Last Round of Comments

Brett
Allison
Christy

I Saw the Sign - Week 5 (Post-TEDTalk)

So I had my presentation today. I had a half day yesterday, but I still stayed up really late thinking, "Ohmigoshohmigoshohmigoshohmigosh this HAS to be perfect," but of course...it wasn't.

My Delivery
The script I wrote for this presentation wasn't bad, and I thought it was better than most of my scripts because I put a lot of honesty and passion into this one as compared to the others. I was originally going to have notecards, but I thought, "Well, if I'm passionate enough about this, then I should be able to memorize it without notecards." I thought it was a good idea - until I forgot my script. I panicked and tried to remember what I was supposed to say, but that's hard for anyone if there's an entire class staring at you, waiting for you to do something and your teachers that are grading the presentation suddenly start typing things into their computers. I had laid out my notecards on a random chair on the stage, so I took a look at that (that took a little longer that it should have), and I resumed my presentation.
I also stood on top of a stool to encourage people to "look at things in a different way," like Mr. Keating said in the movie Dead Poet's Society. I wanted to dramatize my last sentence and say "You're life will surely change" while stepping up on the stool, but I had been scared since yesterday that I was gonna fall and die, so I think the only emotion my audience saw was fear. (I wanted to wear dress shoes, but I wore sneakers so that I wouldn't fall and die.)

My Poem
I planned a lot for this. I knew that if I just signed for the class, no one would have any idea what I was doing. But if I had text on the screen, people would be looking at the text and not at me. So I decided to get my friend to recite the poem while I signed. I was disappointed that I had to use speech, but it was the only option I had.
I decided to write my poem about night. My friend recorded me while I was presenting, and I didn't mess up too much with it, so I was pretty proud of this one.
(Turn on closed captions - there's sound but it's really bad.)

A lot of people thought "Wait...that's it?" but a lot of ASL poems are usually really short, and I could only do so much with the limited vocabulary I had. I also thought if I made my poem too long, it would just have a boring effect and people would stop looking at me. I loved signing words like "fireflies" and "dream" at the end, and hopefully people were still watching me by then.
Here's a transcribed version:
When the lights are off, my world gets bright.
The stars come down and the moon shines out.
When it gets dark, don't look for me;
I won't be there for you to see.
I'm dancing with the fireflies,
Dreaming of my world tonight.

My Takeaway
I think my title sums this up: I saw the sign, and it opened up my eyes. As I said in my TED talk, I used to be at the bottom of a tree called sign language and pitied Deaf people, who were always sitting on top of the tree. However, when I started climbing, I was the one to pity after all because I had been missing out on the most incredible view ever that can only be seen by climbing the tree.
I got to reference Dead Poet's Society and Mr. Keating's quote.

This movie/book is just awesome.

Climbing this tree really gave me a different perspective, and although signing was really fun, I'm so happy I got to look at the scenery by climbing the tree more than anything else.

This project is now over, and I'm not gonna be able to stay up late having fun and make excuses that I'm doing homework anymore. (When I told my mom I'm finished, she asked me, "Oh, so I won't see you doing any late-night dancing anymore?" I guess my signing is so choppy it looks like I'm dancing...) But I've only began climbing this tree, and I have a lot more room for improvement. I'll just keep climbing up, up, up...until the moment I can say to myself that I truly seized the day.

The Final Countdown - Week 4

Hey, tomorrow's d-day; I'm presenting tomorrow!
Last weekend, I went to Deutschfest, which was sort of like a German competition/festival between about seven schools around our area. Competing in a foreign language - and the fact that I'm presenting really soon - made me reflect a lot on learning sign language.

