Legendary Australian activist Stella Young once said: “My disability exists not because I use a wheelchair, but because the broader environment isn't accessible.” Whilst this powerful Disability Advocate is no longer with us, her re-contextualisation of disability remains world-shifting for those open to hearing it.
At Ruby Assembly, we strive to know better and do better in our work. After having a recent discussion with one of our clients, implementing digital accessibility into the content we create has become focus for our team. One of the ways we’re upskilling as an organisation in order to better understand and create digital accessibility is by attending the Accessibility, Usability and Communication Conference on Friday, the 6th of September from 9.00am AEST via Zoom. To book a spot for this conference and learn more, visit the Humanitix wesbite here.
Increasingly, fostering accessibility is a priority for many - especially in the digital space. Executing accessibility as a creator isn’t as simple as doing a quick Google search. It takes time, learning and practice in order to truly be impactful. The good news is, there are many valuable resources available to help you learn about making online content more accessible. Here are 5 things Senior Digital Strategist Alex Russell learned when exploring these resources.
Understanding disability
In order to understand what it means to create accessible content, let’s take a look at what disability actually means.
As defined by the United Nations, a person with a disability is someone with “long-term physical, mental, intellectual, or sensory impairments, which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others.”
The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) identifies eight types of of disabilities:
● Physical: Which impacts mobility or dexterity
● Intellectual: Which impacts one’s ability to learn or process information
● Mental Illness: Which impacts thinking processes
● Sensory: Which Impacts the ability to hear or see
● Neurological: Which impacts the brain and central nervous system
● Learning: Which impacts acquisition, organisation, retention, and understanding of information
● Physical Disfigurement: Which impacts physical appearance
● Immunological Disability: Which is due to the presence of organisms causing disease in the body.
For much of recent history, a medical model of disability was used. This model suggested that people are disabled by their impairments or differences. Because of the negative way this was framed - putting the responsibility onto the disabled person and focusing on what they can and cannot do - society has moved away from this model, instead working under the social model of disability.
According to PWD Australia, this model views disability as:
“The result of the interaction between people living with impairments and an environment filled with physical, attitudinal, communication and social barriers.
It therefore carries the implication that the physical, attitudinal, communication and social environment must change to enable people living with impairments to participate in society on an equal basis with others.”
Meet WCAG
If you’ve never heard of WCAG, this stands for the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. The guidelines were developed by the Web Accessibility Initiative (W3C), and act as a global standard for web content developers, web accessibility tool developers and others who want to create more accessible content for those with disabilities.
The very first set of WCAG guidelines was developed in 1999 as WCAG 1.0, followed by WCAG 2.0 in 2008, WCAG 2.1 in 2018, and WCAG in 2.2 which was released in 2023 - the most recent set of guidelines at the time of writing. The guidelines are divided into three parts: Design Principles, Guidelines, and Success Criteria. To help achieve WCAG Compliance, Success Criteria is split into three implementation levels: Level A, AA, and AAA.
When it comes to Australia, following the WCAG 2.0, or 2.1 guidelines at a Level AA conformance level is what mainstream organisations are advised to be aiming for.
Assistive technologies (AT)
Whilst having accessible content is important - there is often more support needed in order for a person with a disability to properly access the accessible content. This is where assistive technologies (AT) come in. This technology could be a device, program, or piece of physical equipment that helps a disabled person access the world more easily. Examples of assistive technologies can include:
● Screen readers
● Hearing aids
● Automatic page turners
● Wheelchairs
● Closed captioning
● Screen magnification technology
● Voice recognition
Examples of ways to create accessible content
Now that we’ve touched on what disability means, and how those with disabilities use assistive technologies for support, here are some key examples of ways that we can make digital content more accessible for them.
● Colour contrast: When content is displayed on screen, the contrast in colours that it has can impact how easily someone with a disability - such as low vision - is able to read it. This is why having a distinct and clear colour contrast allows for there to be better clarity for the reader in what they are looking at.
● Alternative text: To help assistive technologies like screen readers read an image on a website, there is what’s called alternative text embedded in the site. This is a description of the image and allows a person to understand what it looks like and means, even if they cannot see it. The marker of good alternative text is how well it communicates the context of an image, rather than just describing what it contains.
● Captions and audio transcripts: Having captions and audio transcripts means that content is more searchable, and more people can consume it if they have hearing, cognitive or visual disabilities.
● Headings and structured content: Making sure that your content makes sense, is logical to read and can be broken down into different sections with scannable headings can mean that screen readers and other assistive technologies can work properly and the person using them can understand the content as it was intended to be consumed.
Resources
To help you get started in your learning about accessibility and creating accessible content, here are some national and global resources to explore:
● Introduction to Digital Accessibility - Vision Australia
● How do I achieve the WCAG standard? - Centre of Disability Australia
● The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines website
● Vision Australia Digital Accessibility Tools
● Colour Accessibility: Best Practices and Common Mistakes - Vision Australia
● Web Accessibility Testing Tools - Vision Australia
● Accessible Social Media - Vision Australia
● Digital Accessibility Checklist - Princeton
Learning about accessible content is an ongoing process - and one that requires time and care to become familiar with. It is empowering to know we can contribute to a world that embraces and accommodates those living with disabilities. To learn more about disabilities, and ways to contribute to accessibility both on and offline, visit the People with Disability Australia website here.
