I just appreciate the whole irony of this.

[mariness]

The Disability in Science Fiction panel at Worldcon/Lone Star Con did not have ramps to the stage. Because they knew I would be there (I use a wheelchair), they set up tables in front of the stage, so at least I could sit at the same level as the rest of the panelists. (At the Prose by Day, Poet by Night panel, which to be fair I was only added to about two hours before the panel started, I was on the floor and the other three panelists were on the stage.) The disability panel also did not have an ASL interpreter.

Comments

[jesse_the_k]

Oh my, that sounds infuriating. Did tables in front of the stage work in terms of you connecting with the audience?

This is in no way an excuse, but I know matching ramps to stages is a frustrating business—one WisCon a disability panel also didn't have ramps (but sasha_feather moved heaven & earth and a ramp was installed within ten minutes). The answer, of course, is to have ramps for all the stages and bypass the frustration.

[mariness]

The problem was that it was a large room and crowd; we did have mikes but it was hard for me to see people in the audience.

Honestly, though, for me it was more, you didn't get a ramp for the DISABILITY panel? I understood not having one for the Prose/Poets panel, especially since I was a last minute addition and since disability wasn't part of that discussion at all. That panel I thought we all connected to the (very small) audience.

[sasha_feather]

Yeah but World Con has way more money than we do... The entry price is 250 bucks!

On ASL- how do we do this...

[selkiechick]

So I have been thinking about ASL and services and conventions, and the visibility of ASL at events.

At Arisia, we do not, in general, have ASL for specific events.

Why is this?

Because when I tried to hire interpreters to do this, they gave be the "are you kidding" face and refused the job unless they were able to meet and talk with the Deaf person in the audience (which we didn't have... we were trying to be ready in case there were any Deaf people in attendance). I was informed that ASL providers just don't perform for basic inclusion and visibility purposes (yea, I know this varies). Since then, I have met a few Interpreters (two) that do perform for Universal Design/visibility/Inclusion purposes. I feel like this places conventions trying to do the right thing in a bind. As it stands now, we require people who need ASL to register with the convention a couple of weeks before, and instead of covering key events, we cover set hours (10-5 Saturday and Sunday) and the Deaf Attendees decide what panels they want covered. It's still incomplete coverage. Arisia is a 4 day, 24 hour a day convention, I don't know how we would ever cover it completely... but it is coverage the attendees have some control over.

Re: On ASL- how do we do this...

[mariness]

Does anyone at Arisia have contacts within the Deaf community? I ask because I am really out of my depth here and I don't know what that community wants or needs.

Re: On ASL- how do we do this...

[selkiechick]

We have a few, and I have talked with them. I am looking for some more help, and I have gotten some, which is part of how we are where we are, with a generous budget, and partial coverage that is in the hands of the people who need it.

Re: On ASL- how do we do this...

[futuransky]

If you are thinking about how to provide greater access for universal design purposes for d/Deaf and hard of hearing people, have you thought about captioning/CART? Not all people with hearing impairments are fluent in ASL, and captioning is something that people with a variety of access needs can find helpful. I know it's more expensive, but I wanted to throw it in there as a suggestion!

Re: On ASL- how do we do this...

[selkiechick]

CART costs about the same as ASL, and it does reach more people.

We have worked with CART, and we have struggled with it. It is very hard for a transcriptionist to keep up with readings or with panel discussions. We currently only have CART for the Masquerade (and since this is almost all names... it is very challenging). I would like to expand CART services, but I have a lot more to learn before I can make this happen.

Re: On ASL- how do we do this...

[futuransky]

That makes sense! My partner uses CART a lot, so I know how difficult it can be and how much difference the transcriptionist can make. I just wanted to throw the suggestion in there; thanks for responding. :)

Re: On ASL- how do we do this...

[jesse_the_k]

CART is hard to do — just turn on the captioning for most live TV and be astounded at the errors :,)

CART creators do a better job the more we can supply info in advance. If people are reading poetry, get 'em the poems — they can load 'em in the computer and then spool it out live, ready to insert any changes. Last WisCon we brainstormed names and pronounciations beforehand — I even sent the captionists some audio of Jo Walton reading, since her trans-Atlantic Welsh style won't match the Midwestern US of captionists' sound-based dictionaries.

For both CART and ASL, there's a chicken/egg issue. It will take time for the folks who use these services to learn about them. You may have to convince the Concom that an "audience building" effort is required. It may take two years before your commitment to providing them is reliable enough for someone to make the effort to attend your con.

As I'm sure you know, there's nothing so infuriating as access that's promised but not delivered. See the original post in this thread!