Chapter 13 talks about the
"ILY" sign and how some deaf people have a negative response to it
when a hearing person signs it. The sign can be traced all the way back to
1905. Originally it meant "I Love You," but over the years it has
lost it meaning and now translates to "Hiya." "And so the ILY
has become the best-known symbol of the Deaf community" (102). At one time
it was a very common sign and it in a way helped to introduce some sign
language. It was at one time a positive sign. Some deaf people collect all
sorts of items that pertain to the ILY sign. They collect everything such as
t-shirt, jewelry, pottery, and other what not things, because they consider
them things as a representation of deaf culture history.
“The ILY has become so popular and
widespread, so ubiquitous, that’s become a visual cliché – the ‘Smiley Face’ of
Deaf Culture. What we have is a case of overkill. And with overexposure comes
abuse” (102). Deaf people become annoyed with people who give the ILY sign to
deaf people. Most of the time the hearing person who gives the sign has no
experience in signing or no relation at all to any deaf people. To hearing
people they think they are communicating with a deaf person by flashing that
one sign. Some deaf people take offense to this because they ILY is not cute to
them anymore. Another factor is that a person with no experience in signing
most of the time sign ILY wrong and instead says “bullshit.” That alone is very
offense as a first impression. I understand how it could get overly annoying. A
corny example would be something like my dad or another elderly person saying “cool
beans” or “groovy” to a group of my friends. These words are no longer cute or “in,”
and they are to an extent annoying. “Some of us love the ILY; some tolerate it;
some are sick of it. To some, it’s not cute anymore, just corny” (103). Deaf people have individual feeling towards
the ILY sign.
Works Cited
Morre, S. Matthew, and Linda Levitan. For Hearing People Only. 3rd Ed. Rochester, New York: MSM Productions, Ltd.,2003.Print.
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