Hearing and Speaking Problems for Non-Native English speaking participants.

[Cyrus Shaoul]

Hi All,

I have been lurking on the list for a while, but I wanted to contribute
my thoughts on the problem of difficulties in participation by non-native
English speakers.

In draft-ietf-problem-issue-statement-02, it seems that the only place
where a related problem is discussed in section 2.6.6 (Concentration of
Influence in Too Few Hands). I support this section, as I feel that the
second paragraph describes a real problem. I work with a team of
Japanese IETF participants and they agree that this problem exists for
them.

There was also some discussion in a list thread called "Accomodating ESL
speakers" recently about how non-native speakers have problems
understanding other native and non-native speakers at the IETF meetings.

I think it would good to add a little section about this problem to the
problem-statement, unless it is already too late to do so. (I have ideas
on how to solve these problems, but I will save them until it is time to
provide solutions.)


<SECTION.TITLE>
Hearing and Speaking Problems for Non-Native English speaking
participants.
</SECTION.TITLE>

At IETF meetings, many participants are non-native English speakers.
Many of these participants currently have trouble understanding and
following along with WG discussions when the person at the microphones,
speaks very quickly, with a strong accent, or in a very animated way
that can make it hard for non-native English speakers to understand what
they are saying. Another problem is when speakers use excessive amounts
of colloquial or idiomatic phrases. The meaning of these phrases, such
as "water under the bridge" and "whatcha talking about" and unclear and
can confuse non-native english speakers. A further problem for
non-native english speakers is that the effort to simultaneously read
slides with small letters on a screen and hear and understand the
content of a speech can be too much to handle. Evidence of this is in
the number of non-native English speakers taking photographs of the
projection screen and making private recordings of WG meetings for later
study (making it harder for them to interactively participate during the
WG meeting.)

This problem is amplified when speakers do not speak into the microphone,
or use the microphone improperly. When the microphone is not used, the
sound may be too soft to be comprhensible to non-native speakers even
though it is marginally comprehensible to native english speakers. When
a microphone is not used properly, for example clipping it to a necktie
and then letting it drop, it can add small amounts of feedback to the
sound, making it very hard to understand for non-native English speakers.

There is also a problem with using the Jabber chat system with an
official scribe as a support tool for non-native English speakers. The
benefit of being able to read a summary of the WG meeting in text in
realtime is undeniable, but haveing to constantly look down at a lap-top
(if you have one) while listening to a presentation is difficult and
distracting. Also, very few work groups use the Jabber system, and even
fewer have good scribes.

Another problem is the delay in getting the meeting minutes and
presentation slides published electronically. This process is uneven and
for some WGs, may take more than one month to complete, leaving some
non-native English speakers in the dark on what was said, and what
consensus was reached during the meeting. 

------------------

Does this make sense? I hope this point can get added in some form to
the problem statement.

Thanks, 

Cyrus


Cyrus Shaoul
NTT Advanced Technology Corp.
cyrus at ntt-at.com