increasingly establishing itself as a serious media format for actors, producers and audiences. For example, to boost interest in a television pilot, producers can use web series to distribute teasers or additional content online, and most actors will appear in at least one web production in their career (Miller, 2012). That said, widespread success is not always the ultimate goal of web series – some actors and producers are attracted to the web as a new medium offering a unique opportunity for diverse stories considered

76 Representation uncompetitive in the traditional marketplace, often despite the tendency of critics to only celebrate this medium when it finds success in traditional television formats (Alice, 2016; Monaghan, 2017). The Specials is a key example of this. The series which follows the exploits of a group of intellectually disabled young adults who live together in a share house in ­Brighton, UK, achieved international recognition when it was picked up by Oprah Winfrey’s OWN (Ellis & Goggin, 2015). In the Australian context, the producers of Starting From …Now describe limited attention in ­Australia until the series was picked up by SBS. Both The Specials and Starting From…Now have since returned to YouTube distribution. Internationally, web series has grown exponentially, at times ‘leaving actors, casting directors, and even SAG-AFTRA struggling to adapt to the changing landscape’ (Miller, 2012). However, to date, there has been limited scholarly attention paid to this avenue of distribution. While web series can be created by network television, advertisers and corporations (Christian, 2011), this section focuses on web series that do not have traditional network backing such as those developed by amateurs or independent media. These series typically have high production values comparable to commercial media and in some cases are made by media professionals. Additionally, the web series discussed later in this section have often turned to crowd funding to secure finance, thus allowing producers to retain control of the distribution of their content and therefore build influence. Furthermore, their structure invites an observational and alternative exploration of the world – popular web series invite viewers to pay attention to the aspects of everyday life that they would normally glance past. For Whitney Monaghan, ‘web series can perfectly explore life’s inconsequential moments because their short-form nature seems similarly inconsequential’ (Monaghan, 2017, p. 84). Additionally, the web series format can be viewed as both an alternative mode of production and as a critique of existing media representation. They operate in ‘a rhetorical and economic space’ (Christian, 2012) where ‘new representations may foster new industrial ­arrangements, including the diversification of talent on- and off-screen’ (­Ellcessor, 2015). Felicia Day, creator of the popular American comedy programme The Guild, describes web series as a ‘place to tell stories and present characters that haven’t been seen; to cast actors in roles that would never get hired by a network’ (Day, 2009). This focus on diversity has obvious potential for disability representation, and I have previously identified a key group of web series which depict disability in some form – My Gimpy Life, Stare at Shannon, Don’t Shoot the Messenger, Uplifting Dystrophy, Interrogation, Very Special Episodes and The Specials (­Ellis, 2016). They are all distributed via YouTube or Vimeo and can boast audiences into the millions (see Table 4.1). Although this disability web

Culturally Accessible Online Video  77 Table 4.1  Disability web series examples Title My Gimpy Life Stare at Shannon Don’t Shoot the Messenger Interrogation Very Special Episodes The Specials

Number of videos

Followers / subscribers

34 70 35

10913 1068 4729

36 28

264 32

39

1522

Views 1,045,265 118,179 143,925 115984 Housed on Vimeo who do not provide this information 1,108,401

series format has grown since I first identified this group, with individuals and organisations posting single videos and series, this original group continue to represent a fertile site of analysis, revealing several common themes including recognition of the workings of inspiration porn, onand off-screen diversity and the importance of representing disability through a disabled worldview. One recurrent theme in this medium is the increased opportunity for a wide range of disabled voices to be heard. For example, disabled American actor Teal Sherer, cast by Day in Seasons 3 and 4 of The Guild, then went on to create and star in the pivotal disability web series My Gimpy Life, a comedy series loosely based on Sherer’s own life as an actor who uses a wheelchair. Indeed, Sherer acknowledges frustration with traditional disability representation as a motivating factor for her foray into web series: I was really frustrated because I wasn’t auditioning a lot and wasn’t working, so one of the reasons I wanted to create my own show was to have kind of a showcase for myself… A second element is that I always wanted to share what it’s like being a girl on wheels, and do it with comedy. I don’t think people with disabilities are seen enough in the media, and instead of waiting on someone else to give me that opportunity, I decided I would do it myself. (Gilman, 2013) Similarly, Shannon DeVido, creator and star of Stare at Shannon, is another actor who uses a wheelchair. However, unlike My Gimpy Life which presents relatively true to life scenarios, Stare at Shannon places Shannon in artificial situations – in one episode she dresses up like an Elf on the Shelf in another she attempts to go through a drive through in her wheelchair. These artificial situations work to critique the creation of ableism in society and culture. DeVido believes web series featuring disability are a particularly important vehicle to address the narrow

78 Representation representations of disability favoured by the entertainment industry. For her, web series combat stereotypes by offering ‘honest alternatives’: They’re written and produced by people who live it, rather than able bodied people writing what they think people with disabilities feel and how they act. (Schwartz & Hadley, 2016) Don’t Shoot the Messenger follows sign language interpreter Jacob as he gets lost in translation between the hearing and D/deaf worlds. The web series takes the same approach to My Gimpy Life and Stare at Shannon, but with specific reference to a frustration with existing portrayals of Deaf characters on film and television, as well as the tendency to cast non-Deaf actors in these roles: A number of hearing actors [take] Deaf roles and, with their lack of ASL (American Sign Language) fluency, watching their performances is worse than sitting through a play with actors doing bad fake accents… It has also bothered me that the topics or plot lines about Deaf people are not realistic, and are giving general audiences false information and wrong impressions. (Chaitoo on Schwartz & Hadley, 2016) The Specials likewise seeks to give voice to a marginalised group who as discussed earlier in the chapter are rarely represented on television. Although most web series embrace a comedy genre, there is potential too for dramatic offerings. Within the sample of disability web series under discussion here, Britain Valenti’s science fiction web series ­Interrogation – set in a dystopian future where a team of ex-soldiers are fighting to overthrow a totalitarian government – stands out as the only drama. This series is also notable for including a number of disabled characters portrayed by disabled actors. Valenti was also motivated by a desire for more diverse representations, particularly with reference to strong female characters on screen (Hughes, 2014) and diversity behind the scenes (Black Girl Nerds, 2015). As a way to redress this dissatisfaction with the media’s under-­ representation of diverse communities, disability web series producers often cite a desire to begin by overturning stereotypes. For example, the inspirational discourse outlined by Young earlier has been repeatedly identified as particularly problematic in the web series discussed in this chapter. Caitlin Wood and Cheryl Green, the co-creators of Very Special Episodes, a series adapted from their disability anthology Criptiques, believe the majority of media depictions of disability are ‘what a nondisabled person assumes what disability must be like’ (Wood on Rear, 2015). Each episode in this web series expands on the argument put

Culturally Accessible Online Video  79 forward in Criptiques, taking specific aim at inspirational narratives in an attempt to ‘add more ingroup disability comedy to the media landscape, producing work that doesn’t cater to people’s desires to see disabled people as either charity recipients or heroes and heroines’ (Green on Rear, 2015). Just as Young explained she could contribute more to society than an inspirational speech, Green was motivated to offer a representation that showed disabled people as ‘capable of creating and contributing to culture, and that telling our personal story in a motivational speech onstage is not our highest possible contribution to society’ (Green on Rear, 2015) or, in other words, to reimagine disability in a culturally accessible way. My Gimpy Life furthered this critique of inspiration when Sherer explicitly linked it to a form of discrimination similar to racism when she is befriended by a casting agent after a bad audition. She is invited along to the opening night of the directors’ play For Colored Girls and introduced to her friends, who are all extremely patronising describing her as an inspiration. Teal confronts this group of progressives accusing them of prejudice in a clear reference to Young’s TEDx discussed earlier: I didn’t come here to be your mascot. Oh you’re so inspiring, such an inspiration. Do you know how insulting that is? It’s like me telling her that you’re so well spoken or that you could pass for white or that this is just a wonderful little feminist Fubu theatre company Further implicit critique of disability as an inspirational trope runs throughout the series as Sherer goes about her life. She later acknowledges the impact of Young’s ideas in an interview about making the web series: If you haven’t listened to Stella Young’s TED Talk I’m not your inspiration, thank you very much, I totally recommend it. Stella was a comedian, activist, journalist and wheelchair user. She pointed out that the whole idea that we’re inspiring is grounded in the assumption that the people with disabilities have terrible lives, and that it takes some extra kind of pluck or courage to live them. In ‘inspiration porn’, people with disabilities are basically being turned into objects to make non-disabled people feel better about themselves. (Hudson, 2017) Like Young, Sherer encourages the media to reflect on their practice of turning disabled people into objects. As part of their critique of existing media and television, each series communicates an understanding of society and culture’s role in the creation of disability. This is particularly evident in the titles. Stare at Shannon references a seminal concept in cultural disability studies. People with disability are subjected to an

80 Representation intense form of looking described by Rosemarie Garland-Thomson as ‘the stare’ (Garland-Thomson, 2009). Staring, for Garland-Thomson registers difference and ‘choreographs a visual relation between a spectator and a spectacle’ that is uncomfortable for both (Garland-Thomson, 2002, pp. 56–57). Staring creates a power dynamic in which the, to use Goffman’s terminology, not-normal is further stigmatised and disempowered. Shannon DeVido describes her motivation for creating the series in line with the notion of controlling the stare, ‘If I’m going to be stared at, I might as well be doing something awesome!’ (DeVido, n.d.) My Gimpy Life is a clear example of what Mitchell and Snyder describes as a transgressive reappropriation of damaging language (Mitchell & Snyder, 2000). Sherer reflects on the word choice: Titles can be tricky. We wanted something that would catch people’s attention and represent the tone of our show. “Gimpy” seemed like a perfect fit. (Greer, 2018) Sherer’s word choice ascribes to Mitchel and Snyder’s argument that disability rights advocates, artists and scholars are reclaiming the word ‘gimp’ and using in place of a more palatable word as an ‘ironic embrace of derogatory terminology’ as a form of transgressive leverage. Likewise, The Specials evokes and reworks the semiotics of the phrase special needs. Similarly, if dystrophy refers to tissue or muscle wastage then Uplifting Dystrophy deconstructs the ways people with disability are used to make the nondisabled world feel better about itself. Uplifting Dystrophy follows friends Jonathan and Steve as they attempt to attend a different party in each episode. In each situation, casual ableism prevents Steve, who uses a wheelchair, from entering. The hosts are from diverse segments of society, with nothing in common. These hosts – from a New York party, to a church party, to a restaurant party, to a stoner’s party, to a dance party – are united by their disregard for people with disability. Johnathan and Steve never get into a party because of either the host’s casual ableism or due to Steve’s unwillingness to tolerate the situations imposed on him. Whether he is stuck in a car as his accessible parking permit is stolen, is called out to the front of the church to perform the cheery cripple personality or is stuck upstairs at a dance party or downstairs at a New York party, Steve is clearly the guest you would most want at your party. The creators of all these series often comment on the importance of diversity on- and off-screen and suggest the radical notion that media can be made for a disabled audience, and that is what their web series are attempting to do. Indeed, web series offer a useful vehicle to make these kinds of critiques of (in)accessible built environments and attitudes. Whereas people with disability complaining about accessibility would

Culturally Accessible Online Video  81 not typically receive too much sympathy, the communication styles enabled in the digital media environment appeal to a subsection of the audience. For example, like My Gimpy Life, Uplifting Dystrophy is made by ­people with media training and although web series have a reputation of relying on sketch comedy and therefore requiring actors with improved ­experience – My Gimpy Life, Uplifting Dystrophy and Stare at Shannon are clear examples of this – recent narratives are moving into other genres. With these comes more opportunity for diversity in media representation and employment. Additionally, performers can use web series as a vehicle to promote their talents, expand their skills, and be seen by casting agents. For actors, it is a useful vehicle to reach targeted audiences and be seen in the hope of securing more work (Miller, 2012). For example, Shannon DeVito describes securing a role on the Hulu original programme Difficult People that did not call for someone with a disability: I play this crazy storyteller… I get on stage and Billy Eichner and Julie Klausner are making fun of me… Any actor with a disability has been pigeon-holed into playing a person with a disability and normally they’re sad and pathetic characters. In this, I get to play a funky role. She wears glasses, so my agent submitted me and I just kind of fit the acting style they were looking for. And it turned out I was the right person for the part, and that I think that specific role is so exciting to me because of that one fact [that it didn’t actually call for a wheelchair]. Very, very, very rarely do you ever hear a casting director make that call, and she did. (Semigran, 2015) Significantly, web series are also offering competitive wages for actors (Miller, 2012), albeit at present only in an American context. However, this is also increasingly the case in Australia where the web series format is undergoing considerable growth while made for television drama is in decline. Indeed, it has been observed that making it in the mainstream media is not necessarily the goal of all web series creators, with some turning down Hollywood development deals in favour of diversity. Despite this, in the Australian context, migration to mainstream television remains a key marker of success.

Conclusion Whereas the television broadcast era was characterised by a few-to-many model where a small number of networks broadcast to a mass audience, the post broadcast era discussed throughout this book is characterised by many producers targeting smaller audiences. Both eras can be characterised by different notions of sharedness. The broadcast era for example approached the audience as a mass and sharedness was taken to mean

82 Representation building a national identity and family togetherness. In the post-­broadcast era, audiences have reclaimed and redefined television’s sharedness via their online activities, promoting, recommending, discussing and in the case of web series financing media that matters to them. This chapter has focused on online video and redefining the sharedness of television in the digital era to consider the ways this format, broadly defined is offering three important points of entry to disability media analysis. Firstly, the ways online video through its focus on niche audience and risk-taking offers alternative representations of disability and, secondly, how these representations go beyond a mere alternative offering to focus on the ways they critique existing approaches to disability representation on television. The videos and representations discussed throughout this chapter cannot be assessed via traditional ratings measures; however, they are all examples of shareable media, media that matters to its audience and media that is shared amongst networks of people. Reflecting on their significance to an investigation of disability and television, this chapter has offered three broad case studies of the socalled online video format; streaming giant Netflix, not for profit educational platform TED and participatory cultures of web series produced by amateurs, sometimes with media training, and distributed via YouTube. Foregrounding the situatedness of Australian identity and culture, the chapter has explored the impacts of Australian identities and productions. While Hannah Gadsby’s Netflix comedy special Nanette has been broadly celebrated for its exploration of trauma, mental illness and sexuality, this chapter has situated it within Australian national identity focusing on the roots of self-depreciating comedy and how it can work to disempower the already marginalised. Moving on to another Australian comedian and online video format, the chapter then explored the national and international impacts of Stella Young’s TEDx I’m not here for your inspiration, thank you very much. The influence of Young’s criticism of media discourses of inspiration was further explored via analysis of a key group of disability web series. The next chapter continues the discussion of television’s sharedness by considering the role of overflow in the representation of disability on television and in online discussion taking Game of Thrones as its case study.

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Culturally Accessible Online Video  83 Bastian, B. (2018, 24 August). Nanette, self-deprecation and when not to use it. Retrieved from https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/nanette-self-deprecationand-when-not-to-use-it Black Girl Nerds. (2015, 15 September). “Interrogation: A Scifi Webseries” – Kickass Diversity in a Scifi Package. Retrieved from http://blackgirlnerds. com/interrogation-a-scifi-webseries-kickass-diversity-in-a-scifi-package/ Buonanno, M. (2016). (Not Yet) the end of television. Media and ­Communication, 4(3). Retrieved from https://www.cogitatiopress.com/mediaandcommunication/ issue/viewIssue/46/46 Chae, S., & Flores, D. (1998). Broadcasting versus narrowcasting. Information Economics and Policy, 10(1), 41–57. doi:10.1016/S0167-6245(97)00025-5 Christian, A. J. (2011). Fandom as industrial response: Producing identity in an independent Web series. Transformative Works and Cultures, 8. Retrieved from http://journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/twc/article/ view/250/237 Christian, A. J. (2012). The web as television reimagined? Online networks and the pursuit of legacy media. Journal of Communication Inquiry, 36(4), 340–356. Day, F. (2009). Web series: Four things to ask ­yourself ­before ­starting. Retrieved from http://feliciaday.com/blog/web-series-4-things-to-ask-yourself-beforestarting/ DeFino, D. (2013). The HBO effect. New York, NY: Bloomsbury. DeVido, S. (n.d.). Stare at Shannon. Retrieved from http://www.shannondevido. com/stare-at-shannon/ Ellcessor, E. (2015). Very special webisodes: Web series, disability, and cultural accessibility Retrieved from http://www.flowjournal.org/2015/03/veryspecial-webisodes/ Ellis, J. (2000). Seeing things: Television in the age of uncertaintity. London, England: IB Tauris Publishers. Ellis, K. (2016). Disability media work: Opportunities and obstacles. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Ellis, K., & Goggin, G. (2015). Disability and the media. New York, NY: ­Palgrave Macmillan. Garland-Thomson, R. (1997). Extraordinary bodies: Figuring physical disability in American culture and literature. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Garland-Thomson, R. (2002). The politics of staring: Visual rhetorics of ­disability in popular photography. In S. Snyder, B. J. Brueggmann, & R.  ­Garland-Thomson (Eds.), Disability studies: Enabling the humanities (pp. 56–85). New York, NY: The Modern Language Association of America. Garland-Thomson, R. (2009). Staring: How we look. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. Gilman, G. (2013, 13 June). Web series ‘My Gimpy Life’ gets a second life through kickstarter. Retrieved from http://tv.yahoo.com/news/series-gimpylife-gets-second-life-kickstarter-203245143.html Greer, W. (2018). Interview: Teal Sherer. Retrieved from https://www.­txdisabilities. org/interview-teal-sherer Hudson, L. (2017, 13 January). FREQ #11: Teal Sherer talks. Retrieved from https://medium.com/feminist-frequency/teal-sherer-talks-fad79f2e8652

84 Representation Hughes, A. (2014, 17 November). Hilarious lady-made web series that will help you forget it’s Monday. Retrieved from http://hellogiggles.com/emale-comedyweb-series/2/ Jenkins, H. (2013). Spreadable media: Creating value and meaning in a ­networked culture. New York: New York University Press. Katz, E. (2009). The end of television? The ANNALS of the American ­Academy of Political and Social Science, 625(1), 6–18. LeBesco, K. (2006). Disability, gender and difference on The Sopranos. W ­ omen’s Studies in Communication, 29(1), 39–59. Lotz, A. (2018). We now disrupt this broadcast. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Miller, S. (2012). Spinning a web series. Back Stage – National Edition, 53(30), 14–15. Mitchell, D., & Snyder, S. (2000). Narrative prosthesis: Disability and the dependencies of discourse. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press. Monaghan, W. (2017). Starting From … Now and the web series to television crossover: An online revolution? Media International Australia, 164(1), ­82–91. doi:10.1177/1329878X17708842 Napoli, P. M. (2011). Audience evolution: New technologies and the transformation of media audiences. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Rear, M. S. (2015, 10 March). A new webseries upsets pop culture portrayals of disabilties. Retrieved from https://bitchmedia.org/post/very-special-episodesinterview-disability-representation-web-series Schwartz, D. H., & Hadley, C. (2016, 2 May). Disabled filmmakers breathe new life into storytelling through web series. Retrieved from http://www.­ huffingtonpost.com/david-h-schwartz/disabled-­f ilmmakers-breat_b_9815 188.html Screen Australia. (2014). Online and on demand: Trends in Australian online video use. Retrieved from http://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/­getmedia/0062da06db04-4932-a3e1-20a81d383129/Online-on-demand-copy.pdf?ext=.pdf Screen Australia. (2016). Seeing ourselves: Reflections on diversity in ­Australian TV drama. Retrieved from https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/­getmedia/157b 05b4-255a-47b4-bd8b-9f715555fb44/TV-Drama-Diversity.pdf Semigran, R. (2015, 3 February). Comedian Shannon DeVido on being an actor with a disability & being yelled at by Billy Eichner. Retrieved from https:// www.bustle.com/articles/62017-comedian-shannon-devido-on-being-an-­ actor-with-a-disability-being-yelled-at-by-billy Valentish, J. (2018, 8 August). ‘I broke the contract’: How Hannah Gadsby’s trauma transformed comedy. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/ stage/2018/jul/16/hannah-gadsby-trauma-comedy-nanette-standup-netflix Van Schilt, S. (2014, 3 October). How to talk Australians and the rise of web series. Retrieved from https://killyourdarlings.com.au/2014/10/how-talk-australiansrise-web-series/ Wayne, M. L. (2018). Netflix, Amazon, and branded television content in subscription video on-demand portals. Media, Culture & Society, 40(5), 725–741. doi:10.1177/0163443717736118 Wright, T. (2017, 30 June). Why Hannah Gadsby is retiring from comedy after ‘Nanette’. Retrieved from https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/comedy/whyhannah-gadsby-is-retiring-from-comedy-after-nanette-20170628-gx0313.html

Culturally Accessible Online Video  85 Young, S. (2012, 2 July). We’re not here for your inspiration. Retrieved from www.abc.net.au/rampup/articles/2012/07/02/3537035.htm Young, S. (2014). I’m not your inspiration, thank you very much. ­Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/stella_young_i_m_not_your_inspiration_thank_ you_very_much/transcript?language=en Zinoman, J. (2018, 19 March). Introducing a major new voice in comedy (who also attacks comedy). Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/ arts/hannah-gadsby-comedy-nanette.html

5 Collective Intelligence Disability, Game of Thrones

In 2000, as a relatively unknown actor, Peter Dinklage gave an interview to the magazine Theatre Mania professing a desire to be a ‘leading man’. He observed ‘I seem to play a lot of wisecracking, cynical characters… but what I really want is to play the romantic lead and get the girl’ (­Dinklage cited in Blake, 2000). He also reflected on making a choice about the characters he was willing to portray, ‘My agent knows better than to send me up for a Kmart spot as Santa’s helper, which explains why I’m poor. But that’s the choice I’ve made’ (Blake, 2000). Fifteen years later, Dinklage, having become a superstar, gave another interview in which he identified a significant change to the entertainment industry’s conception of what a leading man should look like: There is a different definition of the leading man now… It’s fantastic. You look at the leading men of the past and they are very different. Hollywood is finally opening the door wider to more realistic ­portrayals of who people are. It’s not just about beautiful ­Hollywood stars. (Peter Dinklage in Lawrence, 2015) Dinklage himself played a key role in bringing about this shift. In the same article, he credited popular American HBO television series Game of Thrones (GOT) as bringing about the shift. GOT is about to ­enter its eighth and final season. In the first season, Dinklage’s name appeared last in the opening credits, but from Seasons 2 to 7, it has received first billing, a significant insight to both the importance of his character Tyrion Lannister and the aforementioned notion of a leading man. Tyrion is a fan favourite and integral to most of the storylines happening in the series; he is also 132 cm tall and has a form of dwarfism. Dinklage describes his character in GOT as a ‘humanised’ representation, something which is in stark contrast to the roles dwarves have been historically cast in. This change in how people with disability are represented in the media generally, and on television specifically, has in part come about due to the increased globalisation of media due to the digital age. Australia

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  87 had long been described as suffering from the tyranny of distance when it came to accessing popular television – previously fans had to wait sometimes up to 6 months to access favourite television shows made in the USA. However, following the digitisation of television, this tyranny began to lift, offering opportunity for both legal access – in the case of GOT, originally via single episode downloads through iTunes and from 2012 via Australian pay television provider Foxtel who negotiated exclusive distribution rights with HBO to all content, including GOT – and unauthorised, or pirated, downloads. This latter form of access has been widely embraced and indeed normalised by Australian television audiences – a huge 30 per cent of Australian GOT fans access unauthorised versions (Marsh, 2017). Indeed, when Foxtel negotiated the GOT monopoly, more people in Australia than any other nation began downloading the show (Macneill, 2017). By 2017, 1.77 million Australians illegally downloaded it, making it the second country (after the USA) most likely to pirate the show proportion to population size (Kay, 2017). An analysis of Australians’ motivations for pirating GOT went beyond just the show’s popularity to also reveal an informed criticism of distribution channels in the Australian television landscape, suggesting unauthorised file sharing of GOT was a fan activity (Macneill, 2017). Frustrated that it was only available via Foxtel, many Australians downloaded unauthorised copies of GOT in order to watch it while they waited for it to be released on DVD. In turn, with more access, be it legally or not, the representations of disability on television are expanding. For example, in my survey of Australian television audiences with a disability, GOT was identified as offering important new representations of disability. It is seen to offer different ways of thinking about the world and has been described as subverting both ‘the disciplinary mechanisms that divide up knowledge and the related marginalisation of various knowledge claims’ (­Clapton & Shepherd, 2017, p. 5). This chapter therefore recognises the importance of the internationalisation of television to local investigations of disability representation and reception. Combined with fan discussions which are overflowing onto various online platforms, these contribute to knowledge spaces which offer new ways of thinking about disability. As such, this chapter uses GOT as a case study – in particular three main characters, Tyrion, Hodor and Bran Stark – to offer analysis of both representation of disability as well as the way disability themes have been taken up and debated in online forums. To begin with, drawing on French cyber theorist Pierre Lévy’s framework of collective intelligence, I argue that audiences of GOT engage in a collective process of meaning-making that offers important insights into the social and cultural construction of disability. The discussion of disability representation must move beyond the television text to consider how meaning is located in multiple sites and subject to multiple influences.

88 Representation

Collective Intelligence and the Second Screen French cyber theorist Pierre Lévy’s concept of collective intelligence has informed much of the theorisation about participatory cultures, spreadable media and fans’ online engagement with television texts. According to Lévy, the computerisation of society will ‘promote the construction of intelligent communities in which our social and cognitive potential can be mutually developed and enhanced’ (Lévy, 1997, p. 17). Lévy emphasises the need for collaborative efforts and ‘collective intelligence’ in the creation of ‘knowledge spaces’. He defines collective intelligence as a collaborative exchange of information and knowledge ‘… constantly enhanced [and] coordinated in real time’ (p. 13). Knowledge spaces stem from the idea that ‘no one knows everything, everyone knows something’ (p. 13). As such, the more people who become connected and participate in the sharing of information, the more we can come to learn. Lévy maintains that by using this approach to knowledge acquisition much can be learnt and gained, even from people judged ‘ignorant’ (p. 14). This collective intelligence, or sharing of ideas and views, could bring about the next phase of intellectual and social evolution. With the rise of more accessible television aided with the digitisation of television, as well as this medium’s associated online presence such as television companion websites, Facebook fan pages, popular culture blogs and trending topics on twitter, Lévy’s insights hold particular significance. Active audiences have become creative audiences, engaging in a process of collective intelligence to participate in the creation of knowledge spaces. Other theorists have also begun recognising this approach taken by producers and consumers of popular television to embrace online platforms. This has variously been described as overflow (Gray, 2008), teleparticipation (Ross, 2008) and social television (Hutchinson, 2017). These modes of participation characterise what we have come to describe as second screen entertainment. Hutchinson reflects on this potential within the media landscape: Social TV is typically undertaken on Twitter with the use of hashtags, but can also occur in other spaces such as Facebook fan pages, Instagram accounts or, more recently, across Snapchat user accounts. This ­ rogramme activity of interacting across social media with a television p could be thought of as one of the most active forms of media consumption: audiences are not just consuming, but using content to create their own conversations and interactive spaces; users are creating content that is medium specific – for example GIFs on Tumblr or hashtag jokes on Twitter; the audience is literally talking back to the production crew in real time; and they may be helping to shape the next iteration of the programme. (Hutchinson, 2017, p. 160)

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  89 Indeed, it can be argued that the process of watching programmes such as GOT is in fact endless – even the term ‘watching’ television is perhaps better defined as accessing television content. Further, as touched on above, these online platforms can be both user-/fan-generated and established by the producers of the television shows in a more official capacity. Each approach exhibits certain differences and constraints of those electing to participate. However, their very existence raises important research questions for television analysts. When does the moment of viewing end? Do these platforms create new connections? How does the intersection between television texts and online communities create new meanings? Do participants assist each other in the process of meaning-making? Although established in a pre-second screen era, John Fiske’s producerly text offers some important insights to such questions. The producerly text, as Fiske explains: … offers itself up to popular production; it exposes, however reluctantly, the vulnerabilities, limitations, and weaknesses of its preferred meanings; it contains, while attempting to repress them, voices that contradict the ones it prefers; it has loose ends that escape its control, its meanings exceed its own power to discipline them, its gaps are wide enough for whole new texts to be produced in them – it is, in a very real sense, beyond its own control. (Fiske, 1989, 2010) Drawing on Fiske’s conception of the producerly text, Henry Jenkins and colleagues argue that spreadable media or ‘the potential – both technical and cultural – for audiences to share content for their own purposes’ (Jenkins, 2013) is Fiske’s producerly theory in action: Material that spreads is producerly, in that it leaves open space for audience participation, provides resources for shared expression, and motivates exchanges through surprising or intriguing content. People want to share media texts which become a meaningful ­resource in their ongoing conversations or which offer them some new source of pleasure and interest. They want to exchange and discuss media content when the material contains cultural activators, when it offers them activities in which they can participate. (Jenkins, 2013) I also drew on Fiske’s framework of producerly popular culture and how it relates to disability studies in my book Disability and Popular Culture to explore the representation of disability in popular texts as simultaneously disabling and enabling (Ellis, 2015). The chapter on television in that book approaches television as a progressive medium that reflects social change. While acknowledging the problematic representation of

90 Representation disability on television – as well as recognising the reality that nowhere near enough disabled characters even appear on the small screen – the chapter discusses examples of producerly disability representations on television which either highlight aspects of social stigma or represent a person with a disability engaging in ordinary life. These changes in the way we access television have resulted in a global shift within the medium itself. Television is now described as experiencing a new golden age characterised by shows such as GOT, ­Westworld, The Leftovers, to further back to The Sopranos and The Wire, to those encompassing both periods such as Twin Peaks. Digital modes of ­access  – including such technology as digital video recorders (DVRs), DVDs, tablet televisions and high-quality cable as well as the traditional television set – have in turn given greater cultural legitimacy to television. This has resulted in a lifting on dramatic limitations previously placed on narrative drama. Whereas once television competed with cinema by playing it safe, offering easy to digest dramas, television now competes directly with the excitement of cinema with dramatic narratives, special effects and multiple locations. Formulaic content has given way to long convoluted narratives that demand and receive commitment from their audience. GOT is a key example of this narrative shift and of a large audience following.

