Glossary

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Electropalatography(also: EPG, Dynamic Palatography, Palatography)

A technique for recording tongue-palate contact during speech using an artificial palate fitted with electrodes. When the tongue touches the palate, it completes a low-amperage electrical circuit that is detected and displayed visually in real time. In accessibility and deaf…

Environmental Awareness(also: Situational Awareness, Environmental Sound Awareness)

The perception and understanding of what is happening in one's physical surroundings, particularly through auditory cues. For Deaf and hard of hearing individuals, environmental awareness is often reduced because many everyday signals — appliance timers, doorbells, approaching…

Environmental Sound(also: Ambient Sound, Non-Speech Audio)

Any auditory information in a person's surroundings that is not speech, including sounds from appliances, alarms, animals, doorbells, traffic, weather, and other environmental sources. For deaf and hard of hearing people, awareness of environmental sounds is a significant…

Extra-Speech Information(also: ESI, Paralinguistic Information)

Aspects of spoken language beyond the words themselves that convey additional meaning, including how something is said rather than what is said. Examples include tone of voice (yelling, whispering), vocal emotion (sarcasm, anger, joy), singing, the language being spoken, speaker…

Fingerspelling(also: Manual alphabet, Dactylology)

A method of spelling out words letter by letter using hand shapes, used within sign languages to represent proper nouns, technical terms, or words that lack a dedicated sign. Each letter of the written alphabet corresponds to a specific hand configuration. Fingerspelling poses…

Freeze Frame(also: Video Thumbnail, ASL Freeze Frame)

In the context of ASL video interfaces, a freeze frame is a static image captured at a recognizable moment of an ASL sign, used as a visual label or thumbnail for video content. Freeze frames allow Deaf users to quickly scan, identify, and select content without watching full…

French Sign Language(also: LSF, Langue des Signes Française)

French Sign Language (Langue des Signes Française, or LSF) is the primary sign language used by the Deaf community in France. Legally recognized by the French Handicap Law of 2005 as having educational, pedagogical, and cultural legitimacy, LSF is a complete natural language…

Functional Literacy(also: Functional illiteracy)

The level of reading and writing skill needed to handle everyday tasks — filling out forms, reading medication instructions, understanding a utility bill, using a web service. Adults below this threshold are described as functionally illiterate, which in the United States is…

Gaze Switching(also: Visual Attention Switching, Split Attention)

The act of shifting visual focus between two or more information sources, such as between captions and presentation slides in a classroom, or between a sign language interpreter and a speaker. Gaze switching is particularly costly for deaf and hard of hearing students who rely…

German Sign Language(also: DGS, Deutsche Gebärdensprache)

The sign language used by the deaf community in Germany, recognised as an independent natural language with its own grammar, syntax, and vocabulary distinct from spoken German. Like other sign languages worldwide, German Sign Language is a visual-spatial language that uses…

Graphic Captions(also: Visual Captions, Animated Captions)

A captioning approach that uses visual elements such as GIFs, animated stickers, icons, or emojis to represent sounds in audio-visual content, as an alternative or complement to traditional text-based bracket notation. Graphic captions can convey additional information about a…

Graphic Score(also: Graphical Notation, Visual Music Score)

A form of musical notation that uses visual symbols, shapes, colors, and spatial arrangements rather than traditional staff notation to represent musical ideas and instructions. Graphic scores communicate musical concepts through visual means that can be more accessible to…

Haptic Music Technology(also: Vibrotactile Music Systems, Haptic Music Interfaces)

Technologies that convey musical information through touch, typically using vibrotactile feedback to transmit sound properties such as rhythm, frequency, and amplitude to the body. Haptic music technology includes wearable devices like vibrotactile vests and jackets that allow…

Hard of Hearing(also: HoH, HH)

A term describing people with hearing loss ranging from mild to severe who typically have some functional hearing, often with the assistance of hearing aids or other amplification devices. Unlike many Deaf individuals who identify with Deaf culture and use sign language, people…

Hearing Aid(also: HA, BTE, Behind-the-Ear)

An electronic device worn in or behind the ear that amplifies sound for individuals with hearing loss. Modern hearing aids include features such as Bluetooth connectivity, directional microphones, and noise reduction. Behind-the-ear (BTE) models are among the most common styles.…

Hearing Loss(also: Hearing Impairment, Hard of Hearing, Deafness)

A partial or total inability to hear sounds, ranging from mild hearing loss to profound deafness. Hearing loss can be congenital or acquired, and becomes increasingly common with age, affecting approximately one-third of people over 65. Digital accessibility for people with…

Hornbostel-Sachs Classification(also: Hornbostel-Sachs System, Sachs-Hornbostel)

