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For this and next week's project, I'm translating Jorge Rivera-Herrans's song "The Underworld" from Epic the Musical. The song follows Odysseus and what's left of his crew as they travel into the Underworld per Circe's instructions. They run into old crew mates, Polites, and even Odysseus' mother in the Underworld. It explores Odysseus' guilt and fear as they meet their passed loved ones.

I learned a few new signs throughout my time translating the song, though I was able to do a lot of it on my own. It was particularly challenging as there were a lot of English language conceptual phrases that were difficult to translate such as "nothing's what it seems" or "greet the world with open arms" They both are easy to understand in English but when translated them you have to find their root meanings and translate that to ASL.

I enjoyed the process, of crafting each lyric line in a way that would be visually pleasing and fun while still understandable.

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A Silent Voice is a movie I've held near and dear to my heart for almost 6 years now. I watched it in the height of the pandemic and I still love giving it a rewatch a few times each year.

A Silent Voice, released in 2017, is an animated film following our 2 main characters; Shoya and Shouko. Shoyo, the black-haired boy, and Shouko the pink-haired girl. Shouko is a deaf girl, and the two of them attended the same elementary school. Shoya actually used to bully her and pretty severely at that, even going as far as costing Shouko's mother hundreds even thousands in hearing aid repairs and replacements.

Shouko moved schools and they never saw each other again. As Shoya's friends abandoned him after his cruel behavior and he was held accountable he learns to become a better person. He's overcome with regret and struggles deeply with his mental health over the guilt. They meet again, and the story continues. I won't spoil anymore incase anyone reading wants to watch this masterpiece.

Shouko, a deaf girl, is seen struggling a lot in her life from her deafness and misconceptions from the people around her. She primarily signs, using JSL, but she can speak just not well. People struggle to understand her speech usually so she opts not to and feels ashamed when she does.

It's interesting seeing her life from her and other's perspectives in one movie and how it affects her and the people around her.

Overall this is a fantastic movie that's simultaneously heart-warming and heart-breaking and I would recommend it to anyone!

Within the movie, you can learn more about the deaf experience and watch JSL in action. It's a sad movie which can make it a difficult watch but it's a beautiful story with amazing story-telling and animation.

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Encounter with a Deaf person at Universal Studios

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IV -  (2) Encounter a Deaf Person in public

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IV -  (2) Encounter a Deaf Person in public

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This summer I visited Florida, and drove to Orlando to go to Universal Studios. Our first day we went to the studios park, and I sported our 2023 ASL shirt. The front spells out "deaf' in colorful fingerspelling and it happened to catch the eye of a passerby. This person was deaf and was accompanied by their hearing sister.

They pointed, noticing and spelling it out, and we got to signing. We chatted about where I was from, where I learned sign, and how I was enjoying the park so far. Their sister joined soon after, pointing out the cool shirt design to which I showed off the design on the back as well. We talked about the parks and they recommended a few nearby rides with low waiting times for us.

Additionally we bought food on that trip from a deaf-owned Taco truck called "Rosita's Latin Flavor" in my home-town of Jacksonville, Florida. The menu had finger-spelling for the titles and names of different dishes as well as other signing elements throughout the truck. I asked about them being deaf-owned and the man taking my order explain that his mother, Rosita, owned the truck and she was deaf and cooked all of the delicious food. I ended up ordering from them and their food was delicious, not that that particularly pertains to ASL but!! A win is a win!

Overall i thought the experience was nerve-wracking but fun to break out my signing skills again after having not signing for so long. There were more deaf experiences than i had expected, which was 0, but I was glad to meet new people and chat over their experiences and be able to communicate!

I learned a few vocab words like some signs that were native to Florida, such as the sign for traffic and traffic in the sense of people as well.

I had difficulty reading the Disney person's fast signing because both were very experienced and fas signers as well as it was a very abrupt and unexpected start. It did motivate me to get back to practicing for the day and for summer in general so I wasn't caught off guard being rusty.

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Nov 4

Nov 11

Nov 18

Dec 2

Dec 9

Dec 16

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Not So Silent is a comic on Webtoon's Originals platform following our two main characters; Lewis and Fernando or "Fern." Fern is a new student at their school, a deaf student who needs an ASL interpreter for lectures and classes but struggles as they end up just being college students looking for a good grade. Lewis, a busy workaholic who briefly learned ASL meets Fern and offers to help out with school. They become good friends as Lewis struggles through all of his responsibilities in school and Fern strives for his dream to dance in the ballet.

