The University of Parma is a partner in the European project AVTIA – Audiovisual Translation for Inclusion and Accessibility, led by an international consortium coordinated by the George Emil Palade University of Medicine, Pharmacy, Science, and Technology of Târgu Mureș (Romania). The partnership also includes the University of Lleida (Spain), the University of Belgrade (Serbia), and the Italian company Pixel, an institute specializing in international education and training.

Co-funded by the Erasmus+ program, AVTIA is aimed at both educators and students, with the goal of training future professionals in the field. The University of Parma’s team—coordinated by Professor Michela Canepari from the Department of Humanities, Social Sciences, and Cultural Enterprises—will focus specifically on audio description for blind and visually impaired individuals, ensuring full accessibility to audiovisual media.

With an estimated 90 million blind and visually impaired people and around 190 million deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals in Europe, the need for projects like AVTIA to address inclusion is clear. Inclusion and accessibility must be seen as tools for fostering a sense of belonging within communities, as social and identity-building instruments that align with the EU’s core values of human rights, equality, freedom, dignity, and democracy.