Syn-aesthetics. Accessibility and understanding of audiovisual texts
Chiara Simonigh
This article addresses some of the issues that media accessibility poses to aesthetics studies on the understanding of audiovisual texts (intended as complex semiotic systems made up of dynamic iconic, visual and acoustic signs). In particular, the paper will examine the relationship between sensory perceptions and imagination and will analyse the function of subtitles for the deaf and the hard of hearing (SDH) and audio description for the blind and the visually impaired (AD). The article will illustrate the theoretical issues and aesthetic principles that lie at the basis of the methods that render audiovisual texts accessible, discussing their value in a new perspective, that is, an audio-verbal-visual aesthetics which can be defined as syn-aesthetics.
Keywords
Audiovisual aesthetics, Synaesthesia, The imaginary, Understanding, Transsensorial perception, Sensorial thought
