A group of deaf people moved into a house across the street rom us a couple month ago. A couple days ago, I had a conversation with one of the guys, Francis, for a half-an-hour or so. Said conversation was carried out by writing notes and passing them back-and-forth. Anyway, Francis seems like a nice guy (insofar as I could tell from a relatively short conversation), and when he invited me over to watch movies Saturday afternoon, I accepted.
Now, the problem I have here is that I had a terrible time wading through Francis’ written syntax. I’m assuming that he’s using a sign language syntax? What can I do to understand Francis a little more regularly?
And help me with etiquette here: should I bring my own pencil and notepad? How does one politely converse, in a written way, while watching a movie? Should I watch with the sound off?
I’d ask Francis if he uses sign language, or, if you’ve seen him using it with his deaf friends, ask what type it is. Let him know that you’d like to learn it. I can’t imagine how taking an interest in learning how to communicate better could be construed as rude. (Deaf dopers, correct me if I’m wrong!)
Similarly, I don’t think they’d expect you to watch with the sound off. Blind people are taught to keep lights on for their sighted friends, and this situation seems parallel. I imagine they’ll be using CC to get the dialogue and such, so you’ll be on even ground for following the movie.
OK - I’ll try to post again…first time it went to no man’s land.
I agree with Scarlett67. Ask them what type of Sign Language, if any, they use. One could be surprised at how many different types there are! Also, from my numerous past experiences they are more than happy to share their knowledge of their language with you. Its also fun to learn new things.
Another thing, though it won’t help by this week, you could do is pick up the book “The Joy of Sign Language”. Its a beginners book and makes learning ASL easy and fun.
Any approach you take make sure to enjoy the new friendships you are making!!!
Zut The primary sign languages used in the U.S. is ASL (American Sign Language), which is the most common, and Signed English.
Signed English is more or less set up like speech, but it tends to be a greater pain in the butt for the deaf (because you start signing suffixes for tense and such – imagine not just having to sign “swim”, but also needing to sign “–ing” to get “swimming.”) IIRC sometimes it also inlcudes punctuation (but I could be wrong on that). Signed English tends to be more cumbersome and unnecessarily complicated because it is structured more for the hearing than the deaf. I know some children who were forced to learn it in school and they just got really stressed out.
ASL follows a much more logical rhythm and scheme for the deaf. The grammar structure and syntax is often quite different than speech. Past and future tenses may not be obvious to the hearing person. So “I swam” may turn into something more like “I swim yesterday I.” (Often you’ll find that the subject of a sentence is repeated at the end.)
Most libraries have books about basic ASL that will help you sort out the grammar structure and syntax. It’s pretty easy, once you get the hang of it.
The part I find tough – just like in speech, when we get lazy we mumble and use slang – is when people sign really casually. Think “mumbling” with your hands. If I saw an instructor sign it was fine, but if I saw a pair of deaf guys signing away, I couldn’t decipher it at all because the gestures weren’t clear to me. It was like eavesdropping on a pair of teenagers who use a lot of slang.
I had a deaf neighbor in a “rooming-house” type situation and we had more fun and more laughs than anybody who has ever lived near me. (Walking nearly naked across the hall to the bathroom in the middle of the night, only to discover he had about a dozen friends over and they were all sitting quite quietly in the next room and watched me wander by.)
I liken my communication technique with him as that of being with a hearing friend in the front row of a rock concert, sitting by the speaker. Moving lips clearly and using hand signals - worked wonders for simple questions. Then as we got to know each other better, I learned a lot of “short-cut” hand signals, and within a few weeks, we were doing a damn good job of having neighborly-type conversations about work, etc.
It would not have been enough to discuss politics or quantum theory, but I liked sitting down with him every once in awhile and “chatting”. And like I said, we certainly did laugh a lot. And if there was something that just wasn’t getting across - pen and paper cleared it up quick.
It was only a few months, but it was a great experience.
BTW…two deaf people in the next room, having sex, is NOT quiet.
I will leave it at that.
Is this america? Then they speak american sign language (ASL).
They are trying to translate ASL into written english, this is called GLOSS.
You may not be able to understand it, but give it a shot. If you have more questions let meknow & just post what they are saying & I can translate it for ya.
Sure, bring your own paper & pen if you want. Expect captions on the videos.