Comments on: A Salute to Big Thinking Sign Language Interpreters

By: Deaf Interpreters: In the Blind Spot of the Sign Language Interpreting Profession? | Street Leverage

Wed, 06 Mar 2013 15:28:36 +0000

[...] think these are some of the things that Nigel Howard addressed in his StreetLeverage - Live presentation in November of 2012, bringing up “the [...]

By: Laura

Laura — Thu, 03 Jan 2013 03:33:37 +0000

Peggy, Thank you for your comments. Yes, you are right, sigh, instead of saying to the teacher, “Can I have her sign this to me and I will circle words she doesn’t know”, I should have waited and discussed the idea first with the deaf person. Crap! I really see that thirty five years of interpreting and seeing this kind of thing happen over and over is wearing on me. I want it fixed now! I want deaf adults to have teachers who know how to teach deaf people in their own language.

By: Evelyn

Evelyn — Sat, 01 Dec 2012 01:09:08 +0000

I want to say thank you in advance for offering videos of the presentations. I am absolutely looking forward to it.

I also want to thank Laura and Peggy for their comments. Laura, I completely agree with the feeling of relief over having the CPC, yet also feeling anxiety over the grey areas. We all are often put in situations, often while working alone, where we have to make decisions and hope they were the best choice we could have made. Yet sadly we don’t often have the opportunity to talk about our work with other professionals in a safe and confidential environment. This is why I am a huge fan and advocate of professional supervision. I know it is currently offered to students at NTIDs ASLIE program, and I know the idea has been suggested for decades, but I think now is the perfect time for it to become a standard practice. It would take a lot of work and a restructuring of professional practices for many, many interpreters – but I think it could be well worth the effort.

Peggy, thank you for your feedback to Laura. You bring up some valid and important points and I hope anyone who reads this will keep your thoughts in mind to reflect on during their own work.

By: Peggy Huber

Peggy Huber — Thu, 29 Nov 2012 23:49:03 +0000

Hi, Laura-
I always appreciate when interpreters are willing to discuss these border-line ethics situations. Thank you for doing so now.

I can completely see where your intentions came from. The result of staying uninvolved seemed to be a collapse of the entire course. I can also see where your inner instructional strategist came through in creating a task that would essentially assess the client’s comprehension.

I see from your description that you were able to get the hearing administration to go with your suggestion – I’m sure because you were viewed as a specialist on Deaf people, their language and culture. However, I do not see where you included the Deaf client’s buy-in, but went forward once you had the approval of the hearing folks. There was no mention of his/her opion of your suggestion. You may have done this and was just not mentioned in your story.

However, here are some questions to consider:

- Did the Deaf client have the right/ability to refuse participation in the assessment? (Keep in mind the power differential in this situation.)
- What would be the Deaf person’s perspective of that kind of on-the-spot assessment of their comprehension? What was their response to the outcome?
- What is the impact on the hearing administrators?
- Is that a fair evaluation of the Deaf client’s skill and knowledge?
- Is the interpreter’s role one of being a part of the instructional team?
- What are other options that would have been in line with cultural mediation? What are the cultural considerations here?

This is an excellent case study that helps us to examine power relationships, hearing and Deaf privilege in these murky situations where the interpreter seems to be the one holding the information that could solve problems that are right in front of us. However, we need to determine if we really do help, or if our help will result in a larger harm.

By: Laura

Laura — Thu, 29 Nov 2012 01:01:04 +0000

I wish I could have gone to the Deaf Disempowerment and Today’s Interpreter presentation as mentioned in this article.
When the new RID Code of Professional Conduct came out I breathed a sigh of relief. It mirrored the real life of an interpreter; the constant, minute, immediate decision making processes we all face everyday. However, a sense of guilt and fear has crept back in as I negotiate these grey areas of what to do and not to do. Am I disempowering deaf people with some of the decisions I make?
I would like to throw one out for my virtual comrades and get your opinion. (Of course I have made it vague so as not to reveal any confidentialities)
I was the ongoing interpreter for a person who was taking self guided computer training courses at a non profit agency. I was authorized to go once a week. On the first day, the deaf person was handed a pile of books and told to follow along and do the exercises in the computer. My gut immediately said, “Hmmmm I wonder if this person is bilingual and can read those books?” The deaf person said nothing; I had just met them and didn’t want to assume anything, plus figured the teacher would evaluate this herself. To make a long story short, as I came in and out over a few months time I would clearly see fairly simple vocabulary words and computer terms that the person didn’t know, but everyone said everyone was doing fine and all tests were being passed. I figured I was missing something. Interpreting services were stopped and I wasn’t called in for another six months. This is when the crap had hit the fan. A new teacher was hired and someone realized that the deaf person had been doing the tests at home with their child’s help and now everyone was upset. So, they decide to have me start coming in once a week again. Honestly, I was heart broken for the person by this time seeing that basically a year of their life had been wasted. They were severely discouraged and ready to quit. Soooo, I get a little more proactive. The next time the teacher hands the person something, I say, “Would you mind if they signed this to me and I circled any words that they don’t know?” About half of the words end up circled in red ink. Everyone isn’t happy again.
As an interpreter I am a cultural mediator (and happen to be an ex elementary school teacher) but was this too much? What would you call this kind of mediation? I want to define this so I can more readily be self reflective and spot disempowering tendencies in myself. I would appreciate any feedback, negative or otherwise.

By: Terri Hayes

Terri Hayes — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 18:46:13 +0000

Much!
and yes, to see you sooner – but it will be forever before I see you… I know – we two busy busy and far away -
but I see you here occasionally and warm in my heart
Thank you for everything you do!
Terri Hayes

By: Brandon Arthur

Brandon Arthur — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 11:39:08 +0000

Terri,

Thanks for your comment.

It is my intention to do the same thing that we did with the Brenda Walker-Prudhom, RID President, interview (http://www.streetleverage.com/2012/04/rid-increases-dues-an-interview-with-president-brenda-walker-prudhom), which is to give viewers the option. Viewers will be able to click the “CC” button, after they hit play, on the YouTube interface to turn the captions on if they choose.

Pleased to know you are finding value in the site.

I hope to see you sooner.

Brandon

By: Terri Hayes

Terri Hayes — Thu, 22 Nov 2012 17:06:42 +0000

Please please please – do NOT caption the signed presenations when you post them here (or at least – give viewers an opportunity to access the talks without open captioning!).. I teach interpreters – and I need Good Professional Authentic presentation style (unrehearsed) videos of Deaf people presenting to a formal audience – to help these interpreters learn to sound like Good Professional Authentic Speakers (when they are interpreting)… and when good conference presenations come up on youtube or otherwise – somebody seems to think its best to put the English right there on the screen under the signer… thus opening the talk to the fluent reader (hearing people can just turn up the voice of the interpreter)… but destroying its viablity as a much needed authentic source for the harder voicing exercises – that at somepoint – every interpreter should be exposed to (multiple times, and each on different – if possible) so they can get ready to do this stuff in real life.
please please please – do not open caption these speakers if they are signing their presentation!
Thank you for listening