About the sign language interpreter for the NYC mayor's updates:
Many people commenting on Ms. Callis’ interpreting seemed unaware how integral facial expression is to ASL. Just as those of us who hear take cues from tone of voice and inflection, those who are Deaf (and there’s a big distinction between Deaf with a capital ‘D” and “deaf”) take cues from facial expression. Facial expressions are a grammatical aspect of the language and can relay more information than the signs themselves. Many hearing people appeared to mistake her animated signing as being theatrical or over the top, when in reality she’s simply conveying the emotional tone of what’s being discussed.
Now imagine doing a four-year degree in computer science where every class, CS or not, is translated by an ASL interpreter - someone is explaining file system directory structures, and hash tables, and MIMD vs SIMD multiprocessing, or physics, or discrete math with English words, while another person is signing them. That's what RIT students, of all degrees, get. Or did... this was a long time ago...
It was kindof wild, for someone like me, who had never been exposed to deaf culture before. I could pass time in class, when I wasn't passed out asleep, trying to figure out how ASL works. That heightened emotional vibe is eye-popping at first, but you figure out what it's doing eventually. I never really got ASL as a language, but the isolated signs usually made perfect sense in context - the signs seemed like obvious matches to the words and phrases that the lecturer was speaking. All I remember these days are the novelty signs : bullshit, tea, tree, fish. pussy) I should have learned it all.
Mrs. lived in the deaf dorms, so was far more exposed to the culture. She knows a lot more ASL than I do.
