Fellow Students: Do You Get "Stuck" In ASL?

breelligerent

breelligerent

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Hey guys! :wave:

Do any of you do this, too? When I'm drunk or really upset I get "stuck" in ASL mode; it's like English is gone and ASL is the only way I can express myself. It doesn't happen very frequently but it's interesting and frustrating when it does.

Some of my friends who know other languages (Persian, French, etc) say it happens to them but I'm curious if other ASL students have experienced this.
 
hmm look likes French LQS? hmm translate to hard say understand! difficult to French is pretty complication!
 
No, but if you do a search, I think you will see quite a few hearing ASL students who say this has happened to them.
 
Bottesini said:
No, but if you do a search, I think you will see quite a few hearing ASL students who say this has happened to them.
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I apologize, Bottensini. I wasn't trying to repeat what others had already stated! I'm happy it's not just me.
 
I can be equally pissed off in both languages. I do not get "stuck" in one. If you're hearing... you're getting a verbal assault from me. If you're Deaf, then the assault is going to be visual. If you speak neither English nor ASL... no worries... whatever language you speak... you're gonna know I'm pissed.
 
breelligerent said:
I apologize, Bottensini. I wasn't trying to repeat what others had already stated! I'm happy it's not just me.
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No, that's ok. I just meant quite a few students had said it before, so it apparently isn't uncommon.
 
I'm guessing the mind does interesting things with languages. When I was studying German in high school, I would dream in German sometimes. Also would start using German words in conversation without realizing it. It was weird and interesting at the same time.

Maybe something similar is happening with you and ASL.
 
DeafBadger said:
I'm guessing the mind does interesting things with languages. When I was studying German in high school, I would dream in German sometimes. Also would start using German words in conversation without realizing it. It was weird and interesting at the same time.

Maybe something similar is happening with you and ASL.
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I dream in ASL sometimes, too. Isn't it a fun feeling, dreaming in another language? I wish I could actually sign as well as my dream-self can sign. Maybe that and getting "stuck" is just a language student thing?
 
Sometimes after an intense/stimulating day of classes I come home thinking in "ASL mode"... this is usually when I want to do any outstanding video assignments.

I don't get 'stuck' in ASL so much as I have good days and bad days.
 
I was doing an activity in Latin and I couldn't think of the word so I signed it instead. And then today in history we had to fill a sheet out and I started signing to myself.
 
A Mouth Full

I have a habit of signing to people when my mouth is full. Im ADD so my thoughts come quickly and so do my hands! Most the time I get blank stares but every once in a while I get a reply! :laugh2:
 
That's happened only a few times to me, more often in Spanish though. I learned Spanish first so when I was first learning ASL my mind would first translate the word into Spanish, then into ASL. So while signing I was thinking in Spanish. Not so much anymore as I haven't really had to use my Spanish in a while.
 
I think it may have to do with a strong distinction between what is "native language" and what is a "foreign language".

Another example of this phenomenon is when students who are trying to pick up a third language keep thinking of their second language instead, such as: an English speaker student who has learned French and is trying to learn German will keep thinking of French words, or will experience some confusion between what words are French and what words are German.

I used to be like this, but after I started studying my 4th language, it stopped.. All the languages seem foreign to me. I do tend to become more "creative" when my English words when I'm drinking though (I might call a chair a "sitting table" or a "Pole Plant" instead of a "tree trunk"), or my grammar gets all messed up ("I am bed go sleep").


OR it simply may be that there's less holding you back, you're drunk so you don't care if you may appear like a fool to others, so it's more fun to use the foreign language. Even among non-language learners, they seem to enjoy repeating weird-sounding words to each other for amusement, such as foreign beer names.
 
shimo said:
Another example of this phenomenon is when students who are trying to pick up a third language keep thinking of their second language instead,
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My daughter relayed a story about this to me. During her ASL (3rd language) comprehension test, she was writing the answers down in German (2nd language) instead of English (1st language). Fortunately she caught it before she handed it in to her ASL prof.
 
All of these things are things that have happened to me (except answering tests in the wrong language). I'm finding that as I pick up more and more languages, they don't mix up with each other. Mixing in with English is fair game for all languages though. ASL, specifically, will often happen simultaneously without me even realizing I'm doing it. My mother pointed it out to me.
 
I sometimes accidentally answer people in ASL. I do it on purpose sometimes, because I prefer signing over speaking, but sometimes I finish answering what ever they asked or said and they're looking at me like "Wut" and it takes me a moment to realize what I did.

As far as getting stuck in a language, besides my english accent, the only other time I got stuck in a language was German, and it was when I was on a special drug that starts with K. It was bizzare as I hadn't spoken or studied German in over 2 years at the time, but I was speaking fluent German, and could not, for the life of me, get out a single English word. I even had a perfect accent.
 
I don't necessarily get stuck in any one language... But when I get angry they all kind of meld together. I am naturally very expressive and emotional, so even when I am not signing... I still kind of do.

And when I am angry vocal words turn into gibberish. Which for me is a meld of English, Latin, Spanish, and Russian. And had I learned more German, that would probably be put into the mess as well.
 
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