Terps

[AquaBlue]

I can only purchase one publication this month. They are Inside Deaf Culture by Carol A. Padden and Tom L. Humphries, a SignNews subscription, or a fingerspelling DVD?

Which one should I choose?

 

[AquaBlue]

Below (sig) is a link to a newly created blog of notes I took when I first started learning sign years ago. Is it accurate?

 

[Anij]

I can only purchase one publication this month. They are Inside Deaf Culture by Carol A. Padden and Tom L. Humphries, a SignNews subscription, or a fingerspelling DVD?

Which one should I choose?

Have you confirmed that you can't get the book and/or DVD via the library system ??? you might have to inter-library loan them... but they should be available

Personally I'd go for Inside Deaf Culture ... (have you read Journey into the DEAF-WORLD ? )

 

[Anij]

Below (sig) is a link to a newly created blog of notes I took when I first started learning sign years ago. Is it accurate?

You could also add DW & DWII

 

[AquaBlue]

Have you confirmed that you can't get the book and/or DVD via the library system ??? you might have to inter-library loan them... but they should be available

Personally I'd go for Inside Deaf Culture ... (have you read Journey into the DEAF-WORLD ? )

The one I have now is For Hearing People.

 

[AquaBlue]

Have you confirmed that you can't get the book and/or DVD via the library system ??? you might have to inter-library loan them... but they should be available

Personally I'd go for Inside Deaf Culture ... (have you read Journey into the DEAF-WORLD ? )

Oops. Sorry.

 

[AquaBlue]

You could also add DW & DWII

??

 

[Anij]

??

Deaf Way & Deaf Way II

 

[AquaBlue]

Mouth Morphemes shapes defined: Word document or Web page.

 

[Etoile]

Mouth Morphemes shapes defined: Word document or Web page.

Wow, that page requires knowledge of ASL linguistics to make any sense. We just covered these NMM's in my linguistics class yesterday, but if I hadn't had that, I would have had no idea what this page was talking about. It's so incomprehensible that I recommend forgetting you ever saw it. Seriously, don't follow anything you read on that page, it is completely wrong if you're a beginning ASL student and you don't know what you're doing.

 

[AquaBlue]

Wow, that page requires knowledge of ASL linguistics to make any sense. We just covered these NMM's in my linguistics class yesterday, but if I hadn't had that, I would have had no idea what this page was talking about. It's so incomprehensible that I recommend forgetting you ever saw it. Seriously, don't follow anything you read on that page, it is completely wrong if you're a beginning ASL student and you don't know what you're doing.

I got that info directly from a video titled Mouth Morphemes in American Sign Language. The page I put up is exactly what is taught in that video. So the video instruction is wrong Etoile?

 

[Anij]

It's not that it's wrong - but you have to walk before you run.
MMs are like going from crawling to signing up for a marathon in a 24hour span.

MM are tricky - and by that I mean that not only do they take practice to "Get right" if your learning , but I also mean that it would be VERY easy to accidentally offend someone who is a native signer (hearing or Deaf) if you just start "doing MM" - they could easily think you're making fun of them - which would be a major faux pas, and could take alone time to explain away ... it's better to have them show you, then to just start "doing them" from what you've seen or read in a book.

no one is going to expect a beginning ASL student to even know about MM - let alone use them - once you become involved more in the language (meaning living language, not just word retention) you'll start adding them ...

I second what Etoile said - it's nice to know they exist - but for the moment put it away for later, and focus on learning culture, and real life interaction skills... all the rest will fall into place.


HTH - remember , we're trying to help ... no need to have extra scrapped knees if you can avoid it right ?

 

[AquaBlue]

It's not that it's wrong - but you have to walk before you run.
MMs are like going from crawling to signing up for a marathon in a 24hour span.

MM are tricky - and by that I mean that not only do they take practice to "Get right" if your learning , but I also mean that it would be VERY easy to accidentally offend someone who is a native signer (hearing or Deaf) if you just start "doing MM" - they could easily think you're making fun of them - which would be a major faux pas, and could take alone time to explain away ... it's better to have them show you, then to just start "doing them" from what you've seen or read in a book.

no one is going to expect a beginning ASL student to even know about MM - let alone use them - once you become involved more in the language (meaning living language, not just word retention) you'll start adding them ...

I second what Etoile said - it's nice to know they exist - but for the moment put it away for later, and focus on learning culture, and real life interaction skills... all the rest will fall into place.


HTH - remember , we're trying to help ... no need to have extra scrapped knees if you can avoid it right ?

I understand what you are saying. I was just curious to learn what MM was that's all. I would not dare to use it in sign communication.

