In this vlog, Carl Schroeder compares "1984" by George Orwell with Gallaudet University regarding bastardizing ASL.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Maui and the Sun (Redone)
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder talks about a popular Hawai'ian myth, Maui and the Sun.
Maui and the Sun
Click to Play
IN this vlog, Carl Schroeder tells about a popular Hawaiian myth, Maui and the Sun.
ASL Dragon: Sooket the Bridge Directress
This vlog is dedicated to Debbie Kay who inspires me to develop a female character in ASL Dragon. Sooket is a well-beloved leader in the forest valley where ASL Dragon lives.
Dear Steve (The Deaf Sherlock)
Dear Steve,
You’ll always get a few bad apples, and it pains me to admit that down the ages certain well-known people have been charged with serious crimes ranging from corrupting the youth (Socrates) to protesting the oppression (Martin Luther King). Nonetheless, if you should chance across any Deaf person at Gallaudet University, then it is statistically most likely that he or she is being oppressed.
Punishment does not work. It is not good because those inflicting the retaliation can’t make a believable promise to the oppressed that oppression will stop once he or she cooperates with them.
If you wish to picture Gallaudet University without emotional suffering, then you should read Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. Concisely stated, the habitants of this novel are not immune to unpleasant feelings. When these feelings occur, however, they take the drug soma: “One cubic centimeter cures ten gloomy sentiments.” But instead of being desirable, their lives come across as flat. In Brave New World, there is no depth of feeling, no ferment of ideas, and no artistic creativity. Fear of change and a lack of imagination go halfway to explain why the IKJ-JKF-PK administration wished to punish the protestors.
Suffering is not just good for our Deaf community; it can also be good for those arrested on Friday, October 13th - Black Friday. Let me give you an example of the useful pain. When you accidentally put your hand on a hot stove, wouldn’t a quick withdraw of your hand from the stove be without pain? The same ideas would also have to be considered when removing psychological pain. So if you wanted to get rid of psychological pain, you should make sure that other elements of oppression were also removed so that you would still be motivated to do what you needed to do.
I do not attempt to predict how we’ll spend our oppression-free lives. I don’t think it is up to me to offer advice to Gallaudet University President Bob Davila. I do believe that he does not shy away from the fact that oppression has its roots in the punishment inflicted upon Deaf people for centuries.
There exists a huge amount of unnecessary and undeserved suffering that is just bad and that we should get rid of. Look at Mississippi and Oregon Schools for the Deaf. Be glad that Gallaudet University set up an example that oppression of the Deaf must stop, and retaliation does not work. Elementary, Mr. Watson.
With aloha always, Carl
You’ll always get a few bad apples, and it pains me to admit that down the ages certain well-known people have been charged with serious crimes ranging from corrupting the youth (Socrates) to protesting the oppression (Martin Luther King). Nonetheless, if you should chance across any Deaf person at Gallaudet University, then it is statistically most likely that he or she is being oppressed.
Punishment does not work. It is not good because those inflicting the retaliation can’t make a believable promise to the oppressed that oppression will stop once he or she cooperates with them.
If you wish to picture Gallaudet University without emotional suffering, then you should read Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. Concisely stated, the habitants of this novel are not immune to unpleasant feelings. When these feelings occur, however, they take the drug soma: “One cubic centimeter cures ten gloomy sentiments.” But instead of being desirable, their lives come across as flat. In Brave New World, there is no depth of feeling, no ferment of ideas, and no artistic creativity. Fear of change and a lack of imagination go halfway to explain why the IKJ-JKF-PK administration wished to punish the protestors.
Suffering is not just good for our Deaf community; it can also be good for those arrested on Friday, October 13th - Black Friday. Let me give you an example of the useful pain. When you accidentally put your hand on a hot stove, wouldn’t a quick withdraw of your hand from the stove be without pain? The same ideas would also have to be considered when removing psychological pain. So if you wanted to get rid of psychological pain, you should make sure that other elements of oppression were also removed so that you would still be motivated to do what you needed to do.
I do not attempt to predict how we’ll spend our oppression-free lives. I don’t think it is up to me to offer advice to Gallaudet University President Bob Davila. I do believe that he does not shy away from the fact that oppression has its roots in the punishment inflicted upon Deaf people for centuries.
There exists a huge amount of unnecessary and undeserved suffering that is just bad and that we should get rid of. Look at Mississippi and Oregon Schools for the Deaf. Be glad that Gallaudet University set up an example that oppression of the Deaf must stop, and retaliation does not work. Elementary, Mr. Watson.
With aloha always, Carl
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
English is Many Words; ASL is Many Signs
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder gives two translations of Professor Ben Tervoort's statement given to me during my 1983-84 Wanderjahr (Year of Wandering).
A Deaf Metamorphosis
There is a story told in the world of the Deaf somewhere in this vast universe. It is about Saiserit, the Deaf hearer, who underwent a metamorphosis from Deaf to hearing, and later back again. When asked which was more troublesome, he answered hearing. Many Deaf people can attest this assessment: Hearing is troublesome.
According to tradition, Saiserit was born Deaf. His prophets assembled together and agreed that he would undergo a trouble or a transformation. Saiserit, destined to the land of the Deaf that calls for different virtues from the hearing world in which the language is spoken, mastered the art of learning in sign language.
At the age of 21, however, the young gentleman met with his prophets to talk about his fate as forecasted at his birth. He was presented a special stone that would enable him to hear without any difficulties. He left his land for a short excursion in the hearing world with the stone held next to his heart.
During the journey into the hearing world, Saiserit listened to stories of the archetype and stereotype of the Deaf, blending of language-less-ness and mind-less-ness. He also listened to social demands of the hearing world that Deaf people have to cooperate with certain basic agreements: They must learn to speak; they must learn to lipread. But virtues like using sign language and being a rugged individual take on different meaning in the hearing world. Deaf people are expected to exemplify certain virtues, especially regarding speaking and lipreading, that are adaptive to hearing people. Saiserit almost became blinded by their clashing of the dualities.
Dualistic thinking forced Saiserit to see the world from both a Deaf perspective and a hearing perspective, to be good at sign language and to be good at hearing people’s ways. His first wonder moment in his life as a hearing person was his own realization: "I was born Deaf." He found it terrifying to realize that his deafness was saddled with sensibilities those hearing people found repugnant.
During the journey into the hearing world, Saiserit decided to throw his prophets' stone away. He wanted to be relieved from hearing people's dualistic thinking. He became Deaf again, and his non-dualistic thinking freed him from right and wrong. Right and wrong is about relations between hearing people and a judgement they make against the deafness, and it is always on one direction only. Saiserit was happy to be Deaf, his birthright.
Compassion and integrity became the trouble-free moral of this metamorphosis story.
According to tradition, Saiserit was born Deaf. His prophets assembled together and agreed that he would undergo a trouble or a transformation. Saiserit, destined to the land of the Deaf that calls for different virtues from the hearing world in which the language is spoken, mastered the art of learning in sign language.
At the age of 21, however, the young gentleman met with his prophets to talk about his fate as forecasted at his birth. He was presented a special stone that would enable him to hear without any difficulties. He left his land for a short excursion in the hearing world with the stone held next to his heart.
During the journey into the hearing world, Saiserit listened to stories of the archetype and stereotype of the Deaf, blending of language-less-ness and mind-less-ness. He also listened to social demands of the hearing world that Deaf people have to cooperate with certain basic agreements: They must learn to speak; they must learn to lipread. But virtues like using sign language and being a rugged individual take on different meaning in the hearing world. Deaf people are expected to exemplify certain virtues, especially regarding speaking and lipreading, that are adaptive to hearing people. Saiserit almost became blinded by their clashing of the dualities.
Dualistic thinking forced Saiserit to see the world from both a Deaf perspective and a hearing perspective, to be good at sign language and to be good at hearing people’s ways. His first wonder moment in his life as a hearing person was his own realization: "I was born Deaf." He found it terrifying to realize that his deafness was saddled with sensibilities those hearing people found repugnant.
During the journey into the hearing world, Saiserit decided to throw his prophets' stone away. He wanted to be relieved from hearing people's dualistic thinking. He became Deaf again, and his non-dualistic thinking freed him from right and wrong. Right and wrong is about relations between hearing people and a judgement they make against the deafness, and it is always on one direction only. Saiserit was happy to be Deaf, his birthright.
Compassion and integrity became the trouble-free moral of this metamorphosis story.
Tell Congress that IDEA is NOT inclusive
In this Vlog, Carl Schroeder urges Deaf people to contact their Congress representatives and claim that IDEA is INVALID. It excludes the sense of sight for language acquisition of both ASL and it's conterpart English.
Monday, January 29, 2007
Women in SEE vs. ASL
A vlog: Carl Schroeder discusses Signed Essential English vs. American Sign Language. The winner is ... women in ASL!
Sinterklaas (Santa Claus) Is Real!
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder retains his personal innocence about believing Sinterklaas in The Netherlands and Santa Claus here.
What are the Basic Vlogging Techniques?
You can be a vlogger! And your audience will love you!
The most important step is to prepare for vlogging. One aspect of this preparation involves easy research that can provide you with a great deal of fun. Make vlogging a special treat rather than springing it on your audience. They love rituals, and there are a few simple devices for opening your vlog to put your audience in a particular receptive mood.
Almost everyone knows how I always open my ASL Dragon vlogs, petitioning for no translation. And how I always presents discussions or share stories. My audience knows what to expect from my vlogs.
Another key technique is to be relaxed and natural in using ASL. Imagining you are carrying on a conversation with a friend and suddenly that friend says, gleefully, "Oh, tell me all about that!" Vlogging does offer you such an ideal listening situation.
In my vlogs, I tend to use non-manual expressions (mouthing, body shifting, eye gazing) because I am communicating with my audience, expecting them to listening to all parts of signs. I give myself fully to the spirit of the moment, inviting the audience to my vlogs.
All in all, it is my firm belief that the vlogging instinct is an innate fixture in the human psyche and that everyone is capable of developing that instinct and becoming a good vlogger. Give yourself a try and your audience will love you!
The most important step is to prepare for vlogging. One aspect of this preparation involves easy research that can provide you with a great deal of fun. Make vlogging a special treat rather than springing it on your audience. They love rituals, and there are a few simple devices for opening your vlog to put your audience in a particular receptive mood.
Almost everyone knows how I always open my ASL Dragon vlogs, petitioning for no translation. And how I always presents discussions or share stories. My audience knows what to expect from my vlogs.
Another key technique is to be relaxed and natural in using ASL. Imagining you are carrying on a conversation with a friend and suddenly that friend says, gleefully, "Oh, tell me all about that!" Vlogging does offer you such an ideal listening situation.
In my vlogs, I tend to use non-manual expressions (mouthing, body shifting, eye gazing) because I am communicating with my audience, expecting them to listening to all parts of signs. I give myself fully to the spirit of the moment, inviting the audience to my vlogs.
All in all, it is my firm belief that the vlogging instinct is an innate fixture in the human psyche and that everyone is capable of developing that instinct and becoming a good vlogger. Give yourself a try and your audience will love you!
Language, Communication and ... Piano
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder distinguishes between language and communication. And piano, too!
Sunday, January 28, 2007
Boredom of a Deaf Linguist-to-be
Just as psychological sophistication allows us to name and understand deafness, so linguistic sophistication allows us to understand language and culture of the Deaf. Psychology is about how deafness affects the mind; linguistic is about how language affects the mind. Off and on, psychology and linguistics have been considered contradictory.
Most of us learned that deafness is a lack--something missing. Deafness is, to paraphrase Jeff in Signs of the Times, nothing but truth. But, in technical meaning, it is not normal. It is easy to quantify or describe scientifically on any audiogram.
Audiograms are ways of understanding what normal hearing is. They provide scientific context for interpreting hearing experience. When you see my audiogram, you will agree that I'm stone Deaf. My audiogram is not an exam. It is "Absolute Truth" that is so beyond human understanding that I could never, ever hear normally. With or without cochlear implants.
My world, that is, Deaf world, is what I make it. I create the universe of my own experience. How I think about life, language and leisure determines what my own experienced world is like and how I participate in it. This phenomenon is what, in ASL jargon, is called OPPRESSION. The oppression I've experienced affects everything and everyone around me.
What causes my deafness is "making wrong judgments." The fact is, all of us have a natural consequence of seeing the world as dual--disparity between good and bad, sunrise and sunset, Deaf and hearing and so forth. We often see the world only from our own limited perspective. For example, in audiograms, we construe deafness in what Jungian psychology calls "the Shadow" which is best illustrated in Plato's Allegory of the Cave where people, if bound by chains, understand the world as they see flickering movements of shadows on the cave walls.
So what do sign language linguists do? Well, at Gallaudet University, they don’t trade worn-out witticism about campus parking lots or the absurdity of English exit exams. When linguists rant, they just do more than rant. Linguistics save Deaf people from psychological boredom.
Most of us learned that deafness is a lack--something missing. Deafness is, to paraphrase Jeff in Signs of the Times, nothing but truth. But, in technical meaning, it is not normal. It is easy to quantify or describe scientifically on any audiogram.
Audiograms are ways of understanding what normal hearing is. They provide scientific context for interpreting hearing experience. When you see my audiogram, you will agree that I'm stone Deaf. My audiogram is not an exam. It is "Absolute Truth" that is so beyond human understanding that I could never, ever hear normally. With or without cochlear implants.
My world, that is, Deaf world, is what I make it. I create the universe of my own experience. How I think about life, language and leisure determines what my own experienced world is like and how I participate in it. This phenomenon is what, in ASL jargon, is called OPPRESSION. The oppression I've experienced affects everything and everyone around me.
