Why ASL interpreters are necessary at live events

Mark Chrysafis
·Video Producer

We spoke with an ASL interpreter at Capital Pride about the importance of accessibility at live events

Video Transcript

MERVIN PRIMEAUX-O'BRYANT: Sign language is a beautiful language. We want to show that we care and love all of those people. It doesn't matter if it's in a church, if it's at some presidential address or anything We have to think about deaf people and this access.

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Hello, everyone. Hey, Yahoo! My name is Mervin Primeaux-O'Bryant, and this is my sign name. I am a deaf interpreter. ASL is such a beautiful language. And I wanted to be involved in how I could practice and hone my skills. It was my native language.

I did ASL, Black ASL. I worked on some international sign language and British sign language. Language is just part of who I am. And you know, I've got these beautiful hands to do all this fabulous work.

Some deaf people or hearing people are born with ASL. American Sign Language is their first language. Some hearing people will meet deaf people later. There's lots of deaf people who are fluent in American Sign Language who will provide the right resources and where you can find the right information to learn.

If you have a hearing teacher, someone who uses ASL as a second language, that's not the best way to learn. And you want to make sure that you're learning from deaf native users. Sign language is very powerful. You know, there's power in words, and it's so visual.

Just like theater, an interpretation has to be able to feed that exposure as people are growing up. You can't take away language from those folks. And deaf people are here. They're part of the community. They have to be involved, and they have to participate in everything that we do. Their participation in the interpreting process is so critical.

We have residential deaf schools and the hearing world the intersect all the time. And we have to provide interpreters for that. Whether they use Black American Sign Language, Japanese Sign Language, American Sign Language, there's so many different sign languages that we can provide interpreters and access for.

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