PS. Should I take the page down? I mean it might be useful to others don't you think?

 

[AquaBlue]

Here's a real-life usage of mnemonics. In this case I employed both the Order Method/Link System and the Mnemonic Alphabet. This is a list of words as they appear in my ASL dictionary. With these techniques I can review all the tangible signs anywhere I go (exercising, having lunch or whenever)...they remain in my memory because I associated them to each other and anchored them with animal pegs. Like a mental filing system (organized for when I need to access them). Remember you have to be wildly creative with tons of imagination for this to stick to your brain. Here is my C sign list story.

Not to bring up an old, off-topic, post, but I feel it is important for folks to understand the power of memory. Check out this guy using mnemonic techniques. It's really very simple.

Also I've created a memory tale to recall the sign words from the dictionary (A). Of course I understand that some other signs are used per word but at least I have a starting point. This is the mnemonic story:

The youth abandoned the awful abortion by storming out of the clinic. A fender bender made the opposite driver admit liability to the abrupt accident. Luckily her body did not absorb the addictive acid given her at the clinic. On television she watched the opposing party analyze the annual presidential address with disfavor. The committee appointed an able-bodied adult to oversee foreign affairs. During the following argument, the Republicans possessed an absolute advantage over the Democrats. But the nominee himself continued to attack his ambitious agenda with fervor. The board accepted the absurd advice to follow public opinion and fiscally arrive at an average amount per year. The congressional news made the Supreme Court justices act youthful in their advanced age. One of those wise men walked the corridors and thought how history applauded the adroit ancestors for all they had given a nation. The man told his son, standing beside him, that to ascend in life, one must be aware of the big picture and pay attention to the details before anything else. On the steps of the court building a mob of protesters cursed the bill against charging adulterous individuals with judicial punishment. Then, alas, the people’s anger ceased and the remains of the day kept calm. That evening, among the alumnus class of judges, the speaking member accidentally announced the award for judge-of-the-year to the wrong member. The following day, a lawless thief approached the judges with an ashamed attitude before fainting on the spot. After the ambulance left, a professors booming voice echoed the halls of justice. Above the air conditioning unit was a small window that acoustically transmitted the voices of an adjacent University’s math department. In class, the teacher gave another cryptic answer to a simple problem before a group of bedazzled pupils. One courageous soul, unable to add the awkward arithmetic formula, raised a hand in query. Red faced, the instructor ignored the question and continued preaching about Algebraic equations to the room.

Outside, in the cold wind of the night, a car alarm blared again and again before the police were summoned. As a police report was being drawn, an appreciative officer viewed a young woman with an attractive appearance walking nearby. All night long and all morning the next day, the city rested.

But as the night approached trouble was brewing and it lasted all night with activity across the other side of the city. In a banquet hall invitees had to apply for admission to the anniversary gala. But the front door bouncer and his assistant told the audience they also needed an appointment to enter. They had to send people away from the assembly and sadly most could not attend the event. It was an awkward situation for the hosts, but they had absolute authority to turn people away. The aggravated people started to accumulate; annoyed at the way they were treated. The guests of the gala were astonished at the size of the protest and they avoided the riot as best they could while existing. They mob began throwing rotten apples at the banquet hall; an apple almost striking the host while more upset people rushed in from around the corner- setting fires and adding to the chaos. A fire truck automatically arrived with a Dalmatian atop the red engine machine. As the area was cleared of the wildly mad people, the driver tried to call in a report, but no one answered- the antenna was out. All day the men fought the flames. The trucks emergency alarm was blaring; and some firefighters were afraid they would get hurt. After the inferno, the fire men discover that, among the guests, some were deceased in the ruins. The autopsy showed they passed from smoke inhalation.

 

[RDC_girl]

It's not that it's wrong - but you have to walk before you run.
MMs are like going from crawling to signing up for a marathon in a 24hour span.

MM are tricky - and by that I mean that not only do they take practice to "Get right" if your learning , but I also mean that it would be VERY easy to accidentally offend someone who is a native signer (hearing or Deaf) if you just start "doing MM" - they could easily think you're making fun of them - which would be a major faux pas, and could take alone time to explain away ... it's better to have them show you, then to just start "doing them" from what you've seen or read in a book.

no one is going to expect a beginning ASL student to even know about MM - let alone use them - once you become involved more in the language (meaning living language, not just word retention) you'll start adding them ...

I second what Etoile said - it's nice to know they exist - but for the moment put it away for later, and focus on learning culture, and real life interaction skills... all the rest will fall into place.


