Watching movies through listening at any place in any time- a special event for visually impaired people

HE, Jian-hao and HORNG, Shih-chang (2017) Watching movies through listening at any place in any time- a special event for visually impaired people. Paper presented at: IFLA WLIC 2017 – Wrocław, Poland – Libraries. Solidarity. Society. in Session 242 - Audiovisual and Multimedia, Information Literacy and School Libraries.

Bookmark or cite this item: https://library.ifla.org/id/eprint/1771
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Language: English (Original)
Available under licence Creative Commons Attribution.

Abstract

Watching movies through listening at any place in any time- a special event for visually impaired people

Taipei Public Library Qiming Branch offers library services different to other branches which are specially for visually impaired people. As you know, visually impaired people have difficulty in reading so they rely on listening and touching to live and learn. Qiming Branch is devoted to not only providing braille books, audio books, e-books and large-print books but also meticulously designing a variety of activities to encourage the visually impaired to participate, such as a reading club, exhibition of touching art, and “watching” movies. It is not that kind of movie watching that uses the eyes. The program “Watching Movies Through Listening” intends to give the visually impaired the same opportunity to watch and learn from videos. “Watching Movies Through Listening” is an entertaining activity. We hope it can share joy and be fulfilling. Moreover, it’s a cultural activity. By participating, the visually impaired can broaden their horizons and gain much food for thought; and it’s also a social activity. We encourage the visually impaired to come out of their homes to attend. The event is guided by a professional storyteller and volunteer team. They orally describe the characters, scenes, sounds and plots of the movie. Through the interactive discussions, participants are able to deeply understand the implications and what the movie director wants to express. However, still many visually impaired people can’t come to library in person. In order to let the ones who can’t conveniently participate, audio recording is available. We upload the mp3 files on to the Taipei Public Library website and visually impaired people can listen online or download the record by inputting the ID and password. It supports computer, mobile phones and tablets and they can listen at any place they want;and it’s all free, mainly funded by the city government. Started in 2003, the program has been executed for well over 10 years. We upload 6 to 8 movies on average every month and have had 540 movies so far. 31,233 people have used this service in total. This thoughtful service helps to open another door for visually impaired people and lets them experience the colors of life. We have also built up a database of oral movies that can be shared with other institutions providing services for the visually impaired and wish to bridge the information access gap.

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