Translated…
Language, is a part of culture, and, the various cultures are, like independent islands, corresponding to the relationships of the hearing and the deaf, it’s like, standing on two sides of the world, gazing toward one another…
What Causes the Distance
Since I’d started working as a sign language translator, I was often asked, “Are the deaf easily angered?” “They don’t seem to be evenly tempered at all.”
Why would there be a misunderstanding such as this, I guess, it’s probably, when the people saw them sign, their hands are making huge gestures, and their faces become twisted too, that, is what’d caused this misunderstanding.
This top question for the deaf, is actually very easily answered: like how our voices would raise when we talked, to show our emotional ups and downs, the volumes of our voice would change, the silent ways of speaking is exactly like so, using the movements, and facial expressions, to show the level of the words.
Some say, “the gap between language had made people more distant from each other.” Because language symbolized culture, and, based off of the different levels of understandings we have of each other, this is the sole cause of this gap.
Based off of this, “language” seemed to carry, a sort of an original sin, the hearing, because they couldn’t comprehend sign language, so, they’re more, estranged from the deaf. But, I think, that hearing people like you and I, don’t we both feel, that “hey, s/he is not hearing me” when we communicate too?, and so, we’d gotten, louder and louder still, and, we’d become, animated at the same time, and got red in the face, arguing our points, like we’re from two different countries that don’t speak the same language. But, we are, speaking the same languages, taking it apart, we can, comprehend, every single word. And so, believing, that language is the cause of the communication barrier, it isn’t necessarily accurate either.
Another example, a lot of the elderly had hearing impairments, and, as the offspring wanted to talk, to tell them something, to ask them over for lunch, they’d needed to, use a ton of force to speak, so the elder would know what is required, requested of them. But, if this went on for a long time, and the younger generations got tired, they may blame the elderly for becoming isolated, ignoring others, in the end, they’d stopped, communicating with them too. And this sort of a distance, is not caused by the differences of language, but, is it, really, related to being able to hear and being deaf?
From This Side of the Shorelines to that Side of the Shores
A while ago, a friend who’s deaf signed up for scuba diving lessons, through the translator, he’d gotten the knowledge transmitted from the diving coach, along with the needed knowledge to scuba dive safely, and so, he was able to, dive freely, like the hearing in the oceans too. This reminded me, that once, a diving coach who’s a friend of mine shared his experience leading a deaf person in the lessons, at first, he was, very worried that he’d not known enough sign language to communicate effectively with the group, how was he to teach them? Later on, the members of the group who are deaf used the cell phone, and keyed the questions in, reminded him, that he could also utilize the tools, to help him communicate better with them, he’d also, added in the body language, told them what to watch out for once underwater, along with some movement commands too.
And, at the time of the dive, his originally worried heart was slowly, at ease—this friend of mine realized, that the deaf friend not only did the right movements as the rest of the group, and, he’d discovered, that no matter how long one screams underwater, it’s of no use, and in that environment, where you can scream, but can’t make a single sound, the deaf is abler to share the joys immediately than the hearing (because using sign language is unrestricted underwater).
All of these differences in language of the lack of, is on one thing: can you empathize?
Like how I’d mentioned earlier, language is a part of the culture, and the various cultures are like islands, and the relationship of the hearing and the deaf is like on this side and that side of the shorelines. Looking at us, translators, we are, bridges, and, we may get affected, by the differences of the levels of interpretations, as well as whether or not we keep professionalism, and thus, the bridges we built, are of various length, width, and sizes. And, all we can do is in each translation, we do the best we possibly can, so everybody gets to where they want to go.
If we stepped a bit closer, and, stop differentiating between hearing, deaf, everybody, every heart, is unique, and, there would be, distance between us all, because when we interacted, we’d lacked that empathy. Without empathy, even if we’re using the same language, we’d just, piled up higher and higher, and, there wouldn’t be a bridge, to get to each other’s sides.
And so, the core of communication is the heart, is your heart in it, when you talk with so-and-so, if so, then, there shouldn’t be any barrier to communication, just different views on the same things, but if there isn’t enough that’s put into communicating, then, no matter how valid your points are, the person you’re talking to just, won’t get it, because you’re NOT using your heart, to communicate your thoughts to the person.