If you have visited Deaf Pundit’s “The Deaf Edge” blogsite recently, you might be aware of the “Equal Communication Access” PR campaign she is currently coordinating. I applaud her for taking the initiative to create such a campaign and get the word out!
However, this campaign has gotten me thinking a little…
What sign do you use for “access?”
I tend to use the sign for “enter” to also mean access…and I notice that Deaf Pundit does the same in her demonstration vlog. In fact, I think most Deaf people I have met use this sign for “access.”
But I am curious if there are other, possibly even better signs for “access” out there?
What got me thinking about this is I recall a conversation I had with a group of folks that included Deaf Professionals, Interpreters, and a few ITP students in which we were all sitting around a big round dining table, enjoying lunch at this restaurant. We were discussing various topics related to deafness, and the conversation soon started talking about communication access.
During this time, one ITP student asked what sign we used for “access.” Most of us did in fact show the sign for “enter” – the idea of being able to enter into services.
However, one interpreter – whose husband happens to use a wheelchair – stated that she preferred to use a different sign, and proceeded to show us the sign she uses. As she explained it:
When I am talking about Communication Access, I prefer to make the sign for access much like the sign for contact, where the fingertips of the middle fingers touch each other. To me, this sign is more conceptually accurate to the idea – Deaf people are trying to “make contact” with the rest of the world, and to be able to do that successfully, they need to be able to communicate with the support of whatever services are necessary… whether that be interpreters, closed captioning, TTY, relay services, etc.
To me, the sign “enter” is more about physical access, being able to actually get into the building – a problem that my husband (who is a wheelchair user) has to deal with. So I prefer to use different signs. “Enter” if I am talking about people in wheelchairs who need physical access; “contact” if I am talking about Deaf people who need communication access.
Hmmmm…using “contact” to mean access? This is an interesting idea. I can see where perhaps this sign would be more appropriate for Deaf people. I know one thing that we in the Deaf Community often have to struggle with is how people view us as similar to other disabilities, and tend to clump our needs in with others – like getting a wheelchair for us at the airport, or whatever. Maybe this sign will help to better clarify what our needs are – better ability to have that contact with other people in the world?
Personally, I’m flexible. I can use either sign and be okay with it. But I do find this interesting, and would like to “throw it out there” for a little discussion with my Deaf peers.
What do you think? What should be the sign for “access” as used by Deaf people? Should we just continue to use the sign “enter” or perhaps the sign “contact”…or maybe there’s an even better sign out there to use?
I’d be interested in your thoughts, so feel free to share!
(Of course, I do agree with Deaf Pundit…however you prefer to sign it, the most important thing is that we all should be advocating for it!)
By the way, just for clarification…if I could, I would make this a vlog for y’all – it certainly would make it clearer and easier to understand what I am talking about! But unfortunately I don’t have a webcam or videocam to use…it’s on my list of things to buy when I win the lottery! So until I have a little more money in my wallet, you’re stuck with reading my blogs.
Sorry!
This sculpture shows the sign for "connect"...and that is what Deaf Pagan Crossroads is all about - making connections. Connections between Deafhood and Paganism, connections between the Deaf Community and the Hearing Community, connections between myself as the writer and you as the reader. I hope you will take the time to read my various posts, some of which are listed below. Welcome to the Crossroads, and I hope you make some connections here!
Deaf Pagan Crossroads 
Interesting point! I do like that sign, myself. Conceptually, the interpreter’s sign is more accurate, imho. But at the same time, the sign ‘enter’ could also be interpreted as finally entering the world on a level field.
I’ll have to think on this…
Interesting indeed!
I’m an ITP student and I was taught the “enter” sign to use for meaning access. But I can see how the “contact” sign might be used.
I will have to bring this up with my instructors and see what they say…
I wonder how many of us tend to stop interpreters to clarify signs we do not understand because its not a sign that majority in that deaf community uses?
I use enter sign for access. It makes more sense than contact since “entering” opens up the “door” to allow full access.
I personally feel terps should use signs that are used by the majority.
