Same Language Subtitling

Same Language Subtitling puts subtitles on movies and TV programs in the language spoken or sung on-screen. Karaoke-style coloring of the text in real time is usually included. See PlanetRead research links on SLS.

"We commissioned an independent five-state study by Nielsen’s ORG-Centre for Social Research...

"The literacy rate, of our relatively large sample of over 23,000 individuals from five states (aged 7 and above) turned out to be 68%, using the census method. Yet, by the paragraph reading method, the literacy rate was, at best, 55%. At best, because only 17% were fully literate and 38% “early-literate” – people with beginning alphabetic knowledge who were unable to read the simple paragraph.

"...India can be estimated to have 146 million fully-literate, 327 million early-literate, and 387 million non-literate people [based on 2001 census total of 860 million people].

"We looked at the impact of SLS on school children who were illiterate in 2002, when SLS began on Rangoli [a nationally telecast program of Hindi film songs using SLS]. Purely from schooling, without any exposure to SLS, we found that 24% children became good readers after 5 years of schooling. But in the group of school children that was exposed to SLS, 56% became good readers.

"Conversely, in the no-SLS group, 25% children remained illiterate even after 5 years of schooling. While in the SLS group, 12% remained illiterate.

"The impact of SLS on children is also found in adult illiterates, although less pronounced. After 5 years, while only 3% illiterate adults became good readers in the no-SLS group, in the SLS group, 12% became good readers.

"No-SLS group: 83% illiterate adults remained illiterate. SLS group: 68% adults remained illiterate after 5 years of exposure to SLS.

There is a project to put text-to-speech, icon-to-speech and karaoke-style coloring in all Sugar activities.