American Sign Language - Joy's way

Lecture:

Our conversational phrase for today: Are you into sports? What’s your favorite?

Signs we learned today:

Deaf culture:

English idioms….boy, can they be difficult. “Beat a dead horse”….I mean, if you signed that, it would be very visually disturbing and would not at all mean what you meant for it to mean. Right? What does it mean? When someone says to you “Oh, Joy, don’t beat a dead horse!” I think it means “get over it. Stop talking about it. Let it go!” And how about “Get your goat!” I remember the first time that came up in the college setting. I was interpreting, and the teacher said “Get your goat.” I was temporarily dumbfounded. If I signed “GET” “YOUR” “GOAT”…..again, thinking about this visually, the poor student would have thought….”hmmmm…..what if I don’t have a goat?” or ” I didn’t know you could have goats in the city.” or “Get my goat and then do what with it?” None of that would have been good. So, I signed it to him word-for-word (transliteration) and then said “ENGLISH” “IDIOM” “MEAN” “BECOME ANGRY” or “IRRITATE”….

And then there are Deaf idioms….I will just give you one “FINISH” that one little sign can mean so much, including my favorite interpretation “Knock it off!!” If you sign “TOUCH” “FINISH” that can mean many things, including “Been there. Done that.” It means “I’ve already experienced that.”