New Signers' Funny Mistakes

Here's a few that I've heard of:

One of the students at my alumni had problems with classifiers when he met I King Jordan years ago. The student meant to sign 'nice to meet you', but signed it with two fingers, not one. Later IKJ asked the dept chair what kind of signs were being taught in ASL 1.

A friend got confused about the sign for 'situation' and shocked the teacher. I told him that the index finger and fist are both classifiers and what the other way was that sign could be interpreted.

Was showing a group of students some signs at a Deaf event, meant to sign 'one month' but moved the index finger of my dominant hand to the back, not down the front. That changed 'one month' to a sign for 'condom'... more fun with classifiers.

Heard that a terp had problems during a geometry class. Tried using another sign instead of drawing out a triangle. The student corrected her after class and got a good laugh.
 
Just got back from my mom's. I was trying to teach her how to text on a number pad of a phone. She was pointing out that some of the letters are nice because you only have to press the key once. She mentioned D as an example, but unfortunately, she raised the wrong finger and flipped off the people behind her out the window. We both spent the next couple of minutes rofl. She really is learning, just a little slow :)
 
ITPjohn said:
Was showing a group of students some signs at a Deaf event, meant to sign 'one month' but moved the index finger of my dominant hand to the back, not down the front. That changed 'one month' to a sign for 'condom'... more fun with classifiers.
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Oops! :giggle:
 
i went to the deaf club saturday night and met a wonderful lady from the lab, she was smoking and i meant to say "i didnt know you smoked" but instead i accidentally said "i didnt know you smoked weed..." whoopsie. :eek3: and then i went to lab on monday and she told people about it. i was so embarrassed.
 
typeingtornado19 said:
i went to the deaf club saturday night and met a wonderful lady from the lab, she was smoking and i meant to say "i didnt know you smoked" but instead i accidentally said "i didnt know you smoked weed..." whoopsie. :eek3: and then i went to lab on monday and she told people about it. i was so embarrassed.
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Nice of her to embarrass you like that. I hate people who think they know it all. :mad:
 
typeingtornado19 said:
she told me it was funny and cute and i guess maybe to her..
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i'm sorry, but that's not what you tell someone when they make a signing mistake. what you do is help them by demonstrating how to make the correct sign. if she said that to me, i would have told her to show me how to make the appropriate sign instead of making a joke about it.
 
Hear Again said:
i'm sorry, but that's not what you tell someone when they make a signing mistake. what you do is help them by demonstrating how to make the correct sign. if she said that to me, i would have told her to show me how to make the appropriate sign instead of making a joke about it.
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she showed me how to do it right, but im just embarrassed.
 
Hear Again said:
that's good. i'm glad she at least showed you how to make the correct sign.

try not to be embarrassed. after all, those kinds of things happen to new signers all the time.
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yeah, but one of the people she told was the head of the ASL department.
 
As some of you may know, I play the accordion and melodica in a small band, even though I'm totally deaf and must rely exclusively on visual cues. Not to be mean, but I think my dad is funny when he tries to sign. Tonight at practice, he came up to me and said (very slowly and stilted-like), "Heather with socks."

I was lost for words. I guess he saw the confusion in my face because he turned to Heather for help translating, and she translated for him. He meant to say, "You and Heather play the same part."
 
typeingtornado19 said:
that is kinda funny. thats an easy mistake to make though.
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it is funny. lol. it's a good thing my sign language instructor had a sense of humor about it though and didn't get offended. and my sign language instructor said the same thing -- that it's a common mistake new signers make all the time.
 
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