A Case Study in Collective Intelligence – Game of Thrones This digital trend of long character arcs and complicated backstories, as well as the welcoming of niche audiences, has led to an emergence of extensive online communities of interest. As such, a television programme’s committed audience may contribute to or utilise extensive online wikis to stay on top of the multiple plot interconnections and to interact with other groups of fans who are deeply committed to their particular series  – they use these to assist one another in a process of meaning-making via collective intelligence. The GOT wiki, for example, describes itself as: … an encyclopedic guide to the HBO television series Game of Thrones that anyone can edit. Our content is up to date with the latest aired episode so beware of unwanted plot details if you are not. (Game of Thrones Wiki, n.d.) This wiki is a clear example of collective intelligence – the site includes character backstories, news about GOT, community discussion forums and information about the various houses, religions in the series and a transmedia connection to the books on which this television series is based. This fan-created forum differs from the officially released HBO

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  91 version cited below, which alludes to a complicated narrative not easily explained in a few sentences: Summers span decades. Winters can last a lifetime. And the struggle for the Iron Throne has begun. It will stretch from the south, where heat breeds plots, lusts and intrigues; to the vast and savage eastern lands; all the way to the frozen north, where an 800-foot wall of ice protects the kingdom from the dark forces that lie beyond. Kings and queens, knights and renegades, liars, lords and honest men … all will play the ‘Game of Thrones.’ (Game of Thrones: About the Show, 2014) The television adaptation of George R.R. Martin’s fantasy novels A Song of Ice and Fire, GOT is set on the fictional continents of Essos and Westeros, with the majority of action taking place on Westeros. GOT features a complicated narrative with several plot arcs that trace all the way back to the beginning of the series. As the seven kingdoms of Westeros engage in civil war for the Iron Throne, and the last lineal descendant of the overthrown dynasty amasses an enormous army in the hopes of reclaiming the throne, an impending winter after a decade of summer looms dangerously, along with mythical threats from the north. GOT is a show about power, stigma and overcoming social barriers. While the series began with unambiguous heroes Ned, Robb and ­Catelyn Stark, following their murders, GOT began to put forward social outcasts, anti-heroes even, such as Tyrion Lannister (Harvey & Nelles, 2014). Tyrion, who in the first season is described as having a soft spot in his heart for ‘cripples, bastards and broken things’, has come to wield significant power within the series and has also become a fan and critical favourite. As Tyrion is a dwarf, rather than the popular notion of an able-bodied hero, there is a significant body of popular commentary about this character’s representation of disability and disabling environments. In addition to Tyrion, GOT includes many other characters with disability. An incomplete list includes Hodor, Bran Stark, Jaime ­Lannister, Shireen Baratheon, Jorah Mormont, Aerys Targaryen, ­Sandor Clegane (‘The Hound’), Lord Varys and the unsullied army, Arya Stark, Doran Martell, Maester Aemon and Khal Drogo. In ­addition, psychologists have diagnosed characters such as Joffrey Baratheon, Ramsey Bolton, Cersei Lannister, Sandor Clegane and Theon Greyjoy with mental health conditions such as PTSD, Stockholm syndrome and various personality disorders (Sheehan Perkins, 2017). The sheer number of the aforementioned online platforms devoted to GOT and to these characters – not to mention the fans’ engagement with them – has therefore given rise to a wealth of information that researchers can engage with when assessing the cultural impacts of a television

92 Representation drama from a disability perspective. A search for disability on the GOT wiki, for example, yields 25 results that lead to various corners of the site, from character backstories, to full episode summaries, to plot lines that occurred in the book but were omitted from the television series. In addition to this expanding archive are daily new posts, which are updated in real time as a new episode is released. Indeed, the GOT’s efforts towards disability inclusion and ‘promoting awareness of the disability experience, accessibility for people with disabilities, and the accurate depiction of characters with disabilities’ were recognised with a Media Access Award in 2013 (Winter Is Coming, 2013). Speaking at the event, George R.R. Martin described his approach to developing characters: We have to start thinking of each other as people. All of us have goodness in us. All of us have evil in us. We’re all great characters in the real world. Everybody has done things that they’re ashamed of in their life, everybody has done things they’re proud of. This is true of whatever state we are in as human beings. We all have that common humanity. That’s what I’m striving to do, to remember that all the characters are human too. (Media Access Awards, 2013) GOT fans have immense respect for Martin and so these words hold great significance (Sarikakis, Krug, & Rodriguez-Amat, 2017). In an interview about the book with The Atlantic, literary critic Lauryn S. Mayer explains that this notion of GOT’s common humanity is something which helps blurs the boundary between the disabled and able: By talking about disability as a very certain set of extreme conditions, we have a tendency of setting up these walls between them and us. But what Martin does is show how very, very fragile the boundaries between wholeness and bodily vulnerability are. Only in a moment you can go from being an ‘able’ person to somebody who is ‘disabled’. (Mayer as quoted in Kornhaber, 2016) Martin’s attitude echoes Alison Wilde’s recommended approach to disability media analysis where the central question is not one of negative stereotypes but of ‘how to achieve cultural recognition on equal terms, to work towards cultural images where being depicted as good, evil, wise, ordinary, extra-ordinary or changeable, is as possible for people with impairments as it is for other people’ (Wilde, 2004). Adding to this is Massie and Mayer’s argument that GOT deconstructs such typical disability clichés, instead ‘examining the costs of ableist ideologies and uncovering the fear of mortality and vulnerability that compels people

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  93 to build a wall separating themselves from the disabled’ (Massie  & Mayer, 2014). These cultural ‘walls’ were earlier identified by disability ­theorists throughout the 1990s, variously defining the normate (Garland-­ Thomson, 1997), normalcy (Davis, 1995) and theories of normalisation (see Shakespeare, 2006). In 1997, Rosemarie Garland-­Thomson embarked on a project of denaturalising the cultural encoding and enfreakment of what she referred to as extraordinary bodies. She coined the term ‘normate’ to describe the ‘veiled subject position of cultural self, the figure outlined by the array of deviant others whose marked ­bodies shore up the normate’s boundaries’ (Garland-Thomson, 1997, p.  8). Therefore, cultural meanings of normality – or in Garland-Thomson’s terms the normate – make sense only in relation to extraordinary bodies that exist outside this definition. Extraordinary bodies act as a cultural metaphor for society’s concerns, preoccupations and anxiety and have been a point of fascination across many historical and contemporary cultures as evidenced in mythology, sideshows, medical exhibits, literature and popular movies. This chapter follows this notion, focusing on the extraordinary characters featured in GOT, in particular Tyrion, Hodor and Bran, and continuing the analysis of the online knowledge spaces that have appeared which extend discussion around these particular characters. Tyrion The character of Tyrion Lannister regularly transgresses established boundaries of existing cultural images of people of restricted growth. An online comment following the announcement of GOT’s Media ­Access Award described Tyrion as ‘just as complex as any other character’; this was in stark contrast to the typical depiction of ‘dwarves as clowns’ (Winter Is Coming, 2013). However, while GOT has been broadly celebrated for its representation of disability, it has also fallen into several problematic disability tropes, such as disability as a punishment for wrongdoing, the sweet innocent and the supercrip (see Harrison, 2018). When Tyrion first appears in Season 1 of GOT, characters approach him from a position of both fear and wonderment. Referred to as ‘the imp’, ‘halfman’ and ‘dwarf of Casterly Rock’, he is the subject of ridicule and suspicion. Yet Tyrion has a reputation of excessive drinking, whoring and – somewhat ironically – reading. He despises being called ‘the imp’ and describes himself as the ‘clever’ one; his brother Jaime, by comparison, is the ‘pretty one’. The rival family, the Starks, focus their suspicion of the Lannisters on Tyrion; however, it is his siblings Cersei and Jaime who they should really fear. Cersei and Jamie are engaged in a passionate incestuous affair that, if discovered, would see them murdered by the King Robert Baratheon, Cersei’s husband. Cersei’s children are in

94 Representation fact fathered by their uncle Jaime and therefore have no rightful claim to the throne, so in order to retain power, Cersei must ensure this secret is kept. When King Robert’s advisor Jon Arryn discovers this secret, he is murdered, and it is this murder which sets in motion the series of events that begin the struggle for the iron throne. Later, when 10-year-old Bran Stark discovers the siblings having sex in a tower, Jamie pushes him through the window in order to silence him. However, he lives, although he sustains a spinal cord injury. Despite all of the lovers’ secrets and wrong-doings, it is still Tyrion who is considered ‘an ill-made, spiteful little creature full of envy, lust, and low cunning’ by his own father Tywin Lannister. Tywin resents Tyrion for his disability and his mother’s death in childbirth and described wanting to carry him into the sea and ‘let the waves wash [him] away’. As such, this follows a typical narrative – the disabled character being seen as evil and less than human. Yet as the story progresses, audiences come to see a multifaceted representation of a disabled character. Tyrion displays intellect, compassion, loyalty, bravery and wit, eventually rising to become a key decision maker in almost all the intersecting power plays taking place throughout season 7. Indeed, it is this anti-hero that is consistently celebrated by bloggers and commenters that identify as disabled. His depiction of disability is often celebrated for transgressing typical boundaries of disability representation by being a main character, for being represented outside the typical inspiration narrative typically afforded disabled characters, and finally for highlighting social disablement (Ellis, 2014). For example, it is unusual for characters with a disability to appear in ongoing series as regular characters, and even less so as main characters. In their content analysis of disability on prime time television in the UK, Guy Cumberbatch and Ralph Negrine found that people with disability appeared in documentaries, current affairs programming and crime genres. They posited that, in order for social change to occur, people with disability needed to also become leading characters on television (Cumberbatch & Negrine, 1992). Tyrion is not just a series regular character; he is afforded a narrative whereby he is not celebrated for the usual inspirational qualities. In fact, Tyrion is central to all aspects of the narrative. In addition, Tyrion is seen to also veer away from the typical representations of disabled characters – he frequently delivers speeches and participates in conversations that expose social prejudice and stigma, thereby highlighting issues of social disablement. For example, several key scenes throughout GOT feature Tyrion critiquing society’s treatment of people with disability. For example, after Bran loses the use of his legs, most characters believe the boy is better off dead. His sister Arya articulates what the family is thinking when she despairs that he will never be able to realise his dream of becoming a knight – he can no

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  95 longer climb nor ride a horse. Significantly, Arya makes these comments as she is being disabled by social constructions of gender. The first scene in which the Lannister siblings appear together is of them discussing Bran’s predicament as he lies in a coma. The scene offers insight into their world view and the differences between the three. Cersei maintains there is ‘no mercy letting the child linger in such pain’, and Jaime agrees, commenting ‘even if the boy lives, he’ll be a cripple, grotesque, I’d take a good clean death any day’. Given their role in Bran’s disablement, these are particularly brutal comments; they would prefer their secret die with Bran. In contrast, Tyrion argues that death is too final and that, while he has life, Bran still has possibilities. When Bran does awake, his family and those around him are true to their comments – they treat him as though he is better off dead and talk for him, not to him. Bran himself tells his brother Robb he’d ‘rather be dead’. By comparison, Tyrion is the only person to directly speak to Bran. He presents him with plans to pass onto his saddler for a modified saddle to enable him to ride again, just like the saddle Tyrion himself uses, showing that the environment and negative attitudes can work together to create disability. Tyrion takes a social model influenced point of view and encourages Bran to start thinking about changing the environment, not focussing on what his body cannot do: … with the right horse and saddle even a cripple can ride […] You must shape the horse to the rider[…] On horseback you’ll be as tall as any of them. Tyrion’s (and by extension Peter Dinklage’s) status as the star of GOT was further solidified in Season 4 when he is on trial for his nephew King Joffrey’s murder which he did not commit. He accuses the world of perpetuating prejudice against people with disabilities, of perpetuating social disablement: I wish to confess. I wish to confess! I saved you… I saved this city… all your worthless lives. I should’ve let Stannis kill you all. I’m guilty… guilty… is that what you want to hear? [Tywin: ‘You admit you poisoned the king?’] No. Of that I’m innocent. I’m guilty of a far more monstrous crime. I’m guilty of being a dwarf. [Tywin: ‘You are not on trial for being a dwarf’.] Oh, yes, I am. I’ve been on trial my entire life. [Tywin: ‘Have you nothing to say in your defense?] Nothing but this: I did not do it. I did not kill Joffrey but I wish that I had! Watching your vicious bastard die gave me more relief than a thousand lying whores! I wish I was the monster you think I am! I wish I had enough poison for the whole pack of you! I would gladly give my life to watch you all swallow it! I will not give my life for Joffrey’s murder, and I will get no justice here.

96 Representation This speech is an example of what Tobin Siebers describes as ‘claiming’ disability (Siebers, 2004). Siebers draws on the concept of passing to propose an altered approach to managing stigma via disability ‘masquerade’. Disability masquerade ‘claims disability as a version of itself rather than simply concealing it from view’ (Siebers, 2004). Such an act according to Siebers: … counteracts passing, claiming disability rather than concealing it. Exaggerating or performing difference, when that difference is a stigma, marks one as a target, but it also exposes and resists the prejudices of society. The masquerade fulfills a desire to tell a story about disability, often the very story that society does not want to hear because it refuses to obey the ideology of able-bodiedness. (Siebers, 2004) Tyrion certainly is seen to be claiming his disability. He embraces his stigmatised identity and in turn has become an ambiguous hero within GOT and amongst its audiences. His impassioned courtroom monologue prompted an equally impassioned Twitter response through the hashtag #FreeTyrion. Significantly, this Twitter discussion was in the broader online discussion of GOT and not on disability-specific blogging sites. Tyrion has amassed a significant cult following from both disabled and non-disabled audiences alike. Hodor Throughout his appearance on GOT, Hodor is somewhat of a unique character. He is described within the narrative as being ‘simple-minded’ and is only able to say one word – ‘hodor’. This in turn is the name everyone calls him although, as we find out later, his actual name is Wylis. Hodor first appears in Season 1, where he is instructed to carry Bran around after he becomes paralysed. Indeed, Hodor functions as little more than transport for Bran for the following five seasons, except for Season 5, in which neither he nor Bran appeared. Unlike the majority of other characters in the series, even minor characters, Hodor is not given a history nor backstory until moments before his death protecting Bran from White Walkers. However, Hodor has attracted the attention of television fans, bloggers and medical doctors alike who – via the aforementioned process of collective intelligence – have all attempted to diagnose him. These online discussions have resulted not only in character analysis but have also increased cultural attention and representation about communication disorders. Further, as the series progressed, this discussion has been continually added to and updated, with any inaccuracies regularly addressed, making it a vibrant and balanced conversation. The conversation

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  97 transitions across several years from a medical paradigm to one that recognises society, culture and television in the creation of disability. In this way, television representation regarding this form of disability is seen to be anything but static or only coming from one point of view. This is particularly the case regarding discussions on diagnoses of Hodor’s condition and on how he was represented. For example, for a brief period, the consensus was that Hodor had expressive aphasia because his intellectual capabilities appeared intact but he was assumed to have experienced a loss of language functioning (Gaines-Lewis & Smith, 2015): So what can account for Hodor’s incessant Hodor-ing? Whether he intended it or not, George R. R. Martin created a character with a textbook example of a neurological condition called expressive aphasia. The condition dates back to the French physician Paul Broca. In 1861, Broca was introduced to a man named Louis-Victor ­Leborgne. While his comprehension and mental functioning remained relatively normal, Leborgne had progressively lost the ability to produce meaningful speech over a period of 20 years. Like Hodor, the man was nicknamed Tan because he only spoke a single word: Tan. (Gaines-Lewis & Smith, 2015) However, not all agreed, and several articles appeared taking issue with the diagnosis. For example, Katie Gore published an article on Speech IRL that went viral positing that Hodor had a developmental delay, and not asphasia: Hodor is portrayed in both the books and movies as being significantly cognitively impaired. He is generally able to follow basic instructions that are given to him, but his actions and reactions are typically those of a toddler or young child (in one instance, Hodor cries and cowers because he is afraid of a thunderstorm, while the 11-year-old Bran tries unsuccessfully to calm him down). He is not self-sufficient and has poor adaptive social skills, needing reminders for things like remembering to wear clothes. [George R.R. Martin] uses the adjective ‘simpleminded’ to describe the beloved half-giant. (Gore, 2015) Whereas scientific websites focused on the diagnostic features of the conditions and attempted to diagnose, popular culture blogs engaged in a representation that emphasised the tragedy of Hodor’s predicament as this indicative quote from Bustle indicates: The idea that trauma to his head could have led to Wylis’ loss of speech and a life spent with no other word but Hodor to express

98 Representation himself is heartbreaking. Wylis could be yet another person whose life was irrecoverably changed by the events of Robert’s Rebellion. One violent blow to the head while in the service of the Starks may be the origin of Hodor, and the end of Wylis – and in this world of fantasy, Wylis’ fate could very well be grounded in science, making it all the sadder. (Bowman, 2016) The levels of discussion around GOT such as those relating to Hodor show it to be a good example of prestige television, something which follows a complicated, ever-changing narrative that requires commitment from its audience. For example, the three assessments quoted above occurred before GOT fans were finally told the real origins of Hodor’s communication disorder. In Season 6 episode 2, we discovered Hodor had experienced a ‘magically-induced time-travel paradox brain damage with a likely side of pre-traumatic stress disorder’ (Gore, 2016). Bran, who had been honing the mystical ability to ‘warg,’ or enter the minds of animals and see the world through their eyes, placed himself, Hodor and their companion Meera in danger when he recklessly warged beyond the wall providing the White Walkers, an ancient race of humanoid ice creatures, access to their cave hideout. When they attack, Bran and Meera escape, instructing Hodor to ‘hold the door’. Bran, who is at the time time-travelling and watching the younger Wylis in the stables, accidently warged into his body, causing young Wylis to experience his future death while being instructed by Meera to ‘hold the door’. Hodor’s last episode offered experts and non-experts an expanded diagnostic profile with which to assess Hodor. Katie Gore revisited the issue in conversation with a speech language pathologist, ultimately concluding that Hodor might have aphasia but that was not the point of the representation. However, what is important to note within all of this online discussion was that the drive to diagnose Hodor failed to consider Hodor as a person nor the ways his disability was socially constructed: Diagnostic labels are limited, but disabilities are complex. A diagnosis does not define a disability, and a disability does not point to one diagnosis inherently. Diagnostic labels and disability symptoms all too commonly lead to assumptions about what a person can or cannot do, what they do or do not understand, what they do or do not want. Hodor was boxed into the identity of simple-minded nearly-mute stableboy for his entire life because of the assumptions of others. (Gore, 2016) Significantly, the Hodor discussion therefore moved from one entrenched in the medical model towards one that began to recognise the workings

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  99 of the social model. Approaching this development within the context of the narrative does not necessarily favour a cure/care diagnostic approach because knowledge spaces were opened online via collective ­intelligence with literary, medical, television, disability and GOT experts questioning whether the narrative had finally fallen into a disability trap. Together, these various participants were engaging in a process of collective intelligence developing a theory of complex embodiment. Had Hodor suddenly become a stereotypical representation? Returning to The Atlantic interview, Mayer described liking GOT primarily because it does not fall into disability traps. However, she saw the Hodor characterisation as edging too close to the sacrificial Christ-like figure (­Kornhaber, 2016). Meanwhile, #holdthedoor became a trending topic on Twitter within hours of the episode airing, and crafters began creating and selling Hodor doorstoppers within 3 days. The Hodor conversation across several years and medical, popular culture, and literary conversations is an example of spreadable media. These activities showed that Hodor mattered to people, just as he mattered to the narrative. This new information regarding both plot and characterisation regarding Hodor also provided further opportunity to reflect on other characters as they relate to Hodor. For example, Bran, whom Mayer describes as an abusive, complicated character: He’s abusing Hodor but he’s not an evil character – he’s selfish and lacks empathy on occasion, just like everybody else. [By contrast] imagine what Dickens would have done with him: Tiny Tim. (Kornhaber, 2016) Bran’s warging abilities became immediately apparent after he woke from his coma, when he appeared as his younger self following the three-eyed raven through the stables. In the context of the history of disability representation, online discussion offers some useful insights. For some, Bran was the supercripple, given compensatory abilities upon becoming disabled. He was metaphorically and literally transformed into a superhuman. However, for others, he displayed the complexity of humanity. Unable to walk, and despite best intentions, no one had made him the modified saddle nor taught him to ride the horse in the way Tyrion had earlier suggested, and as such, Bran relied on Hodor for mobility. Therefore, the dynamic between Hodor and Bran also illustrates the central role of social attitudes in the creation of disability. While Bran never received his saddle, Hodor never received an opportunity other than to be Bran’s transport. While neither characters is a perfect representation of disability according to the social model, they do reflect George R.R. Martins’ goal to foreground the humanity of each character he represents.

100 Representation

Conclusion In an article published in Disability Studies Quarterly, Colleen Elaine Donnelly reflects on Tyrion Lannister as a complex character who invites spectators to confront their disability prejudices and judgements: He is a multiple-faceted character, self-indulgent and without remorse, yet capable of compassion, courage under fire, and a sense of morality that ends up putting him at cross purposes with other family members. (Donnelly, 2016) The representation of disability via Tyrion is indeed complex and challenging. He becomes a powerful leader in the series yet is still subject to significant social stigma. However, Tyrion claims disability constantly throughout GOT and works diligently to improve the lives of others he identifies with, the aforementioned ‘cripples, bastards and broken things’. Thus, while Tyrion the character contributes to the knowledge claims about disability and disability representation on television, this chapter proposes an equally important area of analysis – the creation of knowledge spaces about disability via online discussion about disabled characters on GOT. Applying Pierre Lévy’s framework of collective intelligence to audiences of GOT as they engaged in a collective process of meaning-making, I argued that such discussion, constantly added to and updated in real time, offers important insights into the social and cultural construction of disability. While Tyrion became a fan favourite, prompting the hashtag #freetyrion, Hodor was approached from a medicalised and tragedy perspective until he was finally afforded a backstory. It is important that disability studies begin to pay attention to television fan activities if it is to move forward in its analysis of contemporary television. The notions of collective intelligence, second-screen entertainment and producerly text all hold particular significance for disability representation and advocacy because the general population gain most of its insight into the experience of disability through television and other media (Haller, 2010). Lévy’s framework of collective intelligence explains that people with more knowledge as well as those with less experience with a topic will come together in online spaces to assist one another in making sense of television representations, in this case how society is choosing to represent disability. Additionally, second-screen online discourse allows often marginalised people, for example those with disability, a voice in debates from which they are usually excluded. In turn, disability has entered the realm of producerly spreadable media through social media discussions about disability representation on film and television and via the creation of disability-specific online sites and

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  101 forums such as GimpGirl and the now defunct Feminists With Disability for a way Forward FWD, disability thematically entering mainstream sites like TV tropes and disability activist websites such as The Accessible Netflix Project and #toylikeme. Conversations about disability representation on Twitter span years, with hashtags entering the popular culture zeitgeist. As such, television and social media as a form of collective intelligence are able to create more media attention to promote increased representation and advocacy and, importantly, therefore also offer an alternative to the often disabling media power. GOT was selected for analysis in this chapter because it is a popular programme within Australia; indeed, many Australians download unauthorised copies in order to stay up to date with the series as it airs in the USA. Many cite dissatisfaction with the Australian licencing agreements that result in current episodes of GOT only being available on Foxtel. As Part II of the book moves on to consider access, the availability of international programming via this platform becomes increasingly problematic, particularly when access features are withheld from ­Australian audiences.

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102 Representation Garland-Thomson, R. (1997). Extraordinary bodies: Figuring physical disability in American culture and literature. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Gore, K. (2015, 14 April). Hodor does not have aphasia. Retrieved from https:// www.speechirl.com/hodor-does-not-have-aphasia Gore, K. (2016, 30 May). Hodor, aphasia, and what it means IRL. Retrieved from https://www.speechirl.com/hodor-aphasia-and-the-irl-story Gray, J. (2008). Television entertainment. New York, NY: Routledge. Haller, B. (2010). Representing disability in an ableist world: Essays on mass media. Louisville, KY: Advocado Press. Harrison, M. (2018). Power and punishment in Game of Thrones. In J. L. Schatz & E. G. Amber (Eds.), The image of disability: Essays on media representation. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company Inc. Harvey, D., & Nelles, D. (2014). Cripples, bastards, and broken things: Disability in Game of Thrones. Retrieved from http://www.randomhouse.ca/hazlitt/ feature/cripples-bastards-and-broken-things-disability-game-thrones Hutchinson, J. (2017). Cultural intermediaries: Audience participation in ­media organisations. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. Jenkins, H. (2013). Spreadable media: Creating value and meaning in a networked culture. New York: New York University Press. Gaines-Lewis, J., & Smith, D. (2015, 9 April). Why does Game of Thrones’ Hodor only say “Hodor”? Retrieved from https://www.nature.com/scitable/ blog/mind-read/why_does_game_of_thrones Kay, D. (2017, 24 July). Alpha60 white paper: Piracy ratings for Game of Thrones season 7 episode 1 (701). Retrieved from https://alpha60.co/2017/07/24/ alpha60-white-paper-piracy-ratings-for-game-of-thrones-season-7-episode-1/ Kornhaber, S. (2016, 27 May). The ethics of Hodor. Retrieved from https://www. theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2016/05/the-ethics-of-hodor/484643/ Lawrence, W. (2015, 12 September). How Game of Thrones changed Peter ­Dinklage’s life. Retrieved from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/ news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11510137 Lévy, P. (1997). Collective intelligence: Mankind’s emerging world in cyberspace (R. Bononno, Trans.). New York, NY and London, England: Plenum Press. Macneill, K. (2017). Torrenting Game of Thrones: So wrong and yet so right. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, 23(5), 545–562. doi:10.1177/1354856516640713 Marsh, S. (2017, 30th June). A third of Aussies plan to illegally download latest Game of Thrones season. Retrieved from https://finance.nine.com. au/2017/06/30/16/50/30-percent-of-aussies-plan-to-download-game-ofthrones-illegally Massie, P. J., & Mayer, L. S. (2014). Bringing elsewhere home: A song of ice and fire’s ethics of disability. In K. Fugelso (Ed.), Ethics and medievalism (pp. 45–60). Cambridge, England: D. S. Brewer. ­ edia access Media Access Awards. (2013). Game of Thrones creator at the m awards. Retrieved from https://mediaaccessawards.com/game-thrones-creatormedia-access-awards/ Ross, S. M. (2008). Beyond the box: Television and the Internet. Oxford, ­England: Blackwell Pub.

Collective Intelligence: Disability, GOT  103 Sarikakis, K., Krug, C., & Rodriguez-Amat, J. R. (2017). Defining authorship in user-generated content: Copyright struggles in The Game of Thrones. New Media & Society, 19(4), 542–559. doi:10.1177/1461444815612446 Shakespeare, T. (2006). Disability rights and wrongs (1st ed.). New York, NY: Routledge. Sheehan Perkins, M. (2017, 15 July). If Westeros had psychologists, Game of Thrones characters would have these mental illnesses. Retrieved from https:// www.businessinsider.com.au/mental-illnesses-game-of-thrones-characters2017-6?r=US&IR=T#/#game-of-thrones-returns-for-its-seventh-seasonon-july-16-honda-intends-to-continue-analyzing-more-characters-on-his-­ podcast-and-youtube-channel-during-the-new-season-6 Siebers, T. (2004). Disability as masquerade. Literature and Medicine, 23(1), 1–22. doi:10.1353/lm.2004.0010 Wilde, A. (2004). Are you sitting comfortably? Soap operas, disability and audience. Discover! 2. Retrieved from http://disability-studies.leeds.ac.uk/files/ library/wilde-Alison-Wilde-Dis-cover-2-Adapted-Paper.pdf Winter Is Coming. (2013, 22 October). Game of Thrones wins award honoring disability awareness. Retrieved from http://winteriscoming.net/2013/10/ game-of-thrones-wins-award-honoring-disability-awareness/

Part 2

Access

6 Digital Diversity

In 2014, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings made an apocalyptic prediction – broadcast television would go the way of the horse and carriage by 2030 (Hecht, 2014). This was not the first time such a predication about television had been made – back in 2012 an article in the Atlantic had predicted streaming would see the end of television, broadcast and cable (Thompson, 2012). Earlier in 2010, Australian commentators were predicting television would become accessible anytime, anywhere and dominated by niche programming (Walters, 2010). Yet at the time of Hasting’s comment, Netflix was not even legally available in Australia. Although discussions had been taking place for its entry into Australia as early as 2011, it was not until 2015 that it actually launched in this country. The delay was due to pre-existing television rights agreements and to existing media opposition – the Netflix business model posed a significant threat to Australian broadcasters. Indeed, these agreements continue to have an impact – Netflix Australia offers only about a quarter of the content of its US counterpart. Amidst these cries of the end of television, I taught a unit called Television and Popular Culture aimed to establish a critical approach to television and video that would bridge both academic and popular discussion regarding this medium. The unit focused on the evolution of screen technologies, texts, audiences and industries brought about by the internet, Web 2.0 and user-generated content. However, my students insisted that they did not watch television. Instead, they were downloading, torrenting and watching YouTube on their mobile devices and laptops. They were not bound by network timetables; they were subverting the stranglehold the pay television system had in Australia by accessing shows via illegal downloads. Wasn’t that still television, I would ask, just accessed from a different technology? Two years later, after giving a talk on television access to a group of students from China, I was told the same thing, but the story had evolved. Now, television – or whatever we were calling it – audiences were adding to its accessibility through the creation of transcripts and user-generated captions (see Chapter 8). However, these shows and participatory materials were still definitely not being watched on the

108  Access traditional television set in a lounge room. And we probably should not even be calling them television. Earlier this year, I held a symposium in Australia on Disability, Media and Human Rights to conclude the research project that this book accounts. I opened the 2-day event by talking about how this project had not turned out the way I imagined it would 5 years previously, when I began it. I had intended to investigate whether the transition to digital television would improve representations of disability on television and/ or facilitate the provision of accessibility features such as closed captions, audio description, signing avatars and so on for people typically excluded, or marginalised, from television. However, after waiting 13 years for digital television in Australia, it arrived with little fanfare. It was then closely followed by video-on-demand services, which in turn revolutionised all aspects of the medium. At that point, the study of disability and television also achieved legitimacy. Internationally, scholars and activists were conducting reviews and analysing the number of disabled characters on television (see Chapter 2). Communities of people with disability and their allies began forming online communities to talk about the inadequacies of disability representation. As a broader society, we embraced a strong intersection between digital media and television via online discussion. Consequently, my research project on disability representation and access seemed to take on a life of its own. It took me further than I had anticipated – into the digitisation of television across broadcast, catch-up and video-on-demand services into smartphone technology, entertainment media, online activism, print media, working in the media, disability toys and disabled gamers. Speakers at the aforementioned symposium addressed all these topics and more. Additionally, social media was emphasised as a particular game changer for the television of the future at this event. It was offering people with disability the opportunity to speak back to the media – or even make their own media – if what the media was doing was inadequate. As these three scenarios suggest, television has changed. We do not watch television anymore – we access it. Quite often we contribute to its meaning with our own producerly productions, second-screen engagements or accessible translations. This offers great opportunities for many, including people with disability. However, it must be acknowledged that disabled people have a different relationship with television cultures of production, consumption and regulation, both pre- and post-digitisation, and with this explosion of television freedom, there is danger this group will continue to be marginalised. This chapter focuses on the impact of digitisation on this group. The chapter begins with an introduction to digital television, reflecting on the impacts this has had on both disabled and mainstream audiences and briefly discussing the different ways it was introduced in various countries. Other associated online technologies such as catch-up television and video-on-demand, user-generated videos and digital recording

Digital Diversity  109 devices and program guides are also discussed. This section concludes with a focus on accessibility features present in digital technologies, and outlines four major concerns with the switch to digital television for people with disability – the digital divide, remote control accessibility, set-top boxes, and usability. The chapter considers both the impacts of the digitisation of television and outlines the opportunity for advanced accessibility features for disabled people.

