[Linganth] Making AAA Presentations Accessible

[MOLLY JOSETTE BLOOM]

Hello All,
as the AAA meeting approaches, please keep in mind that some presentation
formats are more accessible than others to people with varying embodied
capacities for vision, hearing and sustained interaction in large crowds.
As such, the Disability Research Interest Group (DRIG), a Special Interest
Group of the SMA, has drafted accessible presentation guidelines to help
you make your presentations as accessible as possible. Please keep this
document in mind as you prepare for AAAs.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

The DRIG Steering Committee
http://www.medanthro.net/interest-groups/drig/








Disability Research Interest Group

Guidelines for an Accessible Presentation

The Disability Research Interest Group (a Special Interest Group of the
Society for Medical Anthropology) encourages presenters at the 2017 meeting
of the American Anthropological Association to abide by common
accessibility guidelines. Similar guidelines have been adopted by other
organizations as standard policy. Although AAA has yet to adopt these
guidelines formally, we ask that you review this document and make your
presentation and roundtable events as accessible as possible.

Embodied capacities for vision, hearing, and sustained interaction in large
crowds vary between people, and wax and wane for each of us from hour to
hour and over the course of our lives. Maximizing the accessibility of our
presentations furthers our professional work. It helps your work reach a
wide academic audience, which furthers the core goals of scholarly
exchange.

Your talk:

Come prepared with a list of Proper Nouns, including names of people and
places, and specialized terms in your talk. If there is an ASL interpreter
present, s/he will need to review this document before your talk begins in
order to familiarize himself/herself with words and names that do not have
a standard ASL sign.

Come prepared with 2-3 printed text copies of your talk. Making printed
versions available helps people who may have difficulty hearing or
processing auditory information to follow your talk. Choose size 17 font or
larger and feel free to add a disclaimer: “Please do not distribute without
the expressed permission of the author” with your name and contact
information. Alternatively, you put the text on a website that people can
easily access from their devices. This can use a unique and private link,
and has the added benefit that readers can chose their own text size. You
can take down the link after the conference, and you can ask people to
return your print copies at the end of your talk.

Note that providing an alternative presentation model is appreciated by
people for many reasons, including language fluency, learning style, and
personal preference.

Announce that printed “access copies” are available at the start of the
talk. It is best practice to then offer them to those who respond to that
request, without asking anyone why they are requesting the copy.

Is your powerpoint accessible?

Use a high contrast powerpoint (white text on black background, and bold
text or a substantially wide font work well). Try to use a sans-serif font,
such as Arial, and maintain a large font size (17 size font or higher).

Avoid using too much text on a single slide.

Is there visual information on your slide? Describe all images - do not
assume that your audience can see ANY of the images. Include information
about:

   -

   Content
   -

   Aesthetics and style
   -

   Connection to talk


Roundtables & Q & A:

All speakers should use a mic at all times. All audience members asking
questions should use a mic, or a mic user should restate any questions
asked without amplification. As with presentations, if an ASL interpreter
is present, it is best practice to check if the interpreter has finished
interpreting before proceeding.

If there is an ASL interpreter present:

ASL interpreters sign in American Sign Language, which has its own
grammatical structure and nuances. It may take more or less time to express
an idea in ASL than in spoken English. When interpreting academic English,
interpreters often spell out proper nouns or jargon terms letter-by-letter,
which takes longer than speaking. As such, when you are presenting a text
that is being interpreted into ASL, it is best practice to pause slightly
to allow the interpreter to catch up after names, place names, or jargon
terms.

Links to accessible presentation policies and guidelines for other
organizations:

   -

   American Sociological Association:
   http://www.asanet.org/sites/default/files/savvy/footnotes/julyaugust08/presentation.html
   -

   Pacific Rim Conference presenter accessibility guidelines:
   http://www.pacrim.hawaii.edu/presenters/accessibility



Molly Bloom
PhD Candidate
Department of Anthropology
UCLA
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