What causes my deafness is "making wrong judgments." The fact is, all of us have a natural consequence of seeing the world as dual--disparity between good and bad, sunrise and sunset, Deaf and hearing and so forth. We often see the world only from our own limited perspective. For example, in audiograms, we construe deafness in what Jungian psychology calls "the Shadow" which is best illustrated in Plato's Allegory of the Cave where people, if bound by chains, understand the world as they see flickering movements of shadows on the cave walls.
So what do sign language linguists do? Well, at Gallaudet University, they don’t trade worn-out witticism about campus parking lots or the absurdity of English exit exams. When linguists rant, they just do more than rant. Linguistics save Deaf people from psychological boredom.
Linguist Ben Tervoort and I
I just had a recollection of my intellectual conversation with Professor Ben Tervoort (1920 – 2006) who taught linguistics at the University of Amsterdam. He wrote some books about Gebarentaal (Dutch Sign Language) at St. Michielsgestel Institute (praised as the world’s leading institution in oral education for the Deaf), which was very upsetting. Ben got kicked out, and he quit the order of Jesuits and got married and had three daughters. In 1964, he received an honorary doctorate for his work from Gallaudet University. In his University of Amsterdam office, I saw a picture of him sitting next to Senator Edward Kennedy and President Leonard Elstad in the 1964 commencement. Ben was very proud of it.
Ben and I were riding on a tram (streetcar or trolley) in Amsterdam in the summer of 1983. We talked about Deaf people's identity and self-actualization (my research themes during my Watson fellowship) best through their own language. We also discussed how to translate between signed and spoken languages, and he said there shall never be an accurate translation, and we then joked about how The Holy Bible gets lost in multi-language translations. Even more so in sign language translations.
I asked Ben what I needed to remember best about him. He smirked and thought for a long while. He then looked into my eyes and said in rudiment Gebarentaal (he's not a native signer!). I then tried to translate it into written English and checked with him for an approximate language equivalence. Bernard agreed it would be the best we could say in the English language: "English is many words; ASL is many signs."
Professor Ben Tervoort made it irrefutably clear that by denying ASL in Deaf education, there exists a missing piece of the puzzle needed to complete the picture. ASL is not about intellectual life, he emphasized, but the rise of Deaf identity is an important part of their language and culture.
Modern technology and cultural awareness have forced our society into a higher perspective on what we mean to be Deaf ... and human. In a small way, my experience with Professor Ben Tervoort influenced me greatly.
Ben and I were riding on a tram (streetcar or trolley) in Amsterdam in the summer of 1983. We talked about Deaf people's identity and self-actualization (my research themes during my Watson fellowship) best through their own language. We also discussed how to translate between signed and spoken languages, and he said there shall never be an accurate translation, and we then joked about how The Holy Bible gets lost in multi-language translations. Even more so in sign language translations.
I asked Ben what I needed to remember best about him. He smirked and thought for a long while. He then looked into my eyes and said in rudiment Gebarentaal (he's not a native signer!). I then tried to translate it into written English and checked with him for an approximate language equivalence. Bernard agreed it would be the best we could say in the English language: "English is many words; ASL is many signs."
Professor Ben Tervoort made it irrefutably clear that by denying ASL in Deaf education, there exists a missing piece of the puzzle needed to complete the picture. ASL is not about intellectual life, he emphasized, but the rise of Deaf identity is an important part of their language and culture.
Modern technology and cultural awareness have forced our society into a higher perspective on what we mean to be Deaf ... and human. In a small way, my experience with Professor Ben Tervoort influenced me greatly.
Deaf Enlightenment
There is an enlightenment that goes with being Deaf, an understanding of the real language and culture, namely, American Sign Language (ASL). Not all Deaf people avail themselves of this enlightenment. Some are blinded to it by a preferred mode of communication. Some are blinded by the guilt and confusion their parents and educators instilled in them by a language xenophobia--a fear of another language. And some are blinded by the misinformation perpetuated by the IKJ-JKF-PK administration of Gallaudet University. Yet this enlightenment is there for us, if only we open our eyes.
Deaf enlightenment is undergoing a dramatic transformation because of the recent recognition of ASL in 1960s. This linguistic claim has been researched, documented, criticized, and brought about in part by the rise of Deaf identity.
All modes of communication for the Deaf do not make sense anymore. The traditional myths describe the deafness as a pathological challenge, being reparable to restore hearing even among those born Deaf. Cochlear implants are a technological marvel, but scientific observation shows us that people with CI do not hear in the same manner hearing people normally hear. We have barely begun to see what deafness really is. Deafness is a biological condition that makes our life, language and leisure human.
190 years ago Laurent Clerc, a Deaf French educator, arrived in Hartford, Connecticut and began a new way of understanding Deaf people in America. While Deaf people from Martha's Vineyard Island who attended the first American School for the Deaf in Hartford obviously used signs, there was evident that they never merged them into the English language. Through the work of Laurent Clerc, we can model for the rest of humanitiy how to understand the real language and culture of the Deaf.
The point of this Deaf enlightenment is to be evolutionary and, therefore, challenging to the status quo of traditional practices of marginalizing ASL and repairing deafness.
Deaf enlightenment is undergoing a dramatic transformation because of the recent recognition of ASL in 1960s. This linguistic claim has been researched, documented, criticized, and brought about in part by the rise of Deaf identity.
All modes of communication for the Deaf do not make sense anymore. The traditional myths describe the deafness as a pathological challenge, being reparable to restore hearing even among those born Deaf. Cochlear implants are a technological marvel, but scientific observation shows us that people with CI do not hear in the same manner hearing people normally hear. We have barely begun to see what deafness really is. Deafness is a biological condition that makes our life, language and leisure human.
190 years ago Laurent Clerc, a Deaf French educator, arrived in Hartford, Connecticut and began a new way of understanding Deaf people in America. While Deaf people from Martha's Vineyard Island who attended the first American School for the Deaf in Hartford obviously used signs, there was evident that they never merged them into the English language. Through the work of Laurent Clerc, we can model for the rest of humanitiy how to understand the real language and culture of the Deaf.
The point of this Deaf enlightenment is to be evolutionary and, therefore, challenging to the status quo of traditional practices of marginalizing ASL and repairing deafness.
From Glory File
Date: Sun 28 Jan 2007 02:10:51 AM EST
From: Donovan Cresdee dcresdee
To: Carl Schroeder
Subject: Greeting from Australia.
Dear Carl Schroeder,
This posting is to inform you that I just wanted to stop carrying around with me a sense of guilt related to the fact that I have been one of your regular website visitors but failed to share with you, my own comments or ideas over the last few months. It is now time for me to do so. Added to this, I also mentioned your name in my website, “Donovan’s Den” because you instilled in me, your professional belief that visitors to your website should know how important critical thinking is and how it can be developed through involvement in blogging and vlogging. More even, I have been aware of the fact that you are interested in studying applied linguistics, particularly ASL and second/foreign language pedagogy. I have just completed my PhD thesis, focusing on Auslan discourse cohesion and second language teaching.
I am not a Deaf American, but am a fluent ASL watcher. I grew up a Deaf family using Auslan in Adelaide, Australia and about twenty years ago, I graduated from Gallaudet University where I used ASL as my subsequent language. I know your younger brother, who told me a bit about you (Please excuse me, I could not remember his name).
After reading hundreds of your posts, I must say I enjoyed them immensely and admire your commitment to the blogs/vlogs and the views and ideas you expressed in your languages. I also love your stories about ASL dragon. I am very grateful to you for sharing them from a perspective of a Deaf intelligent and knowledgeable person with not only Deaf Americans (or primary ASL users) but also Deaf outsiders like me.
In response to your recent post regarding instructions on how to make a movie, apart from reading your blogs and vlogs, I browsed other bloggers’ and vloggers’ frequently and realised that you and they uploaded their movies to a few online video sharing services, particularly YouTube and Google video. I am not sure whether you have been aware of other services which may be better than those services. This is because one service namely Grouper enables signed language users to respond to any video through the use of both text and video comments. I think thousands of people around the world who prefer to use signed languages to communicate our ideas or comments, would love to use this service. To look at my Grouper vlogpage please click on this http://web.mac.com/donniec/iWeb/Site/Vlog/Vlog.html (The best online video). Please excuse me, the respondents and myself used Auslan, not ASL in the vlogpage. There are also another online video sites namely Motionbox and Viddler which may be useful to those who learn signed language as a second language and have a problem with their receptive skills in two-handed or one-handed alphabet fingerspelling. I occasionally used these services for my website and involvement in Deaf lobbying group activities.
I hope you will be grateful to have this contribution as a token of my gratitude.
Best of the luck with your presentation in the Blogging/Vlogging Conference at Gallaudet University.
Kind regards,
Donovan V. Cresdee
42 Rozells Ave,
Colonel Light Gardens,
South Australia 5041
email: dcresdee@internode.on.net
fax: 08 8276 9495
mobile: 0417992392
homepage: http://web.mac.com/donniec/iWeb/Site/Welcome.html
PS: Would you please mind me placing this email above in my website for Auslan teachers?
From: Donovan Cresdee dcresdee
To: Carl Schroeder
Subject: Greeting from Australia.
Dear Carl Schroeder,
This posting is to inform you that I just wanted to stop carrying around with me a sense of guilt related to the fact that I have been one of your regular website visitors but failed to share with you, my own comments or ideas over the last few months. It is now time for me to do so. Added to this, I also mentioned your name in my website, “Donovan’s Den” because you instilled in me, your professional belief that visitors to your website should know how important critical thinking is and how it can be developed through involvement in blogging and vlogging. More even, I have been aware of the fact that you are interested in studying applied linguistics, particularly ASL and second/foreign language pedagogy. I have just completed my PhD thesis, focusing on Auslan discourse cohesion and second language teaching.
I am not a Deaf American, but am a fluent ASL watcher. I grew up a Deaf family using Auslan in Adelaide, Australia and about twenty years ago, I graduated from Gallaudet University where I used ASL as my subsequent language. I know your younger brother, who told me a bit about you (Please excuse me, I could not remember his name).
After reading hundreds of your posts, I must say I enjoyed them immensely and admire your commitment to the blogs/vlogs and the views and ideas you expressed in your languages. I also love your stories about ASL dragon. I am very grateful to you for sharing them from a perspective of a Deaf intelligent and knowledgeable person with not only Deaf Americans (or primary ASL users) but also Deaf outsiders like me.
In response to your recent post regarding instructions on how to make a movie, apart from reading your blogs and vlogs, I browsed other bloggers’ and vloggers’ frequently and realised that you and they uploaded their movies to a few online video sharing services, particularly YouTube and Google video. I am not sure whether you have been aware of other services which may be better than those services. This is because one service namely Grouper enables signed language users to respond to any video through the use of both text and video comments. I think thousands of people around the world who prefer to use signed languages to communicate our ideas or comments, would love to use this service. To look at my Grouper vlogpage please click on this http://web.mac.com/donniec/iWeb/Site/Vlog/Vlog.html (The best online video). Please excuse me, the respondents and myself used Auslan, not ASL in the vlogpage. There are also another online video sites namely Motionbox and Viddler which may be useful to those who learn signed language as a second language and have a problem with their receptive skills in two-handed or one-handed alphabet fingerspelling. I occasionally used these services for my website and involvement in Deaf lobbying group activities.
I hope you will be grateful to have this contribution as a token of my gratitude.
Best of the luck with your presentation in the Blogging/Vlogging Conference at Gallaudet University.
Kind regards,
Donovan V. Cresdee
42 Rozells Ave,
Colonel Light Gardens,
South Australia 5041
email: dcresdee@internode.on.net
fax: 08 8276 9495
mobile: 0417992392
homepage: http://web.mac.com/donniec/iWeb/Site/Welcome.html
PS: Would you please mind me placing this email above in my website for Auslan teachers?
Saturday, January 27, 2007
From My Vlogging Studio
In this vlog, I am demonstrating my vlogging studio. Using both webcam and digital camcorder, I discuss research findings by Neville of Salk Institute about brains of Deaf children that are different from those of hearing children.
Deaf Brain (1 of 2)
Deaf Brain (2 of 2)
The first vlog is done with a digital camera; the second with a webcam. You can distinguish quality between these cameras.
Enjoy!
Deaf Brain (1 of 2)
Deaf Brain (2 of 2)
The first vlog is done with a digital camera; the second with a webcam. You can distinguish quality between these cameras.
Enjoy!
LEGO People are People, Too
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder demonstrates how to teach American Sign Language through LEGO people.
Friday, January 26, 2007
SLCC = Fear of ASL (at Gallaudet)
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder asserts that fear of American Sign Language starts out as a building campaign for Sorenson Language and Communication Center (SLCC) as part of the university mission of "diversity and inclusiveness." Initial purposes for speech communication prove deceptive in a very high level of careful and rigorous argumentation at Gallaudet University, but we can overcome them by vlogging more. Bob's Vlog helps a lot, too!
No Mistake if You Knew ...
If you knew what I know, and if you walked for a mile in my moccasins, and if you saw me the way I saw myself, and if you had to write down my information whenever you filled out one of those forms to certify that I am Deaf.
But you won't. You couldn't. You're not even an audiologist, I'm told. Honest. You need to understand this. If I want to prove that I am Deaf, I MUST find an audiologist to verify my deafness. I need to pay for it, too.
A few years ago I learned that my physician's note stating that I am Deaf was rejected. Why? Having known me and my body for 25 plus years, he was probably the most reliable and appropriate of all to certify my deafness. No, I was told, he's no audiologist.
