Dans le cadre de la nouvelle société de l'information multimédia et communicante, cette thèse propose des contributions méthodologiques et techniques relatives à la représentation, l'animation et la transmission des objets virtuels.<br /><br />Les méthodes existantes sont analysées de façon comparée et les performances des standards multimédias actuels évaluées en termes de réalisme d'animation et de débit de transmission. Pour surmonter les limitations mises en évidence, un nouveau cadre de modélisation et d'animation de personnages virtuels est proposé. Le modèle SMS (Skeleton, Muscle and Skin), fondé sur le concept de contrôleur de déformation d'un maillage, est introduit et sa formulation mathématique développée. Le graphe de scène 3D et le flux de compression associés à SMS sont décrits. L'approche SMS est évaluée dans le cadre d'un nouveau service de transmission télévisuelle d'un signeur virtuel destinés aux déficients auditifs. Le modèle SMS a été promu dans le standard MPEG-4 version 5.

The current study examined the role of two different methods of sign presentation on signed and spoken language acquisition of toddlers aged two to four years with Down syndrome (DS). The aim of this study was to determine if a method commonly used by native signers/Deaf mothers (referred to in this study as signing to maintain joint attention (SMJA)) was more effective than the method commonly used by hearing mothers and speech-language pathologists (referred to in this study as the triangular method of signing). Both methods were compared in a within-subject design for effects on the participants’ total number of words signed and/or spoken, unique words signed and/or spoken, and parent report of novel word acquisition. Although the sample size was small, clear trends were seen suggesting SMJA may result in greater increases in early language acquisition for toddlers with DS. These results are consistent with considerations regarding the DS phenotype. The use of signing takes advantage of strengths in gesture and visual-spatial short-term memory. More specifically, the use of SMJA addresses weaknesses in attentional capacity by allowing the child to attend to the object and referent without disruption, thereby maintaining joint attention and supporting language acquisition.

The aim of this dissertation project is to describe the ways people experience parenting a deaf child who uses a cochlear implant. Within a framework of social science studies of disability this is done by combining approaches using ethnographic and netnographic methods of participant observation with an interview study. Interpretations are based on the first-person perspective of 19 parents against the background of their related networks of social encounters of everyday life. The netnographic study is presented in composite conversations building on exchanges in 10 social media groups, which investigates the parents’ meaning-making in interaction with other parents with similar living conditions. Ideas about language, technology, deafness, disability, and activism are explored. Lived parenting refers to the analysis of accounts of orientation and what 'gets done' in respect to these ideas in situations where people utilize the senses differently. In the results, dilemmas surrounding language, communication and cochlear implantation are identified and explored. The dilemmas extend from if and when to implant, to decisions about communication modes, intervention approaches, and schools. An important finding concerns the parents’ orientations within the dilemmas, where most parents come up against antagonistic conflicts. There are also examples found of a development process in parenting based on lived, in-depth experiences of disability and uncertainty which enables parents to transcend the conflictive atmosphere. This process is analyzed in terms of a social literacy of dis/ability.

In this work, we will present several contributions towards automatic recognition of BSL signs from continuous signing video sequences. Specifically, we will address three main points: (i) automatic detection and tracking of the hands using a generative model of the image; (ii) automatic learning of signs from TV broadcasts using the supervisory information available from subtitles; and (iii) generalisation given sign examples from one signer to recognition of signs from different signers. Our source material consists of many hours of video with continuous signing and corresponding subtitles recorded from BBC digital television. This is very challenging material for a number of reasons, including self-occlusions of the signer, self-shadowing, blur due to the speed of motion, and in particular the changing background. Knowledge of the hand position and hand shape is a pre-requisite for automatic sign language recognition. We cast the problem of detecting and tracking the hands as inference in a generative model of the image, and propose a complete model which accounts for the positions and self-occlusions of the arms. Reasonable configurations are obtained by efficiently sampling from a pictorial structure proposal distribution. The results using our method exceed the state-of-the-art for the length and stability of continuous limb tracking. Previous research in sign language recognition has typically required manual training data to be generated for each sign, e.g. a signer performing each sign in controlled conditions - a time-consuming and expensive procedure. We show that for a given signer, a large number of BSL signs can be learned automatically from TV broadcasts using the supervisory information available from subtitles broadcast simultaneously with the signing. We achieve this by modelling the problem as one of multiple instance learning. In this way we are able to extract the sign of interest from hours of signing footage, despite the very weak and "noisy" supervision from the subtitles. Lastly, we show that automatic recognition of signs can be extended to multiple signers. Using automatically extracted examples from a single signer, we train discriminative classifiers and show that these can successfully classify and localise signs in new signers. This demonstrates that the descriptor we extract for each frame (i.e. hand position, hand shape, and hand orientation) generalises between different signers.

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

This diploma thesis deals with semiotics (the study of signs) in audiovisual commercials. In its theoretical part it is engaged in the field of semiotics. At this point it investigates mainly the problems of a sign, the key element of semiotics. Furthermore it follows the development of the knowledge acquired through semiotics to other areas of research which help to detect the meanings of communication. Those areas are the levels of signification, thus denotation, connotation and myth. This chapter especially draws on Roland Barthes and his publication Mythology, which inspired this diploma thesis. The theoretical part continues by explanation of the main problems of commercial. It gives out the definition of a commercial, explains commercial as a communication process, but also depicts the strategies used in a commercial. Furthermore it tells about conceptualization of a commercial by Jean Baudrillard. Since the thesis analyses audiovisual commercials, it also deals with the sound and picture of a commercial. In its practical part the thesis continues with the analysis of seven audiovisual cosmetic products' commercials itself. Semiotic analysis is done according to Barthes' model. The thesis describes each commercial's story, scene, and sounds, and then analyses those elements as well as the...

