The other morning for the Master of Arts in Interpreting Studies, I read a quotation of Danica Seleskovitch’s “Théorie du Sens” or “Meaning Model” and I’m not sure it applies to sign language interpreters who interpret contact language between English speakers and bilingual English/ASL deaf signers. After all, it is not that most deaf people don’t know English; it is that they can’t hear it. The only time I do what Seleskovitch describes is when I’m interpreting for ASL monolinguals, and even in their ASL there is often some English. Is there any “pure” ASL that we can apply the Meaning Model to?

Relating how I became an interpreter in 18 months to the chapter “The 10,000 Hour Rule” from the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. What is your “10,000 Hour” story?

A video response to Mikey Krajnak’s video about ways that interpreters accept and deal with feedback. I relate my experience in the MA in Interpreting Studies program at WOU and what I’m learning about effective and nonjudgmental ways interpreters can give each other feedback, including Demand-Control Schema, Observation-Supervision, and Case Conferencing. I also ask Mikey what he thinks about whether “the customer is always right” and how to give good customer service as an interpreting professional.

My reflections after the first week of our two-week face-to-face session (or colloquium). I learned a lot, and I share what I learned about feedback as a follow-up to the video I posted about receiving unsolicited feedback last week. Topics include Demand-Control Schema, Talking about “The Work,” practitioner-centered approach, professional discussion, case conferencing, listening, observation/supervision, nonjudgmental inquiry, guided self-discovery, etc.

In this signed language video, I talk about my experience of sharing a sample of my interpreting and transliterating work and receiving unsolicited criticism on it. Haters tend to be people with no real names and no creative works of their own. All they do is shoot down others’ work and give nothing to YouTube. As an interpreter, I am courageous enough to share my work–imperfect though it may be–with the world so that people may see it, but I am not thick skinned enough to take criticism about it. I think there are things a person creates and is willing to share with the world but doesn’t want to allow responses on because they don’t want the criticism and they don’t need the praise. This is how I feel about the sample I posted yesterday.

As an assignment for the Master of Arts in Interpreting Studies at Western Oregon University (WOU MAIS), I completed a videotaping of myself spending about 20 minutes interpreting a source text I had not heard before. I found my source text, Simon Lewis: “Don’t take consciousness for granted,” at TED.com. There is an interactive transcript that you can view by following the link above.

I would like to think that this is not a sample of my best work, but I am humble enough to accept that there are times when I am working in real situations that this is the best I can do with such an unfamiliar topic and fast pace.

Here are some facts about me and the circumstances under which this sample was recorded:

• The hearing speaker appears to be a 50-something-year-old white male from a foreign English-speaking country (South America, Australia, England?).
• I am a 44-year-old white American male.
• I began learning ASL when I was 21.
• I have 21 years’ experience as an interpreter and transliterator.
• I earned my RID CI in 1998 and my CI in 1999.
• I earned my RID NIC Master in 2010.
• I earned a Bachelor’s degree in 2003.
• This is my first recorded video assignment for the Master of Arts in Interpreting Studies at Western Oregon University (the WOU MAIS).
• I recorded this in my own home using a tripod, camera that records HD video, laptop connected to TED.com, amplified computer speakers connected to the laptop, and both artificial and natural lighting. I set up all of the technology myself just before recording this sample.
• I had no audience for this recording; all that was in front of me was my camera and my home.
• My only preparation was reading the “About this Talk” and “About the Speaker” paragraphs before interpreting/transliterating the video.
• I planned before I recorded this to publish it on YouTube for a global audience, even though this was not a requirement of the course assignment.

I post this more for educational purposes than as a part of a résumé, but if a potential employer were to judge my work based on this sample, I would not discourage them from doing so. As I said, this may not be my best, but it is an acceptable sample of current work considering the circumstance listed above.

Do you have any questions about any part of this video or the making of it? If so, please leave a comment. I have disallowed further comments for reasons stated in the two comments I made on this blog entry.

I created these two videos yesterday and this morning at the start of the Master of Arts in Interpreting Studies program at Western Oregon University (WOU MAIS).

I had fun with this one, letting out a bit of my campy side along with my geeky side. I guess I’m just so giddy about getting a new laptop and this fancy new presentation remote. I don’t work for Targus, but I sure wouldn’t mind if they sent me a check! Ha ha. Really, though, I am so happy with this product and it fills a need that anyone who does presentations and has a MacBook Air is going to need to fill. I wish this information had been there for me when I was frustrated with the lack of any solution in the Apple Store yesterday. Just get one. You won’t be disappointed. Or your money back. (If the store you buy it from has a money-back guarantee, that is.)

P.S. There is a tiny switch inside the remote (which you can see when you pop off the back) that allows you to set it to Windows PowerPoint, Mac Keynote, or Mac PowerPoint. Very nifty, but you might overlook it if you didn’t know better. So now you know!

Thanks to YouTuber xkorijaidenx for emailing me about her video response to YouTuber soph1951′s vlog “What Exactly Is ASL?” Soph’s vlog was inspiring and liberating for me, and moved me to create this video response. I will leave it up to people who know American Sign Language to understand this video without captions or preface. It speaks for itself.

The gist of my comments, for those who don’t know American Sign Language, is that we should trust the validity of the NIC (National Interpreter Certification) and the RID (Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf). This unfortunate incident of one individual’s corrupt behavior does not invalidate test scores any but 3% of test takers during the time in question; those candidates have already been notified and will have to retest. RID conducted the examination into this matter professionally in every way, and though I was frustrated myself while waiting for my test results for a long time, I now applaud RID for following a stringent protocol and maintaining secrecy about the situation until the investigation was complete. Please, consumers of interpreting services, continue to trust RID. It is a trustworthy organization. And please, fellow interpreters, do not doubt your scores. If you passed at the level you wanted, there is no need to retest. If you failed, you failed. Many of us fail tests the first time. Believe the results, learn what you need to learn to pass the test, and retake it. That’s what I did, and it worked. Again, this is a sad situation, but it has been handled. Let’s not let this get us down. We are good and RID is good. I am proud of us.

[P.S. I forgot to include a link to the source announcement. I don't want to post a link to the RID media page, because that link is constantly changing, so I will refer you to RID Addresses Invalid Rater Scores on National Interpreter Certification Exam — FAQs.]