So I got referred to an audiologist. It was not for a medical reason; it was for a school admission reason. I need a classroom interpreter. My health insurance policy says it does not cover the expenses so I had to pay $75 per hour. I was in the audiologist's office for two hours, mostly waiting, and I had to pay $150 for an audiogram, showing that I'm profoundly Deaf in both ears.
Why an audiologist? It's no mistake if you knew I'm Deaf. It's no mistake if my physician knew, too.
But you won't. You couldn't. You're not even an audiologist, I'm told. Honest. You need to understand this. If I want to prove that I am Deaf, I MUST find an audiologist to verify my deafness. I need to pay for it, too.
A few years ago I learned that my physician's note stating that I am Deaf was rejected. Why? Having known me and my body for 25 plus years, he was probably the most reliable and appropriate of all to certify my deafness. No, I was told, he's no audiologist.
So I got referred to an audiologist. It was not for a medical reason; it was for a school admission reason. I need a classroom interpreter. My health insurance policy says it does not cover the expenses so I had to pay $75 per hour. I was in the audiologist's office for two hours, mostly waiting, and I had to pay $150 for an audiogram, showing that I'm profoundly Deaf in both ears.
Why an audiologist? It's no mistake if you knew I'm Deaf. It's no mistake if my physician knew, too.
Learning Will Happen ...
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder recalls his MSSD principal Merv Garretson's discussion about the educational philosophy of Summerhill School.
Inclusiveness: Obsession and Hoax
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder concludes that inclusiveness of all modes of communication for the Deaf is a well-organized hoax.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Philosophy of Vlogging
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder philosophizes vlogging as a significant medium through which we can express our thoughts in exclusive ASL.
Tentative Presentation Outline: Vlogging-Blogging Interactive Learning Model
Vlogging-Blogging
Interactive Learning Model
Learning comes from within,
from the desire to satisfy curiosities and know
more about self and society.
Introduction
•Beliefs
•Theories
•Goals
Beliefs
•ASL-English language interdependence through vlogging and blogging
•Wetenschappen (Dutch/English translations: weten/wits and –schappen/sciences … shapes of knowledge)
•Professors as instigators of knowledge
Theories
•Vygotsky: Students gain knowledge from each other and from adults.
•Potter: All of our instruction materials are video-based so they situate the students in real-world environments and break that video base down into specific skill instructions.
Goals
•Hands-on experimentation
•Student-generated questions, investigations, and demonstrations
•Assessing student learning in the context of academics
ALOHA!
initial reaction to impromptu response to vlog captioning
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder reacts to the "Oh I See" vlog: Impromptu Response to Vlog Captioning.
Counting Sesame and Flax Seeds in ASL
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder demonstrates how he counts sesame and flax seeds in ASL.
V-Blogger Conference: From Bottom to Top
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder discusses that different people think differently. Ideas materialized from the upcoming Vlogging-Blogging Future Gallaudet should be submitted to greatideas@gallaudet.edu/.
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Is There a God in ASL? (Don't Skip this One!)
Or are we the Deaf still inside Pandora's Box where there's hope? Why do we know that hearing people will still snatch this hope from us because of their ignorance and neglence of our needs for language and culture? Why do they not believe that deafness is God's gift to our happiness?
Philosophy, I'm so warned, furnishes no evidence of happiness. Reason is not absolute, either. I do not say to you, go and reason with the language and culture of the Deaf. I say to you, go and learn whether Deaf people have ideas of happiness.
If every religion is founded upon the idea of a God's happiness, then it is definitely possible that we the Deaf have happy ideas best expressed in American Sign Language, or ASL for short. As every cause has its own effects so deafness is the cause, not the effect; it has always been. What! You may challenge: Is ASL one of the effects of deafness? What are other effects? Ignorance and neglect.
Deafness is always in existence. It cannot be eradicated; it is our life alone that suffers if we allow these ignorance and neglect. They are necessary by seeking to procure our needs for language and culture. Baron d'Holbach, a 18th century German philosopher, asserts in his book, Good Sense: "It is a deaf and useless God, who can effect no change in general laws, to which he is himself subject."
It is true, furthermore, that we the Deaf are real. This is because understanding philosophy is in the region of the ideas that our deafness is an eternal truth that is not dependent upon God. It depends on our happiness.
I have been much perplexed in accounting for the claim that my deafness is a disability which is only half the truth. These reasons for my disability carry on a posteriori drawn from the English language that is foreign to ASL, the language and culture which we have deduced a priori. I am happy to be Deaf, neither more nor less.
We can say that there is a God who does not exclude our language and culture. And in the same way, the good use of ASL will attain its rewards in the hierarchy of happiness. Thank goodness for Thomas Jefferson's "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," the latter of which is our ultimate hope.
Philosophy, I'm so warned, furnishes no evidence of happiness. Reason is not absolute, either. I do not say to you, go and reason with the language and culture of the Deaf. I say to you, go and learn whether Deaf people have ideas of happiness.
If every religion is founded upon the idea of a God's happiness, then it is definitely possible that we the Deaf have happy ideas best expressed in American Sign Language, or ASL for short. As every cause has its own effects so deafness is the cause, not the effect; it has always been. What! You may challenge: Is ASL one of the effects of deafness? What are other effects? Ignorance and neglect.
Deafness is always in existence. It cannot be eradicated; it is our life alone that suffers if we allow these ignorance and neglect. They are necessary by seeking to procure our needs for language and culture. Baron d'Holbach, a 18th century German philosopher, asserts in his book, Good Sense: "It is a deaf and useless God, who can effect no change in general laws, to which he is himself subject."
It is true, furthermore, that we the Deaf are real. This is because understanding philosophy is in the region of the ideas that our deafness is an eternal truth that is not dependent upon God. It depends on our happiness.
I have been much perplexed in accounting for the claim that my deafness is a disability which is only half the truth. These reasons for my disability carry on a posteriori drawn from the English language that is foreign to ASL, the language and culture which we have deduced a priori. I am happy to be Deaf, neither more nor less.
We can say that there is a God who does not exclude our language and culture. And in the same way, the good use of ASL will attain its rewards in the hierarchy of happiness. Thank goodness for Thomas Jefferson's "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," the latter of which is our ultimate hope.
Bob's Vlog: New Gallaudet, New Promise, New Future
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder reacts to Bob's Vlog. It's the best rebuttal to IKJ's recent article, Deaf Culture and Gallaudet.
Math in ASL lost in Pineapple Field
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder does some math in ASL that gets lost in some pineapple field on the foot of Haleakala (correct spelling here...misspelled in the video).
Inclusiveness: It is Different for Absolutists
Ask: where is it politically correct to oppress ASL and destroy Deaf Culture? On January 22, Gallaudet University President Emeritus I. King Jordan published an article labeling certain Deaf people as absolutists and criticizing Deaf culture. A few hours later, bloggers posted and expressed some anger for IKJ as the leading Deaf-basher. Parents of the Deaf across the nation became scared.
There is still an extraordinary degree of language and culture racism in American society. Deaf people often become the victims of being defined in the language other than their own called American Sign Language (ASL). They suffer because hearing people retaliate for their own ignorance of ASL and Deaf culture.
There has been much discussion about the communication of the Deaf not exemplifying the proper use of English. To the contrary, this whole debate is an illustration of ignorance—the ignorance of our American society as to what it has wrought in the Gallaudet University community. Neither ASL nor the English language may be above the freedom of speech clause in a theoretical sense, but they both are most certainly useful in higher learning.
The tension between two languages at Gallaudet University—ASL and English—is not new. It has been particularly thorny where, in lieu of a trivial communication policy approach, Deaf people have been traditionally submitted to a mode of communication that is more convenient for their hearing counterparts. Recently, however, these tensions have started to come out into the open. The 2006 protests at Gallaudet University about the oppression of ASL galvanized the Deaf community and sent shock waves across the nation and around the world.
Protests at Gallaudet University might be indecorous but excluding ASL on this particular campus where Deaf people are is by nature the worst of all.
There is still an extraordinary degree of language and culture racism in American society. Deaf people often become the victims of being defined in the language other than their own called American Sign Language (ASL). They suffer because hearing people retaliate for their own ignorance of ASL and Deaf culture.
There has been much discussion about the communication of the Deaf not exemplifying the proper use of English. To the contrary, this whole debate is an illustration of ignorance—the ignorance of our American society as to what it has wrought in the Gallaudet University community. Neither ASL nor the English language may be above the freedom of speech clause in a theoretical sense, but they both are most certainly useful in higher learning.
The tension between two languages at Gallaudet University—ASL and English—is not new. It has been particularly thorny where, in lieu of a trivial communication policy approach, Deaf people have been traditionally submitted to a mode of communication that is more convenient for their hearing counterparts. Recently, however, these tensions have started to come out into the open. The 2006 protests at Gallaudet University about the oppression of ASL galvanized the Deaf community and sent shock waves across the nation and around the world.
Protests at Gallaudet University might be indecorous but excluding ASL on this particular campus where Deaf people are is by nature the worst of all.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
ASL Dragon: Gisbatzed's Staff
In this vlog, Gisbatzed's staff is explained. It was made by Sookiet, a woman with powerful spirit who lives in the forest valley.
Which Vlog?
A Letter from Scared Mom of Deaf and CODA Children
(Carl's note: I have edited the names and some few words so that it won't be too obvious who wrote the letter. And also from which city that is in America. It's really sad that such the community in which she lives practices and promotes the oppression of language and culture of the Deaf.)
Date: Tue 23 Jan 2007 07:55:56 AM EST
From: XXXXX
To:
Subject: Love Your Vlog!
Greetings Carl!!!
I just want to express my feelings that:
1. I do really love your Vlog so much which it helps me to feel more relax and calm to understand about our true Deaf Culture and Deaf Education needs,
2. my XX yrs old Deaf child did really learn a lot from viewing your Vlogs,
3. and my Deaf Husband thought you are so AWESOME!!!
I just want to speak out my feelings that I was so disgusted to learn about the new building in Gallaudet University IS NOT ASL CENTER on this link: http://www.savegallaudet.org/?p=64
I did watch Ricky Taylor's Vlog about economics but I do not see Sorenson and CSD support ASL as in 100% as they could... I was SO DISGUSTED!!!! Soon I do hope to know and be aware of which Video Relay Services andText Msg Relay Services do support ASL 100% ... I need to know that because I do not want to see that my Deaf family wastes our time for not knowing if any Relay Services (both Video and Text msgs) do not have 100 % ASL support...
Thanks so much for your own bearable time to read my short email..
Highly Warm ASL Respectfully Yours,
Mrs. XXXX~~~~ Deaf Mom of Deaf and CODA Children
P.S. (Please do not publish my real name because here in the city of XXXXX is a BIG Strong Audism Community!!! And do not publish "(city) Mom" because Deaf people here in XXXXX will know who I am because they will know who Mom of Deaf and CODA children is! I am too scared!!!)
Date: Tue 23 Jan 2007 07:55:56 AM EST
From: XXXXX
To:
Subject: Love Your Vlog!
Greetings Carl!!!
I just want to express my feelings that:
1. I do really love your Vlog so much which it helps me to feel more relax and calm to understand about our true Deaf Culture and Deaf Education needs,
2. my XX yrs old Deaf child did really learn a lot from viewing your Vlogs,
3. and my Deaf Husband thought you are so AWESOME!!!
I just want to speak out my feelings that I was so disgusted to learn about the new building in Gallaudet University IS NOT ASL CENTER on this link: http://www.savegallaudet.org/?p=64
I did watch Ricky Taylor's Vlog about economics but I do not see Sorenson and CSD support ASL as in 100% as they could... I was SO DISGUSTED!!!! Soon I do hope to know and be aware of which Video Relay Services andText Msg Relay Services do support ASL 100% ... I need to know that because I do not want to see that my Deaf family wastes our time for not knowing if any Relay Services (both Video and Text msgs) do not have 100 % ASL support...
Thanks so much for your own bearable time to read my short email..
Highly Warm ASL Respectfully Yours,
Mrs. XXXX~~~~ Deaf Mom of Deaf and CODA Children
P.S. (Please do not publish my real name because here in the city of XXXXX is a BIG Strong Audism Community!!! And do not publish "(city) Mom" because Deaf people here in XXXXX will know who I am because they will know who Mom of Deaf and CODA children is! I am too scared!!!)
Monday, January 22, 2007
Semantics of Language Violence
Ryan Commerson’s “An Act of Violence?” vlog is an excellent work, except, in my opinion, for a single part of his dilemma over whether or not questioning President Davila if there might be problems of semantics in MSA’s reprimand over recent protests, violence of academic freedom versus violence of ASL, the speech community of the Deaf.
Now that we have new leadership at Gallaudet University, maybe we’ll see some effort to help heal the Deaf communities everywhere. Changes need to be made to Administration & Operations Manual to include American Sign Language (ASL) as the language of higher learning and teaching. Why ASL is inevitable and why not!
Considering how Gallaudet University has been framed by the mainstream media, it’s no wonder most fair-minded scholars—notably those who’ve been colonized by news outlets that blindly uphold the status quo—think every Deaf person in the America deserve being defined in someone else’s language. That’s outrageous, and recent scolding by MSA about the protests as an act of violence for academic freedom is an affront to the existence of ASL.
There is a lot of evidence that would tend to confirm this language oppression. There is even a description of similar practice in the “diversity and inclusiveness” mission which excludes American Sign Language (ASL) as the language of higher learning and teaching from the Administration & Operations Manual, the campus bible.
For all the clamor over using ASL academically, there’s been relatively little ruckus over the support of the language and culture of the Deaf at Gallaudet University for many years. However, there’s been an inescapable agreement over the violence of ASL at Gallaudet University that must be stopped immediately.