An Introduction to the Digitisation of Television Drawing on Elizabeth Ellcessor’s notion of the ‘preferred user’ as a way to consider ‘specific arrangements of bodies, technology, culture, and power’ (Ellcessor, 2016), it is clear that television’s preferred users have historically been non-disabled: A television set assumes an audience capable of receiving audiovisual material; captions are opt-in, and video description is only rarely available. Such technologies maintain the hegemony of the preferred user position through their materiality and their status as a default; in doing so, they uphold an able-bodied norm regarding media and society more broadly. (Ellcessor, 2016) For Ellcessor, the preferred user of most technology is typically white, affluent and able-bodied. As a result, this user comes to stand in for the ‘default experience of a medium’ (Ellcessor, 2016, p. 63). A consideration of a disabled user, however, reveals ‘actual uses and user positions’ that undermine the normative assumptions that surround users of technology. Inherent in Ellcessor’s critique of the preferred user is a recognition that alternative means of access are available for disabled users– for example, captions and audio description provide a way for people with hearing and vision impairments respectively to access television. Indeed, the switch to digital television was seen as offering the opportunity for a more widespread availability of both features. However, as I will discuss in this section, this was not always the case, in large part because disabled people continue to be devalued as a key audience demographic – access to television is not considered a human right for this group, despite the arguments put forward in the UNCRPD. As such, I consider the disabled television user as they engage with both the technology of television, its insistence on the primacy of vision and hearing, as well as the assumption of a non-­disabled preferred user. The Impact of Digital Television Digital television, sometimes described as the most significant evolution in television technology since colour, offers better picture, better sound

110  Access and more content than analogue television. Transmission is the key difference between analogue and digital television. Unlike analogue television, which transmits images in FM and audio in AM, digital television transmits all the features of television together across digital channels. This also enables it to offer more features, including additional audio, video and text. Compared to analogue television, digital compression enables ‘more channels to be transmitted with better image quality and improved interactive applications. Roughly six times as many channels can be broadcast with the same amount of transmission capacity as … one analogue channel’ (Adda & Ottaviani, 2005, p. 161). The format therefore offers the opportunity for both more information and flexibility to manipulate the form in which that information is presented to the viewer. As Ian Weber and Vanessa Evans explain: … [digital television] is about data or combinations of zeros and ones representing values for improved colour representation, contrast and sound. What distinguishes it from the current analogue terrestrial system is the amount of information it can deliver and the flexibility that broadcasters have to manipulate the form in which that information is presented to the viewer. (Weber & Evans, 2002) In short, digital television enables a personalised one-on-one experience and should therefore facilitate greater flexibility in the ways television can be watched and accessed, especially for people with disability. ­I ndeed, several commentators and academics predicted it would ‘­empower’ its viewers (Bozios, Lekakos, Skoularidou, & Chorianopoulos, 2001; ­Dawson, 2010; Jensen, 2005; Wilbur, 2008). This promise of ­empowerment alongside the ability to manipulate the way in which information is presented held particular significance for a sizeable portion of the disability community, including people who predominately communicate in sign language, people with both hearing and vision impairments, and people with dexterity impairments (Pedlow, 2008). Importantly, this access to digital technologies is a key way of ensuring that people with disability are included in social, political and economic processes, and are therefore less likely to experience social exclusion (Macdonald & Clayton, 2012, p. 704). It has been argued that digital television could improve this social inclusion through accessibility options such as captions, audio description, signing, spoken subtitles and clean audio. Indeed, social isolation and lack of independence are key issues for the disability community, and core studies in digital television accessibility have focused on these issues. For example, Slater et al. argue digital television could potentially be a key enabler for people with disabilities by lessening social isolation through improved access to information, government services and communication (Slater,

Digital Diversity  111 Lindström, & Astbrink, 2010). Similarly, Charmichael et al. found that digital television could increase the independence of groups of people with disability by increasing access to entertainment and information in an era where the role of television in general is becoming more important (Carmichael, Rice, Sloan, & Gregor, 2006). For Elizabeth Ellcessor, the digital format allows people with disability access to a global media sphere (Ellcessor, 2011). However, for this to occur, the technology must take into consideration the specific needs of people with disability who require alternative and accessible methods of access. Yet, despite all the rhetoric prior to the introduction of digital television, the reality of how people with disability actually experience it reveals digital television is a key site of both inclusion and exclusion. Accessibility Features Access to digital television for people with disability has been largely excluded from mainstream public debate. However, people with disability have long been advocating for more concentrated activist efforts around two key accessibility issues – closed captions and audio description – as well as other accessibility requirements which would benefit a wide range of different people, including those with hearing or vision impairments, physical or intellectual disabilities, and the elderly (Table 6.1). Table 6.1  Television accessibility requirements according to disability Impairment / accessibility requirements Hearing • Subtitles for 100 per cent of the content • Sign language in newscasts, documentaries and education programs • A clean audio service for dramatic or fictional contents Vision • Audio description for fiction programs and documentaries • Interactive services, such as an electronic program guide, accessible by means of audio navigation systems • Enhanced graphical user interfaces (for people with residual vision) Physical disabilities • Interactive navigation systems • Adaptable ergonomics of hardware and software Elderly and people with intellectual disabilities • All of the above • A ‘design for all’ strategy

112  Access For example, people with vision impairments have been identified as a group that has been excluded from television as a leisure pursuit as a result of both technological and legislative barriers (Robare, 2011). Early proponents of digital television predicted audio descriptions of non-audible visual material on-screen would become more widely available because of digital television. While this has been true in some cases, for example in the UK where audio description is available on around 10 per cent of programming, for the most part audio description is not widely available, particularly in Australia (for a detailed discussion see Chapter 7). Likewise, although closed captions were already a feature of television, digital technologies were predicted to facilitate improved access to television for people who are d/Deaf or hard of hearing through new technologies such as ‘closed signing’ and lip-reading avatars. It was not predicted, however, that the digitisation of television would see this community having to reignite their fight for the inclusion of captions on the new platforms (see Chapter 8). In addition, there was concern that people with dexterity impairments would experience exclusion as a result of the switch to digital television due to increased demands on dexterity with reference to television set-up, remote control use and interactive demands (Pedlow, 2008). However, observations regarding the issues faced by this cohort have instead been used as an example of how to create more accessible and usable equipment for all users (Sinclair, Bramley, Dobbie, & Gillespie, 2007). Despite the recognised benefits for television audiences, the introduction of digital television was delayed all over the world. With television serving a recognised cultural function –providing access to information and the associated participation in society – most members of the population needed to have made the switch from analogue to digital before governments could turn off the analogue system. Different countries took different approaches to encouraging their population to make this switch. For example, in the USA, delays were not initially expected because of that country’s reliance on subscription services rather than free-to-air television. A coupon program was introduced for people who did rely on free-to-air services to obtain a set-top box. However, the program proved problematic when it became apparent that the number of people affected was grossly underestimated. A 2-year extension was introduced, and further funding had to be provided for the coupon scheme to ensure everyone on the waiting list could obtain the necessary equipment. Nevertheless, 421 television stations still chose to make the switch exclusively to digital television at midnight on the original cut-off date of 17 February 2009 (Wigfield, 2009). As a result, millions of disadvantaged and vulnerable Americans, including disabled people who could not afford subscription television, were left with limited television

Digital Diversity  113 availability until the coupon issues were resolved and people could obtain their set-top boxes. Although in the UK, more communication was attempted with people with disability regarding the digital television switchover, take up was still slow. A Switchover Help Scheme was offered in the UK between 2007 and 2012 to assist people who were over 75 or had a disability – that is, are blind or partially sighted, or claim a disability benefit – with the transition to digital television. Despite letters being sent to around seven million potential eligible customers explaining the scheme, by 2010 only 18 per cent of those eligible had used the Help Scheme (Committee on Communications, 2010), and it recorded a significant final uptake of just 19 per cent and an associated underspend of £340 million (­DigitalUK, 2012). The lack of awareness or uptake of the Help Scheme was attributed to ­several factors including the initial installation fee of £40 for many eligible customers deterred uptake, and the lack of effective publicity (Committee on Communications, 2010). Accessibility was also criticised with people reporting difficulty accessing quality closed captions, and after support through the government (Evans, Wu, & Price, 2015). Like, the UK, a Household Assistance Scheme (HAS) was offered in Australia to provide both financial and practical assistance with the conversion to digital television in households ‘where at least one person was in receipt of the maximum level of aged pension, disability support pension, carers payment and equivalent DVA payments’ (Australian National Audit Office, 2012). HAS provided eligible customers with a free supply and installation of an accessible digital set-top box and a new television antenna if required. The set-top box provided was specifically designed to include accessibility features such as captions and audio description. HAS also offered ‘practical and technical assistance to those who are most likely to have significant difficulties in selecting and installing the appropriate equipment to switch to digital television’ (Australian National Audit Office, 2012, p. 15) and provided post-­ installation support for 12 months should the equipment become faulty or if issues with its use became apparent over time (Australian National Audit Office, 2012). According to the 2012 audit, of the estimated 1.9 million households which may be eligible for the HAS, 85,326 services had been provided at a cost of $37 million to the government. By 2014, a further 95,000 customers received HAS services (Department of Communications, 2014). Common Concerns during the Switch to Digital Television In addition to the broad focus on captions and audio description, the available literature identifies four additional concerns with the switch to digital television – the digital divide, remote control accessibility, set-top boxes, and usability.

114  Access With regard to the digital divide, digital technologies, while offering significant potential, should not be treated as an automatic source of liberation for people with disability. While they may help to reduce environmental barriers, they will not automatically ‘change the relationship between individuals with an impairment and society’ (Roulstone, 1998). Without a corresponding change in disabling attitudes, technological advancement will not result in full inclusion. Further, technology must be accessible, usable and affordable to ensure this group benefit. Indeed, the digital divide significantly impacted on people with disability’s experience of the transition from analogue to digital television: … those with hearing disabilities and those with vision disabilities do not have access unless the infrastructure incorporates inclusive design. Also, people with all sorts of disabilities may not even be able to operate the controls or the interfaces that manage the features and functions of the display or recording device as home electronics move from components to system-based purchases. (Simpson, 2009) The groups most likely to be affected by this digital divide were people over 65 years of age, those with a low income and those with a disability. The level of inaccessibility and poor usability of digital television experienced by this group is compounded by social isolation or having no one to call for assistance when setting up a set-top box or learning how to use complicated remote controls. Both of these points were a source of frustration amongst people I interviewed: It wasn’t accessible to set up. I had to point the remote control to a certain part of the TV to get it to work (that was very annoying as I’d usually miss the spot or go right up to the TV with the remote to make it work – defeats the purpose of having a remote). Indeed, the remote control has long been a ‘source of deep ambivalence, a symbol of uncertain media futures’ (Thomas, 2011). The advent of the remote control shifted the balance of power from broadcasters to ­viewers – it prompted an era of innovation and experiments as broadcasters tried to retain the interest of viewers who could easily change channels. Amongst audiences, the remote control came to represent a sort of cultural power, with the person controlling the remote also holding the balance of power in the home. During the switchover, for people with disability the remote control became even more of a focal point with their ‘excessive number of buttons, with limited meaningful grouping and often inadequate labels’ (Pedlow, 2008). Similarly, Clarkson and Keates’ study focuses on elderly people with disability to identify common problems encountered during

Digital Diversity  115 the digital television switchover such as difficulty locating and pressing buttons on remote controls, reading subtitles, and the cognitive demand of operating an unfamiliar system. They cite changing channels, using menus and turning subtitles on and off as frequently problematic – this is significant considering the compulsory nature of digital switchovers (Clarkson & Keates, 2004). Another study by Costa and Duarte employed user surveys and comparisons of web applications and television access to determine whether accessibility features on televisions are limiting to users with vision impairment (Costa & Duarte, 2017). The authors assert that, as it has become more interactive, television has become less accessible to users with vision impairment. Users now need to navigate and negotiate increasingly complicated remote controls and report getting ‘lost’ when using onscreen menus, when trying to record, or when accessing electronic program guides. At the same time, they are also dealing with a larger number of channels that do not necessarily offer the accessibility options that many require in order to make the television usable in the first place. Set-top boxes are another key area of focus. Clarkson and Keates compare two commercially available set-top boxes – one marketed as ‘easy to use’, and the other a market leader at the time of the study (Clarkson & Keates, 2004). They assess the usability of each of these early model set-top boxes, and highlight numerous scenarios in which a user or prospective user of a set-top box could experience accessibility issues, including installing and tuning the box, operating the program guide, using subtitles, and navigating menus and other interactive content (p. 1). They conclude that design needs to be more universal (p. 6). This idea of universal design is often presented as an effective solution to the problem of digital disability. By ‘designing for disability from the beginning’, universal design techniques can result in ‘products that are more beneficial for a wider range of people’ (Ellcessor, 2015). Clarkson and Keates continue, arguing that, rather than focusing upon developing assistive technologies for particular impairments, a universal design approach would better accommodate all users, including those with a range of impairments as well as users with less experience using digital technology such as the elderly. Due to these issues with set up, remote controls and set-top box inaccessibility, digital television gained a reputation of being complicated and not user-friendly (Pedlow, 2008; Slater et al., 2010); it was not ‘usable’. Usability is a key component in the accessibility of digital television for people with disability. Usability, under the sub-strand of accessibility, refers to simple and straightforward content that can be used by all with minimal specialised knowledge or equipment (Ellcessor, 2010). By comparison, video-on-demand has been identified as more accessible, usable and intuitive; however, there are examples of both video-on-demand and catch-up television not making pre-existing accessibility features such as

116  Access captions available as each technology is subject to a different regulatory environment (see Chapter 7). In addition, while there is a considerable amount of existing research on the usability of certain devices to access televised programs – ­t ypically televisions, set top boxes, and to some extent computers – there appears to have been relatively little research conducted into the usability of other devices, such as smartphones and tablets. In fact, there has been relatively little scholarly research into digital or video-on-demand television and mobile devices in general – a lot of what has been published comes from magazines and newspapers (see ­Sintumuang, 2012). For example, there is a vast chasm between accessibility guidelines and accessibility implementation in mobile applications – the responsibility for accessibility rests in the hands of app developers who often do not meet accepted nor required accessibility standards (Goggin, 2015). Goggin calls on the main players in the tech world to take more responsibility for ensuring the accessibility of devices and the apps that run on them, again reflecting a need for more focus on the notion of universal design. If these key issues of accessibility are not prioritised, digital television, rather than promoting inclusion, in fact further disables and isolates people with disability. Yet despite the long history of digital television in Australia, there remains a lack of commitment to disability access and usability. For example, the delivery of accessibility features relies not only on shifting policy and social agendas but also on the priorities of broadcast suppliers and manufacturers of hardware. A common approach to the technology required is not considered to be a priority – user interfaces vary across hardware devices and pose a significant challenge for continuity of accessibility across devices and platforms. Further, the accessibility of devices for watching television is also often determined by the software and operating system platforms that are used. While in the past this has led to issues of access, many devices now piggy-back on the more accessible platforms of mobile phones, both Android and iPhone. This means that if a device can be voice-­ controlled from a smartphone, then a television app can usually also be voice-­controlled. For example, in the last 2 years in particular, devices like Apple TV, Google Chromecast and others that allow your phone to control the remote have significantly increased the accessibility of some forms of television and satisfied some concerns about remote control and set-top box accessibility discussed above. Additionally, more and more devices have voice search, voice command and screen reader technology to enable a wider audience to be able to navigate the interface. While a welcome move, it is important to ensure people also have access to the assistance they need to set them up in the first place. However, whether or not access services such as captions or audio description are available to the user will depend on multiple parties in the

Digital Diversity  117 television production and distribution chain, particularly the developer of the app or program and the television content provider. Indeed, platforms and content providers often disagree about who is responsible for providing captioned or audio-described content, with the unfortunate result being a lack of these features. However, in the case of some services such as Netflix and ABC iview, they provide both the content and the app that delivers the content, so they can ensure the compatibility of their accessibility services with the devices capable of running the app. Netflix is therefore able to ensure that content is captioned prior to acquisition or in-house, and in a format that is compatible with their content delivery systems. Netflix thus has the most captioned and a­ udio-described content, although the latter is not yet available on all devices. By comparison, ABC iview follows only the minimum required level of accessibility and is currently being sued by a coalition of A ­ ustralians with vision impairment for violating human rights. The provision of accessibility and therefore usability features – or the lack thereof – is also closely linked to current legislative requirements. ­ ustralian teleCaptions, the most widely available access feature on A vision, is subject to both Australian standards and legislated quotas. Yet, this is only of use with already-captioned content. While there are laws in place to ensure captioning of much content on broadcast and free-to-air channels in Australia, there is currently no specific Australian legislation regarding the mandated captioning of programs streamed across newer digital services. By comparison, the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations require captioning capability for all video devices ‘that receive or display video programming transmitted simultaneously with sound, including those that can receive or display programming carried over the Internet’ (National Association of the Deaf [NAD], 2011). Therefore while the US laws require content screened online to be captioned, no such legislation ­ ustralia. Yet digital content traverses international borders. exists in A This leads to ­inequality in access around the world. Some providers are at least aiming to rectify this issue – for example, even though Netflix Australia is under no legal obligation to provide access services (unlike Netflix US), it has very high levels of captioning. Similarly, audio-­described Netflix content is available to Australians although there is currently no standard mandate in Australia pertaining to audio description, even though most newer model smart televisions can display this feature if available. However, television is being watched on more than just the regular television set. There are now screening cultures on mobiles, laptops and tablets which complicate television broadcast and reception in a digital age. Australian households have an average of 6.4 screens per home. These newer services and the screens used to access them often display a stronger commitment to accessibility. However, there is the potential too

118  Access that new streaming services – both subscription and free-to-air – do not value their audience and therefore ignore accessibility in the transition to online portals (for a discussion of captions see Chapter 7).

Taking Digital Television Online Connecting over the top or catch-up television and video-on-demand, watching user-generated videos on YouTube or Vimeo, and accessing digital recording devices and program guides such as TiVo, Telstra TV and Fetch TV also form part of the digitisation of television and the shift to individualising both access to and representations on television. Like digital broadcast television, these services and devices hold great potential for customisation and flexibility, therefore potentially benefitting people with disability who need access to television using captions, audio description and voice-activated electronic program guides. For example, catch-up television offers viewers the opportunity to watch television shows outside of broadcast times using an internet-connected device. It was first introduced in Australia between 2008 and 2011, with services beginning as websites and then later progressing to apps with the take up of mobile media. Subscription video-on-demand services have also caused a major shift in the way television is used and consumed in Australia. Prior to 2015, there was a small subscription video-on-demand industry in this country, although tech savvy users would illegally access Netflix via VPN. Local providers such as Quickflix and EzyFlix had limited content due to licencing restrictions, so the bulk of video-on-demand services used by Australians related to catch-up television. Netflix – which had been operating in the USA since 1997, streaming since 2007 – did not become legally available in Australia until March 2015. Stan and Presto Entertainment also became available that same year, with Hayu following shortly after in 2016. A disability focused video-on-demand site – Disability Busters – launched in April 2016. Early providers Quickflix and EzyFlix were unable to withhold the increased competition from newer operators such as Stan and Netflix, and ultimately Presto too was folded into parent company and pay television provider Foxtel. Amazon Prime launched in 2018. In 2014, Screen Australia published research which suggested watching television content online was ‘for everyone’ (Screen Australia, 2014, p. 2). The report highlights several reasons for Australian audiences’ embrace of watching television online via video-on-demand and catch-up television services, including niche audiences, a move towards less collective and concurrent television-viewing practices, and a growing video-on-­ demand market in Australia. In short, the research focuses on the ways user preferences and individualised approaches to viewing and accessing television were changing the way television is consumed. However, while Screen Australia identified a variety of different audience segments, such

Digital Diversity  119 as regional viewers, differences amongst age demographics and occupation status, one group who have long been excluded from all types of television access was conspicuously absent from the discussion – people with disability. Yet, as with the aforementioned move to digital television, people with disability could significantly benefit from television’s shift to online platforms (Ellis, 2014). Each of these new television services provide more individualised viewing preferences, additional functionality and usability, while also ‘illuminating the limits and challenges all technologies face in a convergent environment’ (Beltrame, 2011). Television’s further transition to the internet is again resulting in opportunities and challenges for people with disability. Roy Morgan research from 2016 offers some useful insights to television’s transition to the internet. Despite the headline grabbing declaration that ‘over one in seven Australians now watch no commercial television on a normal weekday’ (Roy Morgan, 2016) what the research actually showed was that people are moving their viewing to online platforms: But aside from being simply a new competitive channel, internet streaming and downloading provided a whole new outlook on media consumption: content on-demand. Now, Commercial TV faces an even more direct competitor, in the form of Subscription Video On Demand (SVOD) including Netflix, Stan, Presto, Quickflix and Foxtel Play. (Roy Morgan, 2016) At the same time, despite the significant rise in smaller screen use, the traditional television set has only slightly fallen in consumption (Fearn & Helliker, 2016). A large television screen was described as an accessibility feature by several interview participants throughout this research. Such large screen televisions, home theatre systems and rooms have reinvigorated television viewing in the home. While it is true, audiences use a variety of methods to access broadcast television, catch-up television and subscription video-on-demand, the large television continues to be a popular option particularly if television is ‘smart’ and the viewing is communal. Indeed, in a study of nine domestic households of early adopters of subscription video-on-demand in Australia, ‘the television was retained for shared viewing, but, as the night wore on, participants would eventually turn to mobile devices in order to watch television that matched their individual interests’ (Meese, 2017, p. 28). The single point lounge room television therefore still provides an important point of family entertainment coherence. This was the case for the people with disability I interviewed. They described watching television with their family members: We have the one TV in one room in the house and, although we put in points to be able to have TVs in other places, we actually have

120  Access already got the big TV in one room, and that’s the separate room to the living and kitchen and everything else, because I didn’t want to have TVs everywhere. And of course now, really what happens is if we’re watching something as a family, we’ll watch something in that room… as my kids are becoming teenagers, they’re going off on their own with their own devices more. We’re trying to make sure that there are things we do together. It’s part of parenting. … it just makes sense to put on the big screen so that we could watch same show together. Or housemates: I live with people whose English is their second language and so [captions] can be easier for them… I think it helps them learn ­English as well. Partners, housemates and family members were described as generally understanding of a person’s need to use captions and audio description. One participant who lived in a share house described always finding the captions turned on when she watched television, even if hearing housemates had been watching television before her. However, for some, television-watching necessitated the presence of another person to make the experience accessible. Two participants described the experience of watching television with another person with a different type of impairment and the ways they compensated for each other: … my best friend was here a couple of weeks ago and we had on Game of Thrones because she’s helping me describe the series ‘cause I haven’t seen it before, and she is deaf and we put the captions on for her, and yet of course, there’s no audio description for Game of Thrones. So, we have to keep pausing and stopping and she has to explain to me what’s happening. My partner is deaf, tone deaf, so we use captions all the time. There’re not enough captions. They don’t have caption available which is weird or it’s not what’s actually being said… because I’m hearing it I’m noticing that that word doesn’t fit and she doesn’t notice it because she’s not hearing the words. It might be during the soft whisper part of the movie or something, so she won’t to be able to hear that. And I’ll be like, that’s actually not what they said. However, for others, the lack of accessible features meant that while they may be in the same room as another person, each was watching a different show: I must admit I’m not a big TV watcher just because they really haven’t been accessible in the past, so I’m quite often lying on the couch

Digital Diversity  121 while [my partner] is watching shows, but then when the availability of iview came in, and Netflix, I find it really difficult to go back to watching shows that don’t have any audio description. So what happened is I’m listening to one show on Netflix while [my partner] is watching Foxtel or she often used Netflix on her iPad as well… we’re in the same room but we are watching different shows.

Conclusion While the introduction of digital television was delayed throughout the world, predictions abound about where television is headed next. For example, in 2017, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg reflected on the possibilities augmented reality had for the future of television. He suggested, ‘You want to watch TV? We could put a digital TV on that wall and instead of being a piece of hardware, it’s a $1 app, instead of a $500 piece of equipment’ (Aouf, 2017). I have heard this prediction before, when I was interviewing a man who used a wheelchair about his vision for the ultimate television that would suit his access needs: … it’s a TV that’s in your walls that made out of glass that’s actually a smartphone TV, and it’s also a phone, tablet, everything. And so I could be in the lounge room but let’s say I want to go and make my sandwich, I could say, ‘Follow me,’ where I could watch my show while I move into the kitchen. It just moves from one screen to another on the wall. The whole wall was the TV, so it just moves as it follows you. That’s great. Because then you can still be doing something while you’re wheeling because your hands are busy. So that’d be cool. Throughout his interview, this participant often reflected on the necessity of keeping his hands free so that he could operate his wheelchair. Using a mobile phone, for example, was out of the question if he wanted to be able to operate his manual wheelchair. Thus, while this man articulates a mainstream prediction for the future of television, he is not the preferred television user as outlined by Elizabeth Ellcessor at the beginning of this chapter. Reflecting on Ellcessor’s notion of the preferred user, the chapter outlined the opportunities and challenges the digitisation of television represents in terms of possible accessibility features for people with disability. The chapter explored the approach taken to people with disability during the period of transition in the USA, the UK and Australia. While in some cases, this group remained on the margins and were not recognised as a television user, in other cases efforts were made to include this group. Five key themes emerge in the available studies around this period and the effect on people with disability – the availability of captions and audio description, the digital divide, remote control accessibility, set-top boxes, and usability.

122  Access The chapter also explored television’s further transition to the internet and reflected on the opportunities and challenges for people with disability. While Screen Australia claimed watching television online was ­ ustralia, ‘for everyone’ prior to the introduction of video-on-demand in A the experience of people with disability show this is not in fact the case. With a lack of captions and audio description and inaccessible interfaces, this group again are not the preferred user. The following chapters go on to explore these issues in depth with a focus on audio description, captions, and the mainstreaming of accessibility features within an individualised viewing experience.

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7 Audio Description

Introduction During a Senate estimates hearing in March 2018, Australia’s first disabled federal minister Senator Jordon Steele-John questioned the Liberal government about the lack of audio description on Australian television. Citing the statistic that 450,000 Australians with vision impairment required audio description to access television, Senator Steele-John challenged everyone in the room to ‘think [about what] their daily life would be like without being able to access television services, what kind of social impact that would have’. Audio description is a track of narration which describes the important visual elements of a television show, movie or performance which are included between the lines of dialogue. It is a secondary audio track delivered through a variety of mechanisms, from radio simulcast to a secondary channel on a television receiver either at the point of broadcast or reception or finally via an app. While the audio description on Netflix for example can be turned on as a language option, four dedicated audio description apps (Disney Movies Anywhere, MovieReading, Actiview, Big Access Media) have become available to provide audio description. They are all location-specific, meaning people outside of particular regions cannot access the app and three of the four focus on movies. The apps work by syncing with the ambient sound of the film or television show and audiences access it using a smart device and headphones so as not to disturb others in the audience who do not require the audio description. While audio description is an essential feature to make television accessible to audiences who are blind or vision impaired, benefits to other disability groups and to the mainstream audience are increasingly being recognised. Yet, despite its documented widespread advantages, ­Australia remains the only English-speaking nation in the OECD that does not currently offer this feature on free-to-air television. In an attempt to redress this, an audio description working group, of which I was a member, was convened throughout 2017 to discuss options for introducing audio description on television in this country. Three  delivery

126  Access options were explored – via free-to-air terrestrial television, via catch-up television or via a dedicated app – yet no recommendation could be agreed upon by the group which was comprised of free-to-air and subscription broadcasters, blind advocates, audio description providers and academics. In the estimates hearing, Senator Steele-John acknowledged the work of the audio description working group, yet also challenged the minister for communications regarding the publication of the report, asking him to ‘give me a clear time line as to the date on which this report will be made public[?] It isn’t hard. Have you got a very big in-tray? Does it get lost in there or what the hell happens?’ However, the report did not seem to be much of a priority for the minister who offered a vague, ‘I can’t tell you when a decision will be made before a decision has been made’. And so continued the political cat and mouse game around audio description that Australians with vision impairment have experienced for over two decades. I write this book six months after the group’s report was delivered to the minister for communications, and just as it has finally been made public. However, in the final report, there remains no indication of whether audio description will ever be introduced into Australian television programming, let alone any preferred delivery option. While it is unclear whether the senators in the room back in March did as Steele-John suggested and imagined what their life would be like without television, studies dating back to the 1960s reveal the importance of television to people who are blind and vision impaired for social inclusion and, more recently, have discussed how the addition of audio description offers a significantly enhanced television experience for this group (American Foundation for the Blind, 1997; Cronin & King, 1998; Ellis, 2015). For example, a US study of audio description during the 1980s cites a viewer with vision impairment’s description of the experience of watching television with audio description: …. [It was] very emotional. I found myself pacing the floor in tearful disbelief. It was like somebody had opened a door into a new world, in which I was able to see with my ears what most people see with their eyes. (Cronin & King, 1998) Lauren Henley from the advocacy group Blind Citizens Australia offers further insight into the social importance of television to Australians with disability, reflecting on losing the social inclusion afforded by television when she lost her sight: You might think that missing out on television is no great loss, but it’s about more than watching the latest episode of Days of our Lives. Like the rest of my friends and family, I want to have choice

Audio Description  127 about what I watch and have the ability to be informed about what is going on in the world. I lost many things when I lost my sight, but one of the things that I lost was social inclusion. (Henley, 2012) Henley’s anecdote is supported by academic research which suggests television plays a central role in offering communities shared access to major events, news and popular culture. Over the course of this research, I have interviewed many people with vision impairments who are frustrated and have had enough of the lack of action on this issue. One participant described successive governments as ‘gutless’ and most were aware of how poorly Australia compared to other countries regarding the availability of audio description. Time and again people told me that Neighbours and Home and Away, two popular Australian soap operas, were available with audio description in the UK but not locally, in the country in which they are made. Likewise, many noted that the majority of American programming which had already been audio-described, such as Law & Order was, frustratingly, imported into Australia without this feature. This chapter reports the findings of that research, focusing on the lack of audio description on Australian television despite its availability worldwide and in this country. The chapter begins with a brief history of audio description internationally, from its conceptual origins in medieval texts to its now widespread availability on video-on-demand provider Netflix. Turning specifically to the Australian example, the chapter then reflects on the contradictory availability of audio description in this country, including a brief analysis of the federally funded Screen ­Australia policies pertaining to audio description. The current ­Australian circuit of culture regarding audio description – how identity and representation sit alongside production, consumption and, importantly in this case, regulation – is then considered using insights obtained from the aforementioned interviews.

