Christian Vogler

Dr. Christian Vogler is a professor in the Communication Studies program. He also is the director of the Technology Access Program research group. He leads and co-leads multiple research grants that focus on accessible technology for the deaf and hard of hearing. Topics include video relay services, captioned telephone services, closed captions for TV and streaming video, better consumer control over hearing aids and cochlear implants, next-generation smart home alerting systems, and accessibility of voice interfaces like Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. He collaborates closely with Dr. Raja Kushlanagar at the IT program, Dr. Patrick Boudreault at Interpreting, and HSLS faculty.

In his role, he also is involved in bringing consumers, industry, and policymakers together on accessibility issues, advocating for a deaf/hard of hearing perspective, as well as developing prototype technologies for improving the accessibility of such systems. Prior to joining TAP in 2011, Dr. Vogler has worked on various research projects related to sign language recognition and facial expression recognition from video at the University of Pennsylvania; the Gallaudet Research Institute; UNICAMP in Campinas, Brazil; and the Institute for Language and Speech Processing in Athens, Greece.

Dr. Vogler passionately believes that deaf and hard of hearing people have only scratched the surface of what is possible with the internet and mobile communication technologies, and that the most exciting technological developments are still to come. He always is on the lookout for students who are interested in communication technologies and want to make a difference in how we use them.