Now that we have new leadership at Gallaudet University, maybe we’ll see some effort to help heal the Deaf communities everywhere. Changes need to be made to Administration & Operations Manual to include American Sign Language (ASL) as the language of higher learning and teaching. Why ASL is inevitable and why not!
Considering how Gallaudet University has been framed by the mainstream media, it’s no wonder most fair-minded scholars—notably those who’ve been colonized by news outlets that blindly uphold the status quo—think every Deaf person in the America deserve being defined in someone else’s language. That’s outrageous, and recent scolding by MSA about the protests as an act of violence for academic freedom is an affront to the existence of ASL.
There is a lot of evidence that would tend to confirm this language oppression. There is even a description of similar practice in the “diversity and inclusiveness” mission which excludes American Sign Language (ASL) as the language of higher learning and teaching from the Administration & Operations Manual, the campus bible.
For all the clamor over using ASL academically, there’s been relatively little ruckus over the support of the language and culture of the Deaf at Gallaudet University for many years. However, there’s been an inescapable agreement over the violence of ASL at Gallaudet University that must be stopped immediately.
Frank Turk, Ricky Taylor and Deaf Economics
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder discusses Frank Turk's thesis and Ricky Taylor's appeal to promote economical opportunities for the Deaf.
Revelation and Turfism in IKJ's Article
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder critiques IKJ's article, Deaf Culture and Gallaudet.
Sunday, January 21, 2007
Can You Copy ...
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder asks if you can copy after him. It's simple but tricky. | |
Magic Mag-net-ic
This is fun to watch. Something for some of my critics who want me to post something interesting.
To the Deaf, Wherever They Are
I don't know what you think is the greatest creation of this vast universe. For me, without question, it's deafness.
People with cochlear implants, I hope you're enjoying locating the origins of sounds and noises. Deaf-blind people, I wish you all the joy that tactile American Sign Language (ASL) can be used everywhere. Beethoven had spent a lifetime creating music he could hardly hear. And yes, isn't vlogging something.
Here on the beautiful, rural island of Maui, the creation of ASL Dragon enabled us to entertain literature in exclusive ASL. With this language tool, every user of ASL can elevate him/herself into Dan McClintock's comic strips.
Let's face it. We live in an age of information miracles. Pick your own.
Me, DeafRead. Without it, I'd be bored. Or at least half bored. Who is not?
It’s not just before DeafRead I never could have produced videos because no one believes ASL. It's not just that ASL I never could express my own thoughts without looking at myself in the mirror. No. The creation of DeafRead cured me of primal fear and nullified the number-one law of the English language.
I am one of those people who, if I'd been born talking too much, would have landed a role in the “Raiders of the Lost Ark” movie. Or ran for The White House. Five thousand years ago, I would have been eaten right away in some mountains.
I'm special. Exceptional. Extraordinary. I have a unique ability to count the number of stars at night. The only problem is that I just can't hear music. Or people talking to me. As I say, I have a natural advantage over other people, but only as long as I use ASL.
I am Deaf. A human being who can do anything but hear. (Oh, yes, that's IKJ!)
The best way to explain what that means, emotionally speaking, is to describe for you a vlog I once put in Kalalau's Korner and then DeafRead. The vlog is about seeing and not seeing ASL Dragon.
In fact, I'll paint a picture for you myself. Here's the dragon, living in the forest. Actually, all we can run into the forest to find ASL Dragon and have fun.
Finally, we the Deaf like to talk and be talked with in ASL. We live for it. We live for those rare moments when Gisbatzed, the protégé of ASL Dragon, comes to our town for a visit. It's going to be our only real world. Where are you, Gisbatzed?
Outside of that deafness, there is nothing but boredom. So are some of my critics!
People with cochlear implants, I hope you're enjoying locating the origins of sounds and noises. Deaf-blind people, I wish you all the joy that tactile American Sign Language (ASL) can be used everywhere. Beethoven had spent a lifetime creating music he could hardly hear. And yes, isn't vlogging something.
Here on the beautiful, rural island of Maui, the creation of ASL Dragon enabled us to entertain literature in exclusive ASL. With this language tool, every user of ASL can elevate him/herself into Dan McClintock's comic strips.
Let's face it. We live in an age of information miracles. Pick your own.
Me, DeafRead. Without it, I'd be bored. Or at least half bored. Who is not?
It’s not just before DeafRead I never could have produced videos because no one believes ASL. It's not just that ASL I never could express my own thoughts without looking at myself in the mirror. No. The creation of DeafRead cured me of primal fear and nullified the number-one law of the English language.
I am one of those people who, if I'd been born talking too much, would have landed a role in the “Raiders of the Lost Ark” movie. Or ran for The White House. Five thousand years ago, I would have been eaten right away in some mountains.
I'm special. Exceptional. Extraordinary. I have a unique ability to count the number of stars at night. The only problem is that I just can't hear music. Or people talking to me. As I say, I have a natural advantage over other people, but only as long as I use ASL.
I am Deaf. A human being who can do anything but hear. (Oh, yes, that's IKJ!)
The best way to explain what that means, emotionally speaking, is to describe for you a vlog I once put in Kalalau's Korner and then DeafRead. The vlog is about seeing and not seeing ASL Dragon.
In fact, I'll paint a picture for you myself. Here's the dragon, living in the forest. Actually, all we can run into the forest to find ASL Dragon and have fun.
Finally, we the Deaf like to talk and be talked with in ASL. We live for it. We live for those rare moments when Gisbatzed, the protégé of ASL Dragon, comes to our town for a visit. It's going to be our only real world. Where are you, Gisbatzed?
Outside of that deafness, there is nothing but boredom. So are some of my critics!
A Letter from New York
Date: Sat 20 Jan 2007 04:19:13 PM EST
From: XXXXXXXX
To: kal1952@myway.com
Subject: hello from New York
Hello Carl.
Greeting from New York City where I live and work. I have read a lot of blogs and vlogs since Gallaudet's 2006 protest started. Before that, I was too ignorant for Gallaudet which made me think that a Gallaudet degree was very ineffective for years. I was very tired of meeting a lot of Gallaudet graduates, mostly deaf, are depending on welfares forever. I had no idea why their brain can't be function after their graduation from Gallaudet. I know certainly that not only do deaf graduates have that but also black, Latino and white do as I know but my point is why Gallaudet didn't work out with deaf future. I have looked down at Gallaudet for long time although I am full of deaf and I am a very active in deaf community and all minorities and majorities.
Until Gallaudet's protest, I can't understand why. I started reading blogs and vblog relating to Gallaudet issue which is my first time. Personally I didn't like reading blogs. I am a best friend of books, not blogs.
I started to understand better about Gallaudet, I stopped looking down at Gallaudet and started to fall in love with G, feel like I want to work with G faculty / staff there to develop a better bridge between Deaf and the world, want to work on new projects to publicize deaf stories, deaf politic, deaf drama, and deaf mythslike what New York Times do.
Who changed my mind about Gallaudet? I am going to say....
Answer: You.
Your blog and vblog brought me to discover the truth, common-sense issues and veiled theories and answers. It made me to feel passionate to see you.
I surprised that you live in Hawaii. What made you think Hawaii is the BEST place for you to live. Are you retired from Gallaudet?
I believe you graduated from Gallaudet, is it?
Feel free to reply back.
Ah forgot to introduce myself... My name is XXXXXXX. I am a designer for fashion company like "XXXXXXX" and I am a freelance photographer and designer. XXXXXX
From: XXXXXXXX
To: kal1952@myway.com
Subject: hello from New York
Hello Carl.
Greeting from New York City where I live and work. I have read a lot of blogs and vlogs since Gallaudet's 2006 protest started. Before that, I was too ignorant for Gallaudet which made me think that a Gallaudet degree was very ineffective for years. I was very tired of meeting a lot of Gallaudet graduates, mostly deaf, are depending on welfares forever. I had no idea why their brain can't be function after their graduation from Gallaudet. I know certainly that not only do deaf graduates have that but also black, Latino and white do as I know but my point is why Gallaudet didn't work out with deaf future. I have looked down at Gallaudet for long time although I am full of deaf and I am a very active in deaf community and all minorities and majorities.
Until Gallaudet's protest, I can't understand why. I started reading blogs and vblog relating to Gallaudet issue which is my first time. Personally I didn't like reading blogs. I am a best friend of books, not blogs.
I started to understand better about Gallaudet, I stopped looking down at Gallaudet and started to fall in love with G, feel like I want to work with G faculty / staff there to develop a better bridge between Deaf and the world, want to work on new projects to publicize deaf stories, deaf politic, deaf drama, and deaf mythslike what New York Times do.
Who changed my mind about Gallaudet? I am going to say....
Answer: You.
Your blog and vblog brought me to discover the truth, common-sense issues and veiled theories and answers. It made me to feel passionate to see you.
I surprised that you live in Hawaii. What made you think Hawaii is the BEST place for you to live. Are you retired from Gallaudet?
I believe you graduated from Gallaudet, is it?
Feel free to reply back.
Ah forgot to introduce myself... My name is XXXXXXX. I am a designer for fashion company like "XXXXXXX" and I am a freelance photographer and designer. XXXXXX
Language Influence in ASL
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder discusses language influence to support the vlog, HEARD? | |
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Jane vs. Jane
Sustainability in Using American Sign Language
I Ka Wa Mamua,
Ka Wa Mahope
(in Hawai'ian:
The future is in the past)
Let the past glory of American Sign Language (ASL) return to Kendall Green. We are drawn at this time to take deliberate steps toward our own healing - ours internally, our language and culture, our communities. We are here to insure that we sustain a future for all the Deaf.
Sustainability is providing for current needs in ways that do not diminish or deplete future generations from enjoying the same quality of life or benefiting from the same resources. ASL is our language and culture that tells us who we are. Our sustainable action is defined as "meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." Let's ask: How do we penetruate and promote ASL academically at Gallaudet University, while dealing with inevitable language bigotry, hegemony and oppression?
Vlogging and blogging about what ASL truly is and what could happen if the world "lived ASL" will allow us to explore linguistic and cultural aspects as well as modern day implications of deafness and the value of using ASL. It is our stories, both ancient and modern that tells not only about our value, art, and importance of this language, but also about the different cultural styles and techniques that makes us powerful Deaf people. Vlogging and blogging about sustaining ASL, in fact, connects us to each other.
We invite you to understand that ASL holds cultural values and representations. For this reason we are to develop sustainability in using ASL academically through vlogging and blogging about it for the future generations.
Friday, January 19, 2007
Why JKF Couldn't Play Well
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder discusses Psychologist Mildred Parten's theory of social play for language and culture development. There are four stages of play: solitary, parallel, associate, and cooperative. He suggests that JKF missed the last stage of social play.
Mindfield during my Lunchtime
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder explains briefly about the book he began to read.
Vlogging-Blogging Interactive Learning Model
Abstract for the upcoming vlogging-blogging conference held at Gallaudet University.
Submitted by Carl Schroeder, Kalalau’s Korner
Vlogging and blogging have expanded and enriched our lives and give us many options not imagined a year ago. It is important to note that the implementation of these technological strategies cannot be delayed while Gallaudet University continues to try to promote communicative diversity and inclusiveness. In the other words, it has become evident that American Sign Language (ASL) and English depend on each other. This ASL-English language interdependence is best accomplished through vlogging and blogging.
Mastering a university level of both languages—ASL and English—through vlogging and blogging presents Gallaudet University with many new challenges. Indeed, the language interdependence creates one of the many obstacles facing us in procuring assistive technology (AT). By law, AT has been defined as “any item, piece of equipment, or product, whether acquired commercially, off the shelf, modified, or customized, that is used to increase, maintain, or improve the functional capabilities of individuals with disabilities” (P.L. 101-407, The Technology Related Assistance Act of 1988). As this definition includes a wide range of products, from “low” technology (i.e., white board), which is easily constructed with no electrical parts, all the way to “high” technology (i.e., digital camcorder), which is more complex and costs considerably more money, it also refers to services, strategies, and practices that alleviate barriers faced by Deaf individuals.
From computers to communication devices, the world of technology offers many Deaf people the tools necessary to be more successful in university, at work, and at achieving the highest level of self-fulfillment. Making informed decisions about technologies at Gallaudet University is a challenge that will continue to increase in coming years.
Submitted by Carl Schroeder, Kalalau’s Korner
Vlogging and blogging have expanded and enriched our lives and give us many options not imagined a year ago. It is important to note that the implementation of these technological strategies cannot be delayed while Gallaudet University continues to try to promote communicative diversity and inclusiveness. In the other words, it has become evident that American Sign Language (ASL) and English depend on each other. This ASL-English language interdependence is best accomplished through vlogging and blogging.
Mastering a university level of both languages—ASL and English—through vlogging and blogging presents Gallaudet University with many new challenges. Indeed, the language interdependence creates one of the many obstacles facing us in procuring assistive technology (AT). By law, AT has been defined as “any item, piece of equipment, or product, whether acquired commercially, off the shelf, modified, or customized, that is used to increase, maintain, or improve the functional capabilities of individuals with disabilities” (P.L. 101-407, The Technology Related Assistance Act of 1988). As this definition includes a wide range of products, from “low” technology (i.e., white board), which is easily constructed with no electrical parts, all the way to “high” technology (i.e., digital camcorder), which is more complex and costs considerably more money, it also refers to services, strategies, and practices that alleviate barriers faced by Deaf individuals.
From computers to communication devices, the world of technology offers many Deaf people the tools necessary to be more successful in university, at work, and at achieving the highest level of self-fulfillment. Making informed decisions about technologies at Gallaudet University is a challenge that will continue to increase in coming years.