It’s about the access to information / information exchanging.
While I do understand and agree that it is important that interpreters respect the deaf community and use the signs that the deaf person is most comfortable with, I am not sure that we should criticize those interpreters who use or show us different signs that they might have learned in other places.
I have learned a couple of new signs from watching interpreters, and I find it interesting to learn new signs and to learn new ways that people think about words and their concepts.
For example, just reading this post and reading what the interpreter has to say…I never thought about it that way, but I can see her perspective, and like Deaf Pundit says, I think she makes an interesting point about the concept of the word “access.”
But I also can understand what C means above, about the door opening to allow full access.
I guess it all depends on how you see it…but I do agree that the majority of deaf people use the enter sign.
Access would be best as if you were imitating separating 2 cloth partitions or opening up a door made of cloth or string beads.
Richard
I’m playing the “Devil’s Advocate” here…
what is our reason for wanting to have better interpreting services, VRS services, closed captioning, etc?
Is it so we can have better “contact” with others? So we can get in touch with others, or be in touch with news, information, entertainment, etc. that other people take for granted?
For example, if I am trying to get an appointment with the doctor to find out why I’ve been feeling lousy, I need to be able to CONTACT the doctor, right? But in order to make contact with the doctor in order to get the information I need to find out why I am sick, I need VRS services, interpreting services, etc.
Sooooo….is “contact” more conceptually accurate?
After all, when we talk about “I need to contact the doctor, I need to contact social services, I need to contact a lawyer….” etc. etc. etc. what sign do we use? We use the contact sign, not the enter sign, right?
The fact that we use VRS to call to arrange an appointment or an interpreter to enhance communication shouldn’t really matter…the bottom line is we are just another consumer wanting to make contact and receive services, period.
Is what we are really talking about here the ability to enter the door to using services…or the ability to have that same equal contact as everyone else does?
No, I am not being argumentative here…like I said, it really doesn’t make any difference to me. I’m just offering this perspective up to give us more to think about…
I agree with ocean1025 that CONTACT doesn’t solve the problem either, but please tell me how ENTER is conceptually accurate? Shame on ITP/IEPs who keep this myth alive.
But I have to disagree with C (#3 above): How does COMMUNICATION ENTER ENTER mean “communication access?” Because you as a bilingual understand that ENTER means “access” in English? While that may be true, it doesn’t solve the problem of interpreting *meaning* to others who don’t have the same understanding. I could sign TOOTHBRUSH to mean “sandwich” if the other person “understood” me when I used it.
But a non-English-dependent Deaf person will not understand “access” from that sign/context unless (1) the interpreter mouths “access” and/or (2) the interpreter pairs the sign ENTER with fingerspelled A-C-C-E-S-S. Otherwise, “access” needs to be contextualized to match the person’s language usage.
Personally I don’t care for ENTER to mean “access” because that isn’t what “access” means; “access” means having the ability to receive equivalent services or permissions, not only being able to ‘enter into something.’ Wheelchair-bound people want “access” (go into) a building; our community wants “access to” (receipt of interpreters, technologies, etc. to make the experience the same) services and opportunities. To me, a more conceptually accurate sign might be FAIR/EQUAL: COMMUNICATION FAIR, for example, to mean “communication access.”
Having said all that, the fact here is that our community’s language usage is so diverse that the one-word-equals-one-sign model is not sufficient.
When I read Deaf Pundit’s blog and her goal for this campaign ( which I think is a great idea, by the way)…
and then I read the comments above, I am wondering if there is in fact a better way to sign the message:
“SAME SAME COMMUNICATION EQUAL”
Sounds to me like the basic message of this campaign is that Deaf people want and deserve the same equal right to communication as everyone else…and if achieving that equality means using support services such as interpreters, VRS, captioning, ASL, Assistive Listening Devices, or whatever, then so be it.
Any thoughts on this idea?
I never thought about that. That IS probably a better way to say it. 😀
Good post, Ocean… now you got me thinking!
“Access” using enter sign can apply for different reasons like mentioned by others like CC, etc.