History of Audio Description Internationally Conceptually, audio description has long roots within art and literature. For example, Socrates described the process of ekphrasis whereby ‘one form of art can be used to illuminate and accentuate the properties of another’ (Dolmage, 2014). Ekphrasis historically refers to a description of anything; it is a rhetorical tool that amplifies and expands the meaning of the original text and can occur between any artistic mediums. Similarly, if we think of the way mediaeval texts were constructed, the importance of audio description to television does not seem so foreign. Medieval texts consisted of four artists (poet, scribe, illuminator, rubricator) each being responsible for a component of representation. Text,

128  Access image and colour both compliment and compete with each other, ‘each system is a unit independent of the others and yet calls attention to them; each tries to convey something about the other while to some extent substituting for it’ (Nichols, 1989, p. 7). This folio approach requires a mediation between different artists, minds and senses. Again, ekphrasis features in the medieval manuscript as the poetic component gives verbal descriptions. Television is, likewise, considered a collaborative effort – different artists take responsibility for different components of representation, from script to screen, lighting, costuming, directing, filming and so on. However, unlike the medieval manuscript which treated the visual image as secondary to the text, on television, images rather than words are the primary focus. Indeed, while television has always included an audio component, this has not always been the case for all visual ­media  – the original silent films are a good example of this. Prior to the introduction of sound, D/deaf and hard of hearing audiences were valued as an important audience demographic. However, interestingly, as film began to incorporate sound with the introduction of the talkies in the mid-1920s – therefore excluding D/deaf audiences – those who were blind and vision impaired were targeted as a potential new audience through audio description. An article published in the New York Times in 1929 reports on a screening of the film Bulldog Drummond, attended by 100 members of both the New York Association for the Blind and the New York League for the Hard of Hearing (New York Times, 1929). The article describes the screening as ‘the first talking picture ever shown especially for the blind’ and reflects on the process and the audience’s reaction: An interlocutor explained the visual sequences for the blind when the dialogue was momentarily halted. Those without eyesight seemed to enjoy the performance, especially the humorous parts, and there was prolonged applause at the end of the film. (New York Times, 1929, p. 28) However, while the vision-impaired audience were provided with this audio description, those who were D/deaf and hard of hearing were given no such assistance (Schuchman, 1984, p. 71). The intention was clearly to attract a vision-impaired audience to replace the large D/deaf and hard of hearing audience lost with the introduction of sound to cinema. However, it does not appear that this service was offered on an ongoing basis and there is a paucity of literature regarding any form of formal audio description for a number of decades, leaving blind and vision-impaired audiences to rely purely on assistance from family and friends. Indeed, it was not until the 1940s and 1950s that the first regular audio description service was provided, albeit limited to Spanish audiences,

Audio Description  129 when Gerardo Esteban, a radio presenter on that country’s national radio station Radio Nacional de España (RNE) began to describe films. He would begin each description by introducing the film and the cinema from which they were broadcasting, explaining tonight you will have the opportunity to hear and live [the movie] across the radio waves as we are here to narrate over those silent moments in the sound track and to add details so that you can appreciate the action that is taking place on the screen. (Orero, 2007a) The radio station considered the service a commercial venture and charged distributors to air the descriptions. Esteban’s descriptions have been described as offering ‘an important space in prime-time radio programming […] until the birth of television’ (Orero, 2007b, p. 112). However, audio description as we have come to understand it today is often located as originating in the 1960s following the US department of education’s administrator Chet Avery’s urging that consumer groups affiliated with the blind and vision impaired follow the lead of Deaf advocates and apply for funding to describe educational media (DCMP, 2017). However, unlike the Deaf community’s focus on captions to facilitate access to education and entertainment, the majority of Blind activists focused instead on access to the workforce and other areas of social inclusion (DCMP, 2017; Snyder, 2005). In the entertainment arena, there was a small, but active, group of Star Trek television fans who shared audio-described versions of the original television show on cassette tape (Cronin & King, 1998). Change took a while and it was not until a decade or so later that a number of academics and industry insiders in the US begun to further develop the concept of audio description. For example, in 1972 San Francisco State University communications professor Gregory Frazier founded the AudioVision Institute to explore making media and live performances more accessible to people who are blind and vision impaired (DCMP, 2017). His 1975 Master’s thesis explored the process of creating an audio-described version of the television–film drama The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pitman (Frazier, 1975) The thesis offered an historical account of attempts to entertain blind and vision impaired ­ razier audiences alongside the development of the audio-described text. F reflected on listener comprehension, and where narration could be inserted in the film text, ultimately finding audio description to be ‘successful in theory’ and suggesting more research regarding the creation of such tracks. Such research was carried out by other pioneers in audio-description services. In the early 1970s, Dr Margaret Pfanstiehl established the Metropolitan Washington Ear Reading Service which took a broad focus to

130  Access providing access to entertainment to people who are blind and vision impaired. Her contribution to television was particularly notable and, just as Gerardo Esteban had utilised radio to describe cinema in 1940s Spain, during the 1980s Pfanstiehl simulcast an audio-described version of the PBS television show American Playhouse on the radio (Lewis, 2017). In addition to Pfanstiehl’s Metropolitan Washington Ear Reading Service and Frazier’s AudioVision Institute, other groups were active during the 1990s, describing theatre, movies and television shows as well as hosting initiatives, conferences and best practice guidelines for the provision of audio description, including James Stovall’s Narrative Television Network (NTN) established in 1989 and Barry Cronin and Laurie Everett from PBS/WGBH. In 1990, all four received an Emmy for their work audio-describing television (Bernstein, 2009; Lewis, 2017). By the end of that decade, the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced that it intended to phase-in mandated audio description for television. Three main audiences were noted in their Notice of Proposed Rulemaking – people who are blind or vision-impaired, people with learning disabilities, as well as people doing several things at once (Federal Communications Commission, 1999). The inclusion of the last category, that of a mainstream audience, is of note and was due to 60 per cent of the mail which was received from the aforementioned NTN being from sighted viewers who enjoyed the programming (Federal Communications Commission, 1996, 1999). True to its word, in 2000 the FCC introduced a policy that required the four largest television and five largest cable networks to produce 50 hours of ­audio-described content per quarter by April 2002 (Mikul, 2010). While the policy was ultimately overturned by the Supreme Court following a challenge instigated by the Motion Picture Association, the networks had already begun to comply with the FCC’s mandate. Further legislation to reinstate these rules was drafted and gained increasing support up until 2007 but never progressed beyond the Senate subcommittee stage. Finally, in 2010, the US 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act (2010) restored the rules set up by the FCC to mandate 4 hours of ­audio-described content per week (Media Access Australia, 2012a). From 1 July 2018, broadcasters are required to provide 87.5 hours of audio description per quarter (Wiquist, 2017). However, in the US context, the availability of audio description or accessibility measures for people who are blind or vision impaired has been largely considered to be well below the standard established by captions as demanded by people who are D/deaf or hard of hearing (Robare, 2011). As mentioned earlier, despite activism from the Deaf community for the availability of captions, activists for the blind have focused their energies towards workplace accessibility (Downey, 2008; Snyder, 2005). However, with the advent of streaming and the associated increase in television viewing options in the early 2010s, community perceptions

Audio Description  131 began to change and there was a groundswell of online activism with the common goal of encouraging these new video-on-demand providers, mainly streaming giant Netflix but also Hulu, Amazon and iTunes, to introduce audio description on their services (Kingett, 2014). This was spearheaded by Blind activist Robert Kingett who established the Accessible Netflix project in 2014. Responding to the criticisms from the disability community that Matt Murdock, the blind lead character in Daredevil, would not be able to watch his own show on Netflix (­K ingett, 2015), audio description was introduced on all original programming 2 weeks after the release of that show, a significant moment for the availability of audio-description worldwide. This occurred only 2 weeks after Netflix was finally launched in Australia. Netflix advertised the service as a form of translation, describing it as ‘just like choosing the soundtrack in a different language’ (Wright, 2015). In addition, just as the correspondence received by the NTN had previously showed, mainstream audiences also began recognising the potential of audio description (see Mancuso, 2015; Price, 2018). For example, as communities of fans converge online to discuss key moments of popular television programming, the increased information about the programmes via audio description is offering an important fan resource (see Chapter 9). As a result, Netflix now promote the entertainment potential of audio description to augment consumer experience for all. Netflix’ audio description system is relatively easy to access and can be turned on – or off – as a language option. In comparison with the US experience, throughout the 20th century, audio description has developed in Europe as more of a form of translation and has therefore garnered attention within translation studies rather than as an activist issue (Szarkowska, 2011). In addition, two key concerns arise in the European literature regarding the provision of audio description – the absence of guidelines or standards and differences in cultural practice. For example, one study of the different approaches people from Spain, Greece and the USA took to describing the same film yielded significant cultural differences. While the former two countries tended to focus on vivid descriptions of action, the US describers inserted cinematic descriptions of camera movements. Further, Greek describers communicated the perceived emotions of characters; whereas, US describers focused on the technical features of the film. The US describers also referred directly to the film in their description and spoke in the present tense while Spanish and Greek describers spoke in the past tense and described narrative without referring to it being a film (Orero, 2008). The researchers thus recommend the creation of guidelines to facilitate greater access to audio description across the world: Notwithstanding the obvious cultural differences among the many European languages and cultures, some basic, common framework

132  Access may be agreed upon and applied. Descriptive guidelines will prove useful for the creation of AD scripts which could then be translated, and perhaps even stored in a data-bank from which broadcasters could download them. This way, the few available resources for media accessibility will be optimized, giving rise to a more systematized and better-quality audio description. (Orero, 2008, p. 191) Yet ten years later, no such guidelines exist. With the increasing internationalisation of television, the availability of audio description created in different locations could be of great benefits to people in other locations where audio description is not as widely available – one prominent example of this is Australia.

Audio Description in Australia Currently, Australia is the only English-speaking nation in the OECD that does not have audio description on television. Broadcasters in ­Canada, Ireland, the UK and the USA are all subject to legislative requirements that mandate a certain number of hours of audio description. While New Zealand does not have legislation in place, 30 hours per week of audio description is made available through the public broadcaster and is funded via a government grant. Yet despite the lack of a consistent audio-description service on Australian broadcast television, there have only been two television trials and a few historical instances of volunteer community radio efforts to simulcast audio-­described dramas. Currently audio description is only available to Australia via subscription services such as Netflix, iTunes and Amazon. Some limited Foxtel children’s television content is available through the Big Access Media app. Historically, there have been limited choices in access to entertainment for people who are blind or vision impaired. At the end of last century, a voluntary service organised by Vision Australia offered audio-described theatre and VHS content; however, in 1999 the Royal Institute for the Blind held only 51 audio-described videos in their library and information services unit. These videos had been borrowed 450 times, with a further 250 waiting for loan requests (Simpson, 1999). In 1983, the community radio station 3RPH in Melbourne offered audio description of the international tennis competition Wimbledon as an extension to the television coverage specifically for vision-impaired audiences. In another example of a radio–television simulcast, 3RPH provided descriptions of the popular Australian television dramas Water Rats, The Man from Snowy River and Law of the Lands during the 1990s (Simpson, 1999, p. 38); however, the service was viewed as being ‘at the expense of other content’ (Simpson, 1999, p. 5). So, while the theatre description

Audio Description  133 service continued, and continues to this day, in 1998 Vision Australia and Blind Citizens Australia received funding from the Australian government to research the practicality of introducing an alternative and on-going audio-description service for televised content. The result was John Simpson’s policy paper When a word is worth a thousand pictures: improved television access for blind viewers in the digital era (Simpson, 1999) which has been attributed as the first Australian policy position paper on this issue. Directly tied to the then imminent introduction of digital television in Australia, the report gave an overview of how blind and vision-impaired Australians were accessing television, the policy issues around this and the importance of introducing audio description at the same time as digital television in Australia. Eight recommendations were made in this report that have influenced the progression of audio description in Australia. These recommendations mainly centred around the establishment of various working groups, committees and seminars and, as a result, has been described as approaching audio description from an abstract rather than practical level (World Blind Union, 2011). While this abstract approach to audio description also occurred in the USA with Frazier’s Master’s research, it is worth noting that at the time of the release of Simpson’s paper, ­Australia was over 20 years behind the USA. As such, while Simpson made important and technologically relevant recommendations, change was slow and it was not until 2005 that the federal government provided any catalyst for change – a commercial incentive grant for the ­Australian Caption Centre to start an audio-description service and audio-­describe ten DVDs. Reflecting on the release of these DVDs, a report commissioned by the World Blind Union in 2011 explained: After the release of these DVDs with AD, blind or partially sighted consumers commented that they hoped that this initial batch of DVDs would be followed by an ongoing service, otherwise they would rather not have any as it would be cruel to be given hope which was subsequently dashed. (World Blind Union, 2011) However the service did continue, expanding from 2 per cent of all content in 2005 to around 25 per cent in 2012 (Media Access Australia, 2012b). This goal of increased audio description on free-to-air television continued to drive the sector, and between 2008 and 2010, the Australian government conducted a policy review into Access to Electronic Media (see Department Broadband Communications and the Digital Economy, 2010). Audio description and the UN Convention of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) featured heavily throughout the review and its responses. One important outcome was a 2012 trial of audio description on the public broadcaster the ABC.

134  Access The 2012 ABC trial consisted of 14 hours of audio-described content each week for 13 weeks. While the trial was warmly received by audience members with vision impairment, some technical impediments and limitations were identified mainly due to the timing of the trial – Australia was simultaneously transitioning from analogue to digital television. These issues included hardware compatibility, the ‘ad hoc’ approach undertaken by the ABC regarding manual implementation of audio description, including its rollout on limited devices, and the need for upgraded digital receivers (Department of Communications, 2014, p. 2). However, while advocacy groups acknowledged the technical complexities involved, the expected stakeholder discussions that were due to be held post-trial, in part to attempt to resolve the issues experienced, were never undertaken. Ultimately, the government continued to look to technological change and consumer demand as the driver for audio description rather than a government-­led mandate, suggesting industry innovation and competition would result in the provision of audio description on Australian broadcast television. This lack of subsequent commitment to providing audio description resulted in Blind ­Citizens Australia lodging a formal complaint of disability discrimination against the ABC and the federal government in 2013. This complaint represents a significant shift in rhetoric amongst the vision-impaired community. Whereas in 2005, they expressed reluctance to receive audio-described DVDs in case these was not made available on an on-going basis, by 2013 this community was taking action and standing up for audio-described television as a human right. This shift can also be seen in subsequent attempts at introducing audio description. Whereas Australians with blindness and vision impairment responded to the 2012 trial by emphasising audio description as necessary for social engagement and a fundamental human right from which they were being excluded, by 2016 when a second trial was run on the ABC’s catch-up portal iview this group also began focusing on their consumer rights and gave feedback focusing on the quality of the service. Following the 2012 ABC trial, three key moments have affected the reception of audio description in Australia. First, in 2015, when audio description became available on original Netflix programming, that provider became the only and most reliable audio-description s­ ervice for Australians who are blind or vision impaired. Then, in 2016, iTunes, which some reports suggest had actually been offering a limited ­audio-description service since 2013, launched a new audio-description iTunes room where Australian consumers could apparently easily access audio-described iTunes content for the first time (AppleVis, 2016). Further, Amazon Prime launched in Australia in 2018, offering another avenue for audio description. ­ ustralia The availability of audio description on Netflix and iTunes in A can in part be attributed to US legislation such as the Communications

Audio Description  135 and Video Accessibility Act which reinstated the requirements set in place in 2000 by the FCC that television networks offer 4 hours of audio description per week. The Act went beyond this requirement and introduced quality standards and incremental increases each year, with the intention of reaching ‘100% of television programming described by 2020’ (Edelberg, 2018). Because of this mandate and the significantly longer history of audio description in the USA, a large amount of audio description was made available both via Netflix, iTunes and then Amazon. However, free-to-air and pay TV in Australia had been importing American programming for years without the associated audio-­ description tracks. This again highlights the potential importance of the establishment of an international database for Australian audiences suggested earlier drawing on the work of Oreo (2008). As mentioned in the introduction, in addition to imported programming not being made available to Australians on broadcast television with their original audio-description tracks, a significant amount of local programming likewise has tracks that could be screened alongside ordinary programming but which often is not. The government-funded body Screen Australia began prioritising the creation of audio description alongside captions in 2011 to coincide with a government-funded national upgrade of cinemas to be caption and audio description compliant by 2013 (Screen Australia, 2011). The policy shift saw audio description requirements enter into Screen Australia’s terms of trade, core conditions and marketing agreement policies. While these refer mainly to films, it does stipulate audio description for DVD release (Screen ­Australia, 2017), a popular distribution channel for Australian television drama. Producers of non-film content are also encouraged to provide this feature to facilitate access (Screen Australia, 2017). However, s­ ection 21.3.5 of the policy’s core conditions – which cites audio ­description as a matter that must be included in each marketing agreement – does apply specifically to television dramas (Screen Australia, 2013). These policies have resulted in the creation of audio-described content. For example, an analysis of the ABC’s screening of Screen Australia–­ funded programming found that almost one quarter of shows had audio-­description tracks available (see Ellis, Kent, & Locke, 2018). However, without a mechanism or indeed mandate to make these audio-­ described tracks available, they languish in secret archives. Similarly, two of the seven dramas analysed in Chapter 3 include audio description on their DVD release. However, without a mechanism nor the industry’s willingness to broadcast them, there exists a large back catalogue of audio description which remains frustratingly unavailable to audiences. Put simply, these audio descriptions are not available on television in the country in which they are made because broadcasters actively resist enabling this feature.

136  Access

Circuit of Culture and Audio Description As discussed in Chapter 1, the circuit of culture enables a complete cultural analysis via the five entry points of representation, identity, production, consumption and regulation (see Du Guy et al., 2013) Table 7.1 identifies the key themes which emerged in interviews with Australians with vision impairments as they relate to each point in the circuit of culture. Although distinct, these categories of analysis intersect and influence each other in several ways to give meaning to audio description in Australia. The historical representation of audio description has tended to focus on key individuals, for example Gerardo Esteban in Spain, Chet Avery and Margaret Pfanstiehl in the USA and John Simpson in ­Australia. Indeed, this is the approach taken in this chapter. However, this individualised approach to audio description has had the unintended consequence of constructing audio description as a form of charity or volunteer effort made available by kindly individuals with non-­ commercial motivations. Drawing specifically on the Australian example, regulation has a key influence on both the production and consumption of audio description in this country. Funding requirements, audio-description trials, international regulation and import/export agreements facilitate the production of audio description but without any requirement to facilitate their Table 7.1  Audio description and the circuit of culture Point in the circuit of culture

Key themes obtained from interviews

Representation

Need for an increased focus on human rights Need for an increased consumer focus Need for consistent standards Acknowledgement of television as a social activity Acknowledgement of the feeling of exclusion, that television is considered integral for inclusion Frustration that Australian content is audio-described when exported overseas or released on DVD but is not available on broadcast television Frustration with watching non-audio-described television content once this service had been experienced Issues surrounding cost – the ‘economics of disability’ (Ellis et al., 2016) Contradictory approaches to technology – some were willing to try new technology, others preferred older technology and were unwilling to upgrade Recognition of the importance of the public broadcaster Recognition that the government should legislate

Identity Production

Consumption

Regulation

Audio Description  137 delivery to Australian audiences, these tracks exist primarily as a lost library of content. As such, people with blindness and vision impairment are excluded from full participation in contemporary Australian society. In their introduction to the second edition of Doing cultural studies, Du Gay et al. urge readers to contemplate the ‘boundary between the public and the private as a basis for regulation’ (Du Guy et al., 2013, p. xix). This boundary looms large in the circuit of culture of audio description in Australia. The blindness sector have long argued that audio description is the responsibility of governments to introduce and fund, believing legislation mandating audio description is the most appropriate solution. However, successive governments have tended to put the responsibility on industry innovation and the private sector. In turn, the broadcasters are on record in the 2017 audio-description working group’s final report as believing ‘it is the role of the Government to fund programmes that address social inequities and maximise social welfare’ (Department of Communications and the Arts, 2017, p. 7). However, in reality, it is up to all parties to come to the table. Television traverses both the public and private, and governments take responsibility for both the introduction of television itself and the transition to digital broadcasting. For example, although much of television is a commercial enterprise, these broadcasters lease spectrum from governments. Yet, in addition, the commercial television sector also has rights and responsibilities, particularly in regard to the concept of human rights. For example, the obligations imposed on signatory governments to the UNCRPD to make television accessible also rely on the cooperation of the private sector, as the department of the Australian Attorney General explains: Countries are also to take appropriate steps to set standards and guidelines for access to facilities and services that are open to the public, to make sure that private businesses that provide facilities or services to the public take into account access for people with disability, and to provide training for people involved with access for people with disability. (Attorney General’s Department, n.d.) Audio description must therefore be seen as the responsibility of both government and industry – not being able to access television is not only a significant form of social exclusion but also a violation of human rights, of identity, another key factor in the circuit of culture. Partici­ pants who were blind or vision impaired often reflected on the ways they felt excluded from the broader community because they could not participate in the shared experience of television. Indeed, key themes relating to this lack of identity, alongside economic and technology issues, emerged throughout the interviews.

138  Access Primarily, participants recognised television as integral for social inclusion and highlighted it as being a social activity. However, watching television with a friend or family member was essential for this group because they had to rely on them for on-the-fly descriptions. As such, there was a sense that people would prefer to be able to experience television together without enforcing this additional labour on the person with whom they are watching television. Indeed, the social aspect of television watching and discussing shows with friends and colleagues after the fact is a key theme that runs through Vision Australia’s advocacy efforts in this space (Blindness Sector, 2017). Participants also highlighted the connection between this need for a strong identity, for increased social inclusion and cohesion, with the aforementioned responsibility – of both government and industry – to provide this content. For example, while the most consistent provider of audio description was recognised as coming from subscription services such as Netflix and iTunes, the ABC was particularly highlighted as not meeting its responsibilities to provide this service: I watch a lot of ABC. So if I’m gonna watch something, I watch a lot of stuff on iview, on my iPad. The ABC’s perceived reluctance to take this issue on board seems to be in contrast to the situation in other countries where public broadcasters have typically shown leadership in providing audio description. For example, audio description was already provided on the public broadcaster in the USA before quotas and legislation were introduced, and public broadcasters are the main providers of audio description in ­Canada, New Zealand and Italy. Indeed, a 2013 study of e-accessibility in the European Union found public broadcasters were the most consistent providers of audio description (Kubitschke, Cullen, Dolphi, Laurin, & Cederbom, 2013). Returning to the idea of regulation, legislation was highlighted as a significant motivating factor in the EU study, highlighting that audio description was more likely to be in place if required by law (Kubitschke et al., 2013). Interview participants also discussed how, from an Australian perspective, a similar political and commercial will was lacking and recognised that this would be the main catalyst for any change. However, participants also acknowledged that other factors came into play, including the inconsistent availability of audio-description services, its associated prohibitive cost, and the challenges associated with accessing the technology required. This chapter has already discussed the lack of – and inconsistent approach to – audio-description services on free-toair television in Australia, in particular the frustration that, even when audio description is available for both local and international content

Audio Description  139 screened in Australia, Australian audiences are not given access. As two participants noted: … if you look at the UK [or] the American experience… probably fifty per cent of the shows come on the ABC, on iview, [already have] audio description on them, so why not just buy the audio description? It happens in the UK and there’s plenty in Canada in the US and other places. And it’s interesting. An example, for instance, Neighbours, which is an Australian show, is audio-described in the UK, but not audio-described here. Unbelievable. In addition, there has been a change in perception amongst Australian audiences who are blind or vision impaired regarding audio description on television. Audio description on Netflix original programming had been introduced only a short time before the ABC iview trial, leading to a sudden increase in availability of accessible programmes. For the vision impaired, it was therefore difficult or even impossible to go back to watching television without audio description: Now that there is audio description I don’t bother watching shows that don’t have it. As the great majority of TV shows don’t have AD, I don’t feel like I’m missing out by not having a TV. However, while it is noted that audio description is more widely available on paid subscriptions services such as video-on-demand and catch-up services, accessing these programmes requires a computer or smart television, an internet connection, access to a significant amount of data and, of course, the financial means to facilitate this. The latter in particular is a significant factor for this community and the ‘economics of disability’ (Ellis, Kent, Locke, & Merchant, 2016) – the additional costs associated with having a disability – was discussed by many interview participants as a common and uniting theme. As one participant suggested: Technology works to create and enforce class divides by excluding those of us without the latest computer equipment. The ease of access to this technology was also a widely discussed topic. Across the board, participants were of the view that setting up a television was difficult to impossible, while accessing the same content on a mobile device such as a smartphone or tablet was much easier: [When digital television was introduced in Australia] It was certainly difficult to set [the television], as a blind user… because most

140  Access TVs… weren’t very accessible in their menus … When you have to search, scan for digital stations, and all that, none of that was really accessible. In addition, some were willing to try new technology, while others preferred older technology and were unwilling to upgrade: I use my iPad because my iPad’s got voiceover software and whatever I touch, it reads. So I can sort of move around a lot easier, but it doesn’t work with every channel. All but ABC iview have ‘updated’ systems, which excludes me from accessing. My iPad, although but a handful of years old, cannot ‘upgrade’ its OS – Apple requires that a new model is purchased! Television has become increasingly personalised, through both the variety in platforms and providers and via a rise in individualised, personalised hardware and devices from which to access it. Indeed, as discussed in Chapter 6, accessible or audio remote controls have been highlighted in a number of research projects as a significant and essential access feature for people with disability, and for vision impairment in particular (Carmichael, Rice, Sloan, & Gregor, 2006; Clarkson & Keates, 2004; Costa & Duarte, 2017; Costa, Ficheman, Correa, Lopes, & Zuffo, 2012; Ellis, 2014; Pedlow, 2008). Pedlow (2008) recommends a broader universal design approach to accessibility to make technology accessible and usable for all with varied needs. Such an approach has been embraced by Apple TV which is marketed as being accessible ‘out of the box’, with an audio remote control being one of its main features. Increasingly, these audio features are being used by the mainstream population. However, once again, the costs of an Apple TV and the required internet connection can be prohibitive. For example, at the time of the iview trial, only 37 per cent of Vision Australia members were able to afford access to the internet (Blindness Sector, 2017). Cost is a significant factor for this community. Costs associated with internet connections and hardware required to access video-on-demand and catch-up-services that require internet access for example are prohibitive. With audio description only available via paid subscriptions or purchases, people with blindness and vision impairment were left behind.

Conclusion This chapter has reflected on what audio description means to A ­ ustralians who are blind and vision-impaired with regard to social inclusion. Recently, there has been a shift in how this cohort see audio description, from the rather passive view put forward by the World Blind Union in 2011 that unless an ongoing service could be promised they would

Audio Description  141 rather never be exposed to the service, to the post-ABC 2012 trial stance that audio description is a human rights issue and integral to social inclusion, to finally a more consumer-focused attention on quality at the time of the 2016 iview trial and post increased Netflix and iTunes offerings. This also goes hand in hand with increased discussions regarding the cost of these services. For many in the disabled community, this is an enormous barrier to service access – since audio description is not available on free-to-air television, the only option is to access it via pay television, yet many are unable to afford subscriptions to these services, expensive televisions nor even internet connections. Another significant barrier to the implementation of audio description in Australia is the lack of understanding about what it is or where it is available. Because it is not available on terrestrial free-to-air television, despite policies in place to promote it such as those attempted by both the aforementioned ABC trials and Screen Australia, its subsequent inaccessibility means that most Australians have simply not come across it. It is this lack of knowledge, and therefore lack of representation – not to mention any accompanying legislation – which is a serious impediment to its availability going forward. This is particularly striking when considered in the context of international availability and regulation such as Europe’s attempts at standardisation, and particularly in relation to the worldwide acceptance, and legislation, of other assistive services such as captions. At present, no such standards nor mandates exist in Australia regarding audio description, and there has been little discussion about this outside of certain minority circles to garner change anytime soon. The next chapter goes on to consider the availability of captions in the Australian television landscape. While regulation does exist to mandate the provision of captions on some platforms, this has not kept pace with technological change.

References American Foundation for the Blind. (1997, 25 August). Who’s watching? A profile of the blind and visually impaired audience for television and video. Retrieved from http://www.afb.org/section.aspx?FolderID=3&SectionID=3& TopicID=135&DocumentID=1232#frustrating AppleVis. (2016, 10 May). Apple highlights audio-described movies with new iTunes room. Retrieved from https://www.applevis.com/blog/apple-news/ apple-highlights-audio-described-movies-new-itunes-room Attorney General’s Department. (n.d.). Rights of people with disabilities. Retrieved from https://www.ag.gov.au/RightsAndProtections/HumanRights/ Human-rights-scrutiny/PublicSectorGuidanceSheets/Documents/Rightsof peoplewithdisability-guidancesheet.pdf Bernstein, A. (2009, 4 October). A local life: Margaret Pfanstiehl, 76, blind activist. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/ article/2009/10/03/AR2009100302661.html

142  Access Blindness Sector. (2017). Report on the trial of audio description on ABC iview. Retrieved from https://www.visionaustralia.org/community/news/05-03-2017/ sector-report-on-abc-iview-trialCarmichael, A., Rice, M., Sloan, D., & Gregor, P. (2006). Digital switchover or digital divide: A prognosis for useable and accessible interactive digital television in the UK. Universal Access in the Information Society, 4(4), 400–416. Clarkson, J., & Keates, S. (2004, 18–21 May). Exclusion by design: An assessment of the accessibility of digital television set-top boxes. Paper presented at the International Design Conference - Design Dubrovnik. Costa, D., & Duarte, C. (2017). Visually impaired people and the emerging connected TV: A comparative study of TV and Web applications’ accessibility. International Journal, 16(1), 197–214. doi:10.1007/s10209-016-0451-6 Costa, L. C. P., Ficheman, I. K., Correa, A. G. D., Lopes, R. D., & Zuffo, M. K. (2012). Accessibility in digital television: Designing remote controls. Consumer Electronics, IEEE Transactions on, 58(2), 605–611. doi:10.1109/ TCE.2012.6227466 Cronin, B. J., & King, S. R. (1998, September). The development of the descriptive video services. Retrieved from http://www2.edc.org/NCIP/library/v&c/ Cronin.htm DCMP. (2017). Description timeline highlights. Retrieved from https://dcmp. org/learn/193 Department Broadband Communications and the Digital Economy. (2010). Investigation into access to electronic media for the hearing and vision-­ impaired media access review final report. Retrieved from http://pandora. nla.gov.au/pan/124964/20110207-1015/www.dbcde.gov.au/__data/assets/ pdf_file/0019/131527/Media_Access_Review-final_report_2-12-2010.pdf Department of Communications. (2014). Audio description trial. Retrieved from http://www.communications.gov.au/television/audio_description_trial Department of Communications and the Arts. (2017). Audio description working group – final report. Retrieved from https://www.communications.gov. au/documents/audio-description-working-group-final-report Dolmage, J. (2014). Disability rhetoric (1st ed.). Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press. Downey, G. (2008). Closed captioning: Subtitling, stenography, and the digital convergence of text with television. Baltimore, MD: The John Hopkins University Press. Du Guy, P., Hall, S., Janes, L., Koed Madsen, A., Mackay, H., & Negus, K. (2013). Doing cultural studies: The story of the Sony Walkman (2nd ed.). London, England: Sage. Edelberg, E. (2018, 4 January). Legal requirements for audio description. Retrieved from https://www.3playmedia.com/2017/03/22/legal-requirementsaudio-description/ Ellis, K. (2014). Digital television flexibility: A survey of Australians with disability. Media International Australia Incorporating Culture and Policy, 150, 96. Ellis, K. (2015). Netflix closed captions offer an accessible model for the streaming video industry, but what about audio description? Communication, Politics & Culture, 47(3), 3–20.

Audio Description  143 Ellis, K., Kent, M., & Locke, K. (2018). The preferred user: How audio description could change understandings of Australian television audiences and media technology. Cultural Science Journal, 10(1). Retrieved from https:// culturalscience.org/articles/10.5334/csci.5105/ Ellis, K., Kent, M., Locke, K., & Merchant, M. (2016). Accessing subscription video on demand: A study of disability and streaming television in ­Australia. Retrieved from https://accan.org.au/files/Grants/VOD%20tip%20sheets/VOD %20Accessibility_report_web_accessible.pdf Federal Communications Commission. (1996). Closed captioning and video description of video programming. Retrieved from https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_ public/attachmatch/FCC-96-318A1.pdf Federal Communications Commission. (1999, 23 February 2000). Notice of proposed rulemaking in the matter of video description of video programming. Retrieved from https://transition.fcc.gov/Bureaus/Mass_Media/­Notices/1999/ fcc99353.html Frazier, G. (1975). The autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman: An all-audio adaptation of the teleplay for the blind and visually handicapped. Retrieved from https://www.acb.org/adp/docs/Gregory%20Frazier%20thesis.pdf Henley, L. (2012). How audio-described TV has changed my world. Retrieved from http://www.humanrights.gov.au/how-audio-described-tv-has-changedmy-world Kingett, R. (2014, 19 November). Will Netflix be inaccessible in Australia and New Zealand? Retrieved from http://netflixproject.wordpress.com/ 2014/11/19/will-netflix-be-inaccessible-in-australia-and-new-zeeland/ Kingett, R. (2015, 1 June). “Daredevil,” audio description and the accessible Netflix project. Retrieved from https://usodep.blogs.govdelivery.com/2015/06/01/ daredevil-audio-description-and-the-accessible-netflix-project/ Kubitschke, L., Cullen, K., Dolphi, C., Laurin, S., & Cederbom, A. (2013). Study on assessing and promoting e-accessibility. Retrieved from http://ec.europa. eu/digital-agenda/en/news/study-assessing-and-promoting-e-accessibility Lewis, D. (2017). A brief history of audio description in the U.S. Retrieved from http://audiodescriptionsolutions.com/about-us/a-brief-history-of-audiodescription-in-the-u-s/ Mancuso, V. (2015, 9 June). The descriptive audio narrator is the best part of Netflix’s ‘Sense8’. Retrieved from http://observer.com/2015/06/the-descriptiveaudio-narrator-is-the-best-part-of-netflixs-sense8/ Media Access Australia. (2012a). Audio description on TV in the US. Retrieved from http://www.mediaaccess.org.au/television/audio-description-on-tv/audiodescription-on-tv-in-the-us Media Access Australia. (2012b). Statistics on DVD accessibility in Australia. Retrieved from http://www.mediaaccess.org.au/dvds/Statistics%20on%20 DVD%20accessibility%20in%20Australia Mikul, C. (2010). Audio description background paper. Retrieved from Ultimo NSW: http://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=http%3A%2F%2 Fmediaaccess.org.au%2Fsites%2Fdefault%2Ffiles%2FMAA%2520-%2520­ Audio%2520Description%2520Background%2520Paper.doc New York Times. (1929, 28 August). Blind and deaf at the movies. The New York Times.