A comprehensive system for classifying musical instruments based on how they produce sound, originally developed by Erich von Hornbostel and Curt Sachs in 1914. The system divides instruments into four main categories: idiophones (sound from the vibration of the entire…

Hybrid Search(also: Hybrid sign-language search)

A sign-language dictionary search pattern that combines search-by-video (a user performs the sign into a camera for sign recognition to match) with search-by-feature (manual filtering of the candidate list by linguistic properties such as handshape and location). Introduced as a…

Hyperarticulation(also: Clear Speech, Over-Articulation)

A speaking style in which a person exaggerates the clarity of their pronunciation by moving their tongue and mouth to more extreme positions, producing more distinct vowel and consonant sounds. Hyperarticulation occurs naturally when speakers perceive that their listener is…

Indian Sign Language(also: ISL, Indo-Pakistani Sign Language, IPSL)

The sign language used predominantly by the Deaf community in India. Indian Sign Language has its own distinct grammar and vocabulary that differs substantially from American Sign Language (ASL) and other sign languages. ISL is used by millions of Deaf individuals across India…

Individual Sign Language Recognition(also: ISLR, Word-Level Sign Recognition, Isolated Sign Recognition)

A machine learning task focused on recognizing individual signs from a sign language, translating single signs independently without considering surrounding context. Unlike continuous sign language recognition which attempts to interpret flowing signed sentences, ISLR identifies…

Informed Consent Accessibility(also: Accessible Informed Consent, Accessible Consent Process)

The practice of making informed consent documents and processes fully accessible to people with disabilities, ensuring they can understand the information being presented and make genuinely informed decisions about participation. For Deaf and Hard of Hearing individuals who…

Interpretive Agency(also: Viewer Agency)

The capacity of an audience member to form their own independent understanding and emotional response to content, free from imposed interpretations. In the context of media accessibility, interpretive agency is a concern when AI-generated or highly expressive captions may impose…

Japanese Sign Language(also: JSL, Nihon Shuwa)

The primary sign language used by the Deaf community in Japan. Japanese Sign Language (JSL) is a distinct natural language with its own grammar, vocabulary, and syntax that differs significantly from spoken Japanese. JSL uses spatial relationships rather than particles to…

Joint Bilingual Navigation(also: Bilingual Form Navigation, Dual-Language Navigation)

An interface design approach that allows users to interact with digital content simultaneously in two languages through different modalities. In the context of Deaf accessibility, joint bilingual navigation enables a form or document to be navigated either through sign language…

Kenyan Sign Language(also: KSL)

The primary sign language used by the deaf community in Kenya, recognized as a national language in Kenya's 2010 Constitution. KSL has its own grammar, syntax, and vocabulary distinct from spoken Kiswahili and English. In accessibility contexts, KSL is significant because many…

Keyword Reading Strategy(also: Content Word Strategy)

The keyword reading strategy is a sentence-comprehension approach in which a reader focuses primarily on high-content words (nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs) to derive the meaning of a sentence, while paying less attention to function words (determiners, prepositions, and…

Language Accessibility(also: Linguistic Accessibility)

The practice of ensuring that information, services, and digital content are available and comprehensible in the languages that people actually use and prefer. Language accessibility extends beyond translation between spoken languages to include providing content in signed…

Late Deafened(also: Adventitiously Deaf, Acquired Deafness)

Late deafened refers to individuals who became deaf after developing spoken language, typically in adolescence or adulthood. Unlike people who are born deaf or become deaf in early childhood, late-deafened individuals often grew up in hearing culture with spoken language as…

Lecture Captioning(also: Classroom Captioning, Lecture Transcription)

The real-time or post-production conversion of spoken lecture content into text, displayed to students during or after a class session. Lecture captioning can be performed by human captioners (such as CART providers), by automatic speech recognition software, or by a combination…

Lecture Capture(also: Lecture Recording, Classroom Recording)

The process of recording classroom lectures, presentations, or educational sessions using video, audio, and screen capture technology for later review by students. Lecture capture systems range from simple single-camera recordings to multi-camera setups that capture the…

Lip-reading(also: Speechreading, Speech Reading, Visual Speech Perception)

The practice of understanding speech by visually interpreting the movements of the lips, face, and tongue, often used by deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals as a communication strategy. Lip-reading relies on watching the mouth region and facial expressions to decode spoken…

Lipreading(also: Lip reading, Speechreading (narrow sense))

The practice of understanding spoken language by visually interpreting the movements of a speaker's lips, tongue, teeth, jaw, and facial expression. Lipreading is used by many Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing people — especially those who acquired hearing loss after learning spoken…

Live Captioning(also: Real-Time Captioning, Live Captions)

