Page 149 - Reading Between the Sign Intercultural Communication for Sign Language Interpreters

134 Reading Between the Signs

Scenarios 3, 4, and 5 take place in the professor’s office.
Scenario 3

Hearing College Professor: Tell me, which high school did you
attend?
Deaf Student: I attended the State Residential School for the
Deaf in Pleasantville.
To many Deaf people, the state residential school is a
focus for fond memories and positive feelings. It is the
place where they may have first acquired sign language,
developed a sense of Deaf culture, found a community
of Deaf people who held similar values and who could
act as role models, experienced a feeling of identity and
belonging, and made lasting friends and contacts.

Hearing Professor: Ohhhhh, I see....
To most hearing people, the idea of a state residential
school conjures up a whole different set of images, more
like being in a mental institution—remote, cold, harsh,
impersonal, a depressing place where children are
forced to live away from their parents.

Scenario 4
Hearing College Professor: If you did not understand this key
concept when we first discussed it in class weeks ago, why did
you wait so long to tell me about it?
To overgeneralize: Americans are impatient. If we don’t
understand something, we want clarification now! We
feel we have a right to understand and the assertiveness
to ask for an explanation immediately. We may even
blame the teacher or professor for not being clear in
the first place. As opposed to many other cultures, we
feel no shame in admitting we don’t know something.
In fact we respect people, even those in positions of
authority, who honestly admit their ignorance of a cer-
tain word or concept. The professor assumes that the
Deaf student holds the same set of values as the major-
ity of American students and therefore should, from
the professor’s perspective, have been more aggressive
in seeking clarification earlier on.

06 MINDESS PMKR 134 10/18/04, 12:01 PM