a corpus-based approach to the language of audio description

2007). During the 1990‟s, many more films were audio described, even
though not on a regular basis.
The Andalusian Autonomous Channel started in 1995, audiodescribing
76 films; it was then followed by the Cine para todos project broadcasting
132 audio described films until 2001. Sitcoms started to be audio described
in 1999 by Channel TV3 (the CCRTV's main channel) broadcasting “Plats
bruts” with AD in Catalan. TV3 and ONCE also worked together on the
sitcoms “Majoria absoluta” and “L‟un per l‟altre”. In 2002 RTVE produced
the audio description for “Nicòlas”, an animated series for children, whose
protagonist was a blind child. As to cinemas, though Spain cannot rely on
DTS or Dolby, some films are provided with open audio description, a type
of description that can be heard by all cinemagoers (Orero, Pereira and Utray
2007). The first audio described film shown in public dates back to 2006
(“Something to talk about” followed by “The Majestic” and “The Pledge”)
and was part of a bigger ambitious project, La Gran Pelicula, which aimed at
audiodescribing one film per week. In 1994 already the film “The
Motorcycle Diaries” had been shown in a commercial movie theatre by the
Catalan Association for the Blind; however, the AD was in Spanish and not
in Catalan because the film was in Spanish itself (Matamala 2007). This
experience had been followed by “Mar adentro” and “Amor idiota”, both
screened in 2005. On the festival side, some films are also audio described
since 2002 for the International Badonet Festival in Spain, for which, in 2005
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