A Day in the Life of a Sign Language Interpreter: Social Distancing

Never had to know how to use Zoom or Google Hangouts before? Virtual conferencing and video meetings with multiple participants a new thing for you?

Well, you have two days to figure it out!

Welcome to “Quarantine Interpreting” in the midst of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. I’m Regina and I’ll be your presenter for this session. (Go learn what that meaneth…)

Our team of sign language interpreters met yesterday morning via Google Hangouts (a video conferencing program through G Suite) to practice using the platform. After a series of “So-and-so, could you please mute yourself? The kids hollering in the background is distracting” and “Why can’t I see myself? Where am I?” answered with, “You have to turn your video permission on,” we were finally ready to explore this new resource. 

It was enjoyable catching up with coworkers and holding up my coffee cup in a virtual toast, and I found I had really missed the gang these past three (or is it four?) weeks. We even sang “Happy Birthday” to my lead interpreter and laughed about the Great Toilet Paper Shortage. It was all fun and games until…we tried to use sign language with one another.

The goal was to rehearse what interpreting for our students virtually over Zoom or Google Hangouts would look like so that we could provide equal access for our Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing students to the online distance learning that schools were now forced to engage with due to school closures and social distancing.

What we ended up looking like were sluggish mimes trapped in a virtual matrix as our hands left swooping ghost images across our individual squares–like drunk contestants in the game show, Hollywood Squares. 

I’m feeling a bit nervous now. I have an hour-long ELA class to interpret tomorrow. My student is either going to feel completely frustrated if I can’t get the kinks worked out of this “virtual experience-thingy” or hilariously laughing at my artistic hand-antics and relying on the less-than-adequate captioning on the screen.

But…we are sign language interpreters!

Masters at adapting to unique situations and environments and professional gurus of language mediation. No little social-distancing interruption is going to throw us off course!

At least, that’s what I tell myself every day as I prepare for the great unknown, uncharted territory of quarantine interpreting. 

Let’s do this! (Want to hear about other experiences in “A Day in the Life of a Sign Language Interpreter?” Check out THIS BLOG POST.)

Regina