My Language Experience
Going to Deutschfest made me reflect on my language abilities. I was born in South Korea, so I learned Korean as my native language. I moved to America when I was eight years old, so I had to learn English. When I entered seventh grade, I was required to choose a language, and I chose German. For my Genius Project, I decided to learn ASL. I'm fluent in two languages and have touched the surface of the other two.
Each language has its own set of perks. Korean is probably the easiest to read, so Korea has one of the highest literacy rates. The low level of difficulty for reading Korean is one big reason why I can still read it. It's also very descriptive and you can come up with really creative ways to say things, even when you don't have "advanced vocabulary." I found a funny diagram online on different ways to say "yellow" in Korean.

Different ways to say "yellow" in Korean

As for English...well, I have yet to find a perk in English that I enjoy except maybe the fact that not all nouns are gendered. Oh, and I like that I don't have to translate Shakespeare when I read his works.
I've had a love-hate relationship with German, although now I love it. In seventh grade, I was initially not that bad at it, but from eighth to ninth grade, everything just went downhill. But now I'm not that bad, and I'm starting to enjoy its perks. I like how there's only one way to read things in German (just like Korean). The difference is, Korean is harder to figure out the spelling, but German isn't as hard to figure out (unless you've got a word like Tschechische Republik, which the teacher can't even spell). German also has a very formulaic grammar, and I'm pretty sure that has some sort of relevance to the high number of geniuses produced in Germany (oh that sounds weird...please excuse my bad wording).

How ASL Crept into my Life
Another thing I thought a lot about was how I came to learn ASL. Korean, English, and German were all languages I sort of expected to learn - English and Korean for obvious reasons, and German because my mom learned German before. I've had no connection to ASL whatsoever (which should be clearly established by now), and although I never saw myself learning ASL, I it was one of the only good decisions I've made in my life. It's a true passion now, and I don't know what I'd be doing without this passion.
Five years ago in 2010, I was in fifth grade. Being a South Korean girl, my role model was naturally Yuna Kim, the South Korean figure skater who broke the world record eleven times. One day on television, Yuna Kim said that her coach persuaded Yuna's mom to get her into figure skating by saying that Yuna was born with the right anatomy for figure skating. After hearing this, I asked my mom, "Mommy, what if Yuna Kim never started figure skating lessons for some reason?" Then my mom replied, "Then she would have lived her whole life without knowing her talent."
I got chills down my spine when I realized that people living in the streets may have the capability of becoming a better violinist than Itzhak Perlman, but can't because they can't invest the 10,000 hours into it, and they may not even have been able to touch a violin their entire lives (Malcolm Gladwell did outline that successful geniuses had an ideal environment when investing the 10,000 hours).
I am nowhere near proficient in ASL as Yuna Kim is in figure skating or Itzhak Perlman is in music, but I do have a big passion. I could have gone my whole life without knowing that I loved this topic and language so much - but I did. And I've come so far.

Mastery?
Six weeks is never a proficient time to start a whole new language (unless you're really really smart and have a lot of time in your hands), but I did try my best by pulling all-nighters and cramming as many vocabulary words as I could in my already-messed up brain. Although I still have a lot of room for improvement, I still have the basic foundation in my head that I probably won't forget. If I meet a Deaf person, I could introduce myself through sign but would probably communicate more through pen and paper. But I'm not ashamed of that. I know that I'd make the decision to use pen and paper because I know in their culture, that's what they'd prefer, and the fact that I know that is what makes me proud. I've learned so much about Deaf culture and Deaf pride, and that information is what makes me happy to have done this project.

Wish me luck on my presentation, and thank you for staying with me.

Comments 4

My computer sort of died while I was writing this post. I'll try to hyperlink the names for your convenience after I get back from my Fiddle Fest (as my art teacher refers to it)

My comments:
Allison: myftia.blogspot.com
Jessica: meanderingwithmandarin.blogspot.com
Liliana: lilgeniusproject.blogspot.com

Trying to "Han'd"le Poetry - Week 3

Hi, I'm Han', and I'm using my hands to sign poetry...Is it a crime to use two puns at once?
Anyways, I did my first attempt at ASL poetry! You can find it at the bottom of the page, but if you were cool, you'd at least skim the other stuff I wrote.

