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00:46:18
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Transcription: [00:42:53]
{SPEAKER name="Shirley Schultz"}
[[to Ella Mae Lentz]] Ah, you should have answered, when people asked if you lip read. What would you answer?
[00:42:57]

{SPEAKER name="Ella Mae Lentz/Shirley Schultz (interpreter)"}
I would say a little bit. I know some people say, lips for, lips are for kissing, not for reading. [[laughter]]
[00:43:11]

If there is nothing else, I suppose we can close?
[00:43:20]

{SPEAKER name="Jo Radner"}
Could you explain how sign language uses devices in poetry that might be like rhyme or alliteration, or similar sounds, in hearing poetry?
[00:43:41]
That is, could you explain how when you planned to compose a poem in American Sign Language, you used the shapes and the motions, and so on, of sign language in your planing of the poem to shape it? Could you show that with a poem, maybe?
[00:43:56]

{SPEAKER name="Ella Mae Lentz/Shirley Schultz (interpreter)"}
Yes, ah, because sign language poetry is completely visual, and English poetry is often based on sound.
[00:44:08]
Sign language uses, as she says, motions and hand shapes for its poet. The poet selects the shapes and certain hand, I guess motions, to make the poem poetic.
[00:44:24]
For example, a short poem by Dorothy Miles, called "Winter". The lines are:
[00:44:34]


Contrast: black and white;
bare trees, covered ground; frozen ice
soft white snow; birth in death.
[00:44:51]


Okay. You saw me do that, signing that poem, now you can see the contrast, black and white, bare trees, covered ground.
[00:45:00]
Now, I'll be translating that, and using my hands to the fullest. Before, I was just using my right mostly. Now, I'll be using both equally.
[00:45:10]


Contrast: black and white;
bare trees, covered ground; frozen ice
soft snow; birth into death.
[00:45:25]


Okay? You see the hand shapes insides? I chose a few hand shapes.
[00:45:31]
One and five, see that? One, black, and, and with the five fingers. White there, bare, trees, again the five fingers.
[00:45:42]
Cover the ground. And then, hard, using five. Soft, using that five shape.
[00:45:50]
And then my hands then are stiff then to soft. Snow, birth, into death.
[00:45:56]
Those, mostly that hand shape, five. And I use space more carefully.
[00:46:01]
I place things, here and there. All hard frozen, black things were over here.
[00:46:06]
And all light, white, soft things were over here.
[00:46:09]
In everyday signs, we use space but not as clearly and specifically as in a poem, to the point. Okay?
[00:46:19]


Transcription Notes:
"Winter" poem taken from " 2005_Bookmatter_AnalysingSignLanguagePoetry " on the internet - with a few words added by the speaker.