144  Access Nichols, S. G. (1989). The image as textual unconscious: Medieval manuscripts. L’Esprit Créateur, 29(1), 7–23. Orero, P. (2007a). Pioneering audio description: An interview with Jorge Arandes. JoSTrans: The Journal of Specialised Translation, 7. Retrieved from http://www.jostrans.org/issue07/art_arandes.php Orero, P. (2007b). Sampling audio description in Europe. In P. Orero (Ed.), Media for all: Subtitling for the deaf, audio description, and sign language (pp. 111–126). Amsterdam, New York: Rodopi. Orero, P. (2008). Three different receptions of the same film. European Journal of English Studies, 12(2), 179–193. doi:10.1080/13825570802151454 Pedlow, R. (2008). How will the changeover to digital broadcasting in 2009 influence the accessibility of TV for Americans with disabilities? Disability Studies Quarterly, 28(4). Retrieved from http://dsq-sds.org/article/view/130/130 Price, E. (2018, 8 March). How to turn Netflix shows into audiobooks (and why you should). Retrieved from https://www.lifehacker.com.au/2018/03/ how-to-turn-netflix-movies-into-audiobooks/ Robare, J. S. (2011). Television for all: Increasing television accessibility for the visually impaired through the FCC’s ability to regulate video description technology. Federal Communications Law Journal, 63(2), 553–578. Schuchman, J. S. (1984). Silent movies and the deaf community. Journal of Popular Culture, 17(4), 58–78. doi:10.1111/j.0022-3840.1984.1704_58.x Screen Australia. (2011, 9 June). Improved access means more audiences for Australian films. Retrieved from https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/sa/ media-centre/news/2011/mr_110609_access Screen Australia. (2013). Core conditions. Retrieved from https://www.screen australia.gov.au /getmedia /fbe48342- 67aa- 44b3-b9c7-d56ffad85788/ CC0-TVdramaInvest-under1m.pdf?ext=.pdf Screen Australia. (2017). Terms of trade. Retrieved from https://www.screen australia.gov.au /getmedia /2e7f34c9-1f1c- 420e-a8d6- 66e984ea3c92/ Terms-of-trade Simpson, J. A. (1999). When a word is worth a thousand pictures: Improved television access for blind viewers in the digital era. Prahran, VIC: Blind Citizens Australia. Snyder, J. (2005). Audio description: The visual made verbal. International Congress Series, 1282(0), 935–939. doi:10.1016/j.ics.2005.05.215 Szarkowska, A. (2011). Text-to-speech audio description: Towards wider availability of AD. The Journal of Specialised Translation, 15, 142–162. Wiquist, W. (2017, 11 July). FCC increases amount of required video described programming on top-rated broadcast and non-broadcast networks. Retrieved from http://www.acb.org/adp/docs/FCC%20Increases%20Hours%20of%20 Video%20Description.pdf World Blind Union. (2011, January 2016). International toolkit on providing, delivering and campaigning for audio description on television and film. Retrieved from https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Digital-Inclusion/Personswith-Disabilities/Documents/International%20Audio%20Description%20 Toolkit_updated%202016.pdf Wright, T. (2015, 14 April). Netflix begins audio description for visually impaired. Retrieved from http://blog.netflix.com/2015/04/netflix-begins-audiodescription-for.html

8 Captions

Introduction Captions are the most widely available alternative television format for disabled people. In my survey of Australians with disability regarding access to television during the simulcast period of digital and analogue television, over 80 per cent of respondents from all disability groups reported watching television with captions, rising to over 95 per cent of those respondents with a hearing impairment. The availability of captions had a material impact on whether a person who reported being D/deaf or hard of hearing would watch a show. Further, the quality of the captioning impacted on whether they considered a show, or even a provider, to be their favourite – one participant noted, ‘Dr Who is a very good show and the ABC do closed captions on TV and iview’. Particular favourite shows included dramas and crime dramas mainly because of the availability and quality of captioning. As one respondent reflected with reference to this genre, the captions are not live and therefore are in sync with what’s happening on screen. Captions, or subtitles, are the text version of speech and other sound in audiovisual media. There are two forms of captions – open or constantly available on screen, and closed captions which can be turned on and off – and these can appear in all types of different media, including television programming, films, web pages, online lectures etc. Whether something is captioned or not can therefore be highly variable and can depend on a number of factors including not only technological availability but also volunteer effort, consumer activism and legislative change. Indeed, it is these latter aspects that perhaps have the most influence on the availability of captions. With each new technological change – be it the emergence of the internet or the switch from analogue to digital television – activists and volunteers have had to re-fight for access to captions and, in particular, for legislative change to facilitate this. For example, prior to the decommissioning of the analogue system in the USA, the Coalition of Organisations for Accessible Technology identified several problems regarding the production, provision and usability

146 Access of digital television services in the context of people with disability. Two key issues related to captions and included ‘technical difficulties associated with pass through of closed-captioning’ and ‘confusion over the scope of […] captioning regulations’ (Crawford, 2007). When the ­Australian government reviewed captions as part of their broader policy discussion on Access to Electronic Media between 2008 and 2010, ­similar issues arose, with submissions focusing on both quality and quantity. As such, many of the submissions called for legislation – as well as enforcement – of captioning quotas. For example, in Australia, while effective campaigning has led to captions being mandated on 100 per cent of content on the primary channels between 6am and midnight, both the newer digital multi-channels and online catch-up portals are currently exempt from this legislation. The result is an inconsistent captioning service that continues to exclude audiences who are D/deaf and hard of hearing. Whereas community groups believe that industry self-regulation is not working, the media agencies claim that existing legislation is sufficient. This chapter therefore explores the production, consumption and regulation of captions across various television technology to reflect on the social inclusion – or exclusion – of audiences who are D/deaf and hard of hearing. I begin this chapter with a history of the production and legislation of captions in the USA, beginning with predictions of their invention and use in the early 1930s and ending with their widespread availability on Facebook today. Key historical and legislative moments in other locations such as the UK and Australia will be referred to throughout this section; however, the USA has been selected as the basis for discussion because of the international impacts activism in that country has had on the availability of – and specifically legislation for – captions for audiences who are D/deaf or hard of hearing throughout the world. The next section focusses on how different media outlets are acknowledging – or ignoring – their captioning responsibilities. While technological change – including, most recently, digitisation – has had a significant impact on the availability and accuracy of captions, the focus must go beyond technological and legislative determinism. The section includes a brief case study of the inconsistent approach to the availability of captions on free-to-air Australian television programming when these shows migrate to online catch-up platforms and its associated impacts for the D/deaf and hard or hearing community. The chapter then moves to a discussion of ‘fansubbing’, or fan-­created captions in several contexts. This unique example of produsage, the ­user-led creation of material, is discussed, particularly in relation how this belies a continuing ableist reaction to D/deaf or hard of hearing audiences. This is followed by a section on the practice of automatic captioning and its accuracy.

Captions  147

A Brief History of Captions In 1915, Alexander Pach, a columnist for the Deaf community newspaper Silent Worker, described motion pictures as being ‘nearer to the realisation of hearing for the deaf than anything else’ (cited in Schuchman, 1984). A short 16 years later, when the silent era had well and truly been superseded by sound, Emil S. Ladner Jr, a Deaf high school student, predicted the re-emergence of words on screen to facilitate access to the new age of talkies in an article published in the American Annals of the Deaf: Perhaps, in time, an invention will be perfected that will enable the deaf to hear the ‘talkies’ or an invention which will throw the words spoken directly under the screen as well as being spoken at the same time. (Downey, 2008) Ladner, who described the end of the silent era as a ‘calamity for the deaf’ (Ladner cited in Johnson, 2017, p. 11), was describing what eventually would come to be known as captions. His comments reflect the importance of visual media which has long been recognised in the educational arena for students who are D/deaf and hard of hearing. For example, during the silent era of film, D/deaf residential schools often invested in film projectors and encouraged students to see movies at school and outside at the cinemas. Indeed, the pedagogical value of film as a visually oriented medium was recognised as benefitting D/deaf students who were encouraged to keep film journals as part of their studies (Schuchman, 1984). However, the introduction of sound completely changed this environment, and D/deaf student newspapers at the time such as Silent Worker offer an important cultural insight into this shifting environment. Whereas silent films were presented as offering access to media, society and culture, even being considered a substitute for books and newspapers, this ended with the talkies when D/deaf and hard of hearing audiences were again excluded. Indeed, the technology to create captions, to re-create the accessibility of the silent era for the D/deaf community, did not begin to develop until the late 1950s. Educators at schools for the D/deaf immediately recognised their potential and began volunteer efforts to caption and distribute both film and television (Downey, 2007). The captioning of television began in the 1960s, with these educators creating the captioning themselves for their D/deaf students (Downey, 2007, p. 70). As the demand grew so did activism and there soon came calls for all public television to be made accessible for the D/deaf and hard of hearing. The debate focused on equality and pushed for recognition that D/deaf ­people were culturally diverse (Downey, 2007, p. 70). As Downey (2007)

148 Access argues, ‘captioning could be seen as the epitome of broadcast justice, analogous to cinematic language translation for a cultural minority’. When Malcolm J. Norwood, at the time the chief of the US government organisation Media Services and Captioned Films, opened the First National Conference on Television for the Hearing-Impaired in 1971, he reflected on the ways captioned movies had potentially improved the educational outcomes for D/deaf or hard of hearing students and predicted an important future audience shift: When the Office of Education began to caption motion pictures for deaf children and adults some 11 years ago, the subtitles were geared to a reading speed of 120 words per minute. Believe me, we had our share of complaints regarding the speed of the captions. Approximately one and a half years ago, we unilaterally increased the reading speed from 120 words per minute to 144 for all films aimed at adult audiences. We haven’t received a single squawk. I mention this to you as a matter of interest for if captions have contributed to the advancement of our deaf population, what will they do for the general population? (Norwood cited in Perkins, 1971, p. 3) Norwood’s remarks reflect the dual approach to captioning taken at the time – establishing the importance for the D/deaf community yet also alluding to mainstream benefits. At the time, a few television programs received government funding to trial the broadcast of captions as a commercial venture, and advocates for the D/deaf were beginning to focus on the rights of all citizens to be able to access television as a public service. The provision of captions on US television began with an open captions trial on the public broadcaster WBGH in which words would be positioned on the screen as part of the normal image (Downey, 2007, p. 71). Eight episodes of The French Chef, the most popular WBGH show at the time, were aired using open captions. While broadcasters ­expressed concerns that open captions would alienate the ‘hearing majority’, WBGH did not have funding to conduct audience research into the reception of these episodes (Downey, 2007, p. 71), yet nevertheless continued to offer the only regularly open captioned show in the 1970s  – a re-broadcast ABC World News Tonight (Jensema, ­McCann, & ­Ramsey, 1996) However, when captioning was introduced on American television, there were no standards in place to monitor nor promote them. The average reading level of the D/deaf community was considered to be at a third-grade level, so captions did not reflect what was said onscreen verbatim. The word count was reduced by one-third, and passive voice sentences, idioms, puns and swearing were removed. These extensive edits continued for many years because ‘deaf people were so delighted to

Captions  149 have captions that they accepted almost anything thrown on the screen’ (Jensema et al., 1996, p. 285). In 1979, the National Captioning Institute (NCI) was established. While initially government-funded, the NCI was designed to eventually be self-sufficient (Downey, 2007, p. 73). In 1980, the focus shifted from open captions to closed, encoded captioning, with viewers needing a decoder to be able to access them. The high cost of these decoders meant that many could not afford to buy them and adoption of the closed technology was slow (Downey, 2007, p. 71; Youngblood, 2013, p. 243). The NCI were charged with both developing and selling these decoders, and providing captioning services to the networks. PBS, ABC and NBC (but not CBS) agreed to a trial (p. 73), but there was a reluctance on the part of broadcasters to pay to caption content when there was not enough evidence of sufficient demand (Downey, 2007, pp. 73–74). From the 1970s onwards, D/deaf activists and their allies began to campaign aggressively for the mandated provision of captions on television. The argument began to focus on the rights of all citizens to be able to access a public service – in the mid-1970s a complaint was lodged claiming that the Los Angeles television station KCET, which was a PBS affiliate, did not provide captioned content for already captioned episodes of The French Chef (Downey, 2007, p. 74). The Greater Los Angeles Council on Deafness (GLAD) picketed the station until the decision was reversed. GLAD then focused on the 1973 Rehabilitation Act to argue television was federally assisted and, by not providing captioned content, broadcasters were in violation of the act (Downey, 2007, p. 74). GLAD also used the 1934 Communications Act, which had established the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), arguing that this assigned them the right to grant and renew broadcast licenses as long as those broadcasters served the ‘public interest, convenience, and necessity’ (Michalik, 1984 cited in Downey, 2007). The FCC could, argued GLAD, therefore refuse to renew the licenses of broadcasters who did not broadcast captioned content. Consequently, the FCC changed its own procedures to avoid such legal actions in the future (Downey, 2007, p.  75). Although this action led to some stations beginning to voluntarily caption more content, it was not until the last decade of that century when US legislation started to really afford significant changes. The passing of the Television Decoder Circuitry Act in 1990 – heavily influenced by prolonged activism from Deaf advocacy groups, including actress Marlee Matlin – decreed that any television with a screen greater than 13 inches must be designed and manufactured to be capable of displaying captions. The act was replicated internationally, with countries such as Australia adopting the same requirements. However, it was not until 1996 that captions became a legally mandated requirement in the USA with the introduction of the Telecommunications Act (­ Youngblood, 2013, p. 244).

150 Access These changes were slowly being replicated around the world. In the UK, at the 1980 ‘teletext for the deaf’ symposium, a woman who was identified as ‘profoundly deaf’ said ‘all we want is something. Just put us in touch… give us a chance; every single night I watch television in silence, nothing…’ (Newell, 1982, p. 266). In that country, captions had become more widely available via a teletext system established in the mid-1970s. While this had been initially conceived as an accessibility feature for viewers who were D/deaf or hard of hearing, its commercial application became apparent almost immediately. Teletext content was aimed to all audiences – it provided content including ‘news, sports results, stock market prices and the weather’ (Schlesinger, 1985, p. 474). While in the US and Australia, the viewers who really needed the teletext system through which captions were displayed struggled to afford it, in the UK, the government cut the deposit required for a teletext television to half that of a non-teletext set (Schlesinger, 1985, p. 475). This ­market-based government initiative created a market for teletext (475) and, unlike the approach taken in the USA and Australia to attempt to regulate in terms of mandatory caption requirements, saw the mainstream popularity of teletext rise in the UK during the 1980s. In Australia, captions first became available on broadcast television in the 1980s when the SBS began offering subtitles for foreign language programmes (adefinty2, 2015; Johns, 1993, p. 4); however, broadcasters were under no legislated obligation to provide them so increased captioning was voluntary and slow to come. Eventually, following negations with the Australian Deafness Council, the Australian government and broadcasters, and the not-for-profit Australian Caption Centre (ACC) was founded by Alexandra Hynes and Adam Salzer in 1981 (Johns, 1993, p. 17). The Australian government contributed over $620,000 in seed-funding to help establish this centralised subtitling office (Office of the Prime Minister) and at its official opening a year later Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser reflected on the importance of changing technology in improving the provision of captions: There is always going to be new technology coming forward, there will always be better ways of doing it if you wait a while. This has been delayed a long while already and I don’t believe that there is any excuse for further delay by the ABC or by commercial stations on the grounds of technology. (Fraser, 1982) Fraser recognised the importance of both technological change and political will in whether Australians who were D/deaf and hard of hearing could gain access to free-to-air television, and in 1982, the ACC began providing its trademark supertext captioning services to the ABC and commercial networks (Senate Environment Communications

Captions  151 Committee, 2015). However, a teletext decoder connected to the television set was needed to view these supertext captions and, initially, this was quite an expensive piece of equipment (adefinty2, 2015). As a result, with limited numbers of the D/deaf community able to afford a teletext, the broadcasters were reluctant to provide much in the way of captions until the audience sector rose. This became a catch-22 situation, because the audience was unwilling to invest in the teletext until more captions became available. It became clear that only legislation would fix this standoff. In 1991, the National Working Party on Captioning (NWPC) was established comprising of consumer representatives alongside advocacy groups, industry groups and the government regulator (initially the Australian Broadcasting Authority) (Johns, 1993, p. 19; Scott, 1997). The NWPC played a crucial role in lobbying the Australian government to provide funding for increased captioning of ABC and SBS news content, and in lobbying for the progressive increase towards captioning of all programming (Scott, 1997). An additional encouragement to increase captioning came from the Federation of Australian Commercial Television Stations (FACTS) Code of Practice. Efforts such as these from industry and advocacy groups contributed to the increase in the percentage of captioned programming, but progress continued to be slow. This began to change with the 1992 passing of the Broadcasting Services Act (BSA) which gave parliament the authority to establish codes of practice for broadcasters which ‘may’ include captioning of programmes for people who were D/deaf or hard of hearing. Legislative requirements to caption programmes were further introduced in 1998 as amendments to the Broadcasting Services (Digital Transition) Act (Senate Environment and Communications Committee). This required stations broadcasting digital television to caption all news and current affairs programmes as well as programmes screening during prime time (6pm to 10:30pm). ­Exceptions were allowed for programmes in languages other than English and live sports coverage. The percentages of content and timeframes for achieving increased captioning levels were introduced in amendments to the BSA in 2001 and 2010. For example, the Broadcasting Services (Television Captioning) Standard 2013, amended in 2016, specifies the quality standards for television captions, including readability, accuracy and comprehensibility. In addition to the broadcasting-specific legislation, captioning falls within the scope of the Disability Discrimination Act, also passed in 1992 (DDA). In 1999, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, now the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) began an inquiry into discrimination complaints against a number of television stations regarding captioning, a practice supposedly contrary to the 1992 ruling. This inquiry enabled a negotiated agreement between industry and advocacy groups, including the NWPC. Between 2001 and

152 Access 2012, the AHRC provided broadcasters with exemptions to their DDA obligations on the condition that they undertake these negotiated staged increases in the percentage of programmes captioned on free-to-air and subscription channels (Senate Environment Communications Committee, 2015). These negotiated targets were then incorporated in amendments to the BSA. Captioning regulation was then more clearly placed within the BSA in 2012, such that authority to grant exemptions and monitor compliance was given to the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) and no longer fell within the purview of the AHRC. All this local legislative change was also aided by the aforementioned increase in worldwide, specifically USA, legislation regarding captions as well as market-based technological incentives in the UK. The quality of captioning also gained increasing attention as D/deaf viewers and advocates began to demand accurate, verbatim captioning rather than the simplistic versions previously offered. Further, following the introduction of the Television Decoder Circuitry Act in the US, decoders began to be built into television sets worldwide, therefore removing the need for a separate device. Today, all digital televisions can receive, decode and display captions on digital broadcast television. However, available technology has not automatically resulted in a more widespread availability of captions. Indeed, as I discuss in the next section, broadcasters remain uncommitted to offering captions on platforms such as catch-up television portals. However, following the introduction of Facebook’s video autoplay function, captions are being embraced and made more widely available. First launched as an in-feed silent autoplay video ad service in 2013, the feature has expanded to all user-generated video. As a result, autoplay has prompted an era of ‘silent storytelling’ (Spector, 2015). With many Facebook users unwilling to turn the sound on in environments where noise is inappropriate, captions have proved useful in this landscape. Indeed, Facebook offers simple instructions about how to both turn on captions by default and how to create and edit captions (Help Centre, 2018).

Legislative Determinism: The Case of Captions Technological determinist approaches to social change are criticised for assuming that technology will result in an automatic source of liberation. Within digital disability studies, many have shown this rarely to be the case because ableist approaches established in the physical world are often carried over into the online environment (see Ellis & Kent, 2011; Goggin & Newell, 2003). The example of captions provide opportunity to reflect on what I describe as legislative determinist approaches to social change and disability access. While legislation has prompted an

Captions  153 increase in available captions throughout the world during the broadcast era, television’s transition to the internet has seen activists having to again fight for access because attitudes did not change. As Marlee ­Matlin explains of the US context: With so much technology out there, there were still holes and people were being left out…There’s no excuse in this day and age with so much technology out there that’s there’s not sufficient and 100 per cent accurate captions. (Fisher, 2014) The holes Matlin refers to relate to streaming television such as Netflix, Hulu and Amazon being exempt from regulatory requirements to provide captions in the USA. Just as her activist efforts contributed to the passing of the Television Decoder Circuitry Act in the 1990s, Matlin’s vocal complaints against Netflix not making pre-existing captions tracks available resulted in a coordinated activist effort of National Association of the Deaf members inundating Netflix with letters and emails. Eventually an Americans with Disability Act (ADA) complaint was taken against Netflix specifically regarding its lack of captioned material – the outcome was that Netflix was compelled to commit to captioning 100 per cent of its content (Mullin, 2012; Wolford, 2012). However, legal experts were confused and divided when a federal appeals court later found Netflix did not have to comply with the ADA because it is not connected to any ‘actual physical place’ (Hattem, 2015). This confusion prompted industry and regulators to consider their captions offering more seriously. Similarly, at the time in the UK – despite regulation mandating 90 per cent captioned content on Channels 3 and 4 and 80 per cent content on all other channels – there were also no legislative requirements regarding the provision of captions on online television (UK Government, 2003). In a similar case to Netflix, the streaming platform LoveFilm (now ­A mazon Prime) had been the target of a #subtitlesnow day of action organised by Pesky People (Pesky People, 2012) and this, along with the Netflix ruling in the USA, prompted discussions in the UK about this inconsistent regulatory environment (Hassell, 2014). As these discussions continued in the UK, changes began taking place in the US regulatory environment. For example, the US 21st Century Television and Video Accessibility Act requires all pre-recorded and live content previously broadcast with captions also be available with these captions online. Content first shown online and then broadcast on television must currently be captioned within 15 days. This quota progressively increased from 45 in 2014, to 30 in 2015, to 15 in 2016 (Federal Communications Commission, 2014). This act also requires cable operators, broadcasters, satellite distributors and other

154 Access multi-channel video programming distributors to caption 100 per cent of their new programming and up to 75 per cent of their pre-rule programming. Australian Case Study: An Inconsistent Approach to Captions In Australia, all the free-to-air channels also offer online catch-up portals so audiences can watch television shows outside of scheduled programming using an internet connection. Typically programming available via catch up has already been broadcast on free-to-air television. However, these portals are considered outside the purview of the BSA and are not subject to the same legislative requirements, including that of providing captions. As a result, captions are created and made available on broadcast television to satisfy legislative requirements, yet are not screened online. While it is true that making captions available online via catch-up portals requires different technology, this technology is available and is in fact being used by several broadcasters, although sometimes in frustratingly limited capacity. This section outlines findings of research into the availability of captions on Australian catch-up television conducted in 2014 and repeated 2 years later in 2016 (see Table 8.1). The intersection of representation, production and regulation works together in the circuit of culture to construct an enduring image of captions for the D/deaf and hard of hearing as an undervalued section of the audience. The section concludes with reflections on the process of consuming captions and how their un/ availability impacts on identity amongst this group. In 2014, captions were available in Australia on the ABC and on some titles on SBS and Channel 7. These titles could not be accessed by the PLUS7 nor the SBS app, although the broadcasters claimed to be ‘working on it’ (Ellis, 2014). While the closed captions sign was visible on Channel 10’s tenplay, captions were not actually available on any content, and captions were not available on Channel 9’s 9now at all. By 2016, despite 2014’s rhetoric of ‘we’re working on it’, little change had been made. During the period of sample collection, Channel 7, who had only recently made captions available online in 2014, was still offering an inconsistent service – captions were available on some episodes of a series but typically not for the whole season. The broadcaster was unapologetic about it, attempting to engage the rhetoric of trying their best and striving for constant improvement. However, an app release promised by Channel 7 in 2014 had still not materialised in 2016. While seven claimed to be working on it, the SBS could demonstrate progress. From providing captions on ‘some’ content in 2014, 2 years later they were offering captions on ‘most’ non-live programming. SBS

Captions  155 Table 8.1  C  aptions on Australian catch-up television Catch-up service

Captions? 2014

2016

ABC – iview Channel 7 – PLUS7

Yes Yes Yes (some titles, not Yes (some titles) ‘Unfortunately we can’t guarantee all episodes) they will be on every episode ‘They are not but we do our best to add them currently available to all shows where Closed on the PLUS7 app Captions are available. They but we’re working are not currently available on it’ on the PLUS7 App but we’re working on it’ Channel 9 – 9Now No No ‘Not yet but we’re working on it’ Channel 10 – tenplay No; however, CC No icon visible on ‘Closed captions are not player currently a feature on the tenplay site’ SBS – On Demand Yes (some titles) but Yes (most non-live content) and not available on for iOS and some Android the On Demand devices using the On Demand app app

had actually engaged in an 18-month process of internal and external consultation to develop a web portal that could display captions (Mikul, 2014). Similarly, the public broadcaster had invested in upgrading their app so that captioned on-demand programming could be accessed via this method, not just their website as had been the case in 2014. Again, captions were not available at all on Channels 9 and 10 in 2016. This brief study of the un/availability of captions on Australian freeto-air catch-up portals over a 2-year period demonstrates the ways ­people who are D/deaf and hard of hearing remain an undervalued audience in Australia. While legislation has been effective in facilitating the provision of captions on broadcast television, it has not resulted in a shift in mindset because these captions, despite being already created, are not being provided online, a medium through which Australians are increasingly accessing television (see Screen Australia, 2014). As broadcasters cry poor, the one-off financial outlay to upgrade software and players would result in an immediate return in audience. While the broadcasters tred water, audiences are taking matters into their own hands. In the US Marlee Matlin is again leading efforts. As part of her advocacy, Matlin, like my students from China in Chapter 6, highlighted the fansubbing website Viki as a model for online distributors to improve their captioning quality (Fisher, 2014).

156 Access Fansubbing The idea of creating your own captions or subtitles is not new – in the 1950s, volunteers captioned films for students enrolled at residential schools for the D/deaf. When Tim Berners-Lee articulated his vision for the world wide web, he emphasised access for everyone regardless of disability (Berners-Lee, 1997). However, as more people began posting user-generated videos in this new medium, Berners-Lee began to be asked how to ensure these videos would have captions. His suggestion of community captioners – whereby other members of the community create and correct captions for those members of the community that need them – sounds a lot like fansubbing as we know it today (see ­B erners-Lee, 2006; Ellis & Kent, 2010). Indeed, in the digital media arena, a strong community of non-professionals engage in fansubbing to create subtitles (and more recently captions) for fellow television fans in the context of online streaming media and video-on-demand. Originally, a fansub was a subtitled version of a film whereby the subtitles were created by amateur fans as opposed to officially licenced translators engaged by the producers of content. However, this has now expanded to include creating subtitles across media genres and, importantly, also creating captioned content in the original language, resulting in increased potential for greater access to online audiovisual media for people who are D/deaf and hard of hearing. For example, Viki is a crowd-sourced global television site motivated to remove language and cultural barriers via the provision of subtitles in over 200 languages (Viki.com, 2018). A play on the words video and wiki, Viki.com has made a significant contribution to amateur television translation, making content available across terrestrial and language borders: Viki provides an equally fascinating alternative to professional AVT. Dominated by Korean-language television dramas (known as ‘K-­ Dramas’), Viki incorporates media from a multitude of different countries and language communities, at times including such unlikely finds as Nepali underground band videos, celebrity interviews from Lebanon, Irish cooking shows, and US speeches on the environment. (Dwyer, 2012, p. 219) If Netflix represents the long tail of television content that cannot ever be fully exhausted, Viki takes the tail even further. The focus on subtitles facilitates access across languages and therefore offers inclusion for ­people who are D/deaf and hard of hearing. For Matlin, the site represents a sustainable workable model for improving the quantity and quality of captions because ‘It’s always the users who know what we need’ (Fisher, 2014). Throughout 2014, Viki launched a focus on captioning for the D/deaf and hard of hearing via their Billion Words March.

Captions  157 The campaign was a direct response to the FCC mandate to improve closed captioning on broadcast and subscription television in the USA. Indeed, Matlin holds Viki up as best practice for the creation of high standard captions, and many see fansubbing such as this as performing an important cultural function by contributing ‘to the internationalisation of audiovisual translation practices’ (Dwyer, 2012). However, the very notion of fansubbing blurs the boundary between the public and private and has therefore been subject to an unsympathetic regulatory environment. Fansubbers themselves are ridiculed as pirates and pushed underground by legal threats and the cultural industries approach the activity with suspicion (Bourdaa, 2013). This treatment of fans is not new as Henry Jenkins explains, fans have long been ‘ridiculed in the media, shrouded with social stigma, pushed underground by legal threats, and often depicted as brainless and inarticulate’(Jenkins, 2006). His motivation for writing the now seminal text Textual Poachers: Television Fans and Participatory Culture was an attempt to ‘construct an alternative image of fan culture’ in which consumers were recognised as ‘active, critically engaged, and creative’. He developed five interrelated features of fan (sub)culture: Its relationship to a particular mode of reception; its role in encouraging viewer activism; its function as an interpretive community; its particular traditions of cultural production; its status as an alternative social community. (Jenkins, 1992) These five characteristics are evident in the activities of fansubbers and other user-generated captioners active online. Fansubbers are ‘cultural mediators’ who work in teams to translate and distribute television content via shared online communities. Fans and users of the captions or fansubs embrace the political act of translating copyrighted materials for wider use (Bourdaa, 2013). Fansubbers themselves have a relationship to each other, acknowledge participatory cultures and share collective intelligence as they strive for improvement and effective translation. As Bourdaa explains: This activity is a collaborative effort that highlights technical and intellectual skills. What is more, fansubbers, by way of this practice, help to legitimise the culture of television series, while playing a role of mediator for this culture in a new geographical space. (Bourdaa, 2013) Copyright is a significant issue for the burgeoning fansubbing community. The automatic downloading and sharing of caption files offers an opportunity for more universal access, yet this illegal sharing has been met with suspicion from copyright holders. In a recent case in the

158 Access Netherlands, a group of fansubbers – the Free Subtitles movement – raised money to take the Netherlands’ anti-piracy association BREIN to court to seek clarification on the legality of their activities. Whereas BRIEN maintained the fansubbers were engaging in illegal activities and encouraging piracy and theft, the fansubbers argued altruistic motivations to give more people access to video content online. However, the court ruled that only the copyright holders could give permission for the creation of subtitles and that fansubbing violated copyright and incited piracy. While it is unclear what broader impact this ruling will have on the practice of user-generated captioning and fansubbing – including for minority groups such as those who are D/deaf and hard of hearing – it is concerning that a court was so willing to accept this as an illegal activity given its obvious extended benefits. YouTube Automatic Captions The interrelationship – and often marked difference in quality – b ­ etween amateur and professional captioning becomes ever more relevant as ­video-sharing sites such as YouTube offer automatic caption features. The feature was first announced in 2006 by Ken Harrenstien, a Software Engineer for Youtube who identified as deaf. In a similar approach to Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser opening the Australian Captioning Centre in 1982, Harrenstien acknowledged the issues that plagued the first generation of automated captions but argued it was important to take baby steps than wait for a ‘giant leap of perfection later’: But I won’t kid you -- there are still light-years to go, and I’m painfully aware of how limited our first implementation is. For example, you’ll notice that it only works for videos using our Flash player (in a browser); US viewers may be bothered that our captions look more like subtitles than TV captions, and non-US viewers may be baffled by the [CC] symbol; and so on and on, not even counting the bugs that infect all new features. But most importantly by far, only a very small fraction of videos are currently captioned. Nor is the quality always good. (Harrenstien, 2006) While the service was rolled out to universities and broadcasters in 2009, it was ultimately released to the public and anyone who wanted to use it in 2010 (Klie, 2010). However, 10 years after Harrenstein’s first announcement, a study of YouTube automatic captions in the context of online learning found on average 7.7 errors per minute and concluded the service was still too inaccurate to be used exclusively (Parton, 2016). While automatic captions have a pervasive reputation of being inaccurate, multiple instructional guides can be found online for contributors wanting to correct automated captioning. Following on from the

Captions  159 hashtag activism of the #subtitlenow campaign, a #NoMoreCraptions campaign agitates for accurate, professional, captioning to be provided for video content. Deaf blogger Rikki Poyner describes the caption experience in 2015: Most of the words were incorrect. There was no grammar. (For the record, Im no expert when it comes to grammar, but the lack of punctuation and capitalization sure was something.) Everything was essentially one long run-on sentence. Captions would stack up on each other and move at a slow pace. All of this is why I hated seeing that this was an option (and still kind of do). Every time somebody responded to, “Please caption your videos!” with, “Click on the CC button. Theres automatic captions!”, I would cringe. Every single time, I would reply saying that they’re not the same thing, not even close. This is why I made videos stating that automatic captions were not captions and why #NoMoreCRAPtions was born. (Poynter, 2018) By comparison, Poynter’s experiences in 2017 had improved but were still not perfect (Poynter, 2018). The #NoMoreCraptions campaign also provides an open source platform to correct inaccurate YouTube captions. Indeed, multiple instructional guides can be found online for contributors wanting to correct automated captioning (Ellis, Kent, Locke, & ­Latter, 2017). However, given the increasing use of captions on ­Facebook videos and other social media platforms, it is in YouTube’s best interests to radically improve automatic captions. Indeed, since Facebook first introduced their automatic play function on videos, users have preferred to engage with captions rather than the video’s sound to continue scrolling through their news feeds. As a result, it has also become common for online videos to include captions following the introduction of automatic captions on YouTube. Hearing users created a new market for the feature as many began to watch videos in environments where sound would be inappropriate. This type of video format became particularly popular when Facebook introduced their auto-play function on posted videos. Facebook have also recently introduced ‘automatic alternative text’ software to describe photos to people with vision impairments (Spinks, 2017). In addition to the large portion of the population with vision impairments, the feature will be of use as the population ages.

