Thank the powers for books, closed captions on life

My apologies if this is a repeat thread.

My sister and I are deaf, her since birth and me for the last eight years after twenty years hard-of-hearing. Used to be, old silent movies and foreign films with subtitles were the best chances we had to figure what happened verbally on-screen.

Even now, I have to go to another city (Tuesdays and Wednesdays only) to see current films with words on the big screen.

I usually wait for the DVD. They’ve steadily improved captioning so it’s not like some local news channels which employ monkeys to post flickers of hieroglyphics, horribly delayed and misspelled.

In fact, most DVDs offer both closed captions (requiring a player with a decoder keyed to a single language) and subtitles in several languages.

Some advantages to subtitles are they are not presented in a block, and you can see picture in between letters and words. You may pause them if you miss a line; pausing closed captions makes them disappear. Subtitles are generally word-for-word and spelled as spoken, whereas closed captioners tend to paraphrase and use "gonna," "wanna," and "should of," even for Queen Elizabeth’s dialogue.

Some hearing viewers can’t stand 'em, but they're such a boon for movie buffs who are deaf and hard-of-hearing. What’s your take?

A current debate rages in AllDeaf, a popular site for deafies and deaf groupies. Many are used to the closed captions presented white on a block of black background. Hmmm. Try saying those last four words fast several times. For now, as both of you noted, closed captions feature words of songs and stage notes, such as "crickets chirp."

Closed captions are holdovers from live television shows pioneered in the early ‘70s and later coded onto VHS tapes. They require a television set which decodes. Tapes with closed captions have a tiny TV somewhere on the jacket with "CC" inside. Another coder uses a small TV symbol with a spike going down like from dialogue balloons in comic books.

Cheap DVDs often have no captions. Some have closed captions or subtitles. Most have both, so you may choose what suits you.

The latest DVDs and Blu Rays feature SDH (subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing) symbolized by those initials in a little small TV set. Most times those have the best features of the both captioning methods. Those DVDs may or may not have subtitles for other languages.

My girlfriend likes closed captions now and has them permanently on her home TV, despite her grandchildren’s complaints, and tossed all her VHSs and DVDs without CC. Many people scream bloody murder about words on the screen, as it can distract, as well as cover lots of action, especially on smaller sets.

I’m happy to see you’re hearies who find captions beneficial.