Indeed, hence the regular misunderstandings (especially over humour) around here, and everywhere online.
My follow-up question would be if the facial gestures would typically be less dramatic if signing to a person in a one-on-one context in close (but properly socially-distanced) proximity? (wearing a mask in today’s Covid Culture would kind of interfere with the message)
That is: are the facial gestures intentionally more animated/exaggerated when doing a broadcast as the hearing-impaired viewer would be at the mercy of the video production crew and, perhaps, screen size if viewing on a tablet device.
I’m seeing a lot of signing lately with the Covid press conferences and the exaggerated facial and body activity is not universal.
A great question. The size of the gestures could be related to addressing a large group.
For me, the question is not so much the size of the gestures but the drama, negative or positive.
As an example, when giving a phone number the facial expressions convey “Oh, my God! You would not believe there is a phone number! It will change your life! It answers every question you have ever had!”
The English speaker merely said “For a taped message with more information, please call xxx.xxx.xxxx.”
As I mentioned before, those of us who are not hearing impaired do not engage in similar huge gestures and, in fact, if we did the listener would be very confused by the dramatic presentation of a mundane phone number.
The amount of expression does very from interpreter to interpreter.
You never met my ex-mother-in-law
buhdum
2 Likes