Conclusion Throughout this chapter, I have argued that the availability of captions relies on a complex interaction among changing technologies, volunteer effort and political will in the form of activist activities and legislative change. Indeed, despite many gains, the fight for captions remains

160 Access on-going and with each technological development or change in media delivery it often seems to start all over again. To understand the Australian environment today, it is necessary to go back to the creation and development of captions in the USA in the mid-20th century, in particular associated government response and legislation. Marlee Matlin has been instrumental in two legislative wins regarding the provision of captions in the USA, which, in the increasingly global television environment, have also had a worldwide impact. Her focus throughout has been on the ways technology allows for accessibility and, in turn, social inclusion, as can be seen in her powerful testimony before Congress for the passing of the Television Decoder Circuitry Act: As a little girl growing up in Chicago, I had dreams just like any other child… to be a policeman, a dancer, a teacher, an actress. I was always told: follow your dreams and be what you want to be. No dream was beyond my reach. But in many of my dreams, I just sat by and watched without understanding a single word of what was being said. As a child, only through my mother could I understand the antics of “The Electric Company”… There was no such thing as captioned television and these moments of dreaming were not open to me. (United States government, 1990) I introduced the concept of legislative determinism in this chapter to illustrate the ways broadcasters and providers caption only according to legislative requirements. While this is sufficient until technology changes, without a corresponding change in attitude towards D/deaf and hard of hearing audiences, captions are not carried over to new technology, until legislation requires it. The examples of captions in both Australia and worldwide illustrate the importance of many additional aspects such as technology, activism and volunteer efforts in ensuring their availability. Indeed, as television transitioned to digital formats, legislative changes were not carried over, suggesting legislation is perhaps too ­technology-specific. For example, although laws mandated captions be displayed on broadcast television, streaming portals and other forms of online v­ ideo-on-demand were not initially bound by the same expectation. Further, because of the legislation and activism discussed throughout this chapter, both the quality and quantity of captions have vastly improved and, in contrast to the expectation that audiences should be grateful for whatever they got, there is now an expectation that captions accurately describe what is said on-screen verbatim. However, rather than embrace this affordance, broadcasters caption to rule in a way that disregards audiences who are D/deaf and hard of hearing. They do not do more than what legislation requires because despite improved captioning as a result of legislative requirements, there has not been a corresponding shift in attitude.

Captions  161 Indeed volunteer efforts facilitated the provision of captions in the early years at schools for people who were D/deaf and hard of hearing, more recently participatory cultures of fansubbers are engaging in community led action to make captions more widespread. The following chapter goes on to consider the mainstream benefits of accessibility features including captions, audio description and clean audio as these features move from a specialist assistive technology for disabled people to become recognised as an important resource for creative television viewers. It has also become common for online videos to include captions following the introduction of automatic captions on YouTube. Hearing users created a new market for the feature as many began to watch videos in environments where sound would be inappropriate. This type of video format became particularly popular when Facebook introduced their auto-play function on posted videos. The next chapter explores the impacts of this mainstreaming of accessibility features focusing on captions, ­audio description and clean audio.

References adefinty2. (2015, 27 March). Captioning – A history. Retrieved from https:// therebuttal2.com/2015/03/27/captioning-a-history/ Berners-Lee, T. (1997). World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) launches international Web Accessibility Initiative. Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). Retrieved from http://www.w3.org/Press/WAI-Launch.html Berners-Lee, T. (2006). Isn’t it semantic? BCS: The Chartered Institute for IT. Retrieved from http://www.bcs.org/server.php?show=ConWebDoc.3337 Bourdaa, M. (2013, 15 October). Fansubbing, a cultural mediation practice. Retrieved from https://www.inaglobal.fr/en/digital-tech/article/fansubbingcultural-mediation-practice Crawford, R. (2007). Disability coalition reports problems in digital television transition. PR Newswire Association. Downey, G. (2007). Constructing closed-captioning in the public interest: From minority media accessibility to mainstream educational technology. Info: The Journal of Policy, Regulation and Strategy for Telecommunications, Information and Media, 9(2/3), 69–82. doi:10.1108/14636690710734670 Downey, G. (2008). Closed captioning: Subtitling, stenography, and the digital convergence of text with television. Baltimore, MD: The John Hopkins University Press. Dwyer, T. (2012). Fansub dreaming on ViKi: “Don’t just watch but help when you are free”. The Translator, 18(2), 217–243. doi:10.1080/13556509.2012. 10799509 Ellis, K. (2014). Television’s transition to the internet: Disability accessibility and broadband-based TV in Australia. Media International Australia, Incorporating Culture & Policy, 153, 53–63. Ellis, K., & Kent, M. (2010). Community accessibility: Tweeters take responsibility for an accessible Web 2.0. Fast Capitalism, 6(2). Retrieved from http:// www.uta.edu/huma/agger/fastcapitalism/7_1/elliskent7_1.html

162 Access Ellis, K., & Kent, M. (2011). Disability and new media. New York, NY: Routledge. Ellis, K., Kent, M., Locke, K., & Latter, N. (2017). Who is working on it? Captioning Australian catch-up television and subscription video on demand. Media International Australia, 165(1), 131–145. doi:10.1177/1329878x17724606 Federal Communications Commission. (2014). Retrieved from https://www.fcc. gov/consumers/guides/captioning-internet-video-programming Fisher, L. (2014, 29 April). How Marlee Matlin helped force streaming video closed captions into digital age. Retrieved from http://abcnews.go.com/ Entertainment/marlee-matlin-helped-force-streaming-video-closed-captions/ story?id=23503281 Fraser, M. (1982, 3 October). Address at the opening of the caption centre S­ ydney. Retrieved from http://pmtranscripts.pmc.gov.au/release/transcript-5907 Goggin, G., & Newell, C. (2003). Digital disability: The social construction of disability in new media. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers Inc. Harrenstien, K. (2006, 19 September). Finally, caption playback. Retrieved from http://googlevideo.blogspot.com/2006/09/finally-caption-playback.html Hassell, J. (2014, 25 June). NAD vs Netflix captions lawsuit: Is LoveFilm in the UK even more exposed? Retrieved from http://www.hassellinclusion. com/2012/06/netflix-caption-lawsuit-uk-implications/ Hattem, J. (2015, 3 April). Court: Netflix doesn’t have to comply with disability law. Retrieved from http://thehill.com/policy/technology/237829-court-netflixdoesnt-have-to-comply-with-disability-law Help Centre. (2018). How do I turn captions on for videos on Facebook? Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/help/427723640933279?helpref=uf_permalink Jenkins, H. (1992). Textual poachers: Television fans & participatory culture (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Routledge. Jenkins, H. (2006). Fans, bloggers, and gamers: Exploring participatory culture. New York: New York University Press. Jensema, C. J., McCann, R., & Ramsey, S. (1996). Closed-captioned television presentation speed and vocabulary. American Annals of the Deaf, 141(4), 284–292. doi:10.1353/aad.2012.0377 Johns, B. (1993). Captioning in a new environment. ABA Update, 17–20. Johnson, R. (2017). “Better Gestures”: A disability history perspective on the transition from (Silent) movies to talkies in the United States. Journal of Social History, 51(1), 1. Klie, L. (2010). YouTube expands video transcription option for all (Vol. 15, p. 11). Medford. Mikul, C. (2014). Captioning on video on demand services: It’s time for ­Australia to catch up. Retrieved from http://deafaustralia.org.au/wp-content/­ uploads/MAA-Video-on-Demand-report.pdf Mullin, J. (2012, 11 October). Netflix settles with deaf-rights group, agrees to caption all videos by 2014. Retrieved from http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/10/ netflix-settles-with-deaf-rights-group-agrees-to-caption-all-videos-by-2014/ Newell, A. F. (1982). Teletext for the deaf. Electronics and Power, 28(3), 263– 266. doi:10.1049/ep.1982.0112 Parton, B. S. (2016). Video captions for online courses: Do YouTube’s auto-­ generated captions meet deaf students’ needs? Journal of Open, Flexible and Distance Learning, 20(1), 8–18.

Captions  163 Perkins, R. (1971, 14–16 December). Proceedings of the First National Conference on Television for the Hearing-Impaired. Retrieved from http://files.eric. ed.gov/fulltext/ED064828.pdf Pesky People. (2012, 5 June). Subtitle now! Day of action: 6 June 2012. Retrieved from http://www.peskypeople.co.uk/2012/06/subtitle-now-day-of-action6-june-2012/ Poynter, R. (2018, 18 January). Are automatic captions on YouTube getting better? Retrieved from http://www.rikkipoynter.com/blog/2018/1/18/ auto-captions?rq=%23nomorecraptions Schlesinger, P. (1985). From public service to commodity: The political economy of teletext in the UK. Media, Culture & Society, 7(4), 471–485. doi:10.1177/016344385007004005 Schuchman, J. S. (1984). Silent movies and the deaf community. Journal of Popular Culture, 17(4), 58–78. doi:10.1111/j.0022-3840.1984.1704_58.x Scott, R. (1997, 1997/08//). Captioning in Australia. Communications Update. Retrieved from http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/CLCCommsUpd/1997/ 88.pdf Screen Australia. (2014). Online and on demand: Trends in Australian online video use. Retrieved from http://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/getmedia/0062da06db04-4932-a3e1-20a81d383129/Online-on-demand-copy.pdf?ext=.pdf Senate Environment Communications Committee. (2015). Broadcasting and other legislation amendment (Deregulation) bill 2014 [provisions]. ­Canberra, Australia: Australian Parliament. Spector, N. (2015, 11 August). How Facebook’s autoplay videos are ushering in a new era of silent storytelling. Retrieved from https://www.adweek.com/digital/ how-facebooks-autoplay-videos-are-influencing-other-areas-digital-166344/ Spinks, R. (2017, 31 August). How accessible technology is moving into the mainstream. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/robin-spinks/ how-accessible-technology_b_11777792.html UK Government. (2003). Communications Act 2003. Retrieved from http:// www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/21/contents United States government. (1990). Television Decoder Circuitry Act of 1990. Retrieved from https://transition.fcc.gov/Bureaus/OSEC/library/legislative_ histories/1397.pdf Viki.com. (2018). About us. Retrieved from https://www.viki.com/about Wolford, J. (2012, 11 October). Netflix will caption all streaming videos by 2014, per settlement. Retrieved from http://www.webpronews.com/netflixwill-caption-all-streaming-videos-by-2014-per-settlement-2012-10 Youngblood, N. E. (2013). Integrating usability and accessibility into the interactive media and communication curriculum. Global Media Journal, 12(23), 1–37.

9 Interpretive Flexibility

When Netflix rebooted the early 2000s cultural television phenomenon Queer Eye for the Straight Guy in early 2018, the streaming service was praised for both its positive portrayal of masculine friendships in an era of cruel reality television and for the emotional resonance the series had with audiences. However, in June 2018, D/deaf and hard of hearing audiences took to Twitter to complain about the poor standard of captioning in the makeover series, claiming the captions did not reflect the exact words being spoken. Karamo Brown, the so-called culture expert and host of the show, responded by telling fans the news ‘broke [his] heart’ and that he would personally take the issue up with Netflix as soon as he could. With a popular television personality such as Brown supporting the complaint, Netflix quickly responded, pledging to look into and fix the issue. As the outrage about the problematic captions on Queer Eye grew, two things became apparent – firstly the severity of the problem and secondly the audience sector who were being affected. While Netflix initially claimed that the non-verbatim captions were a result of Queer Eye being ‘non-scripted’ programming or reality television, as the conversation grew, audiences identified problematic captions in other programming, including both non-scripted programming such as RuPaul’s Drag Race and scripted shows such as Luke Cage. One viewer who used captions to compensate for a cognitive, not hearing, impairment noted that she had been keeping a record of all her complaints to Netflix regarding inaccurate captions and, although the number totalled 150, unlike Brown, she had never received a response from the streaming giant (Cooper, 2018). As the story grew, an increasing number of people who were not D/deaf or hard of hearing joined in, including friends and family of people who use captions to compensate for impairments, people with a variety of other impairments from vision to cognitive, and people without any sort of disability but who found that the captions enhanced their understanding of what is happening onscreen, particularly in the digital era of binge-watching (Amatulli, 2018). Together, these groups comprised a potentially significant audience share.

Interpretive Flexibility  165 With this latter, and arguably more mainstream, non-disabled group beginning to be the most vocal on the issue, captions are gaining more attention. For many, captions have been identified as essential to television viewing due to both second screen distractions and the viewers’ desire to access as much information about a narrative as possible (Farley, 2017). This is particularly the case with the advent of so-called prestige television which involves complicated storylines and unusual character names – for example, fans of both Twin Peaks and Game of Thrones report using captions to follow the detailed plots (Bradley, 2017; Ellis, 2014). As such, today’s television audiences want to personalise their viewing options via captioned content in order to more easily follow what is happening on screen – as Jason Kehe explains in a Wired ­article, the more television you watch, the more television you miss (Kehe, 2018). In turn, this demand has led to increased mainstream access, and captions are now considered a standard feature for many viewers, particularly those accessing video-on-demand services. The associated increasing demand for captions in other media such as online videos, especially those hosted on social media such as Facebook, has also seen a discernible improvement in their availability. This chapter begins by introducing the social construction of technology (SCOT), specifically the notion of interpretive flexibility as a frame to understand the mainstream benefits of accessibility features. The chapter then focuses on three traditionally disability-focussed features – captions, audio description and clean audio – to illustrate how their access and inclusion can also be of benefit to a wider television audience. These benefits can be broadly summarised as facilitating increased access to contemporary –personalised – prestige television content in our busy media worlds, promoting transcription and indexing, as well as contributing to advances in an educational setting. Similarly, benefits for the inclusion of other previously unconsidered disability groups are often a consequence of more widely available accessibility features and alternative formats, and these will be referred to throughout.

Social Construction of Technology (SCOT) In Enacting disability: how can science and technology studies inform disability studies? Vasilis Galis argues that the discipline of science and technology studies can inform disability studies by challenging dominant approaches (Galis, 2011). Disability studies has traditionally taken two distinct approaches to the study of technology. First, technology has been criticised for attempting to ‘fix’ the problem of disability (Oliver, 1978; Stienstra & Troschuk, 2005). Technology, particularly rehabilitative technologies were seen as an extension of the medical model. More recently, a growing body of work celebrates the potential of technology in allowing people with disability greater accessibility but critiques the

166 Access lack of access to this technology (Ellis & Kent, 2011; Foley & Ferri, 2012; Goggin & Newell, 2003; Jaeger, 2012). This approach recognises the complex embodiment introduced in Chapter 3. This chapter proposes an examination of a third area of analysis to consider the influence of interpretive flexibility. SCOT is one arm of Science and Technology Studies (STS) that focuses on the way human action shapes technology. For example, in their study of the automobile, Kline and Pinch argue that innovations often occur when a technology is not utilised to its full extent nor in the way that the designer initially intended (Kline & Pinch, 1996). SCOT acknowledges technology design and use as an open process dependent on social influences and the motivations of different groups of (potential) users and manufacturers. Therefore different social groups have different interpretations, expectations and ideologies about how to use alternative technologies. Innovation comes about through a process of interpretive flexibility when different groups of users attach different meanings to the same artefact. As Kline and Pinch explain: The same artifact can mean different things to different social groups of users. […] Such meanings can get embedded in new artifacts, and developmental paths can be traced which reinforce this meaning […]. Interpretative flexibility, however, does not continue forever. ‘Closure’ and stabilization occur, such that some artifacts appear to have fewer problems and become increasingly the dominant form of the technology. (Kline & Pinch, 1996, p. 766) This is not a new phenomenon. There are many examples of technology initially designed to benefit the disabled that, upon entering into a period of interpretive flexibility, were found to benefit everyone. These include the telephone, the phonograph and predictive text as well as personal texting, personal video phones, optical character recognition (OCR), speech synthesis, speech recognition and even the electric toothbrush (Ladner, 2015; Reena, 2009). Further, the current focus on, and preference for, individualised devices such as tablets and smartphones could give this access increasing momentum. For example, screen reading technology, developed for people with vision impairments, is being used by smartphone and audio book users, as well as motorists using GPS navigation systems. Similarly, audio web browsing is gaining popularity, particularly with the increasing popularity of wearable devices and the Internet of Things (IoT). There are other examples. Music apps designed to be inclusive of users with ADHD have also been shown to be more accessible for the general population (Widen, 2017). Similarly, web designers no longer consider accessibility to be just about users with disability. As David ­Carrolon, an expert in search engine optimisation explains, accessibility is ‘about ensuring that all parts of the website can be navigated easily,

Interpretive Flexibility  167 that interaction happens naturally and that all users understand the website without having to spend hours studying it’ (Carrolon interviewed on CKEditor, 2015). Indeed, search engines, which are an important part of web use for most people, have been shown to yield the best results from more accessible webpages. Carrolon recommends approaching search engine bots in the same way as disabled users (­CKEditor, 2015). By improving the user experience for everyone, this approach is a good business strategy. Indeed, technology companies such as Apple and Google recognise that solving accessibility problems will also result in a commercial advantage (Bownlee, 2016; Reena, 2009). While the rhetoric of convenient mainstream access has not entered the medium of television as forcefully, the increased ability to personalise our screens has pushed assistive technologies such as captions, audio description and clean audio into a period of interpretive flexibility. As a result, the benefits of television accessibility for all users – as well as the potential for a process of negotiation amongst different social groups – are being increasingly recognised. For example, while captions were initially conceived to provide access to audiovisual material for people who were D/ deaf or hard of hearing, other social groups such as people learning a new language and television fans seeking out more information about their favourite programmes have attached a new set of meanings to this feature. As such, captions are increasingly used in both television content and online video. Likewise, when Netflix introduced audio description on original programming in 2015, a new group of users emerged who attached a different meaning to this feature. For this group, audio description offered another layer of meaning to television shows that were difficult to follow such as Sense 8 (Mancuso, 2015) or those that did not introduce character names until several episodes along such as Orange is the New Black. At the same time, researchers were considering the possibility that audio description could also be of benefit to other users, including people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) who may have difficulty deciphering facial expressions and emotion (Garman, 2011) as well as the elderly, sick people or people learning the language who may appreciate a verbal translation of visual content (Rai, Greening, & Petre, 2010). However, it should be noted that as these features become technologies of convenience, they are only available because disabled people lobbied for access improvements. While initially this advocacy was purely to realise benefits to specific disability groups, being able to demonstrate the mainstream uses of accessibility has also proven useful in activists’ efforts. For example, it was only when advocates could demonstrate the benefits of captioning for groups beyond those with hearing difficulties that the technology of closed captions really took off (Downey, 2008). Further, when Netflix introduced audio description on their original programming in 2015, they also recognised more mainstream benefits and normalised the feature, describing it as ‘just like choosing the soundtrack in a different language’ (Wright, 2015), although it must be

168 Access noted that the use of this feature amongst audiences who are not blind or vision impaired is still in its infancy. Clean audio, however, differs again – this is an emerging access feature and so the case is still being made for its usefulness as an assistive device for people with and without specific disabilities.

Mainstream Uses of Captions Captions are both the most widely recognised and most available television accessibility feature. In addition to legislation requiring their availability on television, they are given the highest priority in the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) (see W3C, 2008) and are specifically mentioned in Australia’s periodic reporting to the UN about their activities towards the UNCRPD (see Australian Government, 2018). Yet, this widespread ­availability is directly attributed not to their original target audience, the D/deaf and hard of hearing, but rather to their demonstrable benefits to mainstream and non-disabled audiences. For example, while D/deaf activists and their allies in the USA campaigned aggressively for the provision of captions on television in the 1970s and early 1980s, it was not until captions were redefined as of public interest to groups beyond this cohort that the US government intervened and introduced legislation mandating provisions for both their demand – for example through the purchase of decoder technology – and their supply on television. And so captions became an educational and commercial rather than altruistic move – D/deaf and hard of hearing audiences were considered economically powerless, yet the potentially larger audience consisting of students learning to read and immigrants learning English compelled the US government to act (Downey, 2008). Indeed, writing in 1980, Barry Cronin, the Director of Captioning Operations-East for the National Captioning Institute in the USA, predicted the future applications of captioning: New [technological] developments will bring not only more innova­ tion to the hearing-impaired community but can serve many other populations. Bi-lingual children and adults, reading disabled and disadvantaged children, and hospitalized and institutionalized ­people who are in environments where sound levels must be kept low can all be beneficiaries of closed captioning. Two sets of captions can be transmitted simultaneously – using any two combinations of language and language levels. (Cronin, 1980) Although written nearly 40 years ago, Cronin predicted the importance of captions to the current desire for easy information retrieval and increased

Interpretive Flexibility  169 individualisation of television and television access in public places. What he did not predict, however, was the even wider audience for captions which has emerged – people use the feature on personal or public screens in noisy environments such as bars, gyms and aeroplanes, as well as to comprehend large urban screens located in town squares and public parks. Nor did he predict the way users of social media would come to rely on captions to stay in a constant flow of communication. As mentioned in Chapter 8, following the introduction of automatic captions on YouTube, it has also become common for online videos to include captions. H ­ earing users created a new market for the feature as many began to watch videos in environments where sound would be inappropriate – this type of video format became particularly popular when Facebook introduced their auto-play function on posted videos. Facebook has also recently introduced ‘automatic alternative text’ software to describe photos (Spinks, 2017) which, in addition to the large portion of the population with vision impairments, will also be of more mainstream use as the population ages. Of particular importance has been the rise in the use of captions for information retrieval in the era of prestige television. With the advent of DVD boxsets, binge-watching and online communities of fans, writing for television has undergone a dramatic shift. Whereas previously characters did not change much from week to week because audiences could not be relied on to return to a television show regularly (Metcalf, 2012), the advent of catch-up television and binge-watching means that it is no longer assumed that each episode of a television series must be able to stand alone and characters now undergo dramatic shifts over the course of a series (Ellis & Goggin, 2015). Prestige television is characterised by convoluted programming and now dominates popular television and, for many, captions are becoming a vital tool to keep up. For example, the latest chapter of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks is an illustration of complex television programming which is even more intricate than what Metcalf describes above. Characters and storylines are introduced with tenuous connections to each other, nor to the wider narrative or to the already existing Twin Peaks universe. In part 12 of Twin Peaks: The Return, the character Audrey Horne finally makes her return and has an intense conversation about Billy, Tina, Chuck and Paul with a man named Charles who appears to be her husband. Audiences did not know who these characters were. The transcripts and searchable databases of existing visual content therefore became an important resource for fans to search for previous instances of these names and develop theories about their relationships to Audrey (Bradley, 2017). As discussed in Chapter 5, communities of fans discuss key moments of popular television programming online. The increased information about the programmes offered via captions – and their archived ­transcripts – has become an important fan resource facilitating the re-­ editing of scenes. During the 1970s, television fans began re-editing shows

170 Access in this way. However, the process required ‘an exhaustive knowledge of a television show’ (Blankinship, Smith, Holtzman, & Bender, 2004, p. 152). Captions instead can provide a searchable tool or mark-up language for scenes to be more easily discovered. Captions and transcripts facilitate a creative appropriation of television and help strengthen community ties. With today’s increased access to captioning, this process has the potential to become simplified. As discussed in the previous chapter, captions also play an important role in an educational context. Indeed, the relatively widespread availability of captions today can in part be attributed to activism from this sector – educators at schools for the D/deaf as far back as mid-last century recognised the pedagogical relevance of access to screen culture via captions for their students. Screens continue to be an integral part of education today as modern forms of tuition increasingly include distribution of video, particularly in online modes. Students use screens to study and lecturers deliver course materials online and augment face-toface teaching with online resources. Further, with education increasingly entering a transnational space through new massive open online courses (MOOCs) and campuses digitally stretching across countries, accessible lecture videos are becoming more vital for a number of student groups. As such, captions are also starting to be recognised as having mainstream benefits in education (Ellis & Goggin, 2015; Kent, Ellis, Peaty, ­Latter, & Locke, 2017; Merchant, Ellis, & Latter, 2017). For example, closed captions improve both comprehension and vocabulary for the majority of the student population (Podszebka, Conklin, Apple, & Windus, 1998) – they enable easy comprehension of vocabulary that is spoken very quickly or with accents, or which contains mumbling or background noise, as well as clarification of full names and technical terminology. This is of particular note with the increased internationalisation of higher education (Montero Perez, Peters, Clarebout, & Desmet, 2014; Montero Perez, Van Den Noortgate, & Desmet, 2013). Users of captioned online videos also report higher user engagement and better user experience (Griffin, 2015). Captions are of use to students watching content in environments where sound is either unavailable or inappropriate such as in offices and libraries. They also offer the opportunity to increase search engine functionality (Massachusetts Institute of Technology [MIT], 2016), allowing students to jump to the exact point in a lecture they are looking for during assignment revision. As a result, students have become a new group of potential users influencing the social construction of captions.

Mainstream Benefits of Audio Description As discussed throughout this book, the digital television environment is changing television consumption practices. Choice dominates, and audiences are employing a variety of tools to find the content relevant to

Interpretive Flexibility  171 them. As a result, instead of attempting to court a mass and homogenous audience, television today recognises and values diversity, seeking out niche audiences which, when aggregated, rival the mass (Napoli, 2011). In the case of audio description, the reported 575,000 people in Australia with a vision impairment (NDIS, 2015) are the most obvious audience. Traditionally, as seems to have been the case in the limited approach taken by Screen Australia on this matter (discussed in Chapter 7), only this cohort were seen to potentially benefit from this service and as such the benefits for users beyond this group are rarely considered. However, a significant body of work suggests there are benefits of audio description for both other disability groups and for mainstream consumers and producers and, as such, new audience sectors are increasingly being identified. These audiences could be further leveraged through Netflix’s recommendation system. The system uses sophisticated machine-learning algorithms in conjunction with shows people have watched before, the time in which they watch them, and their thematic make-up to offer suggestions to viewers about what they should watch next. As a result, 80 per cent of the shows people watch through Netflix are based on this recommendation system (Plummer, 2017). This system has been replicated by other streaming services, catch-up television and pay television platforms. Similar recommendations based on the availability of audio description could open up a considerable niche audience, particularly given there are 253 million people in the world with blindness or vision impairment (World Health Organisation, 2017). Netflix recognises this potential and offers audio description on all original programming. However, the audience share could go well beyond this already large niche audience if providers and users innovated with some mainstream benefits of audio description. In particular, four potential groups have been seen to potentially not only accept but also embrace increased access audio description – the elderly, people with intellectual disabilities, people whose first language is not English, as well as a mainstream audience. For example, drawing on the literary concept of ekphrasis (introduced in Chapter 7) and the WCAG definition of alternative content, Mara Mills proposes audio description as existing within a new category of media use – the ‘translation overlay’ whereby ‘content is added to source material without creating a new work’. She identifies distinctive groups and contexts in which audio description enhances the entertainment and educational experience for people without vision impairment: Audio described videos have been advertised as aids for multimedia literacy; for ‘eyes-free viewing’ by sighted people (e.g. while driving); for video-based medical education; and for training Autistic people to read facial expressions. (Mills, 2015)

172 Access However, in the digital era of television, particularly regarding the phenomenon of binge-watching, audio description could attract another audience. People are watching more and more television in a shorter period of time and often as their attention is divided – they are consuming more but paying less attention to it. For example, a UK study found 16 per cent of television viewers engaged in multitasking activities while watching television (Cass, 2013), both in a traditional setting (such as cooking while watching a television set) and simultaneously engaging with online technologies to access television (such as seeking out more information online in fan forums, reading character wikis, or turning on the closed caption track as discussed earlier). Udo and Fels also find audio description improves comprehension for people switching focus between a variety of tasks: … [audio description] is useful for sighted individuals who are unable to devote their complete visual attention to watching entertainment media because their visual attention is elsewhere (on tasks such as sewing or ironing) or they must constantly leave and re-enter a room that is within earshot (while doing the laundry, cooking). (Udo & Fels, 2010) Further, as mentioned above in the discussion of closed captioning, with the quality of television improving, narratives have become more involved and difficult to follow, so audiences are turning to alternative forms of access to complement their viewing. Viewers of Sense 8 for example report relying on that show’s audio description track to follow the narrative which constantly shifts between subjectivities and locations to tell the story of eight people across the world who share the same mind (Mancuso, 2015). In another example, Life Hacker magazine highlights audio description as a way to more effectively binge-watch television by turning shows into audio books that can be binge-listened to while driving the car or walking the dog (Price, 2018). Another area of the mainstream use of audio description lies in production, media producers could use it to easily retrieve information and therefore categorise content. For example, a 2007 study of accessibility to audiovisual material identified audio description as a useful tool to categorise and create indexes for moving image databases (Turner  & Mathieu, 2008). The researchers created descriptions of two feature films, two documentaries and seven animated short films, 11 texts in total. The descriptions were used to create an index of visual images which were then compared to the pre-existing audio-description track. The researchers found that the important key words existed in both, thus suggesting audio description could be useful in creating a transcript and then an index for use by media educators or in newsrooms: By linking the description text in a moving image database to the corresponding image, whether they occur on screen at the same time

Interpretive Flexibility  173 or not, and by identifying descriptors in the text that can be considered useful indexing terms, we can provide shot by shot indexing to moving images. This is highly desirable for those who make films and television programmes or who study them, and is very helpful in television newsrooms where shot by shot indexing is necessary in order to have material readily available as news stories build from day to day. (Turner & Mathieu, 2008, p. 2) Indeed, with the escalating demands of the 24-hour news cycle, the potential opportunities of such a database are gaining increasing significance. In addition, as the researchers suggest, these indexes can be quickly and efficiently translated into other languages. The actual and potential uses of such a moving image database are explored in a later article by researchers in Spain who found that audiovisual databases offer significant potential for new forms of indexing, particularly for television journalists making use of documentation services to facilitate communication and exchange of information behind the scenes (­Caldera-Serrano, 2010). These studies suggest the broadcasters who are so resistant to audio description could actually be a group who benefit the most from it. In addition to these entertainment contexts, and, again, just like closed captioning, audio description has also been identified as beneficial to a variety of groups in an educational setting. For example, a group of students was shown the opening scene of The Lion King without audio description and asked to write a description of it. After the same group were provided the scene with audio description, their descriptions became more precise and vivid, thus suggesting a significant improvement in comprehension. As such, the International Literacy Association who ran this study recognise audio description as an instructional tool that helps students improve their writing abilities, attention to detail and media literacy (Hoffner, Baker, & Quinn, 2017). People with intellectual disability have also reported benefits from receiving both visual and audible information (Mechling & Collins, 2012) and studies of students with ASD likewise find a strong preference for voice-over narration on instructional videos amongst some students (Bennett, Gutierrez, & Honsberger, 2013). This section has discussed a number of niche audiences who could benefit from audio description. As discussed throughout this book, once aggregated, niche audiences surpass the mass.

