This is the 4th weekly installment from the 20 chapters in the new book, Deaf Eyes on Interpreting, edited by Thomas K. Holcomb and David H. Smith, which is scheduled to be released in June by Gallaudet University Press. This chapter, American Sign Language Interpreting in a Mainstreamed College Setting: Performance Quality and Its Impact on Classroom Participation Equity, has three co-authors John Pirone, Jonathan Henner, and Wyatte C. Hall.
As John Pirone describes in the video clip above, their research shows it is an illusion to think that providing an ASL interpreter in mainstreamed college classes provides equity for the Deaf students. He enumerates several areas of concern regarding interpreters’ skills and actions, including lack of ASL fluency, less than adequate ASL receptive skills, intercultural incompetency and lack of professionalism. In the full chapter, the co-authors propose solutions to this troubling state of affairs for Deaf students in interpreted college classrooms.
Deaf Culture That 