Translate into ASL from English

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Sugarpuff

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Interpreters,

At first, how did you learn to use sign language and what made you eager to be interpreter?

How can you translate ASL from English, and is it difficult?
 
I was around 10 and I was at a religious convention and saw the information being intepreted. So I asked my dad could I go sit in the deaf section and watch. So I did. At that time in the 80's interpretation was done in se and pse. After awhile the society realized the deaf should get asl interpretation and changed over. I never learned ASL til 1 1/2 years ago. Anyways to answer your 2nd question, you must take classes and learn asl. Asl is a visual and spatial language and is not in any way affliated with english. People get it confused with calling it broken english because hearing people tend to put an english word to a sign and think oh it's broken english but it is not. For example if I sign Tomorrow two-of-us go store buy new clothes. That looks like broken english but in reality it's asl language and deaf do not put english words to the signs hearies do. Deaf just see pictures and the signs are just that signs with it's own grammatical structure, time and space. So learning asl from a frozen book format isn't learning asl it's learning vocabulary. Want to learn asl? Hang out with the deaf and get some good videos like signing naturally 1,2,and3.
 
The first time I ever saw two deaf people was in Walmart and I asked my mom what they were doing with their hands. She responded, "talking to each other."

Then my first year of coaching Special Olympics I walked up behind this girl and asked her where this court was and she started signing me directions. Since I didn't know sign I started talking to her in French. We became friend and she taught me how to sign hard core. No English. Only pointing and fingerspelling.

Now I interpret/ work with special needs people who are deaf/hard of hearing/non verbal. Whether I use PSE or ASL depends on the needs of the person. But I prefer ASL over PSE because PSE can just get so awkward.

But going from ASL to English is not that hard, at least not for me. I mean, I'm used to weird syntax and thinking about what things do in a sentence because I'm such a language nut, but basically here's the formula.

Time (because you have to know when something happened before you talk about what happened)

Topic (because you have to know what you're talking about before you comment about it)

Comment ( typically adjectives and modifiers)

Verbs!(Like Latin! Gotta love that language)

So basically invert the English sentence and there you go, that's the easy way to look at it. ha ha

But that can cause problems because you have to think in two languages at one while one is going one way and the other is going the opposite.
 
you can check my vlog to see how different from ASL into English, thank to my friend who is able to translate my ASL/SEE into English.

PowerOn's vlog :) enjoy
All are subtitle.
 
SnAzZyStyLe2002 said:
I love the English language. It is more comprehensible.
Click to expand...
--Happy that you like english, but if you are deaf or hoh especially before age 5, it would seem asl would make sense due to the fact it is a visual language which is how the deaf perceive things, visually. If you are late deafened after 5 and you learned english first and mce, then I can see that maybe your mind works aurally and english makes more sense. But I have been hearing all my life, and recently learned ASL for the past 1 1/2 years and while I am still learning, I think ASL is very clear and understandable. Sometimes it makes more sense to me than english. So I guess we are all different. I am a visual person so learning ASL has been quick for me, and I like it better than mce.
 
Good idea for English Sign Language that I have very recommended for making a resume for to get a new job. Other things are good to use any kind for them: type on it for biography or anything else; or making a closed-captioning.
 
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