Rare Birds at Gallaudet University
Please pardon my appearance in this vlog. There was just a spring in my thought and I wanted to record it immediately. I thought I should share it with you guys!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1WEE1FuK2A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1WEE1FuK2A
Plato's Cave and Gallaudet Ship
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder discusses The Allegory of the Cave by Plato and then applies it to Gallaudet University. | |
Another Postcard Vlog: ASL Dragon's Tree
| In this vlog, Gisbatzed explains about ASL Dragon's favorite tree. | |
Guest Vlogger: Joshua Staley on ASL
Aloha All!
From time to time, I receive a vlog or a video-letter. Recently I received a vlog from Josh Staley of Albuquerque, NM, and I invited him as my guest vlogger. I found his perspective to ASL uniquely interesting, and I thought you would enjoy listening to his vlog.
Ladies and gentlemen, meet Josh:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veUuaCPcXWA
From time to time, I receive a vlog or a video-letter. Recently I received a vlog from Josh Staley of Albuquerque, NM, and I invited him as my guest vlogger. I found his perspective to ASL uniquely interesting, and I thought you would enjoy listening to his vlog.
Ladies and gentlemen, meet Josh:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veUuaCPcXWA
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Villain or Hero?
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder talks about Brian Riley's involvement in recent protests at Gallaudet University. Riley is going to write a book, and we are to read it. | |
From Anonymous to Libelous ... Abuses
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder expresses his profound concerns about the way we have merged from anonymous to libelous abuses and petitions community leaders to address them. | |
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Fallacy of Suppressed Evidence in the Covington and Burling Report
Throw the Covington and Burling report in your trash can! I will argue why you should reject it as a trashy effort by the IKJ-JKF-PK (Paul Kelly) administration of Gallaudet University.
Covington and Burling LLP is a well known law firm that represents the tobacco industries. It is also well known for being successful in suppressing evidence regarding the health hazards of cigarette smoking by omitting any relevant information, a fallacy. The fallacy of suppressed evidence is necessary to make a study, analysis or report seem more significant than it is.
What the Covington and Burling report doesn't reveal is that Gallaudet University’s principal repertoire is American Sign Language, or ASL for short. Of course, any researchers who didn’t report significant findings just because the Covington and Burling law firm hadn’t set out to explore the language and culture of the Deaf would be remiss. The Covington and Burling report Executive Summary doesn’t even mention ASL at all. Why ASL is suppressed is obvious: the Covington and Burling report MUST seem more reasonable than it appears to be.
How can the Covington and Burling report be neutral if ASL is suppressed? If there is anyone who can defend the Covington and Burling law firm, then he/she needs to have his/her head examined. Thus, there is quite a bit of significant and relevant evidence that ASL is omitted in the Covington and Burling report that, had it been revealed, might have expanded its reputation as the best designed report ever on ASL.
Instead of being held up as a model of promising research, this Covington and Burling report that suppresses ASL at Gallaudet University has to end up in the trash heap where it belongs. Throw it away at once!
Covington and Burling LLP is a well known law firm that represents the tobacco industries. It is also well known for being successful in suppressing evidence regarding the health hazards of cigarette smoking by omitting any relevant information, a fallacy. The fallacy of suppressed evidence is necessary to make a study, analysis or report seem more significant than it is.
What the Covington and Burling report doesn't reveal is that Gallaudet University’s principal repertoire is American Sign Language, or ASL for short. Of course, any researchers who didn’t report significant findings just because the Covington and Burling law firm hadn’t set out to explore the language and culture of the Deaf would be remiss. The Covington and Burling report Executive Summary doesn’t even mention ASL at all. Why ASL is suppressed is obvious: the Covington and Burling report MUST seem more reasonable than it appears to be.
How can the Covington and Burling report be neutral if ASL is suppressed? If there is anyone who can defend the Covington and Burling law firm, then he/she needs to have his/her head examined. Thus, there is quite a bit of significant and relevant evidence that ASL is omitted in the Covington and Burling report that, had it been revealed, might have expanded its reputation as the best designed report ever on ASL.
Instead of being held up as a model of promising research, this Covington and Burling report that suppresses ASL at Gallaudet University has to end up in the trash heap where it belongs. Throw it away at once!
With Critical Eyes
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder urges that we read the report on HMB incidents "with critical eyes." | |
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
ASL Storytelling Theatre for a Fundraising Project
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder introduces his bag theatre, ASL Storytelling Theatre, a delightful social exchange, linking both storytelling artist and audience to the language and culture of the Deaf, American Sign Language. For a fundraising project, email: GISBATZED@yahoo.com
An Essay: Why Vlogging?
Vlogging is fun because it enhances ASL. It can enrich everyone who uses, acquires or studies ASL.
A way to put ASL in a vlog is to think about how I use it. Using ASL does not consist of playing a mental monologue into a camera. Rather, I engage in a constant give-and-take between the thoughts I try to convey and the means ASL offers to convey them. I often grope for signs, am dissatisfied with what I say because it does not express what I wanted to say, or discover when every combination of signs seems wrong that I don’t really know what I want to say. And when I get frustrated by a mismatch between ASL and my thoughts, I don’t give up.
I do not give up vlogging because it can allow me to share my thoughts not just directly, but also indirectly, via ASL Dragon stories, for example, which give a nudge to my audience into grasping connections they may not have noticed about ASL before. For example, my stories often treat forest as if it were a valuable resource, such as the road through the forest (an abstract structure), not seeing the forest for the trees, no two Oak trees are alike, etc. I am using ASL to affect thoughts because it is not the same thing as thought.
The most important step in vlogging is to prepare for it. One aspect of this preparation involves timing that Google and YouTube allow it. Another key aspect is to be relaxed and natural in delivering my stories. For example, I did this “Lipreading Is Weird!” vlog nine times because I kept on bursting into giggling, smirking or laughing at times. The ninth video was without any of them, which was miraculous. I tried very hard not to be distracted by positioning myself in the audience either.
I also worried about people not understanding many of the signs I may use in vlogging. I remembered from my language acquisition professor at Georgetown University: Not only is an audience’s ability to acquire ASL far greater than their ability to use ASL, but they also have much more tolerance for ambiguity than I might have. I need to make stories to flow smoothly and I must not inhibit myself by worrying over individual signs.
Vlogging in ASL can be a delightful medium for introducing our society to the language and culture of the Deaf.
A way to put ASL in a vlog is to think about how I use it. Using ASL does not consist of playing a mental monologue into a camera. Rather, I engage in a constant give-and-take between the thoughts I try to convey and the means ASL offers to convey them. I often grope for signs, am dissatisfied with what I say because it does not express what I wanted to say, or discover when every combination of signs seems wrong that I don’t really know what I want to say. And when I get frustrated by a mismatch between ASL and my thoughts, I don’t give up.
I do not give up vlogging because it can allow me to share my thoughts not just directly, but also indirectly, via ASL Dragon stories, for example, which give a nudge to my audience into grasping connections they may not have noticed about ASL before. For example, my stories often treat forest as if it were a valuable resource, such as the road through the forest (an abstract structure), not seeing the forest for the trees, no two Oak trees are alike, etc. I am using ASL to affect thoughts because it is not the same thing as thought.
The most important step in vlogging is to prepare for it. One aspect of this preparation involves timing that Google and YouTube allow it. Another key aspect is to be relaxed and natural in delivering my stories. For example, I did this “Lipreading Is Weird!” vlog nine times because I kept on bursting into giggling, smirking or laughing at times. The ninth video was without any of them, which was miraculous. I tried very hard not to be distracted by positioning myself in the audience either.
I also worried about people not understanding many of the signs I may use in vlogging. I remembered from my language acquisition professor at Georgetown University: Not only is an audience’s ability to acquire ASL far greater than their ability to use ASL, but they also have much more tolerance for ambiguity than I might have. I need to make stories to flow smoothly and I must not inhibit myself by worrying over individual signs.
Vlogging in ASL can be a delightful medium for introducing our society to the language and culture of the Deaf.
Can You Really Understand This the First Time? (1 of 2)
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder assumes you're having some difficulties in understanding this short story by Hans Christian Andersen. | |
Can You Really Understand This the First Time? (2 of 2)
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder assumes that you understand the same story by Hans Christian Andersen the first time. | |
Monday, January 15, 2007
Recall Mike Deninger
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder appeals to recall Mike Deninger so he could bring prestige back to MSSD and KDES by rescinding the "center" name in the Laurent Clerc Center. | |
Lipreading is Weird!
| In this vlog, you don't have any idea of how Carl Schroeder could ever lipread. | |
Counterfactual at Gallaudet University
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder argues WHAT IF the 1988 Deaf President Now protestors were never called boys and girls. | |
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Why Still Blogging?
Blogging is a new discipline in our writing culture.
Around 4,100 years ago, writing began to flourish with language symbols. It merged from incised “counting tokens” which began about 9,000 years ago. Today we are still deeply embedded in this writing culture.
Blogging is like lifting weights: the more you lift, the stronger you get. Every morning and evening I lift my 10-lbs dumbbells because they make me feel painfully good. Everyday I am thinking about what to blog (or vlog) because it makes me feel intellectually good.
Once I have a topic in mind, I need to find out what other bloggers have written about my topic. If they’ve used the same stories, there’s no point in repeating their work in my own words. Most of the time, though, I will find that other bloggers have used different sources and write about different themes, and that reading their blogs would help me place my own blog in perspective.
While I do blogging, I learn from my own blogs. Sometimes, they emerge from my unconsciousness, and they also give me a new angle of attack to understand some thoughts I had previously. For me, blogging is “learning and thinking.” I seem to think more about more things now that I blog every day.
In addition, I constantly learn from other bloggers in DeafRead and find amazing satisfaction from them. We are entering a new phase of writing culture that began thousands of years ago.
Around 4,100 years ago, writing began to flourish with language symbols. It merged from incised “counting tokens” which began about 9,000 years ago. Today we are still deeply embedded in this writing culture.
Blogging is like lifting weights: the more you lift, the stronger you get. Every morning and evening I lift my 10-lbs dumbbells because they make me feel painfully good. Everyday I am thinking about what to blog (or vlog) because it makes me feel intellectually good.
Once I have a topic in mind, I need to find out what other bloggers have written about my topic. If they’ve used the same stories, there’s no point in repeating their work in my own words. Most of the time, though, I will find that other bloggers have used different sources and write about different themes, and that reading their blogs would help me place my own blog in perspective.
While I do blogging, I learn from my own blogs. Sometimes, they emerge from my unconsciousness, and they also give me a new angle of attack to understand some thoughts I had previously. For me, blogging is “learning and thinking.” I seem to think more about more things now that I blog every day.
In addition, I constantly learn from other bloggers in DeafRead and find amazing satisfaction from them. We are entering a new phase of writing culture that began thousands of years ago.
Contact Former Provost Catherine Ingold
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder urges DeafRead friends to contact Gallaudet University's former provost Catherine Ingold who did not support IKJ's application for the university presidency in 1987. In 1988, IKJ changed his heart three times: supporting student protest then supporting President Zisner and then supporting student protest. Provost Ingold was probably correct, and we would love to hear from her. We need to learn from her because this is history in the making. Dr. Catherine Ingold's email address: cwingold@nflc.org | |
From Shakespeare to Browning: Keep on V-Blogging
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder reflects how he is influenced by Shakespeare's Sonnet 60 and Robert Browning's quotation: "A man's reach should exceed his grasp/Or what's a heaven for." | |
Language Politics: ASL Can Do What English Can't
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder compares ASL and English to justify language politics. | |
Saturday, January 13, 2007
No for Political and Economic Reasons
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder discusses rational political and economic reasons for supporting ASL. | |
Misconception of Deafness Can Be Awful
A common misconception is the belief that Deaf children can acquire English best through speech reading and cochlear implants (CI). Due to the fact that they do not hear normally and naturally, their language acquisition is forever altered through the remaining senses--sight, touch, smell and taste--which become highly acute. Deaf people do have a different learning style that no textbook today can honestly address. We the Deaf do not have a special need; we have American Sign Language.
Notice the similarity between these two statements: "We the Deaf do not rely on conventions of researches developed in another language, namely, English," versus "We the Americans do not comply with research findings in the French language." One comment is based in ASL, and the other is based in our American culture. Both may have the exact same consequence in terms of our own being, but our response will determine the way we view ourselves.
Sometimes our society thinks they want the Deaf child to hear and speak when he or she cannot, but this thinking is problematic. When Deaf children begin to think they can really hear and speak, they are going to align themselves with that belief. So if instead, when they "retreat" from speaking or wearing CI, they are told, "Why, it isn't like you to not speak or hear, you are usually so good," they are reinforced by a false reality that their deafness is not inevitable.
When we the Deaf think (or know) who we really are is a powerful being, we are far more likely to acknowledge that way. It is therefore our responsibility as Deaf people to teach this message that misconceptions of our deafness and language could lead to terrible and unspeakable consequences.
Notice the similarity between these two statements: "We the Deaf do not rely on conventions of researches developed in another language, namely, English," versus "We the Americans do not comply with research findings in the French language." One comment is based in ASL, and the other is based in our American culture. Both may have the exact same consequence in terms of our own being, but our response will determine the way we view ourselves.
Sometimes our society thinks they want the Deaf child to hear and speak when he or she cannot, but this thinking is problematic. When Deaf children begin to think they can really hear and speak, they are going to align themselves with that belief. So if instead, when they "retreat" from speaking or wearing CI, they are told, "Why, it isn't like you to not speak or hear, you are usually so good," they are reinforced by a false reality that their deafness is not inevitable.
