1. SPEECH TO TEXT TRANSCRIPTION
IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES
Tabitha Allum, Chief Executive, STAGETEXT

2. About STAGETEXT
• Founded in 2000 following trip to London by some
deaf New Yorkers where they brought captioning with
them
• 5 of our 9 Trustees and 2 of our 6 staff members are
deaf, deafened or hard of hearing
• Receives regular funding from ACE, project funding
from trusts and foundations but also charge direct
costs to venues
• Started in theatre, now expanding to offering speechto-text in museums, galleries and literary events

3. What is speech-to-text for talks?
• Palantypist or
stenographer is used
to transcribe what is
being said using
phonetic keyboard
• Text is displayed at the
front of the
auditorium for talks
and on handheld
displays for tours

4. Who is captioning for?
• There are 10 million people in the UK with varying
degrees of deafness (by 2031, it’s estimated to rise to
14.5 million)
• More than 70% of over 70 year-olds and 40% of over
50 year-olds have some form of hearing loss
• At least four million people who don't have hearing
aids would benefit from using them
• On average it takes ten years for people to address
their hearing loss
• Over 99% of people with hearing loss do not know
British Sign Language
Statistics: Action on Hearing Loss

5. How does captioning help?

6. Static talks
• Palantypist or
stenographer (STTR) is
present or remote
• Text is either
displayed on separate
screens or integrated
with main
presentation using
multimedia scaler

7. Tours using handheld devices
• Audio taken from tour
guide
• Audio sent to remote
STTR
• Transcription sent to a
webpage
• Patrons read the text on
a wifi-enabled tablet as
they walk around the
exhibits

8. Results from feedback card exercise
Those patrons who declare to be using the
text and those who are the ‘incidental’
patrons who find it useful
Name of Venue
Total number of
people attending
% of audience
who booked to
use the text
% of total
audience which
“found text useful”
at the end
National Gallery
(Talk)
108
19%
73%
Wellcome
Collection
(Talk)
90
18%
62%

9. Beyond access?
• Not just deaf, deafened and hard of hearing people
who find it useful
“The conference was my first experience of speech-to-text and I
thought it added greatly to the speakers’ delivery and our
comprehension of their talks... Hearing but also seeing the words
helped me focus and concentrate all the more on the
presentations.”
• The impact of speech-to-text on engagement and
deepening understanding needs to be investigated

10. What we need from speakers
Glossary of key words that the speaker will use, for example:
o Titles of works, proper nouns, places
o Unusual vocabulary that the speech-to-text reporter will not
have in their dictionary: eg Theocentric, Anthropocentric,
Humanism, Worpswede, Grèz-sur-Loing
o Any quotes or excerpts from books, films or writers
o If not prepared in advance, words may appear phonetically:
– Canaletto = can let toe
– Euripides = you’re rip deeds
o Speaker’s PowerPoint presentations, if possible

11. Moving the service on
• Started providing the service in London
• Now looking to expand into other major cities,
like Liverpool
• Growing the audience of deaf, deafened and
hard of hearing patrons
• Investigating impact on engagement among
the incidental users – making a better case
• Would you like to join us….?

12. Thank you for listening
www.stagetext.org
@STAGETEXT
tabitha@stagetext.org