The thesis focuses on how different languages influence spatial cognition of their speakers, i. e., whether and how the differences in spatial language (linguistic representation of perspective, location, spatial scenes etc.) affect the non-linguistic spatial reasoning (orientation, spatial memory etc.). This issue has for a long time been a part of the studies of the relation between language and thouhgt under the flag of so called Sapir-Whorf hypothesis/Hypothesis of linguistic relativity. In the first half of the theoretical part of the thesis, I attempt to summarize the history of the concept of linguistic relativity since 1950s and to revise some critical claims about linguistic relativity by re-reading Whorf's works (chapter 2). The second half of the theoretical part (chapter 3) focuses in particular on the research of the interrelations between spatial thought and language. In section 3.1, I make a brief note on the notion of space in terms of cognitive linguistics. Section 3.2 provides an selective overview of the previous research of the crosslinguic spatial-cognitive diversity. Sections 3.3 and 3.4 connect the theoretical and the empirical part of the thesis. The research itself is presented in the chapter 4. It experimentally tests the hypothesis, that the language-specific...

This thesis is concerned with investigation adapted texts from literature for children and youth specifically adapted for deaf children. The aim of the work is to compare the final quality edited version of particular book for children and youth based on critical analysis, to assess whether the adapted texts respect the settled publishing rules and do not harm original version together with they are really more accessible for deaf children's readers. Adapted texts for deaf children are generally criticized and deemed unsuccessfull. This thesis seeks for an objective reflection of these books and their effectiveness and to submit possible proposals for their improvement. The first chapters are focused on editorial practice and the types of treatements that are performed in books for children and youth followed by a description of the arrangements for deaf children. Critical analysis is subjected to literary work Honzíkova cesta by Bohumil Říha adapted by Jana Purová. The critical analysis is founded on comparision between readability index of original version and adapted version, and study of the first chapter according to specialized literature. All adaptations are recorded and categorized, one segment is analyzed in details. Key words: literature for children and youth, adaptation, edition,...

This thesis focuses on the description of the three basic aspects of the word order in the Czech Sign Language in the contrast with the spoken Czech Language. On the basis of the empiric research the prototypical word order is described for the declarative sentences, topicalization and the order of the signs in the nominal phrase in the Czech Sign Language. The research consists of the video material recording 15 native speakers of the Czech Sign Language of various age. The results are compared with the situation in the three other sign languages - the American, British and Australian Sign Language. The part of this piece of work is a DVD containing particular excerpted examples of utterances, which the deaf signers have used in the research.

Cette thèse se situe dans le domaine de la combinatoire algébrique. Autrement dit, l'idée est d'utiliser des structures algébriques, en l'occurence des algèbres de Hopf combinatoires, pour mieux étudier et comprendre les objets combinatoires ainsi que des algorithmes de composition et de décomposition agissant sur ces objets. Ce travail de recherche repose sur la construction et l'étude de structure algébrique sur des objets combinatoires généralisant les permutations. Après avoir rappelé le contexte et les notations des différents objets intervenant dans cette recherche, nous proposons dans la seconde partie l'étude de l'algèbre de Hopf introduite par Aguiar et Orellana indexée par les permutations de blocs uniformes. En se focalisant sur une description de ces objets via d'autres bien connus, les permutations et les partitions d'ensembles, nous proposons une réalisation polynomiale et une étude plus simple de cette algèbre. La troisième partie étudie une deuxième généralisation en interprétant les permutations comme des matrices. Nous définissons et étudions alors des familles de matrices carrées sur lesquelles nous définissons des algorithmes de composition et de décomposition. La quatrième partie traite des matrices à signes alternants. Après avoir définie l'algèbre de Hopf sur ces matrices, nous étudions des statistiques et le comportement de la structure algébrique vis-à-vis de ces statistiques. Tous ces chapitres s'appuient fortement sur l'exploration informatique, et fait l'objet d'une implémentation utilisant le logiciel Sage. Ce dernier chapitre est consacré à la découverte et la manipulation de structures algébriques sur Sage. Nous terminons en expliquant les améliorations apportées pour l'étude de structure algébrique au travers du logiciel Sage / This thesis is in the field of algebraic combinatorics. In other words, the idea is to use algebraic structures, in this case of combinatorial Hopf algebras, to better study and understand the combinatorial objects and algorithms for composition and decomposition about these objects. This research is based on the construction and study of algebraic structure of combinatorial objects generalizing permutations. After recalling the background and notations of various objects involved in this research, we propose, in the second part, the study of the Hopf algebra introduced by Aguiar and Orellana based on uniform block permutations. By focusing on a description of these objects via well-known objects, permutations and set partitions, we propose a polynomial realization and an easier study of this algebra. The third section considers a second generalization interpreting permutations as matrices. We define and then study the families of square matrices on which we define algorithms for composition and decomposition. The fourth part deals with alternating sign matrices. Having defined the Hopf algebra of these matrices, we study the statistics and the behavior of the algebraic structure with these statistics. All these chapters rely heavily on computer exploration, and is the subject of an implementation using Sage software. This last chapter is dedicated to the discovery and manipulation of algebraic structures on Sage. We conclude by explaining the improvements to the study of algebraic structure through the Sage software