When we the Deaf think (or know) who we really are is a powerful being, we are far more likely to acknowledge that way. It is therefore our responsibility as Deaf people to teach this message that misconceptions of our deafness and language could lead to terrible and unspeakable consequences.
For Kids: Syllogism is FUN
A vlog for children to learn about a basic syllogism. They can create their own syllogism. Here's a simple formula.
Premise A: All X is (adjective).
Premise B: (noun) is X.
Conclusion: (noun) is (adjective).
The first example in my vlog:
Premise A: All fruit is delicious.
Premise B: Apples are fruit.
Conclusion: Apples are delicious.
The second example:
Premise A: All children are youthful.
Premise B: You are a child.
Conclusion: You are youthful.
Friday, January 12, 2007
We Need Hearing Informants (Spies)
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder defends SOME hearing friends who are our language informants.
Consciousness and Language (One Hand Signs)
| In this vlog, using one hand, Carl Schroeder discusses consciousness and language of the Deaf. | |
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Deaf Mind: Tabula Rasa or Creative Vision?
The problem with Gallaudet University is twofold. Its attitude to American Sign Language (ASL) and Deaf Culture is passive, and its attitude to language and speech is active.
Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology for President Robert Davila is going to be an attempt to get back to square one to sort out the mess at Gallaudet University during the next 18-24 months. The German philosopher, Husserl (1859-1938) developed a philosophical inquiry that is based on the premise of reality consisting of objects and events as they are understood in our consciousness and not of anything independent of our consciousness. When Husserl was at university, in the 1880s, he began a new essence of revolution that consciousness is intentional, that it is active, not passive.
We the Deaf know something merely with our mind which is hardly to know it at all. Our whole being is somehow involved in ASL that generates true knowing. When this happens, our knowledge in ASL has a weight that is not found in another language and culture. We do have our own intellectual knowledge.
But how could Gallaudet University have benefited from our knowledge? In fact, we may as well open the question and ask: How can any Deaf individual?
Let me start by introduction another phenomenology developed by the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur. He stresses the reduction—the method of standing back and viewing things from a distance. In 1987, Ricoeur wrote an article, Husserl: An Analysis of his Phenomenology, “By means of this reduction consciousness rids itself of a naiveté which it has beforehand, and which Husserl calls the natural attitude. This attitude consists in spontaneously believing that the world which is there is simply given. In correcting itself about this naiveté, consciousness discovers that it is in itself giving, sense-giving. The reduction dies not exclude the presence of the world; it takes nothing back. It does not even suspend the primacy of intuition in ever cognition. After the reduction, consciousness continues seeing, but without being absorbed in this seeing, without being lost in it. Rather, the very seeing itself is discovered as a doing as a producing—once Husserl even says ‘as a creating’. Husserl would be understood—and the one who thus understands him would be a phenomenologist—if the intentionality which culminates in seeing were recognized to be a creative vision.”
But what is next, we may ask. How can we the Deaf transform present university mission into our own creative vision? We can begin by noting that users of ASL do it all the time. Look at Tower Clock and we can feel the phenomenological vision.
Perhaps an example might help. Deaf children feel spontaneous mental excitement if they see a university student coming to their place. They feel this is natural, like feeling hungry when they smell cooking. But supposing that they are looking through one of the Tower Clock yearbooks, and they see pictures of Deaf students using ASL. These children become fascinated by these pictures. How do they do this? In that question lies the essence of phenomenology. We could say that these children look at the pictures, and deliberately put themselves in the state of mind of Deaf people about to use ASL exclusively. They cease to see the pictures from the “tabula rasa” or the natural blank slate (“these are just pictures,” we may remind them) and deliberately endow them with a dimension of reality—ASL. That is what Ricoeur meant by “the very seeing is discovered as a doing.”
When I was young (there is a picture of me standing next to President Elstad in the 1968 Tower Clock yearbook), I was already standing back and viewing Gallaudet students using ASL exclusively. In my own mind, ASL is phenomenal, and Gallaudet University must therefore be proactive in aggrandizing the future of all the Deaf. Deaf children come in creative vision, not tabula rasa.
Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology for President Robert Davila is going to be an attempt to get back to square one to sort out the mess at Gallaudet University during the next 18-24 months. The German philosopher, Husserl (1859-1938) developed a philosophical inquiry that is based on the premise of reality consisting of objects and events as they are understood in our consciousness and not of anything independent of our consciousness. When Husserl was at university, in the 1880s, he began a new essence of revolution that consciousness is intentional, that it is active, not passive.
We the Deaf know something merely with our mind which is hardly to know it at all. Our whole being is somehow involved in ASL that generates true knowing. When this happens, our knowledge in ASL has a weight that is not found in another language and culture. We do have our own intellectual knowledge.
But how could Gallaudet University have benefited from our knowledge? In fact, we may as well open the question and ask: How can any Deaf individual?
Let me start by introduction another phenomenology developed by the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur. He stresses the reduction—the method of standing back and viewing things from a distance. In 1987, Ricoeur wrote an article, Husserl: An Analysis of his Phenomenology, “By means of this reduction consciousness rids itself of a naiveté which it has beforehand, and which Husserl calls the natural attitude. This attitude consists in spontaneously believing that the world which is there is simply given. In correcting itself about this naiveté, consciousness discovers that it is in itself giving, sense-giving. The reduction dies not exclude the presence of the world; it takes nothing back. It does not even suspend the primacy of intuition in ever cognition. After the reduction, consciousness continues seeing, but without being absorbed in this seeing, without being lost in it. Rather, the very seeing itself is discovered as a doing as a producing—once Husserl even says ‘as a creating’. Husserl would be understood—and the one who thus understands him would be a phenomenologist—if the intentionality which culminates in seeing were recognized to be a creative vision.”
But what is next, we may ask. How can we the Deaf transform present university mission into our own creative vision? We can begin by noting that users of ASL do it all the time. Look at Tower Clock and we can feel the phenomenological vision.
Perhaps an example might help. Deaf children feel spontaneous mental excitement if they see a university student coming to their place. They feel this is natural, like feeling hungry when they smell cooking. But supposing that they are looking through one of the Tower Clock yearbooks, and they see pictures of Deaf students using ASL. These children become fascinated by these pictures. How do they do this? In that question lies the essence of phenomenology. We could say that these children look at the pictures, and deliberately put themselves in the state of mind of Deaf people about to use ASL exclusively. They cease to see the pictures from the “tabula rasa” or the natural blank slate (“these are just pictures,” we may remind them) and deliberately endow them with a dimension of reality—ASL. That is what Ricoeur meant by “the very seeing is discovered as a doing.”
When I was young (there is a picture of me standing next to President Elstad in the 1968 Tower Clock yearbook), I was already standing back and viewing Gallaudet students using ASL exclusively. In my own mind, ASL is phenomenal, and Gallaudet University must therefore be proactive in aggrandizing the future of all the Deaf. Deaf children come in creative vision, not tabula rasa.
ASL Dragon's Story Becomes ... Yours
In this vlog, Gisbatzed told about one of ASL Dragon's favorite stories, bringing us from acorn to oak tree.
No Reprisal or ...
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder, the father of Vivienne arrested on "Black Friday," opposes "light reprisals" at Gallaudet University.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
Not Hearing Enough: A New Trend
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder suggests a new trend called "not hearing enough." | |
Ho'ohanohano, A Case for Piano, and CLAP-CLAP-clap-clap-clap
Ho’ohanohano is in Hawai’ian meaning respecting and honoring the spirit within. When I first learned about Ho’ohanohano, I thought of the Golden Rule: “Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you.” I have also learned that Ho’ohanohano wasn’t about self-serving; instead it was about treating others well.
Therefore, Ho’ohanohano teaches me to take responsibility for the inner spirit that drives me, creates me and moves me toward the actions I choose to take. For this blog, I wish to discuss that asking money for a piano is a case of creative judgment. If a Deaf person can be a secretary, then Mike McConnell can play a piano.
Dan McClintock’s cartoon helps us merge from a very difficult and painful lesson about “unintentional neglect.” We need not make Mike the pianist an outcast, because in denying his apparently musical talent we would have severed the “PROVE DEAF CAN” syndrome. We can find or refer sponsors for his debut at the upcoming Scott Joplin Ragtime Festival in Sedalia, Missouri. We can also hope that the National Republican Party invites him to play “Hail to the Chief” in 2008 and beyond. Maybe he can also play in the annual commencement at Gallaudet University. And better yet, he can play “Hail to Bison” with our CLAP-CLAP-clap-clap-clap music notes.
We can learn more by treating Mike well, with the highest respect for his dignity, and his feelings of self-worth. Ho’ohanohano also teaches that if we support Mike McConnell or any prospect Deaf pianist, we can continually seek to gain trust and respect of him. We will need his talent to get things done with us and through us.
Find a piano for Mike McConnell. We want to see him play. He can play for ASL Dragon, too! I will just let critics distinguish him from his music. Ho’ohanohano is honorable! CLAP-CLAP-clap-clap-clap
Therefore, Ho’ohanohano teaches me to take responsibility for the inner spirit that drives me, creates me and moves me toward the actions I choose to take. For this blog, I wish to discuss that asking money for a piano is a case of creative judgment. If a Deaf person can be a secretary, then Mike McConnell can play a piano.
Dan McClintock’s cartoon helps us merge from a very difficult and painful lesson about “unintentional neglect.” We need not make Mike the pianist an outcast, because in denying his apparently musical talent we would have severed the “PROVE DEAF CAN” syndrome. We can find or refer sponsors for his debut at the upcoming Scott Joplin Ragtime Festival in Sedalia, Missouri. We can also hope that the National Republican Party invites him to play “Hail to the Chief” in 2008 and beyond. Maybe he can also play in the annual commencement at Gallaudet University. And better yet, he can play “Hail to Bison” with our CLAP-CLAP-clap-clap-clap music notes.
We can learn more by treating Mike well, with the highest respect for his dignity, and his feelings of self-worth. Ho’ohanohano also teaches that if we support Mike McConnell or any prospect Deaf pianist, we can continually seek to gain trust and respect of him. We will need his talent to get things done with us and through us.
Find a piano for Mike McConnell. We want to see him play. He can play for ASL Dragon, too! I will just let critics distinguish him from his music. Ho’ohanohano is honorable! CLAP-CLAP-clap-clap-clap
Information, Knowledge and Communication
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder discusses why ASL is important to Deaf babies.
Guest Blogger: Reggie Boyd
Window Display
by
Reginald Boyd
Photo credit: "Cooperation in Florida" Volta Review, March 1936
(Carl’s note: Reggie and I became close friends when we first enrolled in the Model Secondary School for the Deaf in 1970. I’d never laughed so much until I met him. When I received his article, you could never guess the laughter I had. This is not very funny. But, coming from Reggie, I couldn’t help but laughed.)
For many years we are aware that Oralists are Deaf people’s ULTIMATE OPPRESSORS. Today they are still promoting false hope for Deaf children, which is a huge part of their propaganda. We also know that they would put successful Deaf children on a display of some sort, such as a stage to promote their speech/lipreading agenda.
The story I am going to tell you is very unbelievable.
During the National Hearing Week in 1935, the Orlando League for the Hard of Hearing based in Florida set up a window demonstration for speech/lipreading education for the public to see. The Rotary Club sponsored the event because its president happened to be the store manager in one of the largest department stores in the city. The manager donated the WINDOW DISPLAY (Yes, it’s the very same window display where the mannequins were placed to display the clothing.) for the demonstration.
The photograph above shows that the teacher and her Deaf pupils are inside the window with the loudspeaker broadcasting the speech/lipreading activities outside the window. People walking by could listen to the program at the expenses paid by the Rotary Club. For one week, these Deaf children’s true identity was stripped and their self-esteem was destroyed. The Deaf children were humiliated.
Dan Clintock's "Ego" Expanded and Elaborated for All Deaf Children
Treat people as if they were what they ought to be, and
you help them to become what they are capable of being.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832),
German writer and philosopher
I would like to expand and elaborate Dan Clintock’s prose on "ego" in his Cartoon of the Week blog: “Like Carl Schroeder, I’m something of an armchair philosopher myself. Let me share some philosophical stuff with you. Remember Chris Leon’s “big headed” remark? I could again take his suggestion and turn this into a drawing of how to sign “ego.” As I see it – this is just an observation – we male bloggers (Ridor, Mike McConnell, Carl Schroeder and I) are all big egos. Yes, admit it, fellas. We are egos! (chuckle) There’s nothing wrong with having a healthy ego. It’s what keeps the fire in our bellies going. DeafRead wouldn’t be interesting if it wasn’t for our egos.”
Those of us who read in DeafRead know we are in an extraordinary period in life. There is nothing like this time, because Gallaudet University is home again! And like any home, Gallaudet University has to be cared for.
In Deaf Cartoon Blogs, Dan McClintock illustrated a wonderful Hollywood-Square-inspired cartoon with well-known Deaf bloggers. Dan explains how each blogger is about the very identity of DeafRead. As he explains, we cannot define spirit simply in supportive terms. Spirit is part of our reality, but it is also defined by DeafReaders, connection to our Deaf community, and our best vision of our future.
Yet even in our country there are many who are not thriving and are struggling. Far too many of Deaf children are poorly educated, poorly communicated, and are in need of a greater sense of hope. They count on us to work with the assurance that Gallaudet University and its pre-college programs – MSSD and KDES (The Laurent Clerc Center belongs to JKF’s protégés who need to get out, too!) – hold something better and are worthy of their continued stewardship.
As a novice blogger-vlogger, I think; therefore, we are the caretakers of all Deaf children for a better future. After all, it’s a matter of our egos that we serve them rather than that we are their servants. That's our spirit. And our hope for these Deaf children.
