Curb Cuts for Poetry: How Captions Build Access

We typically think of accessible design in terms of physical space — the curb cut that enables a wheelchair to access a sidewalk, for example. A recent project at the University of Arizona Poetry Center transcribing and captioning a sixty-plus-year audiovisual archive of poetry readings demonstrates the way captioning can help us understand recordings in new ways, and how universal design can enhance the experience of a website for users both with and without disabilities.

Sarah Kortemeier oversees the Poetry Center Library, one of North America's premier poetry collections. A working poet, she is a subject specialist in contemporary poetry with additional research interests in library pedagogy, critical cataloging, and library accessibility. Her scholarly writing has appeared in Progressive Librarian and in edited anthologies from the Association of College & Research Libraries and McFarland; her creative work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Ploughshares, and others. Her debut volume of poetry, GANBATTE, won the Felix Pollak Prize from the University of Wisconsin Press in 2019.