Raising a Deaf Robot
The problems with interpreted kid's shows, the problems with ASL research in AI, and the problems with hearing parents writing about their deaf kids. All problems!
Hi, and welcome to the inaugural Deaf Baby Instruction Manual newsletter. There’s an introduction and bio at the bottom of the newsletter, but you’re not really here for that…
Thinking of Linda the Librarian
If you haven’t already seen it, PBS recently debuted long-needed ASL interpreted versions of selected PBS Kids shows, in cooperation with DCMP. Meanwhile, SignUp has added The Magic Schoolbus to their app, and MyGo continues going strong interpreting their corner of the CocoMelon Blippiverse.
This is unquestionably good news, and it means our Deaf kids have a chance to enjoy these shows and learn (or just veg out) the same as any hearing child.
But is it the same, exactly?
Watching an interpreted episode of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood makes me wish for a Plaza Sésamo where every actor, puppet and claymation mostrosity uses ASL. There’s a difference between a show interpreted into sign language from English, and a show made in sign language, for a Deaf audience. I’m thinking of something at that public TV level of production, made by Deaf creators, that showcases native signers and features an either an Eyeth-y Deaf world, or at least a set in a real world that isn’t mediated by the interpreting two-step.
These have existed here and there. Rainbow’s End was the first program I’m aware of—5 episodes were made in 1977-78. Not much of it is available online, but from what little I’ve seen, it looks amazing.
There’s also been the not-my-cup-of-tea Dr. Wonder’s Workshop, a Christian show along the same lines (started by the hearing father of a Deaf child, apparently) and works in progress in various places.
The economics of a small audience means that these kinds of shows have to be be publicly funded (like they are in the UK,) or have some major corporate donors backing them. There is plenty of great children’s media in ASL, but it’s made on a relative shoestring: Hands Land, RMDSCO’s channel, Atomic Hands, and the late, lamented ASL Nook, among many others. Maybe the lesson is to be grateful that we live in an age of no-budgt abundance. But I can’t help wishing for the all-Linda Bove version of Sesame Street.
No robot about us without us
A recent paper by a group of DHH scientists looking at how little Deaf input most AI / Large Language Model research into sign languages actually gets, and how this is holding back and distorting that research. Summarizing it will do violence to the problems that the study identifies—I encourage you to read it if you’re interested: Systemic Biases in Sign Language AI Research: A Deaf-Led Call to Reevaluate Research Agendas (arxiv link)
But I do want to make a note about the issue of expertise Desai et. al bring to the forefront. If you’re not deaf / Deaf / hard of hearing, it’s not only that your sign skills or cultural knowledge might be lacking. It’s that the questions you ask will be limited and potentially far off-target:
“In our review, we find that 64 papers primarily motivate their work as addressing barriers in communication between deaf people and hearing society or spoken language resources. Navigating a hearing world and resulting communication barriers are undeniably a central component of the lived deaf experience. However, sign languages are not merely “communication tools”, they are full languages, with a long history of being recognized as such.
When ML research focuses singularly on the role sign languages play in provisioning access, it overlooks the history and diverse lived experiences of Deaf people, and misses out on exciting avenues for research, as we discuss below.”
I can taste more than a little salt here. After all, all five of the authors are researchers at various institutions, from Gallaudet to Microsoft. Presumably, they are managing their communication barriers pretty well.
But the bigger idea is that, without Deaf eyes on the inside, there are legions of hearing comp-sci nerds throwing time, energy and research dollars into problems that don’t need solving, at best. At worst, it can taint the research, turning months of effort into a big conceptual fart, or bake unfixable issues into “solutions” that end up harming the folks they’re supposed to help.
It’s the ol’ sign language gloves issue writ large, but this has been a force at work in deaf education since Abbé de l'Épée started tinkering with Old French Sign. The engineer’s disease of hearing people meddling in Deaf issues is pervasive, and the mistakes keep getting re-made with every naive hearing administrator or well-intentioned ToD put in charge of a deaf student struggling with issues they can’t even guess at.
Article found via Not Lina Who Not Lina How on Bluesky.
More engineer’s disease, plus an introduction
Which brings us to me. As you probably know, my name is Will Fertman, and I’m a hearing father, with one hearing and one deaf kid. For the past couple years I’ve been writing a guide for parents raising deaf children, the Deaf Baby Instruction Manual.
Now that the book is finished enough to start shopping around, I’m doing the usual second-guessing about its worthiness. But as I struggle with general fears about how bad the writing is, how few of the poop jokes are actually funny, etc., I’ve got a more specific fear: I’m not the first hearing author out there to write this kind of book, and the track record of hearing people giving advice about deaf people is… not great.
My basic defense is that my perspective matters: as a father, I can speak to the issues that parents face first-hand, and honor the advice of the many Deaf adults who helped my family along the way. But the basic rebuttal still holds, too: when Deaf (and DeafBlind) authors like Mark Drolsbaugh, Rachel Zemach, Sara Novic or John Lee Clark are writing about these issues, how much am I helping? Should I just stand around and point to them? And where do the voices of deaf children come in?
It brings to mind Katherine Nicole O’Neal’s work—Parenting is a Conflict of Interest, and the Problematic Assumption of Caregiver Benevolence. I’ll certainly be writing more about her work in the next letter. But the thought I want to leave you all with is, how much can we as parents speak for our children? Do we have any right to do it, and if so, where are the limits?
If you have any thoughts on this, or any ideas or topics you’d like to see in future newsletters, you can reach me over on my Facebook, Bluesky or Instagram accounts, or shoot me an email here. And if you like this newsletter, please pass it on to other parents or folks who’d be interested.
Enjoy the summer!
—Will
___________________
This is an informational newsletter on raising a deaf kid. All opinions in linked articles are the views and copyright of their respective authors, not this guy. All original content is ©2024, William Fertman. Links are not endorsements.