Understanding Unusual Words

Intent of Unusual Words

Certain disabilities make it difficult to understand nonliteral word usage and specialized words or usage. Certain disabilities make it difficult to understand figurative language or specialized usage. Providing such mechanisms is vital for these audiences. Specialized information intended for non-specialist readers is encouraged to satisfy this Success Criterion, even when claiming only Single-A or Double-A conformance.

Benefits of Unusual Words

This Success Criterion may help people with cognitive, language and learning disabilities who:

have difficulty decoding words
have difficulty understanding words and phrases
have difficulty using context to aid understanding

It would also help people with visual disabilities who:

lose context when zoomed-in with a screen magnifier

Examples of Unusual Words

Text that includes a definition for a word used in an unusual way: Organize the list or "cascade" of dictionaries and other resources so that the definition search will find the intended definitions instead of displaying definitions from other sources in the "cascade." (The "cascade" lists the dictionaries and other reference materials in the order most likely to bring up the right definition. This controls the order to follow when searching for definitions.)
Including definitions in the glossary: WCAG 2.0 uses the word "text" in a specific way. Thus, when the word "text" is used within WCAG 2.0 it is linked to the definition of "text" provided in a glossary within the same Web page.
The specific definition of a word is provided at the bottom of the page: The internal link from the word to the corresponding definition is also provided within the page.

Resources for Unusual Words

The inclusion of a product or vendor name in the list below does not constitute an endorsement by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines Working Group or the Web Accessibility Initiative of the World Wide Web Consortium. This list is provided simply for convenience and to give users an idea of what resources may be available

Free bilingual dictionaries for a number of languages are available from the Freedict.org Web site. The dictionaries are of uneven quality and size as noted on the site. Retrieved 9 April 2005.
The WorldStar Free Dictionaries, Translators and Search Engines site provides access to free on-line dictionaries and search engines in many languages. Retrieved 18 November 2005.
More dictionaries are at your dictionary, freelang.com (in English, Spanish and French!) and many other places.

Techniques for Unusual Words

Sufficient Techniques for Unusual Words

Situation A: If the word or phrase has a unique meaning within the Web page:

Providing the definition of a word or phrase used in an unusual or restricted way for the first occurrence of the word or phrase in a Web page using one of the following techniques:
- Linking to definitions
  - Using definition lists
- Using inline definitions
  - Using the dfn element to identify the defining instance of a word
Providing the definition of a word or phrase used in an unusual or restricted way for each occurrence of the word or phrase in a Web page using one of the following techniques:

Situation B: If the word or phrase means different things within the same Web page:

Providing the definition of a word or phrase used in an unusual or restricted way for each occurrence of the word or phrase in a Web page using one of the following techniques:
- Linking to definitions
  - Using definition lists
- Using inline definitions
  - Using the dfn element to identify the defining instance of a word