[nfb-db] Deafblind Group Communication

[Mussie]

John,
I was actually referring to the fact that by simply not learning sign 
language, there is no relationship between your wife and your step-dad, 
which itself implies that sign language learning is a condition of good 
relationship without regard to the fact that there are millions of people 
who are paired as couples and speak different languages. You say sign 
language happens "naturally," but so does any kind of language. My point 
was, then, that people should maintain a positive relationship regardless of 
their language differences and be allowed to adapt on their pace and terms, 
as you say when you said it is their choice (and when you say that, isn't it 
then appropriate to accept the person's choice but then let the individual 
know of your communication preferences; neither the person nor you should be 
forced to adapt to one another's language, but each must actively try to 
encourage the other to find ways to enhance communication rather than 
maintaining isolation or relational distance).
I hope you understood my point. Sorry for simply trotting my words out 
without thoroughly reading your thoughtful responses. I do not always have 
the time to read email listservs (this is one of only 2 lists I am 
subscribed to, by the way).
Mussie
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "John Lee Clark" <johnlee at clarktouch.com>
To: "'NFB Deaf-Blind Division Mailing List'" <nfb-db at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Sunday, June 14, 2009 7:07 PM
Subject: Re: [nfb-db] Deafblind Group Communication


> Mussie:
>
> I think you have deeply misunderstood me.
>
> First of all, I never said anything about forcing anyone to learn sign
> language.  It is always the other person's choice.  I can't force anyone 
> to
> do anything.
>
> What I did say is that learning sign language happens naturally as a part 
> of
> building a good relationship.
>
> A good relationship has many elements in it.  It has give and take.  It 
> has
> respect.  It has trust.  It has its rituals and shared activities.
> Emotional, intellectual, material, and in some cases sexual exchanges are
> made.  And there's communication.
>
> My point is that if someone chooses NOT to learn sign language, it is
> detrimental to the relationship as a whole.  There are many other ways to
> harm the development of a good relationship--such as if your girlfriend
> beats you up and chooses not to treat you nice.  Are you going to say,
> "Well, I can't force her to treat me well as a precondition to our having 
> a
> good relationship"?  No, you wouldn't say that.  Why not?  because a good
> relationship ALREADY has to be one in which you are treated nice. 
> Otherise,
> the relationship is not good, no matter how good the sex is, how much 
> money
> she has, and how intellectually stimulating your conversations are--her
> beating you up is simply not good and therefore the relationship is not as
> good as it should be.
>
> Please understand that all the people who learned sign language first and
> foremost chose to have a good relationship with me.  The groundwork of the
> relationship is always already there even before they become fluent 
> signers.
> I never held sign language as a hostage, like "If you don't learn, I'll
> never talk with you again."  No.  They just naturally learned sign 
> language
> because they wanted to communicate more and better with me, because it is 
> a
> part of contributing to a good relationship with me, which also involves
> other elements.  We both always work on the communication.  It's not that
> person doing all the work.
>
> It so happens the simple fact is that spoken English is inaccessible to 
> me.
> Sign language, on the other hand, is accessible to the other person.  So
> sign language is naturally the language of choice--that is, the language 
> of
> choice FOR the relationship itself, not for the other person, not for me,
> but for the relationship itself.
>
> Now, take my father-in-law.  It's not that he hasn't chosen to learn more
> sign language; it's that he has chosen not to have a good relationship.
> After all, there are OTHER ways to communicate, such as writing via the
> Screen Braille Communicator.  While he can communicate perfectly well, in
> terms of using the same language, with my wife's sister, who is hearing,
> THEY don't have a great relationship.  They can understand each other
> perfectly, but they don't have a good relationship.  Yes, it is easy for 
> my
> wife to look at his not signing as a sore point, but there's a larger 
> issue
> involved.
>
> Everyone who has not learned sign language in my experience don't learn 
> for
> two reasons: One is that they wouldn't have contributed to a good
> relationship anyway--meaning that we wouldn't have a good relationship 
> EVEN
> if we already used the same language.  All of the others who DO want to 
> make
> the relationship work well have learned sign language, but they have also
> done all of the OTHER things necessary for their part in the relationship.
>
> Now, the second reason is that, in some cases, the relationship doesn't
> require a high level intimate communication thing.  There are, after all,
> all sorts of relationships, from superifical ones to deeper ones.  On one
> end of the spectrum might be a cashier at the store.  You two may know
> nothing about each other, but you two still have a relationship because 
> you
> two exchange money for products and also may show respect and maybe some
> friendly gestures.  On the other end of the spectrum would be a 
> relationship
> of such intimacy that you two share everything and can almost read each
> other's minds.
>
> The store clerk, well, the relationship simply does not demand that we 
> find
> a common language so we can have intellectual, emotional, and intimate
> conversations.  But the soul mate, well, you two better have a 
> communication
> method in place that works smoothly, as Haben has put it--SMOOTHLY.
>
> Then the relationships in between the two extremes, I guess after a 
> certain
> point in this range of types of relationships, it begins to become more 
> and
> more necessary a common smooth language is for maintaining a healthy
> relationship.  The level of communication my father-in-law has would make
> him a cool neighbor, but is quite lacking for his role as my wife's 
> father.
>
>
> I am sure that your girlfriend's parents and you have a great 
> relationship.
> As long as you all can communicate some, and satisfy what you all expect
> from your relationship, that's cool.  You may feel there's nothing amiss,
> nothing disrespectful.  So that's great, and their learning more sign
> language is not really crucial to the health of the relationship.  People
> have varying degrees of closeness with the "in laws."  So I will not judge
> whether or not what you have with your girlfriend's parents is good or not
> as it should be.
>
> But if we are talking about my wife, I would be seriously compromised in 
> the
> relationship if she did not know sign language.  The relationship would 
> not
> be good.  But since we both want a good relationship, we both have made a
> lot of effort to learn many, many things, develop new skills, adapt and
> adapt again.
>
> Anyway, the interesting thing is that I have many, many relationships in
> which I think sign language isn't that important but the other person 
> learns
> it ANYWAY.  The relationship doesn't really call for that, but they jump
> ahead anyway and are eager to learn.  I'm like, "Okay, if you want to." 
> For
> example, a new bar and grill opened recently not far from here.  The first
> time I walked in there, at the beginning the waitress didn't know how to
> communicate with me.  I did my SBC thing.  But by the end of the evening,
> she was already spelling out messages.  The next time, she was a master
> fingerspeller and asked me to teach her some signs.  Now she knows many
> signs related to the bar and grill and some other stuff.  I recently 
> learned
> that the first day I was there, she went to the back, Googled the manual
> alphabet, and printed it out and tacked it on the wall.  We could have had 
> a
> perfectly good waiteress-customer relationship without her doing any of
> that.  But she wanted to.  Please understand that this is quite common, 
> and
> not a rarity at all.
>
> So I guess it all boils down to that old saying, "It depends."  Smile.
>
> John
>
>
>
>
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