If you really love an artwork or drawing or cartoon writing an image description of it is an excellent way to connect with it more. You could just say "I love this it's amazing" but if you describe it so that someone else can see exactly why you like it so much?

I don't know you really "see" it then in a way that's deeper.

My grade 5 students make animations and we have a "showcase" where we watch them all together. I write descriptions of each animation and read the description before we watch it. For some reason they LOVE this. Once I skipped reading the description and there was nearly a riot.

The descriptions are very literal. I want the students to know what parts of their idea were clearly communicated in their animations. I didn't expect them to be so popular, though!

For my students and when trying to write alt text online I try to be objective. I think this is important even though it's also important to recognize that it's impossible to be perfectly objective.

All descriptions say something about the perspective of the person writing the text. But, the challenge is to write descriptions that will meet with wide agreement from many different kinds of viewers. So, it's a very useful critical process.

I may ask older students to do this for each other.

I worry that when we say "nothing can be objective" some people take it to mean "it's not worth trying to be objective"

Taking the best objective stance you can is massively useful. It forces you to not just think about what you are thinking and seeing but what other people may think and see. And to look for, in the intersection of all of those perspectives, what is really *there.*

It's because nothing can ever be perfectly objective that's it's all the more important to make this effort.

The other thing I worry about is that my attention and excitement for crafting "The Best Possible Image Description" may intimidate people from just slapping on some alt text ... it's not that big of a deal. It's important that you do it more than doing it perfectly. And often I'm tired and just write something very basic. Because, otherwise the post is a mess and would make no sense. You don't want that do you?

I'm just saying, don't get uptight and intimidated and NOT do the alt text at all.

For my students and when trying to write alt text online I try to be objective. I think this is important even though it's also important to recognize that it's impossible to be perfectly objective.

All descriptions say something about the perspective of the person writing the text. But, the challenge is to write descriptions that will meet with wide agreement from many different kinds of viewers. So, it's a very useful critical process.

I may ask older students to do this for each other.

@futurebird I do find it difficult to not add my own slant to #alttext at times, especially if it’s a scenic photo I have taken because I was capturing something I found specifically beautiful, notable, etc.

I appreciate what you are saying. And am curious about the perspective of folk who use alt text- do they want it to be purely descriptive or do they enjoy experiencing it with the added personal flavour…?

I worry that when we say "nothing can be objective" some people take it to mean "it's not worth trying to be objective"

Taking the best objective stance you can is massively useful. It forces you to not just think about what you are thinking and seeing but what other people may think and see. And to look for, in the intersection of all of those perspectives, what is really *there.*

It's because nothing can ever be perfectly objective that's it's all the more important to make this effort.

@futurebird

It’s this attitude - everyone is biased, nothing is truly objective, so we don’t need to try - that is at the heart of the rejection of reality in the radical right. Because correcting for bias is work, it’s hard to be objective, and it’s often very uncomfortable to see the world and our place in it as it truly is.

That it’s so tempting and comforting to dive into our bias cocoons is precisely why it matters to do the hard work.