Intro to ASL Poem

This person's name is Austin W. Andrews, but he goes by Awti, and he's an ASL storyteller. He can hear, but he was raised in a Deaf family, so he understands this from a Deaf and a hearing perspective, which is pretty cool. This video basically says (in ASL and closed captions) that ASL poetry and nursery rhymes had to do with rhythm and rhyme, just like any written/said poem or nursery rhyme.

• Rhyme: Signs such as "9" and "F" have the same signs. They both look like the "OK" sign that Hearing individuals often use. Using signs that look similar or have similar movements/orientation makes a rhyme scheme for the poem.
• Rhythm: When reciting any poem, there's a certain rhythm that you read them to, even if it's not a song. When reciting an ASL poem, you should say it with a certain rhythm or pace, and depending on the poem, you can go very slowly or upbeat and fast.

Nursery rhymes and poems have a certain rhythm.

Awti went to the beat of One, two. One, two three. Also, he rhymed "diddle" and "fiddle" by making a movement in which he swung his arms back and forth. Since this was a nursery rhyme, this was very upbeat and quick in order to keep children engaged. Most ASL poetry I found were slower and more dramatic, just like how most upbeat English poems are often for children.

Example of ASL poem
Here is an example of ASL poetry from handspeak.com called "The Star Arrow". It's a romantic poem, and you can find a rough English translation here.

I personally like this poem better than the one Awti did because he had to translate an English nursery rhyme, while this woman had all the freedom in the world to make it pure ASL.

My ASL Poem
I thought that a mix of a conversation and a poem would be cool, so I chose a famous scene from Romeo and Juliet (Act 2 Scene 2). Romeo and Juliet are at Juliet's balcony and Juliet says her famous soliloquy and rose quote.
(Remember to turn on closed captions:)

This was quite the challenge - 5 to 6 HOURS! But I had SO MUCH fun with it. I wanted to wear costumes for these, but I couldn't find any, so I'm wearing a sweater that says jardin, which means garden in French (this was probably better for Les Mis but whatever). Anyways, here was my process:

1. Cherry pick necessary lines: The original script is super long, and that was beyond what I could even dream of reciting. I had to know which lines were necessary for others to understand what's going on, but not too many so it was on my level.
2. Shorten the lines: I have no idea how Old Sign Language looked like, so I had to convert the lines into general modern English so I'd be able to figure out how to sign it.
3. Translate the lines: Obviously, I wasn't gonna sign every word I saw; I'm learning ASL, not Signed English. I had to figure out which words I could make rhyme and rewrote the sentences so that it made no sense in English, but made sort of sense in ASL. I couldn't use 100% correct word order because I don't know complex sentence rules for ASL, but I dumbed it quite down so it should make sense at least half the time.
4. Figure out rhythm: I couldn't sign too fast, since I'm a beginner, but I didn't want to go too slowly. I figured that an appropriate rhythm would be 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4. I set it at 60mph, so 1 beat per second. I set up a metronome at 60mph for both Romeo and Juliet and went along with it.
5. Perform! This was the hardest for me. For the steps above, I was being a traslator and a poet, which was hard enough, but now I had to be an actress...in not just a different language, but a different mode of language. Imagine drawing out a scene with Ancient Greek heiroglyphics. Okay, ASL isn't ancient nor that convoluted but still, that's how intimidating it was for me. 
6. Caption: I figured out how to use YouTube, whew. I still had to take the time to find the Shakespearean lines again and write the translation along with it.

I want to expand on the "perform" portion: If you notice how the above signers recited ASL poems, they were showing a lot of emotion and using their space. Awti's entire lecture is very expressive, and if one were to do that while having a spoken conversation, he or she would stand out. It was hard for me to drop all of my preset ideas as a Hearing person and act out the romantic and emotional scene of Romeo and Juliet the way a Deaf person would. There's certain portions of the video where I look REALLY WEIRD. I cringe when I watch the video, but I guess any performers - dancers, actresses, singers - can feel awkward when watching themselves express big emotions.