Mainstream Uses of Clean Audio Clean audio refers to making existing audio more intelligible. It is targeted toward people with a hearing impairment, but could be of benefit to people in noisy environments (e.g. planes) trying to access television content. A portion of the television audience experience issues with both

174 Access the usability and accessibility of digital media associated with television audio for several different reasons. For example, the ‘cleanness’ of the audio, that is the ratio of sound-to-noise or the audio quality itself, is often unclear. In addition, the speech rate of dialogue can be too fast, too mumbled or too accented – or even just drowned out by background music or sound effects – for some users to properly follow. Finally, the consistency of audio volume across and between programmes is a particular problem. This is often quite noticeable when watching television at low volumes, such as at night, or when programming switches to intentionally louder advertisement breaks. These issues can be alleviated by clean audio – also referred to as enhanced dialogue, dialogue enhancement or dialogue-only – which provides speech without any background music or other sounds. Jim Slater’s report on access services for UK mobile television suggests that clean audio would be a reasonable accommodation for a significant portion of the population and recommends that mobile television have clean audio facilities from the start (Slater, 2009): One possibility for a future access service would be to provide a ‘clean audio’ channel which provides the speech without any background music or other sounds. This probably requires a separate audio channel, and a modest amount of data capacity reserved for its transmission. With digital television, the cost of providing such an extra audio channel is modest, and the extra production costs are small compared to the number of people who would be helped by such a facility. (Slater, 2009) He continues by giving examples of those who might benefit from the service, including people with vision impairments and those with a variety of hearing impairments (Slater, 2012): Some blind and partially sighted people may also have a hearing impairment. Many people with a hearing impairment have problems in understanding speech when there is a background sound, and other normally hearing people find background sound distracting. Similarly, Liu & Picard identify the demand for, and the state of research into, clean audio via analysis of ‘calls to broadcaster call centres and audience research on viewer complaints’ (Liu & Picard, 2014). They find a personalised approach to clean audio could solve significant user problems such as viewer difficulties with hearing or understanding audio or big jumps in loudness levels within and between programmes. Other research is also looking into this issue. According to the European Disability Forum (2012):

Interpretive Flexibility  175 One of the most common complaints from persons with disabilities concerns clean audio. The audience would like to be able to separate background sound/music from dialogue to be able to distinguish the audio content. (European Disability Forum, 2012) Additionally, the elderly and people with intellectual disability are mentioned as beneficiaries of clean audio in many studies and, as such, clean audio will become increasingly important as the population ages (ITU, 2010; Itu, 2013). With regard to people with an intellectual disability, initiatives such as the Digital Television for All (DTV4ALL) funded by the European Commission during that continent’s transition to digital television have tried to ensure digital television accessibility for people with disability related to vision, hearing and dexterity as well as for people who have dyslexia. The group conducted research into clean audio and reduced playback speed, as well as user testing of particular clean audio solutions. Clean audio was identified as ‘an emerging access service that is of use [to] a large potential user group despite the extreme heterogeneity of hearing disabilities’ (Brückner & Dosch, 2009, p. 16). Therefore, with an ageing population, an increasing proportion of whom experience age-related hearing difficulties, as well as potential benefits to a variety of disabled audiences the availability of clean audio could become a mainstream issue. However, from a legislative perspective, clean audio is a relative newcomer to the medium of television. Standards for clean audio have been explored and implemented in many jurisdictions including in the UK, Sweden, North America, Canada, Austria, Germany and Japan (Liu & Picard, 2014). However, it has, to date, not been subject to any official regulation and is oftentimes overlooked in favour of other more common assistive technologies such as captioning or audio description. Nevertheless, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) working document on web accessibility (W3C Working Group, 2015, sec. 2.4) makes specific reference to clean audio in the context of television accessibility: A relatively recent development in television accessibility is the concept of clean audio, which takes advantage of the increased adoption of multichannel audio. This is primarily aimed at audiences who are hard of hearing, and consists of isolating the audio channel containing the spoken dialog and important non-speech information that can then be amplified or otherwise modified, while other channels containing music or ambient sounds are attenuated. Using the isolated audio track may make it possible to apply more sophisticated audio processing such as pre-emphasis filters, pitch-shifting, and so on to tailor the audio to the user’s needs, since hearing loss is typically frequency-dependent, and the user may have usable hearing in some bands yet none at all in others.

176 Access Further, the UK Ofcom-funded Clean Audio Project measured the improvements in intelligibility and enjoyment of television for users of their clean audio trials (Shirley & Kendrick, 2006). The project tested the perceived enjoyment levels of both hearing-impaired and non-hearing-­ impaired audiences when the sound quality of dialogue was enhanced. While both groups detected the improved dialogue quality, only the non-hearing-impaired group indicated this improved their enjoyment. Additionally, the Spanish research project HERMES-TDT investigated user requirements for television, including audio requirements, as part of their monitoring of access services. They note that, while incorporating clean audio into the digital video broadcasting standard has been contemplated, ‘regular broadcasting of this service has not started yet in Europe, and the need to move forward on this issue has only been pointed out in research circles’ (Utray et al., 2012, p. 3). Due to the lack of provision, they did not develop a system for monitoring clean audio. However, their initial research into the requirements of people with specific disabilities found people with hearing impairments benefitted from clean audio when watching dramatic and fictional content. To date, there has been a lack of official regulation regarding this in Australia. However, looking internationally for guidance and to the UK specifically suggests a need for legislative intervention. The UK’s 2006 Ofcom review into The Code on Television Access emphasises the need to regulate: Despite the significant benefits of clean audio for persons with hearing disabilities, the legal framework does not pay sufficient attention to this solution for tackling accessibility barriers, and Ofcom has not been granted any competences under the Communications Act to set specific rules on clean audio. (Varney, 2013, p. 149) In addition, some advocacy groups are calling for more research into this emerging technology. A Consumer Expert Group report on the transition to digital television maintains that users ‘should be able to select or be provided with a clean audio channel which provides an alternative mix of spoken dialogue and music/effects suitable for hard of hearing people’ (Consumer Expert Group, 2006, sec. 6). Further, Looms’ (2011, p. 16) description of clean audio suggests that its reach could be broader than just broadcasting a clean audio channel: Work is being done on ‘clean’ or ‘clear audio’, either to ensure that an audio channel is available without music or other additions, or to improve the intelligibility of the audio in the receiver through the use of users’ profiles and filtering. This still has the character of being ‘work in progress’.

Interpretive Flexibility  177 Yet, while clean audio can be seen as the requirement that broadcasters provide a separate ‘clean audio’ channel, to particular specifications  – for example dialogue only, or dialogue and important sound effects  – ­questions remain about the nature of those specifications. Should important ambient effects be included? Will excluding background noise result in comprehension trade-offs? More research needs to be carried out in this emerging area.

Conclusion This chapter moved from the book’s specific focus on disability and digital television cultures to consider the mainstream uses and benefits of accessibility features initially developed to mitigate specific impairments but now discovered – and embraced – by a wider audience including the elderly, people with intellectual disability, people whose first language is not English, as well as a more mainstream following. This is an example of interpretive flexibility, or the way different users and designers culturally construct and interpret technology. SCOT posits that a technology is designed for a specific purpose but may enter a period of interpretive flexibility as relevant social groups emerge and compete for meaning. While closure and stabilisation occur when consensus is reached about the meaning of an artefact, this is rarely a final process. Interpretive flexibility can re-emerge as new relevant social groups appear and compete within a wider sociocultural context. The increasing personalisation of television – both through an increase in programming options such as video-on-demand and due to the rise in the preference for individualised devices – offers an opportunity for interpretive flexibility and the potential to introduce accessibility features as an option. However, Elizabeth Ellcessor (2015) recommends caution in this approach, noting that: … if accessibility measures are allowed to slip entirely into the category of ‘options’, customisations’ or similar settings, it becomes difficult to retain the connection of accessibility to matters of access, civil rights, and political participation. Instead, accessibility features become yoked to ideologies of consumer choice, provided through proprietary means, and made not a matter of access rights, but of personal ‘choice’. (Ellcessor, 2015) As discussed in this chapter, the mainstream benefits of captions and audio description can be broadly grouped into one underlying theme – ­improved access to content. Both features are being embraced by mainstream audiences to provide more information about the content of television shows, be it the complicated storylines of Game of Thrones or Sense 8, or the

178 Access intricate character relationships in Twin Peaks. These accessibility features are therefore providing a form of Cliffs Notes for a new breed of high-quality television programming. Communities of fans have also converged online to discuss key moments of popular television programming available thanks to the increased information retrieval options of these features. In an educational context, this improved comprehension and ease of information retrieval has also featured strongly in the available studies, as has the ability for media producers to repurpose existing content into new creative works, for example creating a searchable tool or an index. Clean audio was also discussed throughout this chapter as an emerging accessibility feature whose relevance to television audiences with and without disability is, while not yet completely apparent, becoming more widely recognised. Along with captions and audio description, this usefulness has also begun to be noticed by people who do not identify as disabled, thus leading to a period of firstly interpretive flexibility and then potentially mainstream acceptance and demand. As the population ages, these features will become increasingly important and therefore must remain in the purview of access rights, not simply consumer choice.

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Interpretive Flexibility  179 Caldera-Serrano, J. (2010). Thematic description of audio-visual information on television. Aslib Proceedings, 62(2), 202–209. doi:10.1108/00012531011 034991 Cass, S. (2013). More viewing, less attention [Data flow]. Spectrum, IEEE, 50(10), 80–80. doi:10.1109/MSPEC.2013.6607036 CKEditor. (2015, 8 July). Accessibility, usability and SEO go hand in hand. Retrieved from https://ckeditor.com/blog/Accessibility-usability-and-SEOgo-hand-in-hand-a-talk-with-David-Carralon Consumers Expert Group. (2006). Digital TV equipment: Vulnerable consumer requirements (A report by the Consumers Expert Group to UK Government and Digital UK). Retrieved from http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/­ activities/ict_psp/documents/digital_tv_eq_consumer_requirements_paper.pdf Cooper, K.-L. (2018, 29 June). Queer Eye host backs viewers on Netflix subtitle change. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts44643667 Cronin, B. J. (1980). Chapter 14: Closed-caption television: Today and tomorrow. American Annals of the Deaf, 125(6), 726–728. doi:10.1353/aad.2012.1099 Downey, G. (2008). Closed captioning: Subtitling, stenography, and the digital convergence of text with television. Baltimore, MD: The John Hopkins University Press. Ellcessor, E. (2015). Blurred lines: Accessibility, disability and definitional limitations. First Monday, 20(9). Retrieved from http://firstmonday.org/ojs/­ index.php/fm/article/view/6169/4904 Ellis, K. (2014). Cripples, bastards and broken things: Disability in Game of Thrones. Media Culture, 17(5). Retrieved from http://journal.media-culture. org.au/index.php/mcjournal/article/viewArticle/895 Ellis, K., & Goggin, G. (2015). Disability and the media. New York, NY: ­Palgrave Macmillan. Ellis, K., & Kent, M. (2011). Disability and new media. New York, NY: Routledge. European Disability Forum. (2012). What is your dreamed accessible television of the future? Retrieved from Brussels: http://cms.horus.be/files/99909/­ MediaArchive/library/EdfTvRemainingAccGaps_FINAL.doc Farley, R. (2017, 29 July). Get over your fear of subtitles, please. Retrieved from https://www.refinery29.com/tv-closed-captions-movie-subtitles-benefits Foley, A., & Ferri, B. A. (2012). Technology for people, not disabilities: Ensuring access and inclusion. Journal of Research in Special Educational Needs, 12(4), 192–200. doi:10.1111/j.1471-3802.2011.01230.x Galis, V. (2011). Enacting disability: How can science and technology studies inform disability studies? Disability & Society, 26(7), 825–838. doi:10.1080/ 09687599.2011.618737 Garman, J. (2011, 29 August). Autistic spectrum, captions and audio description. Retrieved from http://mindfulresearch.co.uk/2011/08/29/autistic-spectrumcaptions-and-audio-description/ Goggin, G., & Newell, C. (2003). Digital disability: The social construction of disability in new media. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers Inc. Griffin, E. (2015). Who uses captions? Not just the deaf or hard of hearing. Retrieved from http://www.3playmedia.com/2015/08/28/who-uses-closedcaptions-not-just-the-deaf-or-hard-of-hearing/

180 Access Hoffner, H., Baker, E., & Quinn, K. B. (2017). Lesson plan: Descriptive video: Using media technology to enhance writing. Retrieved from http://www.read writethink.org/resources/resource-print.html?id=1116. International Telecommunications Union (ITU). (2010). Accessibility to broadcasting services for persons with disabilities. Retrieved from http://www.itu. int/dms_pub/itu-r/opb/rep/R-REP-BT.2207-2-2012-PDF-E.pdf Itu, S. G. (2013). Methods for improving the intelligibility of audio (Part 12). Retrieved from https://www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-t/opb/fg/T-FG-AVA-2013P12-PDF-E.pdf Jaeger, P. (2012). Disability and the internet: Confronting a digital divide. ­Boulder, CO and London, England: Lynne Rienner Publishers. Kehe, J. (2018, 26 June). The real reason you use closed captions for everything now. Retrieved from https://www.wired.com/story/closed-captionseverywhere/?mbid=social_fb Kent, M., Ellis, K., Peaty, G., Latter, N., & Locke, K. (2017). Mainstreaming captions for online lectures in higher education in Australia: Alternative approaches to engaging with video content at Curtin University. Retri­eved from Western Australia. Retrieved from https://www.ncsehe.edu.au/publications/ 4074/?doing_wp_cron=1493183232.7519669532775878906250 Kline, R., & Pinch, T. (1996). Users as agents of technological change: The social construction of the automobile in the rural United States. Technology and Culture, 37(4), 763–795. doi:10.2307/3107097 Ladner, R. (2015, April). Design for user empowerment. Retrieved from http://interactions.acm.org /archive/view/march-april-2015/design-foruser-empowerment Liu, Y.-l., & Picard, R. G. (2014). Policy and marketing strategies for digital media. Florence, KY: Taylor & Francis. Mancuso, V. (2015, 9 June). The descriptive audio narrator is the best part of Netflix’s ‘Sense8’. Retrieved from http://observer.com/2015/06/thedescriptive-audio-narrator-is-the-best-part-of-netflixs-sense8/ Mechling, L. C., & Collins, T. S. (2012). Comparison of the effects of video models with and without verbal cueing on task completion by young adults with moderate intellectual disability. Education and Training in Autism and Developmental Disabilities, 47(2), 223–235. Merchant, M., Ellis, K., & Latter, N. (2017). Captions and the cooking show. Media Culture, 23(3). Retrieved from http://journal.media-culture.org.au/­ index.php/mcjournal/article/view/1260 Metcalf, G. (2012). The DVD novel: How the way we watch television changed the television we watch. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger. Mills, M. (2015). The cine-files » Listening to images: Audio description, the translation overlay, and image retrieval. Retrieved from http://www.­thecinefiles.com/listening-to-images-audio-description-the-translation-overlayand-image-retrieval/ Montero Perez, M., Peters, E., Clarebout, G., & Desmet, P. (2014). Effects of captioning on video comprehension and incidental vocabulary learning. Language Learning & Technology, 18(1), 118–141. Montero Perez, M., Van Den Noortgate, W., & Desmet, P. (2013). Captioned Video for L2 Listening and Vocabulary Learning: A meta-analysis. System, 41(3), 720–739. doi:10.1016/j.system.2013.07.013

Interpretive Flexibility  181 Napoli, P. M. (2011). Audience evolution: New technologies and the transformation of media audiences. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. NDIS. (2015, 1 October). A snapshot of blindness and low vision in Australia. Retrieved from http://www.everyaustraliancounts.com.au/research-reports/ a-snapshot-of-blindness-and-low-vision-in-australia/ Oliver, M. (1978). The misuse of technology: Walking appliances for paraplegics. Journal of Medical Engineering & Technology, 2(2), 69–70. Plummer, L. (2017, 22 August). This is how Netflix’s top-secret recommendation system works. Retrieved from http://www.wired.co.uk/article/how-do-­netflixsalgorithms-work-machine-learning-helps-to-predict-what-viewers-will-like Podszebka, D., Conklin, C., Apple, M., & Windus, A. (1998). Comparison of video and text narrative presentations on comprehension and vocabulary acquisition. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED418382.pdf Price, E. (2018, 8 March). How to turn Netflix shows into audiobooks (and why you should). Retrieved from https://www.lifehacker.com.au/2018/03/ how-to-turn-netflix-movies-into-audiobooks/ Rai, S., Greening, J., & Petre, L. (2010). A comparative study of audio description guidelines prevalent in different countries. Retrieved from http://audio description.co.uk/uploads/general/RNIB._AD_standards1.pdf Reena, J. (2009). How tech for the disabled is going mainstream. Business Week. Retrieved from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2009-09-23/how-techfor-the-disabled-is-going-mainstream Shirley, B., & Kendrick, P. (2006). The clean audio project: Digital TV as assistive technology. Technology & Disability, 18(1), 31–41. Slater, J. (2009). Watching the games on our mobiles. John Gill Technology. Retrieved from http://www.johngilltech.com/publications/phoneability/games/ mobiletv_2012games.htm Slater, J. (2012). Guidelines: Television. Retrieved from http://www.johngill tech.com/guidelines/television/index.htm Spinks, R. (2017, 31 August). How accessible technology is moving into the mainstream. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/robin-spinks/ how-accessible-technology_b_11777792.html Stienstra, D., & Troschuk, L. (2005). Engaging citizens with disabilities in eDemocracy. Disability Studies Quarterly, 25(2), online. Turner, J., & Mathieu, S. (2008). Audio description text for indexing films. International Cataloguing and Bibliographic Control, 37, 52–56. Udo, J. P., & Fels, D. I. (2010). The rogue poster-children of universal design: Closed captioning and audio description. Journal of Engineering Design, 21(2), 207–221. doi:10.1080/09544820903310691 Utray, F., de Castro, M., Moreno, L., & Ruiz-Mezcua, B. (2012). Monitoring accessibility services in digital television. International Journal of Digital Multimedia Broadcasting, 9. doi:10.1155/2012/294219 W3C. (2008, 11 December). Web content accessibility guidelines (WCAG) 2.0. Retrieved from http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/ W3C Working Group. (2015). Media accessibility user requirements (Note). Retrieved from https://www.w3.org/TR/media-accessibility-reqs/ Widen, S. (2017, 22 May). Inclusive design: Making the web accessible for all. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2017/05/22/ inclusive-design-making-the-web-accessible-for-all/#7b82cfb42ab8

182 Access World Health Organisation. (2017, 11 October). Blindness and visual impairment. Retrieved from http://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/blindness-andvisual-impairment Wright, T. (2015, 14 April). Netflix begins audio description for visually impaired. Retrieved from http://blog.netflix.com/2015/04/netflix-begins-­audiodescription-for.html

10 Conclusion

In a scene early in the first episode of The Defenders, blind lawyer Matt Murdock (aka Daredevil) offers some words of wisdom to his client, a young boy in a wheelchair who just received an $11 million payout: That money is really gonna help your parents. But for you, from here on out it’s only gonna get harder, Aaron. You realize you’re only at mile one of the marathon right? Everybody’s gonna tell you how to feel. Doctors are gonna tell you to stay positive. Your family’s gonna tell you not to feel sorry for yourself. Your therapist is gonna tell you not to be angry. As Aaron professes that he is already angry and just wants his life back, Matt continues: They can’t give you that. Maybe you’ll walk again. I hope so. But maybe you won’t. But your ability to get through it as this gets harder that is a hundred times more powerful than slapping a smile on your face and pretending like everything’s just fine… no one can give you your life back, Aaron. You have You gotta take it back. And so Daredevil became a superhero who could speak to and for p ­ eople with disability. This representation of disability acknowledged both social restrictions and the effects of impairment. It also painted an evocative picture of the way disability is typically represented on television (the smiling inspirational cripple), and the problems with this characterisation for actual disabled people trying to get on with their lives. It seemed also to be directed to the disabled members of the audience. Indeed, some discussed online the way it spoke to the reality of their lives (see Matthew, 2017) and I am writing about it here in an academic book – this scene really spoke to me. While this representation cemented Daredevil as a disability superhero, it was not his first foray into addressing the negative aspects of social disablement via the medium of television. Back in 2015 when Daredevil launched on Netflix, disability activists saw it as the perfect

184 Access opportunity to redouble their efforts to advocate for the provision of audio description on the streaming service. And so a coordinated Twitter campaign was launched by the Accessible Netflix Project (ANP) and the Disability Visibility Project (DVP) (see Ellis, 2016). While the ANP had been agitating for the introduction of audio description for several years, when Netflix launched a series that not even its own superhero protagonist could access, the ANP and DVP were able to spin the media in their favour. And so 2 weeks later, Netflix announced the availability of audio description on all original programming (Wright, 2015). Therefore, Daredevil has played a key role in recent efforts to improve disability representation on and access to television. It is also a Netflix original programme, a format threatening traditional television as we know it. This book focused on the embodied, contextual and lived experience of both stigmatisation and digital media usage by disabled Australians, and their intersection as television transitioned to digital formats. It also moves towards a human rights approach to disability. The research proceeded from the assumption that television constituted a social space from which disabled people were excluded both via representation on screen and the ability to access this medium. Television, as a visual and audible medium disables people who cannot see and hear. However, like the wheelchair and ramp, digital television promises increased social inclusion of people with disability through alternative means of access. A greater number of channels offer more opportunity for diverse representation while the digital medium enables accessibility through captions, audio description, signing, spoken subtitles and clean audio. At the commencement of the project, however, only one of these accessibility features – captions – had ever been offered on an ongoing basis in the Australian context. Although a 2008–2010 Australian government policy review into television accessibility for the hearing and vision impaired recognised access to television as a human rights issue and put ­ ustralian forward the possibility of also including audio description on A television (Department Broadband Communications and the Digital Economy, 2010) – little has been done to date. In addition, this shift to digital has been a long-time coming. When this project began, Australia was still predominately broadcasting television across the analogue signal. Only 60 per cent of the population had converted to digital television (ACMA, 2012) and the government had delayed the switch off of the analogue signal several times, preferring to broadcast simultaneous digital and analogue television to give ­Australians time to adjust. While this 2012 figure was much higher than the 10 per cent of households who had made the switch in 2008 (­Ramsay, 2008), the transition to full digital broadcasting still seemed very far away. Nevertheless, Australia did finally make the switch in September 2013, just as this project was gaining traction.

Conclusion  185 Television then underwent further technological change when, also after much delay, video-on-demand was introduced in Australia in 2015. As television increasingly transitioned to the internet, the way people accessed television, both in Australia and internationally, underwent significant changes. People began embracing accessible mobile technologies, and the notion of equal human rights in this context seemed within reach. This project therefore expanded to address these new advancements in all forms of digital television/s. As the scope of the project progressed further, the importance of the UNCRPD also became increasingly apparent, particularly in the Australian context where initiatives to improve representations were readily embraced but where broadcasters evaded responsibility to facilitate this access, such as was the case with the provision of audio description. Yet, if the UNCRPD emphasised the importance of both representation and access, why was one more readily accepted by Australian television broadcasters than the other? Are these calls for disability diversity at the level of representation mere lip service? The UNCRPD and the role of other legislative bodies both in Australia and internationally, was therefore also considered in detail throughout the book. These two underlying themes of representation and access have formed the backbone of the book, particularly in relation to the shift to digitalisation and online television content. Within this, three intersecting dynamics were considered. Firstly, the diversity arising via prestige television – whereby disabled characters were introduced in popular programming and allowed to change and grow across several episodes or seasons, thus elevating the dramatic limitations previously imposed on disabled characters who were represented in stereotypical ways – saw a marked change in representation. Secondly, television began to overflow off the television into online forums, shifting the definition of viewing beyond the moment of screening to also include conversations with others online, thereby opening up discussions regarding both representation and access. Finally, and perhaps most significantly, the notion of web capable devices to watch television became a central part of the project as everyone, not just the disabled, became able to personalise, and therefore improve, their television access. Indeed, the digitisation of television offers a unique opportunity to recast personalisation as an opportunity for cultural accessibility. Cultural accessibility refers to a multifaceted interaction among representation, alternative methods of access, and an environment that facilitates the telling of diverse stories. This book therefore offered a cultural analysis of disability and television, taking into account the full circuit of culture encompassing representation, identity, production, consumption and regulation.

186 Access

Representation The representation of disability in media and culture has long been examined in critical disability studies, with researchers addressing both the mode of production and the meanings of disability contained within the text itself. The approach with regard to television has been to identify negative and, by extension, positive stereotypes to reflect on the way television privileges a non-disabled worldview, both at the point of production – which invariably excludes disabled people – and at the level of meaning within the text itself. Further, while individual texts are examined in depth for the meanings they contain and by extension their relationship to the society and culture that produced them, throughout this book, I have also argued for a deeper consideration with a number of other influences beyond form and content to also encompass context, legislation and consumption. Television is a progressive medium and as society has changed so too have representations. As such, the Australian televisual landscape offers a unique opportunity to reflect on the intersecting influences of government legislation and financial support set against the industry’s commercial requirements. For example, with reference to the genre of television drama, the Australian commercial industry continues to rely heavily on support through Screen Australia funding. However, while this screen-funding agency was established by the Australian government in 2008 with the mandate to support dramas that explored ­Australian cultural diversity and reflected contemporary social concerns, the funded content continues to be criticised for their lack of diversity. Indeed, Screen Australia research conducted in 2016 discovered a mere 4 per cent of characters in Screen Australia-funded television dramas had a disability. However, rather than look at disabled characters in isolation, this book took a cultural approach to the representation of disability on Australian television, taking into account both content analysis and the influences of Australian national identity. The approach considered both intertextual and intratextual patterns of representations analysing texts in depth but looking also to patterns emerging across a number of texts. In Chapter 3, all characters with a potential disability appearing in seven popular Screen Australia-funded television dramas were analysed, regardless of whether they had a speaking part or were seen only on the periphery of the action. The Screen Australia study identified both the frequency with which disabled characters appeared in the selected dramas and analysed the way in which these disabled characters were constructed, represented and been seen to conform to certain stereotypical portrayals of disability. The study found fewer main characters with an identifiable disability than minor characters. Further, amongst the already limited representations of disability, characters were variously represented as predominantly bitter and angry, then as a victim, unable to adjust to life,

Conclusion  187 better off dead, and a burden to others. Such representations emphasise that the premise of Article 8 of the UNCRPD, that of equal human rights for all, was often contravened (See United Nations, 2006). In addition, political concerns were shown to be a key feature throughout the Screen Australia analysis – for example, many historical representations were used in these dramas to explore contemporary issues such as the mental health of Australian war veterans at the same time that government reviews were being conducted into this area. The Screen Australia study also revealed the representation of trauma as an underexplored area of concern within disability analysis on television. More characters were found to be portrayed as having a psychiatric disability than a physical one and most of these were associated with such ideas of trauma, whether these be the catastrophic illness of celebrity and business personalities or significant social events such as war or crime. In particular, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) due to war featured heavily across the programmes. PTSD was also the only disabling condition seen in principal characters, with three main characters appearing to demonstrate characteristics of this condition. However, even within disability studies, the analysis of trauma is significantly underexplored, and this book therefore joins calls to develop a theory of complex embodiment within this discipline. In addition, such common representations as seen above perpetuate the negative social views about disability already circulating within Australian society. For example, in the 2014 budget speech, Australian treasurer Joe Hockey described Australia as a ‘nation of lifters, not leaners’ (Hockey, 2014) and cut a number of disability benefits, services and support systems. Graeme Innes, the Disability Discrimination Commissioner at the time, questioned the concept in a speech to the press club where he maintained ‘Australians with disabilities would be lifters, if there were not barriers in society that force us to lean every day’ (Innes, 2014). Although representations in Australian television dramas rarely recognise the social barriers that confront people with disability in this country, the issue of disability representation more generally is gaining increasing attention amongst politicians, broadcasters and educational institutions, many of whom have pledged support to the Screen Diversity Inclusion Network’s (SDIN) attempts to improve diversity in Australian screen productions. SDIN launched in 2017 with a goal to improve diversity in the Australian screen industry. Broadcasters and other media organisation quickly pledged support to maintain an on-going commitment to best practice in diversity representations. SDIN locates its mission within an international context making connections to the UK’s Diamond focus discussed in Chapter 2. However, it is yet to be seen if this commitment is mere lip service or if change will actually take place. As discussed in this book, the same organisations pledging support for diverse representation do not show a similar commitment to access.

188 Access Similarly, although this book located television within the Australian geographic area, it also acknowledged international influences on disability representation via prestige programmes such as Game of Thrones (GOT), The Sopranos and Twin Peaks. GOT in particular offers an im­ ustralian portant point of entry to both representations of disability and A responses to international legislation, namely television licensing agreements. As discussed in Chapter 5, due to restrictions regarding these agreements, Australian fans are being forced to access unauthorised copies of GOT or subscribe to multiple subscription services in significantly high numbers. For disabled people interviewed throughout this project who just want both more diverse representation and a range of accessibility features such as captions and audio description, this was both annoying and financially unsustainable. The shift to digitisation and its ability to promote narrowcasting – the targeting of programming to specialised audiences – has led to an environment characterised by niche audiences. As a result, the stories told on television have changed. Television entertainment is no longer considered disposable – audiences today contribute to the discussion long after their favourite show has ended via huge databases and wikis of information online, including those regarding disability representation. The fan has therefore been elevated to become critical, intellectual and, above all, creative – whole new texts have appeared from these initial forums in the form of web series. As I have also argued throughout this book, these fan engagements are therefore an important site of disability analysis and, as part of the circuit of culture, offer insights into both consumption and representation. Other forms of online video that have also proved important in this digital television culture were identified and discussed in Chapter 4. Stella Young’s TEDx talk on inspiration porn for example has been shared extensively online and united both the Australian and international disability community’s criticism of media representation. Further, Hannah Gadsby’s Netflix comedy Nanette offers critiques of the Australian cultural identity as it establishes a normative identity that perpetuates multiple forms of stigma related to disability, mental health and gender. Significantly, both Young and Gadsby identify with disability, thus reinforcing the importance of diverse stories to the national and international arena. As I discuss throughout this book, being excluded from accessing popular television has serious social consequences for people with disability who require accessibility features such as captions and audio descriptions. Television representation constitutes a significant cultural database and disabled people report identifying with particular television characters despite television offering at times stigmatised representations and its propensity towards inaccessibility. As discussed throughout this book, while disability critiques of television have tended to focus on representation and the circulation of

Conclusion  189 meaning in the text, a corresponding consideration of access is vital. Without it, the audience is always assumed to be non-disabled. Further, this is an issue of social disablement and inclusion – just as the built environment assumes a non-disabled citizen, television has a preferred user who can see, hear and, in the case of digital television, set up at times complicated technology. In this way, access forms a vital part of the circuit of digital television culture and, just as representation is influenced by form, content, context and consumption, access also relies on the intersection of these cultural influences.