The process of converting spoken language into text displayed in real time, enabling Deaf and hard of hearing individuals to follow live audio content such as meetings, lectures, broadcasts, and events. Live captioning may be performed by human stenographers (CART providers),…

Live Captioning(also: Real-Time Captioning, CART)

The process of creating captions in real time as audio content is being produced, rather than from a pre-existing script. Live captioning is used in television news broadcasts, live events, videoconferences, and classrooms. It presents unique challenges including a natural…

Live Captions(also: Google Live Caption, Automatic Captions)

An Android accessibility feature that automatically generates real-time captions for any audio playing on the device, including videos, podcasts, phone calls, and video meetings. Unlike Live Transcribe which captures ambient speech, Live Captions processes audio output from the…

Live Transcribe(also: Google Live Transcribe)

An Android accessibility feature developed by Google that provides real-time speech-to-text transcription, displaying spoken words as text on the smartphone screen. Live Transcribe supports over 80 languages and is designed primarily for deaf and hard of hearing users to follow…

Logocentrism

In captioning studies, the systematic prioritization of speech and spoken language over non-speech sounds in captioning practices and technologies. Logocentrism in captioning manifests as speech captions receiving more attention, resources, and technical development than…

Mixed DHH-Hearing Communication(also: DHH-Hearing Interaction, Cross-Hearing Status Communication)

Communication that occurs between Deaf or Hard of Hearing (DHH) individuals and hearing individuals, particularly in settings where spoken language is the primary mode. These interactions present unique accessibility challenges because hearing speakers may not be aware of how…

Mixed Hearing Groups(also: Mixed Hearing Settings, Mixed Ability Hearing Groups)

Groups that include people with different hearing abilities, typically d/Deaf individuals, hard of hearing individuals, hearing individuals, and sign language interpreters communicating together. Mixed hearing groups face unique challenges in both in-person and virtual settings…

Mixed-Hearing Environment(also: Mixed-Ability Hearing Space, Mixed-Hearing Performance Space)

A setting in which people with varying levels of hearing ability—including Deaf, Hard of Hearing, and hearing individuals—participate together in shared activities such as music performance, collaboration, or learning. Mixed-hearing environments present unique challenges…

MobileASL

A research project from the University of Washington that developed video compression technology enabling real-time, two-way American Sign Language (ASL) video communication on mobile phones. MobileASL addressed the challenge that standard mobile video calling consumed too much…

Motion Design(also: Motion Graphics, Motion-Driven Design)

The practice of animating graphic elements - text, icons, diagrams, captions - in time-based media to communicate instructional content. In accessible educational video, motion design is used to guide visual attention, sequence information, and pace the presentation of captions…

Music Accessibility(also: Accessible Music, Musical Accessibility)

The practice of making musical experiences — including listening, performing, composing, and learning — available to people with disabilities. Music accessibility encompasses a wide range of approaches, from sensory substitution technologies that convert sound to vibration or…

Musical Accessibility(also: Music Accessibility)

The design and practice of making music creation, performance, learning, and appreciation available to people with disabilities. Musical accessibility spans multiple research communities including Human-Computer Interaction and New Interfaces for Musical Expression, addressing…

NER Model(also: Number, Edition, Recognition Model, NER Accuracy Model)

A caption-quality evaluation model developed by Pablo Romero-Fresco and Juan Martínez Pérez for measuring the accuracy of live subtitling and respeaking. Unlike Word Error Rate, which penalises all errors equally, the NER model weights each error by how much it affects the…

Non-Speech Sounds(also: Non-Speech Audio, Sound Effects)

Auditory content in media that is not spoken dialogue, including music, environmental noises, sound effects, laughter, applause, and other ambient sounds. Non-speech sounds carry important narrative, emotional, and contextual information that contributes to a viewer's…

Non-manual markers(also: NMM, Non-manual signals, Facial grammar)

Linguistic features in sign languages that are conveyed through facial expressions, head tilts, eye gaze direction, mouth movements, and body posture rather than through hand signs. Non-manual markers serve grammatical functions in ASL and other sign languages — including…

Open Captions(also: Burned-in Captions, Hard-coded Captions)

Captions that are permanently embedded into a video and cannot be turned off by the viewer. Unlike closed captions, which can be toggled on or off, open captions are always visible as part of the video image itself. Open captions are sometimes used when a platform does not…

Paralinguistic Features(also: Prosodic Cues, Non-Verbal Speech Features)

Aspects of spoken communication that convey meaning beyond the literal words, including pitch, loudness, rhythm, tone, and emotional affect. These features are critical for understanding speaker intent, sarcasm, emphasis, and emotional state but are typically lost in standard…