Event Description

November Member Meeting

Date: Tuesday, 5 November 2019

Time: 6:30 pm for 7:00 pm start

Venue:  Level 1, Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, 280 Pitt Street, City (the venue is wheelchair accessible and has an ambulant bathroom available)

Bookings close: Sunday, 3 November 2019

Cost: Members $25, Non-members $35, Concession members (with appropriate concession card) $15

Description 

Editing for accessibility

Disability groups estimate that less than 10 per cent of publications worldwide are accessible to people with a print disability, leading to what the World Blind Union describes as a global ‘book famine’. How can editors and writers help address this problem?

The presentation will discuss:

• what is meant by the term ‘print disability’, and some of the ways in which readers with a print disability access and experience print materials

• the challenges faced by disability support organisations such as the Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind Children and its Alternative Format Publications unit

• the work being done by the Australian Inclusive Publishing Initiative (AIPI) to encourage and support the creation of books that are ‘inclusive by design’

• the role of authors and editors in this process, including checking that content is appropriate (‘perceivable’) and using elements such as cross-references, illustrative material and alternative text in a way that is meaningful to all readers, irrespective of how they access the text.

Presenter

Julie Ganner AE is a freelance editor with over 30 years’ experience in the publishing industry. She is IPEd’s representative to the Australian Inclusive Publishing Initiative, a cross-industry forum on print accessibility. Julie is co-author of Inclusive publishing in Australia: an introductory guide, which is available for free download from the AIPI website.