Access Throughout this research, disabled Australian television audiences were frequently of the view that accessibility features such as captions and audio description were either completely unavailable or inconsistent, therefore severely impacting their television consumption. In fact, while captioning is mandated on 100 per cent of content on the primary digital channels, it is not legislated elsewhere and participants may have been referring to the digital multi-channels’ inconsistent approach. Further, several observed that captions seemed less available on commercial television stations and noted that there was also a lack of consistency regarding where they were displayed on the screen. Indeed, participants across each impairment type expressed a dissatisfaction with the ­Australian commercial stations; instead, each person interviewed relied heavily on the public broadcasters the ABC and SBS. However, the ABC is not fulfilling its charter, namely to provide television to all members of the Australian community. For example, audio description, is, to date, completely unavailable on Australian free-to-air television. This was a sore point, particularly because the majority of interviews took place after the conclusion of the 2015 ABC audio description trial on iview. For many with vision impairments, it was difficult to impossible to go back to inaccessible television following this trial. The social model of disability directly counters the notion that disability is an individual’s personal problem to solve yet people throughout this research appreciated the ability to personalise their access to digital forms of television. In addition to captions and audio description, a large screen television was also often cited as a useful accessibility device by people with a variety of impairments. Participants also pointed towards a preference for web capable devices to access television, for example smartphones, tablets and smart televisions. Indeed, from being able to use an iPad at night to watch television in bed, to being able to access audio description on Netflix while their partner watched Foxtel in the same room on a different screen, to accessing captions on a large-screen television at home or using headphones on a computer screen in the library, to Apple TV being accessible ‘out of the box’, to even just finding a comfortable

190 Access place with consistent Wi-Fi connectivity to sit, television is accessed in different ways by different people depending on the effects of their impairments, their financial capability and their technical and media literacy: For us, actually, the disability aspect is about time. So because I do go to bed earlier and get to put my feet up, I actually want to be able to watch things from the bed and I’d still be able to watch the things that maybe that were on TV at seven o’clock but I want to watch them when I’m in bed with my feet up. So it is related a lot to just being able to choose when and where you watch something. You can’t get a comfy enough lounge… You spend so long sitting in a wheelchair, it’s the same seat. It doesn’t matter if you sit in the comfiest seat in the world, if you sit there for so long, that’s not comfy anymore. So I think it’s important to just keep moving to different seats. I got about three different seats in my lounge room and I just sit from one to three hours to totally different seats. So their comfort is totally different when you sit from one to the other. Disabled people are also early adopters of new media technologies, usually in the hope they facilitate better accessibility. This was evident throughout the interviews when participants were asked to recall their experience of the transition to digital television in 2013 – several completely bypassed the household assistance scheme discussed in Chapter 6 and preferred to quickly upgrade to a new digital television set at their own expense. Yet, it is important to remember that this is not always an option for disabled people on low incomes. As can be seen above, television means different things to different people and the emergence of a digital platform has seemingly increased viewers’ choice of not only what they want to access but how. For example, subscription services such as Netflix, Foxtel and Fetch TV were popular amongst the interviewees. While the ABC and SBS were seen as offering a higher quality of programming in terms of disability representation, Netflix was considered most accessible due to the availability of captions and audio description. The personalised approach to programming recommendations was also appreciated across the board. Foxtel, however, was more often noted as something their partners subscribed to but which they did not really use, and Fetch TV was a popular option amongst this group because it was included in internet packages. Others preferred to download videos from the internet that had accessibility features such as audio description already included. Others accessed programming that was not available on broadcast television directly from the source such as World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). Interestingly, despite some WWE content also being available on Foxtel, which a number of participants subscribed to, the WWE app was preferred because more content was available.

Conclusion  191 Yet despite the choice offered in the digital domain, many partici­ pants noted difficulty in setting up digital television for a variety of reasons and many had asked family or partners to complete the setup due to inaccessible menus and complicated technology. By comparison, video-on-demand was described as much more accessible and therefore a more pleasurable viewing experience, even being described as ‘bullet proof’ by one participant.

Identity Foregrounding disability within the context of human rights, as a civil rights, or minority group identity, has been central to critical disability studies’ attempts to move away from a medical towards a social model of disability. However, there is no single experience of disability. People with different impairments have radically different experiences of both embodiment and social disablement and, as such, identifying a common experience has been challenging. Similarly, individuals will have different experiences of disability, even within a given day, that impacts on their ability to participate within society. Further, while disability is culturally situated as a site of disavowal, there has been a discernible shift in terms of disability identity from the beginning stages to the final stages of this research. For example, as part of a survey in 2013, respondents were asked whether they had a disability. Despite being recruited through disability organisations, many replied ‘no’, yet these same participants still selected an impairment type in the following question. From this, I surmised that people with impairments that may be classified as a disability will not necessarily self-identify as disabled despite acknowledging their need for accessible technologies. As such, an interview question around disability identification was included in the interview stage of this project conducted in 2016–2017 to further explore this phenomenon. From this, most of the interview participants identified as either a ‘person with a disability’ or a ‘disabled person’, explaining that it was important to do so to receive the support required to participate on an equal basis to people who did not have any impairments. Had disability become more politicised in the intervening period? Has Stella Young’s critique of inspiration porn had a delayed but significant impact? Indeed, I had many conversations about inspiration porn over the course of this research. For those that did identify as disabled, for some this was a political decision, while for others it was for practical reason, to receive the necessary accommodations: I’d be foolish not [to identify as disabled]. You’re living in a world where you’re ignoring… a fact and I think if you ignore the fact you can’t adapt to it well […] I think it’s important to adapt. I’ve always said the essence of any disability is adaptability. I think that’s true for any disability.

192 Access Great advice, but, in the context of Australian digital television cultures, people who are blind and vision impaired have been asking for support and adaptation for almost three decades. Technological change was supposed to help but as long as audio description remains limited in this country Australia remains locked in a cycle of inaccessible attitudes – not to mention an unrealised human right – regarding television access for this cohort (Chapter 7). Yet, according to their commitments to the UNCRPD, the Australian government has a responsibility to make it available. Indeed, given the mandate to include captioning on all programmes aired between 6am and midnight, as required by both the Broadcasting Services Act 1992 and the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Chapter 8), it is unclear why audio description has not been prioritised in the same way. This is doubly so given both the Department of Communications and the Arts and the commercial television channels’ industry body Free TV’s stated commitments to ensuring ‘all’ Australians are able to access television and see their experiences represented (Department of Communication and the Arts, 2017; Free TV, n.d). For example, the Department of Communications and the Arts prioritises facilitating consumer access and fostering a sustainable industry while encouraging growth and innovation. Further, that department’s corporate plan aligns with the ‘broader Government agenda of encouraging productivity, growth and innovation, including supporting the links between innovation, arts and creativity’. Similarly, Free TV make overt claims to include all Australians, including those with disability, as well as ‘delivering social outcomes’ on their website. Indeed, they claim their members – the ­Australian television industry – are ‘ahead of the pack’ in the digital era. However, their stated claim in the Audio description working group report with regard to the provision of audio description in Australia is that it is not their responsibility (Department of Communications and the arts, 2017). Similarly, despite this, Free TV Australia has developed a Commercial Television Industry Code of Practice to ensure ‘Australia’s modern digital media landscape upholds community standards and ensures appropriate viewer safeguards’ (Free TV, 2010). From this it can be seen that, while Free TV includes notes around representing disability on television, it does not address television accessibility for people with disabilities. For disabled people, access to media is as important as the way disability is represented in the media – both have a material impact on the social position of this group (Ellis & Goggin, 2015). All of this goes against spirit of the UNCRPD, an accord to which the Australian government is a signatory. However, while the UNCRPD imposes obligations on signatories, these can only be met if the private sector cooperates. According to Article 4 of the UNCRPD (see Article 4 United Nations, 2006), state parties must ‘take all appropriate measures’ to eliminate disability discrimination. Along with specific mentions of

Conclusion  193 access to media and communications (Articles 4, 9, 21 and 30), and television specifically (Article 30), Article 9 – Accessibility – addresses the dual responsibility of governments and business to ensure that private entities take accessibility into account when offering services to the public. However, successive policy discussions place the responsibility for audio description on consumer demand, competition and industry innovation rather than the onus being on the industry bodies or – ­perhaps more pertinently – on government mandates. This issue of legislation has been a source of conflicting findings through this research. For example, while captions are the most widely available accessibility feature on Australian television – something which is directly attributed to legislation requiring them, both locally and internationally – legislation has not kept pace with technological change and, with each new form of television, people who are D/deaf and hard of hearing have had to again fight for access. As I argued in this book, this is because legislation alone will not result in a change in attitude. Yet, I also made the case for legislation to mandate the provision of audio description which is not available on free-to-air television at all at the time of writing. At this point in time, government support is required to move past the impasse on audio description, either in the form of legislation requiring it on free-to-air television, or via financial support for people who are blind or vision impaired to access the internet or subscription services that do offer this feature. The notion of identity is central to the digitisation of television, particularly with reference to narrowcasting. As discussed throughout the book, we are experiencing an era of prestige television that demands commitment from its audience. The audience in turn often engages in binge-watching and frequently turns to online portals to gain more ­information about complicated narratives, extended back stories, series interrelationships and fan theories. Access features are playing an integral role in facilitating the creation of transcripts and index databases.

The Future is Digital When I first proposed this book to the publisher, back when Australia was broadcasting in analogue, reviewers encouraged me to reflect on the potential accessible television represented for the non-disabled population. I agreed this was a vital area of future research and I have alluded to the benefits of this approach throughout the book. Intriguingly, my reviewers were onto something; during the course of the research, captions went from being a specialised assistive feature for people who were D/deaf or hard of hearing, being described as ‘visual clutter’ by hearing audiences, to being a mainstream feature of television today. However, audio description remains marginalised; Australians do not tend to know what it is and a pervasive attitude still exists that blind people do

194 Access not watch television. However, as discussed in Chapter 9, mainstream uses for audio description are being identified and experimented with, mainly through Netflix offerings. By comparison, clean audio has been met with interest whenever I mention it to both non-disabled and disabled people. The ageing population especially see it as an important feature going forward. While this research took a cross-disability approach, it increasingly became apparent that in the context of disability and digital television cultures in Australia, audio description required the most attention. I first came across audio description when I attended an Australian disability film festival, The Other Film Festival, in 2007. I did not hear about it again until I read Slater’s 2010 policy position paper about the potential for digital television to transform the viewing experience of disabled Australians. As a sighted person, I did not participate in the ABC audio-­ description trials; however, I found that, following these trials, people who were blind and vision-impaired that I was talking to as part of my research were more aware of what audio description was – and the fact that they were being prevented from accessing it… for seemingly no apparent reason. As discussed throughout this book, audio description is not only a fundamental human right for people who are blind and vision-impaired, but also an opportunity for innovation for everyone. The indifference to this service in Australia, particularly from an industry and governmental stance, at the same time as successive governments are espousing rhetoric about Australia being the innovation nation, is puzzling. Recently, I was watching Luke Cage on Netflix. In it, there was a scene in which a character was given a heavily annotated Bible by the villain Diamondback. I could not make out the notes on the page so I turned on the audio description track to see if it had any clues about what this Bible, and the notes and highlighting, were attempting to communicate to me. Honestly, it took me a while to figure out how to do this, even using my smart television and with my own knowledge about where accessibility features are housed in Netflix. This kind of detective work is not uncommon – mainstream audiences are starting to turn to accessibility features such as captions and audio description to improve their comprehension (Bradley, 2017; Ellis, 2014; Mancuso, 2015). This is an emerging area of study that requires further and thoughtful research. My preliminary work in this area suggests television fans are interested in experimenting with the affordances of audio description (see http://audiodescriptionau.com.au/). Importantly, they also recognise the importance of this feature to people with vision impairments and, as fans of television, believe no one should be excluded from being able to engage with this medium. Television scholars, politicians and technology developers often engage with predictions about the future of television and what to expect next from this medium. Developments in the Internet of Things (IoT)

Conclusion  195 suggest the television could become the centre of home operations and the internet of convenience: … users will be able to instruct their TV to dim the lights, display footage from their home security camera, show who is standing at the front door, or even see what’s inside the fridge — all features envisioning the TV as the command center of the ideal, futuristic Smart Home. (Gray, 2018) While some in television studies reject these kinds of predictions as evidence of television studies’ struggle for legitimacy, the science fiction fan in me enjoys these possible visions of the future. Consider this notion of the affordances of future technological capabilities published in The New York Times in 1907 long before the introduction of television, the internet and digitisation facilitating access for disabled people: Lovers conversing at a distance will behold each other as in the flesh. Doctors will examine patients tongue in another city, and the poor will enjoy visual trips wherever their fancy inclines. In hot weather too, Alpine glaciers and arctic snows will be made visible in sweltering cities, and when piercing northwest winds do blow, we shall gloat over tropical visits of orchids and palms. (The New York Times, 1907, p. 39) The IoT, in conjunction with a smart television, can and does offer these affordances but while the 1907 prediction still focuses on connecting people to machines, IoT predictions of 2018 are concerned with connecting machines to each other. In concluding each interview, I invited participants to reflect on how televisions could be made more accessible for people with disability, to describe their ultimate television experience. As I mentioned in Chapter 6, one prediction echoed Mark Zuckerberg’s suggestion that television could become an app projected onto the wall of whichever room a person happened to be in. Other suggestions focused on universal captions, audio-described content, and audio remote controls and EPGs. However, several also described accessible, personalised televisions as having clear benefits to mainstream audiences: … voice-controlled technology that makes everything easy to say, turn on turn off and all those. I think voice control is probably the best. Audio description on every show / program, talking remote control, talking electronic program guide, talking TV (for when we lose the remote) – just whatever information and feature is available to everyone else to also be available to us.

196 Access I would like to try and design some things physically that makes it easier to have it in bed like the idea of the more portable device. I think I would probably also if we were able to section off the areas of Wi-Fi better, that would be good as well. I would be able to go, okay, that part of the house has actually got all the Wi-Fi, so that when you’re studying or watching TV or whatever, you’re in there, and when you come out to the living area, you’re interacting [with people] more. I began this book with the example of an Auslan-interpreted 6pm news bulletin on the ABC in celebration of National Deaf Week. More recently, the ABC has announced plans to move into an all-digital post television environment where programming will be niche and non-linear, with audiences able to access the content that suits them. While the strategy has caused chaos to the ABC’s management structure and revealed problematic relationships with governments and questionable understandings of audiences, when web capable devices to access television are made accessible to disabled Australians, and niche prestige programming promotes diversity, the benefits extend well beyond this group.

References ACMA. (2012). Television sets in Australian households 2011: Current stock and consumer expectations about replacing television sets. Retrieved from https://www.acma.gov.au/-/media/Research-and-Analysis/Research/pdf/ Television-sets-in-Australian-households-2011.PDF Bradley, L. (2017, 31 July). Dissecting Audrey Horne’s baffling twin peaks return: Who in the world are Billy, Tina, Chuck, and Paul? Retrieved from https:// www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/07/twin-peaks-episode-12-recap-audreyhorne-who-is-billy-tina-chuck-paul Department Broadband Communications and the Digital Economy. (2010). Investigation into access to electronic media for the hearing and visionimpaired media access review final report. Retrieved from http://pandora. nla.gov.au/pan/124964/20110207-1015/www.dbcde.gov.au/__data/assets/ pdf_file/0019/131527/Media_Access_Review-final_report_2-12-2010.pdf Department of Communication and the Arts. (2017). 2017–2018 Corpoorate plan. Retrieved from https://www.communications.gov.au/sites/g/files/net301/f/ doca_corporate_plan_2017-18_final.pdf Department of Communications and the arts. (2017). Audio description working group – final report. Retrieved from https://www.communications.gov. au/documents/audio-description-working-group-final-report Ellis, K. (2014). Cripples, bastards and broken things: Disability in Game of Thrones. Media Culture, 17(5). Retrieved from http://journal.media-culture. org.au/index.php/mcjournal/article/viewArticle/895 Ellis, K. (2016). #socialconversations: Disability representation and audio description on Marvel’s Daredevil. In K. Ellis & M. Kent (Eds.), Disability and social media: Global perspectives (pp. 146–160). New York, NY: Routledge.

Conclusion  197 Ellis, K., & Goggin, G. (2015). Disability and the media. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Free TV Australia. (2010). Commercial television industry code of practice. Retrieved from http://www.freetv.com.au/media/Code_of_Practice/2010_ Commercial_Television_Industry_Code_of_Practice.pdf Free TV. (n.d). Advisory note the portraal of people with disabilities. Retrieved from http://www.freetv.com.au/Media/Advisory_Notes/THE _ PORTRAYAL_OF_PEOPLE_WITH_DISABILITIES.pdf Gray, S. (2018, 1 February). Seeing the big picture on smart TVs and smart home tech. Retrieved from https://fpf.org/2018/02/01/seeing-the-big-picture-on-smarttvs-and-smart-home-tech/ Hockey, J. (2014). Federal budget 2014 – Full speech. Retrieved from http:// www.smh.com.au/business/federal-budget/federal-budget-2014--full-speech20140513-3887i.html Innes, G. (2014, 2 July). Graeme innes: I have never accepted the concept of ‘lifters’ and ‘leaners’. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/comm entisfree/2014/jul/02/graeme-innes-i-have-never-accepted-the-concept-oflifters-and-leaners Mancuso, V. (2015, 9 June). The descriptive audio narrator is the best part of Netflix’s ‘Sense8’. Retrieved from http://observer.com/2015/06/ the-descriptive-audio-narrator-is-the-best-part-of-netflixs-sense8/ Matthew. (2017, 18 August). Hero in a wheelchair – The defenders spoke for me as a ­disabled person. Retrieved from https://superheroethics.wordpress. com/2017/08/18/hero-in-a-wheelchair-the-defenders-spoke-for-me-as-adisabled-person/ Ramsay, R. (2008, 14 August). Delays to Australian digital TV switch likely. Retrieved from https://www.cnet.com/au/news/delays-to-australian-digital-tvswitch-likely/ The New York Times. (1907). Sending photographs by telegraph. Retrieved from https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1907/02/24/101855326. html?action=click&contentCollection=Archives&module=ArticleEndCTA& region=ArchiveBody&pgtype=article&pageNumber=39 United Nations. (2006). Convention on the rights of persons with disabilities. Retrieved from https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/conventionon-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities.html Wright, T. (2015, 14 April). Netflix begins audio description for visually impaired. Retrieved from http://blog.netflix.com/2015/04/netflix-begins-audiodescription-for.html

Index

Note: Boldface page numbers refer to tables. 3RPH 132 ABC see Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) ABC iview 117, 139, 140 ACC see Australian Caption Centre (ACC) access 10–11, 189–91 accessibility 166–7 accessibility features 2, 109, 111–13, 115, 116, 150, 177, 178, 194 Accessible Netflix Project (ANP) 101, 131, 184 ACMA see Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) AFC see Australian Film Commission (AFC) AHRC see Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) Amazon Prime 12, 118, 134; captions 153 American Playhouse 130 ANP see Accessible Netflix Project (ANP) ANZAC see Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) audio description 1–2, 6, 112, 125–7, 132–5, 194; benefits of 170–3; circuit of culture and 136–40; history of international audio description 127–32; indexes 172–3; interpretive flexibility 167 AudioVision Institute 129, 130 Aussie Battlers 2–3, 47, 71 Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) 1, 69, 73, 134, 138, 141, 154, 194, 196; audio description 133–4

Australian Caption Centre (ACC) 133, 150 Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) 152 Australian Disability Discrimination Act 1992 42 Australian Film Commission (AFC) 57–8, 61 Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) 151–2 Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) 40, 58, 61 The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pitman (Frazier) 129 automatic captions, YouTube 158–9, 161 Avery, C. 129, 136 Bale, J. 58 Barnes, C. 20, 20–3, 25, 43 Bechdel-Wallace test 19–20 Belt, R. 27 Berner-Lee, T. 156 The Big Bang Theory (Walters) 27 binge-watching 66, 164, 169, 172, 193 Blind Citizens Australia 126, 133, 134 Bolt, D. 21 Bourdaa, M. 157 BREIN 158 broadcasting model 66 Broadcasting Services Act (BSA) 2, 6, 151, 192 Brown, K. 164 BSA see Broadcasting Services Act (BSA) Bulldog Drummond 128

200 Index captions 6, 117, 145–6, 192; case studies 154–5; fansubbing 156–8; history of 147–52; interpretive flexibility 167; legislative determinism 152–4; mainstream uses of 168–70; prestige television 169; Queer Eye for the Straight Guy 164; YouTube 158–9 Carrolon, D. 166–7 Catching Milat 42–6, 43, 61 catch-up television 115–16, 118, 119, 126, 154, 155, 169, 171 Channel 7 44, 46, captions 154–5, 155 circuit of culture 6; audio description and 136–40, 136 Clark, C. 8 Clarkson, J. 114–15 clean audio 161, 165, 168, 194; mainstream uses of 173–7 Clean Audio Project 176 Clogston, J. S. 23–5, 27, 74 closed captions 2, 111–13, 145, 146, 154, 170, 172 Coalition of Organisations for Accessible Technology 145 collective intelligence 88–90; Game of Thrones 90–3 Commercial Television Industry Code of Practice 12, 192 Communications and Video Accessibility Act 130, 134–5 concerns during switch, to digital television 113–18 content analysis 13, 20, 22, 24, 27, 29, 30, 35, 40, 41, 59, 186 copyright, fansubbing 157–8 Costa, D. 115 Criptiques 78–9 critical disability 6, 28, 59, 60, 186, 191 Cronin, B. 130, 168 Crowe, R. 54, 57 cultural accessibility 22, 25–8, 36, 185 culture, disability 6 Cumberbatch, G. 24–5, 94 Daley, P. 58 Daredevil 131, 183–4 Davidson, M. 60 Day, F. 76 DDA see Disability Discrimination Act (DDA)

D/deaf community, captions 147–52 The Defenders 183 Department of Communications and the Arts 192 Dermody, S. 58 DeVido, S. 77, 80, 81 Diamond initiative 31 Difficult People 81 digitisation of television 109, 185; accessibility features 111–13; concerns during switch 113–18; impact of 109–11 Dimopoulos, A. 9 Dinklage, P. 86, 95 disability 5–6 Disability, Media and Human Rights 108 disability analysis 3, 65, 74, 187, 188 Disability Busters 118 Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) 42, 43, 45, 49, 51, 54–6, 61, 151, 192 disability representations: Catching Milat 43; The Doctor Blake Mysteries (Season 3) 51; House of Hancock 49; Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door 45; A Place to Call Home (season 3) 55; The Water Diviner 56; Winter 53 Disability Visibility Project (DVP) 184 diversity: online video 64; Seeing Ourselves report 41–2 diversity representation 19–20 The Doctor Blake Mysteries 42–4, 54, 61 The Doctor Blake Mysteries (Season 3) 50–2 Don’t Shoot the Messenger 76, 78 Downey, G. 147–9 dramas 43–4; Catching Milat 44–6; The Doctor Blake Mysteries (Season 3) 50–2; House of Hancock 48–9; Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door 46–8; A Place to Call Home 54–5; The Water Diviner 54, 56–7; Winter 52–3 drench effect 25, 31 Du Gay, P. 6, 137 Duarte, C. 115 Dunnett, P. 11 DVP see Disability Visibility Project (DVP)

Index  201 early adopters 119, 190 education: audio description 173; captions 170 ekphrasis 127–8, 171 Ellcessor, E. 19, 25, 109 Ellis, J. 65 Esteban, G. 129, 130, 136 European Disability Forum 174–5 Evans, V. 110 Everett, L. 130 extraordinary bodies 93 EzyFlix 118 Facebook 57, 88, 152; captions 159, 169 FACTS see Federation of Australian Commercial Television Stations (FACTS) Facts of Life 31–2 family entertainment 119–20 fansubbing 146, 156–8 Farnall, O. 25, 31 Federal Communications Commission (FCC) 117, 130; captions 149 Federation of Australian Commercial Television Stations (FACTS) 151 Fels, D. I. 172 Fetch TV 118, 190 Finkelstein, V. 9, 27 Fiske, J. 89 Foxtel 12, 87, 189, 190 framing of disabilities, stereotypes 22–5 Fraser, M. 150, 158 Frazier, G. 129, 130 Free TV Australia 12, 192 Gadsby, H. 69–72, 188 Galis, V. 165 Game of Thrones 86–7, 90–3, 188; Hodor 96–9; Tyrion 91, 93–6 Garland-Thomson, R. 71, 80, 93 Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Discrimination (GLAAD) 20, 28–9, 31, 35 George, A. 19 GLAD see Greater Los Angeles Council on Deafness (GLAD) Goffman, E. 21, 71, 80 Goggin, G. 19, 116 Goodley, D. 26 Gore, K. 97, 98 Gray, J. 31

Gray, S. 195 Greater Los Angeles Council on Deafness (GLAD) 149 Green, C. 78–9 Haller, B. 24, 31–2 Harrenstien, K. 158 HAS see Household Assistance Scheme (HAS) Hastings, R. 107 Hayu 118 Henley, L. 126–7 HERMES-TDT 176 history of captions 147–52 history of international audio description 127–32 history of television in Australia 11–13 Hockey, J. 187 Hodor, Game of Thrones 96–9 Home and Away 30, 41, 127 homosexuality, Nanette 71–2 Hood, K. 2–3 House of Hancock 42–4, 48–9, 49, 61 Household Assistance Scheme (HAS) 113 human rights 7–8, 184 Hutchinson, J. 88 Hynes, A. 150 identity 191–3 illegal downloads 107 impact of digital television 109–11 inclusion rider 34–5 indexes, audio description 172–3 Innes, G. 187 innovation 114, 134, 137, 166, 192, 193, 194 inspiration porn 73–5, 77, 79, 188, 191 Instagram 88 intellectual disability, clean audio 173, 175, 177 International Literacy Association 173 Internet of Things (IoT) 166, 194–5 interpretive flexibility 14, 166–7 Interrogation 78 IoT see Internet of Things (IoT) iTunes 87, 131, 134, 135, 141 Jacka, E. 58 Jenkins, H. 72, 89, 157 Jewell, G. 31–2 John, J. A. 23

202 Index Katz, E. 67, 72 Keates, S. 114–15 Kehe, J. 165 Kenihan, Q. 2 Kent, M. 10 The Killing Field 52 King, S. R. 126 Kingett, R. 131 Kirkpatrick, B. 19 Kline, R. 166 knowledge spaces 87, 88, 93, 99, 100 Kuppers, P. 19 Ladner Jr., E. 147 LeBesco, K. 27, 68 legislation 193 legislative determinism 152–4, 160 Lévy, P. 88, 100 Life Hacker 172 Liu, Y.-l. 174 Longmore, P. 22, 26 LoveFilm, captions 153 Luke Cage 164, 194 McDormand, F. 34 McRuer, R. 27 Mako Mori test 19–20 Mallet, R. 26–7, 28 Martin, G. 91, 92, 97, 99 masculinity, Nanette 71 Mason, G. 41 Massie, P. J. 92 Matlin, M. 153, 155, 157, 160 Mayer, L. S. 92, 99 mental health 58–9 Mental health in the Australian Defence Force 2010 ADF mental health prevalence and wellbeing report 58 Metropolitan Washington Ear Reading Service 129–30 Miller, T. 4–5 Mills, M. 171 Mitchell, D. 26, 80 Monaghan, W. 76 monitoring representation 28–32 Morgan, R. 119 Mork and Mindy 32 My Gimpy Life 65, 77–81 Nanette 65, 68–72, 188 Napoli, P. 66 Narrative Television Network (NTN) 130, 131

National Captioning Institute (NCI) 149, 168 National Disability Strategy 2010–2020 8 national identity 58; Screen Australia 40–1 National Working Party on Captioning (NWPC) 151 NCI see National Captioning Institute (NCI) Negrine, R. 24–5, 94 Neighbours 3, 30–1, 41, 127 Netflix 12, 68–9, 117, 118; accessibility features 190; audio description 131, 139, 167; captions 153; Daredevil 183–4; Luke Cage 194; Nanette 69–72; Queer Eye for the Straight Guy 164; recommendation system 171 Netflix Australia 107, 117 #nomorecaptions 159 normalcy 26 normate 93 Norwood, M. J. 148 NTN see Narrative Television Network (NTN) NWPC see National Working Party on Captioning (NWPC) Ofcom 31, 176 Oliver, M. 9 online video 188; diversity 64; Netflix 68–72; TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) talks 72–5; web series 75–81 online viewing 118–21 overflow 32, 33, 69, 88, 185 Pach, A. 147 pay TV 12, 135 Pedlow, R. 140 perception of representation 28 Pesky People 153 Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door 42–4, 45, 46–8 Pfanstiehl, M. 129–30 Picard, R. G. 174 Pinch, T. 166 A Place to Call Home 43–4, 54 post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) 31, 58, 59, 60, 187 Poyner, R. 159 preferred users 109, 121 prestige television 165; captions 169

Index  203 progressive frames 24 PTSD see post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) public broadcasters, audio description 138 Queer Eye for the Straight Guy 27, 164 Quickflix 118, 119 Ramp Up 73 recommendation system, Netflix 171 regulation: audio description 136–7; captions 153; clean audio 176 representation 19–20, 186–9; monitoring 28–32; stereotypes 22–8 representation on television 8–10, 20, 65, 82, 100 Review of mental health care in the ADF and transition through discharge report 58 Ross, K. 28 Ruderman Family Foundation 29–30 Salzer, A. 150 Schatz, J. 19 Schwartz, A. 60 SCOT see social construction of technology (SCOT) Screen Australia 12, 30, 61, 186–7; national identity 40–1 Screen Diversity Inclusion Network (SDIN) 187 screen reading technology 166 SDIN see Screen Diversity Inclusion Network (SDIN) second screen entertainment 88 Seeing Ourselves report 41, 64 self-depreciation, Nanette 70 Sense 8 172 sharedness, television 65–8 Sherer, T. 77, 79, 80 Siebers, T. 60, 96 Simpson, J. 114, 133 Slater, J. 174 smartphones 116 Smith, D. 97 Smith, K. 25, 31 Snapchat 88 Snyder, S. 26, 80 social activities, television as 138 social construction of technology (SCOT) 165–8 social disablement 60 social model of disability 5, 22, 59, 189

social model stereotypes 32–4 social television 88 The Sopranos 27, 67–8 South Park 27 The Specials 76, 78, 80 spreadable media 72, 89 Stan and Presto Entertainment 118 Stare at Shannon 77–80 Starting From…Now 76 Steele-John, J. 125–6 stereotypes 21–2; cultural accessibility 25–8; framing of disabilities 22–5; social model stereotypes 32–4 stigma 21 Stout, A. 60 Stovall, J. 130 subscription video-on-demand 118, 190 subtitles see captions Sullivan, T. 32 Switchover Help Scheme (UK) 113 tables: Audio description and the circuit of culture 136; Captions on Australian catch-up television 155; Disability representations in A Place to Call Home (series 3) 55; Disability representations in Catching Milat 43; Disability representations in Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door 45; Disability representations in The Doctor Black Mysteries (series 3) 51; Disability representations in The House of Hancock 49; Disability representations in The Water Diviner 56; Disability representations in Winter 53; Disability web series examples 77; Diversity in Australian television drama 41; Relationship between stereotypes and UNCRPD articles 33–4; Series regular characters according to GLAAD analysis 29; Television accessibility requirements according to disability 111 technology, SCOT (social construction of technology) 165–8 Technology, Entertainment and Design (TED) talks 64, 72–5 Telecommunications Act 149 teleparticipation 88 teletext decoders 151 television 3–4; sharedness 65–8

204 Index Television Decoder Circuitry Act 149, 152, 160 television in Australia 6, 11–13, 108, 116, 133, 138 television studies 3.0 5 television’s textuality in relation to stereotypes and stigma 20–2 theory of complex embodiment 60, 99, 187 Thomas, J. 8–9 transgressive reappropriation 26, 35, 80 translation overlay 171 transmission, digital television 110 trauma 60–1 Twin Peaks 90, 165, 169 Twitter 88 Tyrion, Game of Thrones 93–6 UDHR see Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) Udo, J. P. 172 United Nation’s Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (UNCRPD) 3, 7–10, 32–4, 185, 192 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) 7–8 Uplifting Dystrophy 80–1 US 21st Century Television and Video Accessibility Act 153 US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) 130; captions 149 usability 115

Valenti, B. 78 Van Schilt, S. 75 Very Special Episodes 76, 78 video-on-demand 64, 66, 108, 115, 116, 118, 119, 127, 139, 140, 177, 191 Viki 156–7 Vito Russo test 19–20 voice controls, smartphones 116 W3C see World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Walters, C. 27 The Water Diviner 43–4, 56–7 Wayne, M. 66 web series 75–81 Weber, I. 110 Where we are on TV report, GLAAD (Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Discrimination) 29 wikis, Game of Thrones 90–1 Wilde, A. 28 Winter 42–4, 52–3 The Wire 27, 90 Wood, C. 78 World Blind Union 133, 140 World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) 168, 175 World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) 190 Young, S. 48, 73–5, 79 YouTube, captions 158–9