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
To Riddle Deafness or Not to Riddle Deafness
In this video, Carl Schroeder critiques Lennard J. Davis' article, Deafness and the Riddle of Identity, published in the January 12, 2007 issue of The Chronicle Review. Davis is Professor of English at the University of Illinios at Chicago.
Wandering and Wondering
Vlog: Carl Schroeder is a 1983 Thomas J. Watson Fellow from Gallaudet University.
Private Jokes Made Public
No, I don’t know anything and give any damn about the “absolutists.” If everything is absolute, then I don’t really have anything to blog about. However, I have one cent to share with my readers.
In fact, only the authors of the “absolutists” at Gallaudet University—JKF and IKJ—were “in the know” because they shared private jokes about Deaf people. For a long while they were great fun, but when the “absolutist” joke was made public, it became painfully unfunny.
The Washington Post’s Susan Kinzie reported yesterday that last November IKJ wrote to urge the Board to have a more inclusive view in order to suppress the “absolutists” and to withhold American Sign Language, the language and culture of the Deaf, so that diversity could happen. For a long while, the Board (with Levinson being the oldest board member) might have had the privilege of entertaining private jokes which, they thought quite obviously, would never be made public. Who were the “absolutists”? Why were they labeled in the way they remained ostracized? Who thought that users of ASL were stupid? Why was that so? Is that still a private joke?
That was what the IKJ administration was all about: laughing at us, getting rich together by telling and making determinedly silly labels. We the Deaf watched them in silence, and we saw how they signalized to each other non-verbally that they were enjoying private jokes of their own. We also watched their “go-fer or brownnoser” administrators laughing politely at their not-so-funny jokes as if to tell them they got them, or if not, were perfunctionary at best. These middle management administrators just needed to get drunk or high together with the top administration but they didn’t … they were definitely not in the know.
Again, I don’t care very much about the “absolutists” because they were purely an invention to deliberately confound the public.
In fact, only the authors of the “absolutists” at Gallaudet University—JKF and IKJ—were “in the know” because they shared private jokes about Deaf people. For a long while they were great fun, but when the “absolutist” joke was made public, it became painfully unfunny.
The Washington Post’s Susan Kinzie reported yesterday that last November IKJ wrote to urge the Board to have a more inclusive view in order to suppress the “absolutists” and to withhold American Sign Language, the language and culture of the Deaf, so that diversity could happen. For a long while, the Board (with Levinson being the oldest board member) might have had the privilege of entertaining private jokes which, they thought quite obviously, would never be made public. Who were the “absolutists”? Why were they labeled in the way they remained ostracized? Who thought that users of ASL were stupid? Why was that so? Is that still a private joke?
That was what the IKJ administration was all about: laughing at us, getting rich together by telling and making determinedly silly labels. We the Deaf watched them in silence, and we saw how they signalized to each other non-verbally that they were enjoying private jokes of their own. We also watched their “go-fer or brownnoser” administrators laughing politely at their not-so-funny jokes as if to tell them they got them, or if not, were perfunctionary at best. These middle management administrators just needed to get drunk or high together with the top administration but they didn’t … they were definitely not in the know.
Again, I don’t care very much about the “absolutists” because they were purely an invention to deliberately confound the public.
Monday, January 08, 2007
Absolutely No Authority to Discuss "Absolutists" at Gallaudet
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder baffles the implication of the label: "absolutism." He has absolutely no authority to discuss "absolutists" at Gallaudet but suggests there might be a few people who know them. | |
Blogging and Vlogging the Future of All the Deaf
The upcoming blogging and vlogging conference at Gallaudet University is about the future of all the Deaf. Blogging and vlogging the future of Gallaudet University will require critical thinking and critiquing, which could be very revolutionary. It is very important that Gallaudet University promotes such academic discourse utilizing high technologies.
While an undergraduate student, I studied under Professor Cathy Kalbacher who is the granddaughter of one of the first women enrolled in Gallaudet. We read and discussed Alvin Toffler's book, The Third Wave, and it is about two previous revolutions--agriculture and industry--leading to the next revolution--information. Although we realized we couldn't predict the future revolution, we agreed that we should prepare for it. History helps us understand today and be comfortable about tomorrow.
The future of Gallaudet University began in 1864. It was one Sophie Fowler Gallaudet who was the matron advising and assisting her young son, Edward Miner Gallaudet, in shaping and developing what is dubbed today as our collective intelligence that defines deafness not as a disability, but as a "raison d'etre" for our own existence as well as our language and culture, American Sign Language.
By recent protests at Gallaudet University, it started occurring to me that the word deafness is not exactly inclusive. What does it really refer to? What you think of deafness, what comes to mind? Does deafness call for diversity and inclusiveness? We the Deaf know the story of language oppression, the story of language hegemony, and the story of language bigotry. As I am blogging and vlogging, the perception of ASL and Deaf Culture is simply significant. Often, the less an individual is ignorant of ASL and Deaf Culture, the more supportive they tend to be toward Deaf people. That realization prompted me to make changing societal perceptions of the meaning of deafness by democratizing our language and culture. The measurement of higher education at Gallaudet University implies both informed citizenry and workable democracy.
Blogging and vlogging the future of Gallaudet University is so materialized because the recent protests have been catastrophic responses to oppression for Deaf people in the 140-plus years since the inception of the university. The current university mission of "diversity and inclusiveness" is an indirect and implicit assimilation that demands Deaf students to surrender their identity, language, and culture to become part of the homogenous mass, to accept powerlessness, and to have limited success in communication while at the same time fostering linguistic, cultural and communicative misconception (squabbles, absolutists, and all modes of communication) from the mainstream.
Sound daunting? In contrast, we the Deaf still have our hearts open to creating a sustainable, harmonious future together. Sure, but who better to help lead Gallaudet University into the future than bloggers and vloggers invited to the conference next month. My vision of blogging and vlogging the future of Gallaudet University is this: To recruit Deaf youth across the nation and around the world to enroll in Gallaudet University for higher learning and teaching.
I, with all my heart and soul, believe in this upcoming conference, more than ever, we need to come together and create a future for all the Deaf. Adversarial comments and insults are not going to get us anywhere. It's only through constructive dialogue and development that balances the extremes of known and unknown that is based on mutual respect between ASL, the language and culture of the Deaf, and its counterpart English, the language of higher education.
We the Deaf are in the fulfillment stage of intellectual development. I believe that recent Gallaudet protests had made a major step out of the prejudices, the narrow-mindedness of the past. I also believe that we the Deaf have a much greater sense of the global community that the IKJ administration could ever have. There is no other country in the world where the Deaf people have developed as positive a relationship with the federal government, especially Congress, as Gallaudet University. We have incredibly a powerful Deaf community in unity for Gallaudet University.
While an undergraduate student, I studied under Professor Cathy Kalbacher who is the granddaughter of one of the first women enrolled in Gallaudet. We read and discussed Alvin Toffler's book, The Third Wave, and it is about two previous revolutions--agriculture and industry--leading to the next revolution--information. Although we realized we couldn't predict the future revolution, we agreed that we should prepare for it. History helps us understand today and be comfortable about tomorrow.
The future of Gallaudet University began in 1864. It was one Sophie Fowler Gallaudet who was the matron advising and assisting her young son, Edward Miner Gallaudet, in shaping and developing what is dubbed today as our collective intelligence that defines deafness not as a disability, but as a "raison d'etre" for our own existence as well as our language and culture, American Sign Language.
By recent protests at Gallaudet University, it started occurring to me that the word deafness is not exactly inclusive. What does it really refer to? What you think of deafness, what comes to mind? Does deafness call for diversity and inclusiveness? We the Deaf know the story of language oppression, the story of language hegemony, and the story of language bigotry. As I am blogging and vlogging, the perception of ASL and Deaf Culture is simply significant. Often, the less an individual is ignorant of ASL and Deaf Culture, the more supportive they tend to be toward Deaf people. That realization prompted me to make changing societal perceptions of the meaning of deafness by democratizing our language and culture. The measurement of higher education at Gallaudet University implies both informed citizenry and workable democracy.
Blogging and vlogging the future of Gallaudet University is so materialized because the recent protests have been catastrophic responses to oppression for Deaf people in the 140-plus years since the inception of the university. The current university mission of "diversity and inclusiveness" is an indirect and implicit assimilation that demands Deaf students to surrender their identity, language, and culture to become part of the homogenous mass, to accept powerlessness, and to have limited success in communication while at the same time fostering linguistic, cultural and communicative misconception (squabbles, absolutists, and all modes of communication) from the mainstream.
Sound daunting? In contrast, we the Deaf still have our hearts open to creating a sustainable, harmonious future together. Sure, but who better to help lead Gallaudet University into the future than bloggers and vloggers invited to the conference next month. My vision of blogging and vlogging the future of Gallaudet University is this: To recruit Deaf youth across the nation and around the world to enroll in Gallaudet University for higher learning and teaching.
I, with all my heart and soul, believe in this upcoming conference, more than ever, we need to come together and create a future for all the Deaf. Adversarial comments and insults are not going to get us anywhere. It's only through constructive dialogue and development that balances the extremes of known and unknown that is based on mutual respect between ASL, the language and culture of the Deaf, and its counterpart English, the language of higher education.
We the Deaf are in the fulfillment stage of intellectual development. I believe that recent Gallaudet protests had made a major step out of the prejudices, the narrow-mindedness of the past. I also believe that we the Deaf have a much greater sense of the global community that the IKJ administration could ever have. There is no other country in the world where the Deaf people have developed as positive a relationship with the federal government, especially Congress, as Gallaudet University. We have incredibly a powerful Deaf community in unity for Gallaudet University.
Labeling: NPG Status for IKJ Now!
| In this vlog, Carl Schroeder discusses labeling and the persona non gratis status for IKJ. | |
For Amy, Mike and All of Our DeafReaders
In this vlog, Carl Schroeder reacdts to the vlogs by Mike Schmidt and Amy Cohen Efron.
Dialogue between Gisbatzed and Schroeder
Schroeder: What do you think about the possibility of philosophy playing a more active role in American Sign Language, higher education, applied ethics, and so on?
Gisbatzed: ASL Dragon and I think there are many possibilities. We find that Gallaudet University is in a way one of the most difficult places for philosophy to play a language role because the university public relations has been so anti-intellectual they pressed the administration’s diversity and inclusiveness strategies. If we go to Canada or most western states such as California, Oregon and Washington, we’ll have a much easier time claiming and discussing ASL than we would at Gallaudet University. The diversity and inclusiveness catchword has been dumbed down and we no longer even bother trying to get something worked out there because the former administration didn't like anything that has a complicated argument. So we found Gallaudet University very frustrating.
Schroeder: How frustrated are ASL Dragon and you about Gallaudet University?
Gizbatzed: Frustration is important, and we have found it possible to get involved in philosophy more internationally and this was in a way a matter of luck. There is now a large and I think quite exciting internet media called DeafRead.com, which was launched during recent campus upheavals at Gallaudet University. We were finding that young Deaf people – and not only young Deaf people but mostly – in economics, education, linguistics, philosophy, and politics were coming together.
Schroeder: Is it a matter of luck that these young Deaf people had the good luck? How so?
Gisbatzed: These young Deaf people had the good luck to have a group of talented academics and alumni who just decided this protest should happen. They would just not let anything stand in the way of ASL and Deaf Culture so they put in so many hours of their own efforts to preserve and promote them. And we now have the university administration that is run by another alumnus, Dr. Robert Davila, who is well honed in ASL and Deaf Culture. I think the best thing about him is that he brings Deaf people together, so that they who are working on their own capabilities for the first time in the university history. So ASL Dragon and I feel that's what we are now most involved in and we feel that's very hopeful.
Schroeder: Gisbatzed, I have a very serious concern. President I. King Jordan wrote a letter to the Board of Trustees last November, "I believe strongly that if we give in now to the 'absolutists,' that the future of Gallaudet is threatened." What is your perspective of Jordan’s statement?
Gisbatzed: I think in law, which is one of Jordan’s academic appointments, it's a little bit harder because the world of the law firm is a profit-oriented world. So he wanted the board to understand about how our general society subscribes to social justice, but when Jordan went out and worked he was not really in a position to say, "social justice should be striving to produce inclusiveness". Yes, if the Deaf community takes on cases on a pro bono basis they may be involved in issues of social injustice, but it isn't so easy.
Schroeder: Why isn’t it going to be easy to talk about social injustice at Gallaudet University in court?
Gisbatzed: Let’s say if lawyers go into court and talk to the judges, again they are going to be very constrained by the legal precedents and won't have much latitude to inject their philosophical perspectives. But getting people to think about these social injustice issues at all is a good thing.
Schroeder: I don't know how seriously judges, and Supreme Court judges are for the Deaf community and take these things into account. To what extent are they are influenced by philosophical discussions?
Gisbatzed: ASL Dragon and I think Gallaudet has had close to zero influence on the actual development of the law protecting ASL, for example, and the reason is partly of course that judges aren't supposed to bring in any old theory they like but to look at the precedents and the principles involved in a case. But we think there is another reason: while Deaf people are first-rate thinkers, they don't have much practical legal background. Not many of them are linguists either.
Schroeder: So the other question is more concerned with political philosophy and political theory. Are you optimistic about the future of Gallaudet University?
Gisbatzed: In practice, we are very optimistic about the future of Gallaudet University but also after all these debates about the right and the good, and the need to preserve and promote ASL in higher education with some conception of the good. We take work on the capabilities approach and the discussions about the Socratic-Platonic-Aristotelian elements to point in that direction. For example, we have yet to see Plato’s book on language, Cratylus, on the reading list at Gallaudet University. Our question is: to what extent have Deaf people like you, who really discuss the need to go beyond the old Deaf Education framework, really succeeded in influencing the American society, including politicians, in practice.
