We Are Deaf; One And Many

Someone has sent me email to ask to be involve “We are deaf; one and many” project, so here it is! Enjoy… feel free to leave comment.

Filed under: blog, deaf, Vlog, asl, blog, Community, deaf, Project, sign language, Vlog

Proposal To Close SD School For The Deaf

The Governor proposes closing the South Dakota School for the Deaf to save the state $2 million a year.  The idea has shocked many, including students who currently attend the school. But the state has a plan for them and says it was only a matter of time before the school was going to close anyway. 

For more than a century, the South Dakota School for the Deaf has served thousands of children and their families. 

But the state could close the school because of declining numbers. Currently only 30 students attend the school.

Don Jorgensen: Are you disappointed? 
Keegan Sparks: Yeah.
Don Jorgensen:  Because you’re going to have to go to Washington?
Sparks:  Which is hard to communicate because I’m hard of hearing and he’s deaf and a lot of us will have to go to public schools or another school for the deaf. 

The plan is to have the students attend their respective public school districts. For Sparks, that means going to Washington. 

“I knew it would close because the high school group is too small,” Sparks said. 

While some students are disappointed, members of the Board of Regents say for some, closing the school will be best for them in the long run. 

“We will make sure the child gets the educational experience as equal to what they were getting at the school and hopefully better,” Executive Director of the South Dakota Board of Regents Tad Perry said. 

Perry says the state will help those students transition back into their school through an outreach program. 

“We’ll rebuild that staff, a deaf education specialist, audiologist who will go out and work with the families and their children to make sure they are getting the education experience that they should have,” Perry said. 

If the legislature approves of the governor’s recommendation, the school will officially close July 1, leaving about 20 people out of work. 

Perry says there are almost 400 deaf students who already attend their own school districts across the state.

Filed under: deaf, deaf, School, Shut Down, South Dakota

Some DVTV (Christians) said that Homosexuals should not use “Marriage”

I right-clicked on the word Marriage on my Mac to look it up in the built-in Dictionary. As I was reading the various definitions for the word marriage, I was pleasantly surprised to find the second definition to include same-sex partners. 

 I cannot believe we still have to protest this shit (for our rights)

Women and blacks won the right to vote, different races can marry each other, the sun rises every morning then sets every night and gay marriage is going to happen. Get over it, ferchrissake.

Filed under: blog, deaf, Lifestyle, Bible, Christians, deaf, Dictionary, DVTV, gay, marriage

The pas de deux Of ‘Pippin’ at the Mark Taper Forum

The Times (Los Angeles)

With Deaf West Theatre, it often takes two people to play one role: a deaf actor who signs and provides the character’s face and a hearing actor who provides his voice. To pull this off requires performances as well-rehearsed and executed — not to mention intimately intertwined — as a pas de deux. One example of such a partnership is Troy Kotsur and Dan Callaway’s Charlemagne in the Deaf West revival of “Pippin,”which opens Jan. 25 at the Mark Taper Forum.

Though Callaway has never done this before, Kotsur is a Deaf West veteran known for his free-flowing imagination, physical dexterity and a sense of rhythm that allows him to nail musical numbers — even though he can’t hear.

Here’s how Kotsur, 40, and Callaway, 31, created their character and prepared to perform the complicated patter song “War Is a Science,” in which the king plots his next big battle.

Defining Charlemagne

“The king is deaf and has power ruling his kingdom communicating through American Sign Language,” Kotsur says. He also is afflicted by “some kind of madness and dwells on war — like Patton or Bush.”

Acting the part

“I have to keep in mind not to throw all the energy away and stay in control,” Kotsur says. In translating the song’s lyrics into theatrically effective American Sign Language, he tries to reflect both content andsubtext. “The king keeps his chin up, indicating he knows what to do by showing everything’s under control and he has a plan. The king shows his true colors by showing madness (the signs get bigger, then smaller, then bigger as the pace quickens) but constantly gets his act together in showing that everything’s under control (the signs get slower). He is excited but then goes back to ‘everything’s cool.’ “

Finding the voice

“I came in having seen John Davidson in ‘Man of La Mancha,’ ” Callaway says. “I kind of copied him, but I threw that out once I saw Troy. I did something younger and more normal instead. Troy is the focus for

the role and, although we collaborate on the lines, it is his vision of the character, what feels right to him. Providing his voice is very easy because he has such an expressive face. He gives you everything you need and more.”

Preparing for ‘War’

Most of “Pippin’s” actors learned to sign their lyrics by studying videos made by actress Linda Bove and interpreter Alan Champion, who translated the script. Given his experience and penchant for improvisation, Kotsur was allowed more freedom. “I didn’t want to sign their signs,” he says. “It’s like someone else telling you how to deliver a line with a specific mood. I preferred to develop my own choices of signs with Linda’s approval.”

Once rehearsals began, Kotsur says, “tweakings occur until the opening of the show. Props, lighting and costumes may have an effect on my ASL work and performance.” Deaf since birth, Kotsur has to memorize rhythm patterns and relies on cues from cast members — a nod here, a nudge there — to tell him when to stop or start. “If I go off one beat, I’m in trouble. So it’s crucial to stay on the right track along with the music. Or if the musicians are off, I won’t be able to adjust with them. I just continue what I memorized and the music will have to get on the right track.”

