(Turn on the closed captions to follow along)
Hello to all my Deaf-friendlies!
Given the great amount of interest from last year, I am looking at offering one (or maybe two) more happenings about American Sign Language. For those who weren’t there last year, check out the happening link (LINK).
Depending on how much interest there is, and what all works best for you, I was thinking of a lengthy-ish meeting. This would include a quick recap of last year for those of you who missed it, or who forgot some of it. Then we can either move on to more vocabulary, or story-telling, or whatever else you’d care to learn.
If there’s enough interest for two meetings, I was thinking that many of you may fursuit, or know people who do. A lot of suiters don’t like to speak; ASL would be an excellent method to communicate. We could definitely cover things that suiters and handlers would find useful or fun. If we don’t have two meetings, but there is a lot of interest in suiter sign, we can always mix and match.
Some quick examples of what we might cover:
Paw (Finger) Spelling
Animals!
Food
Camping
Manners (Always good to be polite)
Questions and Answers
A little bit of Deaf culture and history
(And since this is CFT, a few more exciting words and phrases might pop up)
I’ll be around all weekend, and am happy to practice all the time. (I’ve actually taken to sign “whispering” to myself when I speak.) For those who are curious, ASL was my first language, as I was born deaf, and have been hard of hearing my whole life. I have perhaps 5 to 10 years of hearing left. My mom is now Deaf (autoimmune inner ear disease), and my dad is following quickly (MS, we think). I’ve taken classes to improve my grammar, and have, for the last year, been the Co-ordinator of the ASL Language Lab at PSU, as well as the Secretary of the ASL Club and a tutor when the professors need a hand.
And as @Morse put it so well last year:
Even if you can’t make it to our happening, I want to leave everyone with one special sign. The ILY sign is a cute, informal way to say “I Love You.” It’s like a visual hug. I already know I’m going to be using it a lot over the weekend because all of you wonderful animal people mean a lot to me, and I hope you’ll reply in kind.
)