Audio describing emotions from a semiotic perspective: Mucize Doktor

Abstract

This article aims to study the audio description of emotions from a semiotic standpoint. Selected scenes from the first episode of Mucize Doktor will be analyzed. This process involves intralingual and intersemiotic translation. Audio Description includes the description of the visual aspects of any audiovisual media for the accession of the blind and partially sighted receivers. To make films and TV series accessible an additional audible narrative is weaved between dialogues to provide information necessary for understanding what has been conveyed through these forms of art. Films or TV series consist of visual signified which refers to moving and still images and written texts and acoustic signified such as dialogues, sounds and music. Audio described versions of these audiovisual products contain only the acoustic content of the original narrative and the voice of the dubbing actor who speaks the images described through intersemiotic operation. In other words, when describing filmic images or what Peirce calls icons, a problematic conversion takes place which turns images into words or icons into symbols and thus the decision making about whether to remain neutral or interpret what is seen becomes blurred. Audio describer/translator’s choice of deductive or inductive approach determines for instance the way emotions are conveyed to the audience, i.e. is it possible to make an inference or is the character’s feeling already known? (Arma, 2011). Mucize Doktor (2019-2021) is a Turkish adaptation of the Korean series The Good Doctor and it tells the drama of a young and talented doctor Ali Vefa suffering from autistic savant syndrome. This study, focusing on his behaviors and other people’s responses, discusses the audio description of emotions in an attempt to guide the blind viewers through the narrative.