Overview
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EnglishFor the English component of our project, we decided to learn some conversational basics of ASL. We did a lot of researching to find a free, reliable, and accurate website that we could use. We settled on SignSchool.com, which allowed us to track our progress and easily review materials. In total, we completed 19 lessons and learned a variety of information that ranged from how to say your name, to how to ask someone out on a date.
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Social StudiesOur ideas for the social studies component of our project were a bit all over the place from the start--we'll admit it. Originally, our plan was to conduct a social experiment of sorts. We identified five aspects of Deaf Culture that we deemed significant. For each of these, we planned an "experiment" that would allow us to experience something similar. In fear of being insensitive, we decided to run our thoughts by a member of the deaf community. We contacted Libby Berlin, a local ASL translator, who invited us to a township meeting in Lancaster about keeping the deaf community safe during natural disasters. Here, we set up an interview with a woman named Eiko. With Libby's help, we were able to talk to Eiko about her experience being born deaf. Our product transformed from a social experiment to a transcript of our interview where we identified important quotes and explained how they were relevant to our research.
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I'm a little jealous. I'm very jealous, actually. I'm afraid, yeah, so, I just feel a little angry about it. I feel jealous because they get to hear beautiful music and so many things. They get to dance to this beautiful music. It's just difficult. -Eiko And I really want more deaf people to-- I really want them to fight...to fight for their rights. -Eiko |
Art
Much like our social studies portion of our project, the art subject was a little confusing for us to figure out. We started with the idea of making molds of our hands signing the letters in the word ABLE, because we wanted to prove the point that deaf people are not disabled; they are fully capable of just as much as hearing people. We started these, but weren't satisfied with the response.
Next, we decided to set up an environment where we could experience loss or alteration of our senses. From there, we would sculpt something out of clay, just to understand the firsthand the process of living with these difficulties. Before we sculpted, we put on a loud ringing sound, put on glasses that prevented good vision, and gloves so we couldn't see the clay. For 30 minutes, we sculpted. Every two minutes, we recorded how we were feeling. We felt four main emotions, listed from the most prominent to the least: anxiety, anger, discomfort, neutrality. Because we were focused on the process and not so much the product in this stage, we still wanted to do something to visually represent the emotions we felt.
Our final product ended up being a sculpture proposal. We wanted our original hand design, the finger spelling of the word ABLE, to be turned into a real life sculpture that the community could interact with. We designed hands signing the word ABLE on Adobe Illustrator and photoshopped them into a picture of our chosen location, Washington Union Station. In our proposal, we went over all the specifics.
Next, we decided to set up an environment where we could experience loss or alteration of our senses. From there, we would sculpt something out of clay, just to understand the firsthand the process of living with these difficulties. Before we sculpted, we put on a loud ringing sound, put on glasses that prevented good vision, and gloves so we couldn't see the clay. For 30 minutes, we sculpted. Every two minutes, we recorded how we were feeling. We felt four main emotions, listed from the most prominent to the least: anxiety, anger, discomfort, neutrality. Because we were focused on the process and not so much the product in this stage, we still wanted to do something to visually represent the emotions we felt.
Our final product ended up being a sculpture proposal. We wanted our original hand design, the finger spelling of the word ABLE, to be turned into a real life sculpture that the community could interact with. We designed hands signing the word ABLE on Adobe Illustrator and photoshopped them into a picture of our chosen location, Washington Union Station. In our proposal, we went over all the specifics.