HTH - remember , we're trying to help ... no need to have extra scrapped knees if you can avoid it right ?

couldnt agree more

 

[Anij]

Not to bring up an old, off-topic, post, but I feel it is important for folks to understand the power of memory. Check out this guy using mnemonic techniques. It's really very simple.

uh huh ... this would be much easier if I actually knew what he was saying... there's no CC/OC/ST ??

That being said I "get the idea" ... but this seems like a "memory game" ... but memory games are temporary ... I still can't imagine how I'd learn a foreign language by matching all the words to another language though ??? it seems complicated since you'd be constantly superimposing one language on the next and vise versa?

 

[AquaBlue]

I feel so discouraged. But I will not let anyone stop my progress.

 

[Anij]

Why do you feel discouraged AB ??


I didn't mean to be discouraging about the mnemonics ... I just personally think for me it wouldn't work ... if you can make it work for you that's great.

You mentioned earlier that you speak english and spanish right ? ... just keep in mind that learning ASL is like learning those languages (adding vocabulary, increasing fluency). So try to do the same thing you do to increase your english and spanish ... does that make sense ???

Don't feel discouraged !!!

p.s. my comment on the video you linked to was that there was no close captioning/open captions/transcripts ... so I had to do a lot of guessing about what was going on ...

 

[AquaBlue]

Are the definitions below accurate? Please omit/add the wording if you feel it is needed. I would think that ASL is the more accepted communication method- am I right?

Deaf Communication Methods:

• Simultaneous Communication (SimCom)
• Signing Essential English (SEE)
• Signing Exact English (SEE II)
• Cued Speech
• Pidgin Signed English (PSE)
• Total Communication
• Signed English
• Manually Coded English (MCE)

Simultaneous Communication (SimCom) means using both sign and speech at the same time, while total communication means using all means of communication available. Total communication is the using any means of communication - sign language, voice, fingerspelling, lipreading, amplification, writing, gesture, visual imagery (pictures). Although some schools/programs for the deaf use ASL and English, the majority of educational programs for the deaf use total communication.

Pidgin Signed English (PSE) contains a mix of ASL rules and English grammar. The signs used in PSE come from ASL, but they are not used in an ASL-ish way, but rather in a more normal English pattern. PSE speakers also may not utilize certain elements of the English language such as the words "the," etc., to speed up communication.

Signing Essential English (SEE) is a form of communication/instruction in which signs are used in exact English word order, with some additional signs for conventions such as the "ing" word ending. Over the years, SEE combined with ASL to create Pidgin Signed English (or PSE).

Cued Speech is not a language, but a means of making spoken language visible. The hand movements used in cued speech represent sounds (phonemes), making it easier to visually learn what sounds are. This flexibility has enabled cued speech to be used in several countries and languages.

Seeing Essential English (SEE I) and Signed Exact English (SEE II): The idea behind these systems is that Deaf children will learn English better if they are exposed, visually through signs, to the grammatical features of English. The base signs are borrowed from ASL, but the various inflections are not used. A lot of inialitization is used. Additionally, a lot of "grammatical markers" for number, person, tense, etc. are added and strict English word order is used. Every article, conjunction, auxiliary verb, etc. is signed. Also, English homophones are represented by identical signs (i.e. the same sign is used for the noun fish and the verb fish, which have different ASL signs). The difference between the two is minor - the principle one being that in SEE II ASL signs for compound words (like butterfly) are used, where the two signs representing the separate English words are used in SEE I. SEE-1 and SEE-2 are signing systems rather than languages on their own. Therefore some people claim that exposure to them does not provide children with the complete linguistic access, which is needed to internalize whole language.

Signed English is similar to SEE-1 and SEE-2, but a little simpler. It is primarily intended, by my understanding, for use with young children and the intellectually limited. It uses English word order, but fewer grammatical markers than the SEE systems - it has fourteen grammatical morphemes (e.g. plural /s/, poessive /s/, /ed/, /ly/, /er/, /ing/, /est/.

Manually Coded English (MCE) is not a particular method - it is a general description of all the system that attempt to reflect English grammar, etc on the hands.

 

[Interpretrator]

Also I've created a memory tale to recall the sign words from the dictionary (A).

You would do much, much better to create a memory tale in ASL rather than English, if I understand correctly what you've done here. You need to start creating an "ASL brain" instead of having every sign match up to an English word. That will cause you more problems than anything else as an interpreter or even just a signer.

I would think that ASL is the more accepted communication method- am I right?

No, because it completely depends on what community you're talking about. There are plenty of deaf people for whom ASL is not accepted very much at all.