[nabs-l] 2009 Inauguration Coverage on PBS to be Described and Captioned Live

[Mary Watkins]

January 16, 2009

Press Contact:
Mary Watkins
617 300-3700
<mary_watkins at wgbh.htm>mary_watkins at wgbh.org

Media Access Group at WGBH To Provide Closed 
Captioning And Live Description for PBS's Inaugural Coverage

Described version of coverage will also stream 
live on the Joint Congressional Committee on 
Inaugural Ceremonies (JCCIC) web site, 
<http://www.inaugural.senate.gov/>http://www.inaugural.senate.gov/

Boston, MA ­ The Media Access Group at WGBH, a 
non-profit service of the WGBH Educational 
Foundation in Boston, Massachusetts, will provide 
both closed captioning and live description of 
Barack Obama's presidential inauguration for the 
PBS presentation of Inauguration 2009, a NewsHour 
special hosted by Jim Lehrer. The PBS coverage of 
the inauguration airs live on Tuesday, January 20 
from 11AM to 1:30PM EST. While live captioning is 
an established feature of many television 
broadcasts, live description, the creation at 
time of air of a narration track imparting 
information about visual elements that people who 
are blind or visually impaired would miss, is a 
rare service. Dunkin' Donuts is generously 
sponsoring the description service for this 
broadcast. In 1993, PBS's coverage of the Clinton 
inauguration was the first live television 
program that was made fully accessible to the 
nation's 36 million deaf, hard-of-hearing, blind 
and visually impaired viewers.

While details from the inaugural planning 
committee are still forthcoming, PBS plans to 
include coverage of Barack Obama's arrival at the 
White House, excerpts of the church service and 
Barack Obama's speech to the nation from the Capitol steps.

Hosted by Jim Lehrer of The NewsHour with Jim 
Lehrer, the PBS presentation will feature 
political analysts Mark Shields and David Brooks, 
as well as a panel to provide historical context:

• Ellen Fitzpatrick, presidential historian and 
professor at the University of New Hampshire
• Peniel Joseph, professor of history and 
African-American studies at Brandeis University
• Richard Brookhiser, senior editor at National 
Review and author of a series of biographies of 
America's founders, including Alexander Hamilton and George Washington

"WGBH is proud to take part in making this 
historic event fully accessible to all PBS 
viewers once again," says Media Access Group 
director Larry Goldberg. "And we're extremely 
grateful to PBS, the team at MacNeil/Lehrer 
Productions and to corporate sponsor of the live 
description Dunkin' Donuts for the opportunity to 
bring not only the audio of the inaugural 
coverage to deaf and hard-of-hearing Americans, 
but also the visual highlights of the occasion to 
those who are blind or visually impaired."

Dunkin' Donuts, for many years a corporate 
caption sponsor of local news broadcasts in the 
Boston area, is sponsoring description for the 
first time. Shannon Maxwell, field marketing 
manager for Dunkin' Donuts says, "Dunkin' Donuts 
individual franchise owners are proud to play a 
part of making this major event accessible to 
blind and visually impaired audiences.  We are 
thrilled that our contribution will make the 
images of the day come alive via description."

Closed captions display spoken dialogue as text 
on the television screen.  The live captions will 
be typed by specially trained stenocaptioners ­ 
working from WGBH’s Boston-based headquarters ­ 
and broadcast simultaneously with the live 
program.  The descriptive narration ­ provided by 
an expert team of describers ­ will be audible 
during pauses in program dialogue and will 
identify speakers, describe settings and convey 
other visual information about the event. 
Captions can be accessed on televisions equipped 
with built-in decoders (most televisions are 
equipped), while viewers can hear descriptions by 
switching to the Second Audio Program (SAP) 
channel on their stereo TVs. The described 
coverage will also be streamed live on the Joint 
Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies 
(JCCIC) web site at 
<http://www.inaugural.senate.gov/>http://www.inaugural.senate.gov/

The Media Access Group at WGBH incorporates The 
Caption Center, the world's first captioning 
agency, founded in 1972; Descriptive Video 
Service® (DVS®), which has made television, film 
and video more accessible to blind and visually 
impaired audiences since 1990; and the Carl and 
Ruth Shapiro Family National Center for 
Accessible Media (NCAM), a research and 
development entity that builds on the success of 
WGBH's access service departments to make 
existing and emerging technologies more 
accessible to these under-served 
audiences.  Members of the Media Access Group's 
collective staff represent the leading resources and experts in their fields.


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