Seale (2006) identifies six potential areas for conflict or contradiction within an organisation or activity system; with regards to individual responses to accessibility. There is a contradiction in my organisation, as Seale (2006) discusses, which relates to poorly designed tools. Witt and McDermott (2002) state difficulties in interpreting accessibility guidelines. They are not clear and open to interpretation and there are many different guidelines. We also have difficulty in interpreting the results of many evaluation tools.
Seale (2006) discusses conflict between stakeholders on responsibility for accessibility. This occurs in my organisation in terms of some stakeholders not seeing their full responsibility and contribution required to achieve accessibility. Academics see it as the responsibility of the technical experts.
A contradiction occurs between community and division of labour. Any accessibility objective that requires everyone to be included will fail if relevant stakeholders are not included.
Seale discusses contradictions around consistent rules of practice to enable practitioners to use the tools available to them. I would not say this is relevant in my organisation as everyone is clear on WCAG and discussions are made on whether to follow this or not.
Contradictions can also occur where rules are inconsistent or weak. Again, I think this is not applicable in my organisation and staff naturally work alongside the tools and we have testing teams.
Seale (2006) also explains a contradiction around the tools if they are unable to be used in the way intended. I think this does occur, but not necessarily as a contradiction. I think we do discuss if the results come up not as expected and we delve deeper to see if the result suggests changes that are applicable. Again, it is down to using the tools, but also human judgement.
I think it is helpful to conceptualise the development of accessibility within my organisation as an activity system. Engestrom’s (1987) systemic model of activity is a helpful model to demonstrate the linkages between stakeholders and what needs to be considered. At a top level, it does help us consider changes and developments – in terms of highlighting who and what needs to be included in a wider context, beyond the guidelines and rules.
Three issues identified from Seale’s (2006) chapter 12 are:
1. The number of tools available and the issues that this results in.
2. Consideration of all the stakeholders and wider context, not just rules
3. Witt and McDermott (2002) state difficulties in interpreting accessibility guidelines. They are not clear and open to interpretation and there are many different guidelines. We also have difficulty in interpreting the results of many evaluation tools.
Filed under: H810 Week 16