This is so exciting! I'll be off to a music festival for three days, so I won't be able to sign too much, but if I polish my presentation enough before leaving, maybe I could present to my friends!

Dun dun dun - Vlog!

This explains some things I mentioned on my blog as well. Vimeo is really weird with closed captioning, so I decided not to waste my time on that - the target audience is Hearing people anyways. Don't forget to turn up the sound, and I hope you enjoy!

GeniusHour Vimeo from Hanna Kim on Vimeo.

Audism

You probably want to know about my journey towards ASL poetry right now, but I want to talk about a concept that affects the Deaf community first. Please read this post, as this really means a lot.

Audism
According to Deaf authors Janice Humphrey and Bob J. Alcorn, Audism is "an attitude based on pathological thinking which results in a negative stigma toward anyone who does not hear; like racism or sexism, audism judges, labels, and limits individuals on the basis of whether a person hears and speaks." I've mentioned before that deafness is not a disability. Audists are people who hold the ideas of audism and believe that hearing people are superior to deaf people. The interesting thing is, audists can be both deaf and hearing, though most are hearing. When deaf people are raised in Hearing communities, they're often told that the fact that they can't hear pulls them to a lower position in society from everyone else, and that they should try their best to be like people who can hear. As a result, they are taught auditory-verbal communication, and they lipread to figure out what someone else is saying and try to make noises until they are told which noise is correct for which word. They constantly receive the idea that they're limited in what they can do because of the way they were born, and they start to think that way as well.
The truth is, that's completely false (that is way too soft of a wording but this has to be school-appropriate, right?). Here is a couple of things relating to Audism that people should know.

"Stop Audism" T-shirt design from handsay.com 

1. Deaf people's level of intellect is nowhere below that of hearing people's. Deaf people, although they can talk, still can't hear what they're saying; they don't have a concept of sound. When hearing people think, they think with a certain voice in their head, but deaf people can't develop that voice in their heads because they don't know what voices sound like. Deaf people who learned sign language, however, can think sign; so they think of themselves signing a certain idea, though they're not actually signing, just as how we think of ourselves talking but we're not really talking. Deaf kids who learn sign language are able to develop this method of thinking, but those who learn auditory-verbal can't develop this mode of thinking as fast as everyone, so that's why some deaf kids seem to fall behind in class. Deafness itself has nothing to do with intellect; in fact, Deaf people have better spatial intelligence than most hearing individuals.
2. Hearing people don't have the power to magically fix a deaf person's speech and grammar. Deaf people who learn auditory-verbal communication has probably went through years and years of education and speech therapy; this is the best they can get. They've been taught to draw with their feet because they don't have hands, and you can't blame them for not being able to draw every single line perfectly.
3. Alexander Graham Bell was a definite audist. In school, when told to do projects on a "Famous figure" or "Hero," many probably chose Bell for being the inventor of the telephone and the educator of the deaf. He did open schools for the deaf, but he did it as audistically (I don't think that's a word) as a human being could. He had a deaf mother and a deaf wife, but his goal wasn't to educate or enhance the Deaf community, his goal was to make deaf people more like hearing people. Why? Because he thought that hearing people were better than deaf people. He thought that there should be no deafness in the world as people think there should be no diseases in the world, and he thought that deaf children were more likely to be born from deaf parents. He broke up the Deaf community as much as possible and tried to get rid of all characteristics of the Deaf community. He even helped pass a law that banned the use of sign language, which drastically hindered deaf children's learning. People falsely credit Bell for being the "teacher of the deaf", but remember that he did it the wrong way.

Another design from handsay.com that says A.G. Bell is "not our father"

Comments 3

Here are the comments this week:
Nicole
- This post kept me on my toes!
Christy
- At this rate, her performance is gonna B Major!
Jessica
- I've taken it a pun myself to come up with a pun for everyone, but sigh, I could not come up with one for Jess's. (Es tut mir Leid Jess)...