This story explores a lot of misconceptions about being deaf and Deaf culture. Despite all the roadblocks Fern hits, he's always bright and fun.

Despite being a comic with no movement, the artist portrays signing well with fluid artwork and vibrant emotions. The speech bubbles, additionally, have different borders depending on how they're speaking. The dotted line borders indicate signing, as seen with the illustrated hand movements.

This comic offers a lot of insight on life being deaf as well as have a deaf parent. It shows a lot of the hardships they face with schools that don't provide good interpreters for their deaf students. I really enjoy this comic and look forward to it's weekly updates. I'm excited to see where the characters go and how the plot evolves.

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Humble:

uses 2 flat B handshapes

Create a plus with your left palm facing the floor and your right place behind that, vertically and index touching your chin

The movement: your dominant hand will swoop over your other hand and move up, in an upside-down rainbow motion

No repetitive movements needed

Elephant:

Using your dominate hand in a relaxed flat-B, you'll start at your mouth and move forward in up and down swooping motions to portray the trunk.

Palm orientation is facing down

No repetitive movements

Goat:

Palm orientation palm facing inward towards your face

using your V and 3 hand shape

You'll start at the chin with your "V" and use your thumb to flick once before moving up to your forward and doing the same flicking motion once more

It isn't a repetitive movement.

"Election" Day:

2 part sign combined with "day"

Dominant hand shape- F with palm facing down

The non-dominant hand is a loose S-hs with your palm facing right.

movement: place your S-handshape and use your dominant (f-hs palm down) index and thumb point where they're touching to dip into the small hole created with the S-handshape.

repetitive

combine this with the sign "day" and you'll have "election day"

Ex:

finger spelled with "e-x" but the x is twisted downward.

Kangaroo:

Using the K handshape (not p) you start bouncing it while moving forward to emulate the kangaroo's movements

Palm is outward

Juice:

Using the "I" handshape

Palm starts outward but moves in

non-repetetive

done with your dominant hand

place your I on the corner of your mouth with your palm facing outward

move out and swing it into a "J"

Mock:

repetetive motions

hs- I and Index finger on both hands

uses both hands

place at chest level

palm down

dominant hand more out while the other is more in

move them forward and back in quick succession for repetitive motions

Bland:

same sime as nice, but continue moving that top hand outward

palms facing each other

flat b handshapes

slide the dominant hand over your other hand's palm and continue moving a bit past the fingertips

non-repetetive

Fake "character flaw":

2 open B hand shapes

both palm down

stacked on top of each other (should look like turtle without the movement)

then bend both down in a bent B shape

non repetitive movements.

I learned a lot about animal signs and their descriptors as well as personality signs and food signs I needed when watching my brother.

I liked taking the time to learn new signs through Signing Savvy. I thought it was fun and interesting as well as just sorting through the different lists and tabs on the website to look at different signs.

I had difficulty with describing the motions in sign as it's harder to describe than just handshape or palm-orientation.

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Project type: informing friends/family about ASL/Deaf culture!!

This past week I went to a new restaurant in Rock Rapids, Iowa called "The County Seat."

I met a man named Rob, and we got into the topic of school, and thus ASL. I was able to teach him a number of aspects regarding ASL such as culture, experiences, signs, and more.

Rob seemed really interested in American Sign Language and we went into an hour long conversation. First I mentioned how i was in ASL III and I loved it. I explained what drew me to ASL, being the visual and physical aspect of it; being something I always found beautiful and enticing about the language itself.

I went on to explain a lot of what our ASL classes contain and how we learn as well as ASL events. I told Rob about my first ever ASL event and many of the ones following that and my journey with ASL as a whole. I explained a lot about Deaf culture and how deaf individuals are born into a world structured for hearing people and the difficulties within their community as a result of that. I taught him more about different types of sign language around the world and history as well. He was really enthusiastic, and excited to hear about it.

I also told Rob about the deaflympics and IS as he had thought ASL was widely and globally used and hadn't known anything about that. I taught him a bit about cultural uses as well as homesigns in relation to CODAs and deaf families as a whole.

Rob explained that he had wanted to learn ASL and had picked up some somewhere along the way but he felt too old to learn it anymore. I told him it was never too late and that it's a fun language and offers so much for you and all of the fun people you can meet through events.

Through this, I was able to talk with someone and teach about something I really enjoy, as well as give more interest to someone who knew little regarding Deaf communities and ASL as a whole!

I learned a lot about how little people know about Deaf culture and signing, and it was an interesting topic. It was very hard to talk over the insanely loud atmosphere in the bar but we had an amazing conversation nonetheless.