Putting it together

“The first time we staged ‘War’ was the first chance I had to see what Troy’s signs were,” Callaway says. “I tried to match as many as I could. But spoken English and American Sign Language are two different languages. You have to figure out how to get them in sync.” Fortunately, he adds, “Troy gives you everything. You kind of lock into his mind and he’s there. Early on, he said, ‘We are going to be one.’ It’s like telepathy.”

Giving and taking

“I like to play and try different things,” Kotsur says. “I also enjoying feeding energy to other actors and react to their reactions during scenes. Dan is able to play too. While the intonation in the voice expresses its mood, it needs to match how I deliver in American Sign Language along with my facial expressions and body language. He follows what I express. There are times when the director, Jeff Calhoun, likes to keep how Dan expressed a line with his voice. Jeff makes suggestions to me about how to match Dan’s delivery. It goes the other way around as well if Jeff sees how I express a line and makes suggestions to Dan to deliver it a certain way.”

“It’s crucial to be able to work together like this to see what works for the character because we are dealing with two cultures. For instance, there are jokes in spoken English for hearing people to catch on, but for deaf people, they might not catch on if I don’t express it right in ASL…. That’s why I improv to just try different things to find what works.”

Anthony Natale, left, Aleks Pevec, Rodrick Covington and Alexandria Wailes rehearse for a production of "Pippin" that combines deaf and hearing actors, voice and American Sign Language. Deaf West Theatre is back at the Mark Taper Forum with a revival of Stephen Schwartz's sly and sensual musical.

Filed under: deaf, asl, bsl, deaf, lis, Los Angeles, sign language, Theatre

Inspirational deaf-blind teacher, poet retires

His memories of Helen Keller are vivid, if not entirely favorable: she had big hands, a forceful personality, and not much of a sense of humor.

But none of that kept Bob Smithdas from working with Keller, icon of the deaf and blind, to persuade Congress to create and fund the Helen Keller National Center in the 1960s. At the Sands Point facility, people who are deaf and blind _ as is Smithdas _ are taught a range of life skills from communicating to cooking so they can live wherever they want to.

Smithdas, 83, was retiring Friday as the center’s director of community education, a post that capped a 65-year-career as an inspiration and an instigator for improvements in the way deaf and blind people lead their lives.

“There have been two giant role models for the deaf-blind person over the last century: Helen Keller and Bob Smithdas,” said Carl Augusto, president and CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind.

In honor of his retirement, Smithdas has been cited in a congressional resolution sponsored by Rep. Gary Ackerman. In addition, Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl has declared Friday “Robert Smithdas Day” in honor of the westernPennsylvania native.

Smithdas was the first deaf-blind man to receive a college degree, graduating from St. John’s University 50 years after Keller got her bachelor’s from Radcliffe. He was the first deaf-blind person to earn a master’s degree (NYU, 1953). He has four honorary degrees from universities around the country.

In 1965, he was named “Handicapped American of the Year” by the President’s Committee on Employment of People Who Are Disabled. A decade later, he married Michelle Craig, who also is deaf and blind; she works as an instructor at the Keller Center.

“I feel that what I was doing was creating a pathway for other deaf-blind people to follow,” he said during an interview at a diner near his Port Washington home. An interpreter used hand-in-hand signals to communicate with him.

Smithdas lost his nearly all his hearing and sight when he was about 4 after contracting cerebrospinal meningitis. The language he had learned up to then deteriorated, and he was taught Tadoma, a method of communication in which the deaf-blind person places his thumb on the speaker’s lips and his fingers along the jawline to understand what is being said.

It led to an unhappy encounters with Keller.

“I had heard that Helen could speak and I wanted to feel her speak, so I reached out to put my hands on her face, hoping that she would speak to me that way,” Smithdas recalls. “But to my surprise she slapped my hand away. I wasn’t amused. I thought it was a crude gesture.”

Smithdas began writing poems as a youngster and has published two collections, “City of the Heart” (1966) and “Shared Beauty” (1983). The Poetry Society of America named him Poet of the Year for 1960-61.

He has also written an autobiography, “Life at My Fingertips.”

“I was a model, a representative of the deaf-blind community,” he says. “Even if I didn’t know it.”

Smithdas said he and others had been arguing for a decade for a place like the Keller Center, but it took a rubella outbreak in 1963 and 1964, which produced thousands of deaf-blind babies, to get the center opened.

Joseph McNulty, executive director of the Keller Center, remembers meeting a mother who was touring the facility.

“She came out of Bob’s office crying. She told me that when her daughter was born, and she learned she was deaf-blind, reading Bob’s life story kept her sane. She said, `Finally meeting him brought me to tears.”‘

Journalist Barbara Walters, who spoke at Smithdas’ retirement luncheon Friday, said Smithdas was remarkable.

“Truly, the most memorable person I had ever met was Robert Smithdas,” she said. “I remember going to Bob’s house, and he cooked me a meal. I was amazed he was able to do this and didn’t burn his hands.”

Filed under: deaf, asl, Bob Smithdas, deaf, Helen Keller, Sign Language Blind, Teacher