But as for communication access… what are we trying to send a message about?
If it’s about the COMMUNICATION itself, then I’m with #9 – J on “SAME SAME COMMUNICATION EQUAL”.
Hmm.
Do another vlog, Deaf Pundit. 😀 😉
Aloha! American Sign Language is context-sensitive. The sign for access depends on how it is used in utterances. As for communication access or information access, I very much prefer to use the sign OPEN. The sign ENTER is appropriate for building access. I hope I’m helpful in this perspective. Mahalo, Carl
People can offer their own interpretations of ‘access’ for Deaf Pundit’s video, she doesn’t need to re-PC, IMO. We can see variety of people with their regional signs which is more enjoyable. As for access for the Deaf’s eyes, I use signs for “two” on both sides of eyes and bend/pop ’em fingers.
Actually, I’d like to gently disagree with the idea that the sign for ENTER is the same one as the sign for ACCESS – it’s a completely different movement. same handshape, but ENTER just moves in one direction once, while ACCESS is a shorter movement and repeated once. In other words, ACCESS does a shorter movement twice, as opposed to a longer, single movement for ENTER. It may be a subtle thing, but it makes a huge difference in the meaning.
About the interpreters respecting the community – well, I’m also very open to new signs that they may have learned elsewhere even though I think they should respect the community above all. Unfortunately, not all interpreters are as respectful as they should be. Once an interpreter used this bizarre sign for environment, which basically entailed holding up one finger and waving at it with the other hand in a circular fashion, like many, many people were studying one person. When I corrected her and inquired about the sign later, she took umbrage and huffily said that this was a trendy sign and she would damn well continue to use it. I’m sorry, but this sign was completely conceptually inaccurate, actually meant something else, and set off huge alarm bells in my linguistic gut. But she just pooh-poohed me as if I didn’t know a thing. She may be considered a top-notch ‘terp, but after being treated like that, I didn’t care and have tried to ensure I don’t get her again.
Yeah. Access is signed differently than Enter. J is absolutely right about that.
As it is, I don’t really care how people sign access. 🙂 Whatever is comfortable for you! 🙂
I agree with J and Iammine in context where we are talking about communication.
It does make a difference depending on what we are trying to convey to others.
There’s always more than one meaning for one word.
As for terps, at times, terp will learn something from ASL class, picking up a sign that majority of deaf in that very same community do not use.
I had one terp that lived in Florida for six months and WI for six months, she was mindful to keep two separate regional signs separate…but at times, she goofed and that was funny since I know she had to remind herself which state she’s in.
The fourth defination for the word access found on Dictionary.com describe the word as a means of approach.
Would that not make more logical sense to use a variation of the approach sign for access?
After reviewing the comments again, in a way, approach does make sense for access.
equal communication approach?
Vlogging conference – may be a good place to take this campaign: Pixelodeon, happening June 9th and 10th in Los Angeles, CA. http://pixelodeonfest.com/
I’ve put up a post on my blog supporting the campaign
http://nemeton.blogspot.com/2007/06/equal-access.html
and I also made a couple of sidebar badges, which I’ve emailed to DeafPundit.
When I was taking ASL classes (for interpreting) my instructor, who later on became my boss, was a CODA. I interpreted a lot of CAD (Computer Aided Drafting) and other computer classes. When I asked my boss / professor about “access” on computer as opposed to “accessing” [entering] a room. He signed ‘contact’ to mean computer access and ‘enter’ otherwise. (I grew up and worked in Orange Co., CA…is the difference regional?) Just my two cents.
I am Deaf, and have always realized that there is always more than one way to sign something. Since it is a visual language, it depends on the meaning, not the word. If you mean “access to a place” then “I want in”. “Enter” then, is right. If you mean “I need access to the office computer system” then you need to get on the computer, “open” might be right, or even “enter”, but I’m not sure I’d use “contact” unless I was “contacting” someone ON the computer. If you mean “I need access to the President of the company” you need to contact him & “contact” is right.
Gaena