Schroeder: Well, there are many different ways in which a kind of quasi-government theory has entered into what we might call Deaf Education; after all it didn't start with me. It started long ago, for example in Hartford, Connecticut in 1817 with the Reverend Thomas H. Gallaudet and Laurent Clerc, who were religious socialists who used the Aristotelian notion of human functioning to argue in favor of liberalism. They were an important and a clear precedent for my comprehension. In fact, I didn't read them until much later, but anyway I now see that they were important and a precedent; their form of deaf education was very comprehensive, it was closer to something like the way Sophie Fowler Gallaudet advised and assisted his youngest son Edward Miner Gallaudet develop this view of higher education. So that takes me to the next step of thinking about amendment-to-constitution making: what should an amendment to The U.S. Constitution guarantee and how can that be implemented?
Gisbatzed: ASL Dragon and I don’t think that Deaf people should think about making an amendment to the Constitution because there are important items in the Declaration of Independence: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Deaf Life. Liberal Education at Gallaudet University. The pursuit of American Sign Language. The First Amendment guaranteed the freedom of speech. ASL is a form of speech that is Deaf Americans’ pursuit. Wherever ASL comes from, I think the important thing is now that it does enrich the debate within Deaf life and liberalism.Am I right in this perception or am I being too optimistic?
Schroeder: I think you are right. I am a new blogger/vlogger in DeafRead, and I’ve been struck by the fact that more Deaf people are interested in law and ethics.
Gisbatzed: Wonderful! However, there’s always a problem, which is that many lawyers have a background that is more legal; they are not philosophers. They don’t read novels much, either. Can you explain a serious disparity between the English-Speech Language Departments and ASL-Deaf Studies Department?
Schroeder: Well, may I suggest that ASL Dragon and you visit Gallaudet University? Each department at Gallaudet always feels they have to have a gimmick.
Gisbatzed: Are you dodging the issues?
Schroeder: I think I tend to be more universal, more ecumenical. It’s language interdependence—the marraige between ASL and English--that, I think, is extraordinary.
Gisbatzed: ASL Dragon and I will come to Gallaudet University.
Gisbatzed: ASL Dragon and I think there are many possibilities. We find that Gallaudet University is in a way one of the most difficult places for philosophy to play a language role because the university public relations has been so anti-intellectual they pressed the administration’s diversity and inclusiveness strategies. If we go to Canada or most western states such as California, Oregon and Washington, we’ll have a much easier time claiming and discussing ASL than we would at Gallaudet University. The diversity and inclusiveness catchword has been dumbed down and we no longer even bother trying to get something worked out there because the former administration didn't like anything that has a complicated argument. So we found Gallaudet University very frustrating.
Schroeder: How frustrated are ASL Dragon and you about Gallaudet University?
Gizbatzed: Frustration is important, and we have found it possible to get involved in philosophy more internationally and this was in a way a matter of luck. There is now a large and I think quite exciting internet media called DeafRead.com, which was launched during recent campus upheavals at Gallaudet University. We were finding that young Deaf people – and not only young Deaf people but mostly – in economics, education, linguistics, philosophy, and politics were coming together.
Schroeder: Is it a matter of luck that these young Deaf people had the good luck? How so?
Gisbatzed: These young Deaf people had the good luck to have a group of talented academics and alumni who just decided this protest should happen. They would just not let anything stand in the way of ASL and Deaf Culture so they put in so many hours of their own efforts to preserve and promote them. And we now have the university administration that is run by another alumnus, Dr. Robert Davila, who is well honed in ASL and Deaf Culture. I think the best thing about him is that he brings Deaf people together, so that they who are working on their own capabilities for the first time in the university history. So ASL Dragon and I feel that's what we are now most involved in and we feel that's very hopeful.
Schroeder: Gisbatzed, I have a very serious concern. President I. King Jordan wrote a letter to the Board of Trustees last November, "I believe strongly that if we give in now to the 'absolutists,' that the future of Gallaudet is threatened." What is your perspective of Jordan’s statement?
Gisbatzed: I think in law, which is one of Jordan’s academic appointments, it's a little bit harder because the world of the law firm is a profit-oriented world. So he wanted the board to understand about how our general society subscribes to social justice, but when Jordan went out and worked he was not really in a position to say, "social justice should be striving to produce inclusiveness". Yes, if the Deaf community takes on cases on a pro bono basis they may be involved in issues of social injustice, but it isn't so easy.
Schroeder: Why isn’t it going to be easy to talk about social injustice at Gallaudet University in court?
Gisbatzed: Let’s say if lawyers go into court and talk to the judges, again they are going to be very constrained by the legal precedents and won't have much latitude to inject their philosophical perspectives. But getting people to think about these social injustice issues at all is a good thing.
Schroeder: I don't know how seriously judges, and Supreme Court judges are for the Deaf community and take these things into account. To what extent are they are influenced by philosophical discussions?
Gisbatzed: ASL Dragon and I think Gallaudet has had close to zero influence on the actual development of the law protecting ASL, for example, and the reason is partly of course that judges aren't supposed to bring in any old theory they like but to look at the precedents and the principles involved in a case. But we think there is another reason: while Deaf people are first-rate thinkers, they don't have much practical legal background. Not many of them are linguists either.
Schroeder: So the other question is more concerned with political philosophy and political theory. Are you optimistic about the future of Gallaudet University?
Gisbatzed: In practice, we are very optimistic about the future of Gallaudet University but also after all these debates about the right and the good, and the need to preserve and promote ASL in higher education with some conception of the good. We take work on the capabilities approach and the discussions about the Socratic-Platonic-Aristotelian elements to point in that direction. For example, we have yet to see Plato’s book on language, Cratylus, on the reading list at Gallaudet University. Our question is: to what extent have Deaf people like you, who really discuss the need to go beyond the old Deaf Education framework, really succeeded in influencing the American society, including politicians, in practice.
Schroeder: Well, there are many different ways in which a kind of quasi-government theory has entered into what we might call Deaf Education; after all it didn't start with me. It started long ago, for example in Hartford, Connecticut in 1817 with the Reverend Thomas H. Gallaudet and Laurent Clerc, who were religious socialists who used the Aristotelian notion of human functioning to argue in favor of liberalism. They were an important and a clear precedent for my comprehension. In fact, I didn't read them until much later, but anyway I now see that they were important and a precedent; their form of deaf education was very comprehensive, it was closer to something like the way Sophie Fowler Gallaudet advised and assisted his youngest son Edward Miner Gallaudet develop this view of higher education. So that takes me to the next step of thinking about amendment-to-constitution making: what should an amendment to The U.S. Constitution guarantee and how can that be implemented?
Gisbatzed: ASL Dragon and I don’t think that Deaf people should think about making an amendment to the Constitution because there are important items in the Declaration of Independence: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Deaf Life. Liberal Education at Gallaudet University. The pursuit of American Sign Language. The First Amendment guaranteed the freedom of speech. ASL is a form of speech that is Deaf Americans’ pursuit. Wherever ASL comes from, I think the important thing is now that it does enrich the debate within Deaf life and liberalism.Am I right in this perception or am I being too optimistic?
Schroeder: I think you are right. I am a new blogger/vlogger in DeafRead, and I’ve been struck by the fact that more Deaf people are interested in law and ethics.
Gisbatzed: Wonderful! However, there’s always a problem, which is that many lawyers have a background that is more legal; they are not philosophers. They don’t read novels much, either. Can you explain a serious disparity between the English-Speech Language Departments and ASL-Deaf Studies Department?
Schroeder: Well, may I suggest that ASL Dragon and you visit Gallaudet University? Each department at Gallaudet always feels they have to have a gimmick.
Gisbatzed: Are you dodging the issues?
Schroeder: I think I tend to be more universal, more ecumenical. It’s language interdependence—the marraige between ASL and English--that, I think, is extraordinary.
Gisbatzed: ASL Dragon and I will come to Gallaudet University.
Sunday, January 07, 2007
The Road through ASL Dragon's Forest
Dear DeafReaders:
You could hardly imagine how much I miss you guys during my ten-day vacation in Washington State. One foggy morning I was driving through the forest and thought about this vlog. So I decided to take the picture for you to see the beauty of the forest.
I received some emails and comments about meeting Gisbatzed in Pacific NW, which seemed confusing. They thought Gisbatzed and ASL Dragon were in Hawaii. Well, as long as ASL exists in the United States and most Canada, so do Gisbatzed and ASL Dragon.
May the new year 2007 bring you the best of everything!
Carl
You could hardly imagine how much I miss you guys during my ten-day vacation in Washington State. One foggy morning I was driving through the forest and thought about this vlog. So I decided to take the picture for you to see the beauty of the forest.
I received some emails and comments about meeting Gisbatzed in Pacific NW, which seemed confusing. They thought Gisbatzed and ASL Dragon were in Hawaii. Well, as long as ASL exists in the United States and most Canada, so do Gisbatzed and ASL Dragon.
May the new year 2007 bring you the best of everything!
Carl
Whither Blog's Charmers?
Sure, today's bloggers and vloggers have talent. But I can't help but wonder what's become of all the top Deaf bloggers and vloggers with attitude. Join me as I talk about a nostalgia for our good ole days.
It was late one Friday night last summer, as I was struggling to fall asleep during reading Ridorlive.com--it didn't matter who (or what) it was about--when I realized that Ricky's blogging style had become stultifying and boring.
Well, at least the professional version. My internet game, which involves lots of philosophical ideas, folklores and myths, is always enjoyable. But what about Ricky's blogs? Well, Ricky almost always included links to justify his thoughts about people he was blogging, which was always a curiosity--more for myself than for a literature masterpiece. I'm reminded of Confucius: High people talk about ideas; Average people talk about things; Low people talk about people. But at least somebody, like me, gets some entertainment value…reading about people.
Ricky exhibited savant like abilities with links--he could reel off long lists of links and tell us exactly what his thoughts are. Time after time after time. In fact, I could get bored silly reading Ricky's blogs and watching some of his videos. I suspect that is because Ricky was one Deaf blogger who used to dominate the Deaf blogsphere. Yes, he had a winning career as a professional Deaf blogger who followed and reported on Jane K. Fernandes, and he even received a sponsorship to attend the 2006 NAD Conference, which was an honor.
Something happened that revolutionized blogging and vlogging forever. DeafRead.com introduced something so charming the blogsphere could be. Through DeafRead, I discovered other vloggers: Jon LeNois, Jon Heffner, Amy Cohen Efron, and Joey Baer. Ricky must have inspired a new generation of Deaf bloggers and vloggers. Yes, I am among these newcomers in the Deaf blogsphere, and I'm still learning the ropes of blogging and vlogging. I am also still following Ridorlive.com because it has some merits. Reading Ricky's blog shouldn't mean I have to agree with everything he said.
With the upcoming blogging and vlogging conference held at Gallaudet University, mind you, Ricky needs not charm. That would be his sabbatical. I wrote to my colleague blogger/vlogger Amy Cohen Efron about some confusions she had: "If I were not invited, I would go humble and cheer for those who are invited." At Gallaudet we will talk about blogging and vlogging in the process. Not blogging and vlogging about the past.
It was late one Friday night last summer, as I was struggling to fall asleep during reading Ridorlive.com--it didn't matter who (or what) it was about--when I realized that Ricky's blogging style had become stultifying and boring.
Well, at least the professional version. My internet game, which involves lots of philosophical ideas, folklores and myths, is always enjoyable. But what about Ricky's blogs? Well, Ricky almost always included links to justify his thoughts about people he was blogging, which was always a curiosity--more for myself than for a literature masterpiece. I'm reminded of Confucius: High people talk about ideas; Average people talk about things; Low people talk about people. But at least somebody, like me, gets some entertainment value…reading about people.
Ricky exhibited savant like abilities with links--he could reel off long lists of links and tell us exactly what his thoughts are. Time after time after time. In fact, I could get bored silly reading Ricky's blogs and watching some of his videos. I suspect that is because Ricky was one Deaf blogger who used to dominate the Deaf blogsphere. Yes, he had a winning career as a professional Deaf blogger who followed and reported on Jane K. Fernandes, and he even received a sponsorship to attend the 2006 NAD Conference, which was an honor.
Something happened that revolutionized blogging and vlogging forever. DeafRead.com introduced something so charming the blogsphere could be. Through DeafRead, I discovered other vloggers: Jon LeNois, Jon Heffner, Amy Cohen Efron, and Joey Baer. Ricky must have inspired a new generation of Deaf bloggers and vloggers. Yes, I am among these newcomers in the Deaf blogsphere, and I'm still learning the ropes of blogging and vlogging. I am also still following Ridorlive.com because it has some merits. Reading Ricky's blog shouldn't mean I have to agree with everything he said.
With the upcoming blogging and vlogging conference held at Gallaudet University, mind you, Ricky needs not charm. That would be his sabbatical. I wrote to my colleague blogger/vlogger Amy Cohen Efron about some confusions she had: "If I were not invited, I would go humble and cheer for those who are invited." At Gallaudet we will talk about blogging and vlogging in the process. Not blogging and vlogging about the past.
Saturday, January 06, 2007
Like Everything Else, Rhinos and Deafness Have Raison d'Etre
In this video, Carl Schroeder discusses the French phrase, raison d'etre, for the existence of rhinos, deafness and everything else.
Happy New Year from ASL Dragon
In this video, Gisbatzed shows ASL Dragon's sign for "Happy New Year!" I think it is inspired by Janus, the two-headed Roman god of gates and doors.
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