Should Gardai know sign language?

liah

I'm just re-watching Weeds season two, in which the main character's son is seeing a deaf girl, and the girl and the son get arrested for being on E. The cop thinks the deaf girl is being difficult, til he's informed she's deaf and everything's understood.

Now, in the case of deaf and/or mute adults who may not have a parent/guardian/whatever there to get that cleared up, what would happen to them? Would they be seen as being difficult and perhaps treated poorly as a result? Are there people who know sign language employed in Gardai stations to sort them out upon arrival if the individual Gard can't understand it? And should Gardai learn sign language?

I guess the same argument could be used for any language, but presumably if they're living in the country they'd have some English so it's not really the same thing as being entirely unable to communicate vocally.

And I guess while I'm on the topic - do you think sign language should be taught in school? For anyone who knows it, how hard was it for you to learn, and do you think it could be taught efficiently in a school setting?

(as an aside, I recognize the impracticalities of enforcing it in either school or amongst the Gardai considering it's a tiny percentage of the population who are completely deaf and/or mute. I'd just like to know people's thoughts on how those situations can be handled.)

policarp

Most Gardai would give 2 fingers to that proposal, I think.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Fist, shake up an down, here's your diploma, officer!

UglyBolloxFace

Can't see it happening to be honest. To teach the Garda sign language would cost way too much money and it would raise too much bother. It's a simple case of 'is it a viable option?' and in this case it is not, due simply to the fact that the majority of the country is not deaf.

That's gay, aul democracy for ya.

Apanachi

liah wrote: »

do you think sign language should be taught in school?

Would have loved to have had sign language as a subject option in school (wouldn't help me much now though as I'm living in Germany and the sign language used here is different to Irish sign language), but it would have been great to have had the chance to learn it at school

KittyeeTrix

It would've been an advantage to the guards in Mayo at the shell protest:D

MagicMarker

No.

Raging_Ninja

The Gardaí have access to translators when the need arises. It's also possible to 'talk' with a deaf/mute person the good old fashioned way - with pen and paper. Its what I do with my deaf cousins on the infrequent occasions where they visit from the UK.

wandatowell

A pen and paper would suffice id say for standard dealings id say.

hondasam

what is it with all the garda threads ?

Kintarō Hattori

In an ideal world yes but it would be required in too few situations to be cost effective and practical. It would take too long, it would be too costly and it would eliminate a lot of people who would consider the Gardai as a possible career.

seamus

I understand the thought behind the proposal, but you're basically asking that someone wanting to join the defence forces learn an entirely new language and way of communicating in order to cater for 0.1% of situations.

But you acknowledge that. While theoretically it's a good idea, as is learning rudimentary sign language in school, your main problem is that of practice. People will learn it, flicker around with it in school, and then possibly never need to use it again. Millions of us learned a language from four years old, spoke it on an almost daily basis at a rudimentary level for 14 years, and five years later can barely string a sentence together in it. Irish.
I'm sure if one was immersed into the language again, it would start to come back, but confronted on the street with someone talking full speed at you in Irish, your first response is going to be, "I have no idea what you're saying to me".

And such it would be with teaching sign language in schools or even teaching it to Gardai. A few months/weeks of practice, then years of non-practice and the skill is lost. Unfortunately it would be a complete waste of resources.

It does make more sense to facilitate speaking communications for deaf people as this is a skill they are going to need to use on a daily basis for the rest of their lives. That's a worthwhile investment.

In normal circumstances, if a Garda is unable to communicate with someone, afaik they hold the person where they are or bring them down the station until they can find someone who can communicate with the civilian. In the case of someone without English, I understand this may work by having someone speaking to them over the radio. Obviously this doesn't work with deaf people

Nodin

hondasam wrote: »

what is it with all the garda threads ?

They're topical, and its the muslims week off. It happens. By the end of this month, maybe mid may it will be 'bosoms' that occupies our sages. Same every year.

Spunge

Why not just carry around a pen and paper instead of having to learn basically a new language ? :P

Morlar

I think it's a nice idea in principle but the logistics of maintaining a qualified and available Gardai 24x7 7 days a week at every police station in Ireland who can speak sign language would cost a lot of money.

UglyBolloxFace

seamus wrote: »

In normal circumstances, if a Garda is unable to communicate with someone, afaik they hold the person where they are or bring them down the station until they can find someone who can communicate with the civilian. In the case of someone without English, I understand this may work by having someone speaking to them over the radio. Obviously this doesn't work with deaf people

Yeah but how do you explain to the person that you are bringing them to the station if they can't understand you? That would be, for that person, a scary experience - not knowing what the hell is going on.

Asking a bit much as its so difficult to learn.

prinz

liah wrote: »

Are there people who know sign language employed in Gardai stations to sort them out upon arrival if the individual Gard can't understand it? And should Gardai learn sign language?

They'd have access to a signer should the need arise. Same as they would have access to translators for Polish, Chinese, Romanian etc which I would guess are far more prevalent in this country.

liah wrote: »

And I guess while I'm on the topic - do you think sign language should be taught in school?

The basics absolutely. Of course then you'd know ISL, and what happens if an American comes in and wants to use ASL.

liah wrote: »

For anyone who knows it, how hard was it for you to learn, and do you think it could be taught efficiently in a school setting?

There was actually an excellent piece on this very issue on Nationwide in the last few weeks, can't remember last week or the one before. There was a lady who IIRC has recently become unemployed and she had the idea of teaching sign language, so she learned it, she developed books for learners and they are actually being translated into foreign languages versions too I seem to recall. Success story! The segment might be on the RTE player still.

seamus

UglyBolloxFace wrote: »

Yeah but how do you explain to the person that you are bringing them to the station if they can't understand you? That would be, for that person, a scary experience - not knowing what the hell is going on.

It would. But I guess there would be a certain amount of comfort in knowing that you're being held by law enforcement people and not a drugs gang looking for money.

It would be very rare to find someone so completely lacking in english that a Garda couldn't at least partially get them to understand what's about to happen.

General Zod

Apanachi wrote: »

Would have loved to have had sign language as a subject option in school (wouldn't help me much now though as I'm living in Germany and the sign language used here is different to Irish sign language), but it would have been great to have had the chance to learn it at school

The oral would be easy, but the essay a nightmare.

sdanseo

It'd be a huge waste of time and effort when you can just use a pen tbh.

As for being arrested...if a garda pulls out handcuffs and grabs your arms you could be deaf dumb and have no legs and you'd still know what was about to happen.

starviewadams

I'd imagine every Garda would carry a pen and paper on them so it wouldn't be that much of a problem.I know one of my deaf cousins carries some sort of deaf asociation card in his wallet too that he could show Gardai that he's deaf,that and his hearing aid.

My two deaf cousins are awesome at lip reading so they just right down what they want to tell me when we're ''talking''

mikom

liah wrote: »

Should Gardai know sign language?

Does this answer your question... http://img703.imageshack.us/img703/5285/gardag.jpg

Canis Lupus

Sign language in school would have been AWESOME.

There's a dude in my local who's deaf and can read lips or possibly my mind, I'm not sure yet.

Saila

they should learn english first no

Knasher

seamus wrote: »

People will learn it, flicker around with it in school, and then possibly never need to use it again.

Actually I think sign language would be something that would be extremely useful in a lot of day to day lives - assuming of course that a reasonable percentage of the population were able to converse at least on a basic level. It would be pretty awesome if you were in situations where either it's too loud to hold a conversation (such as building sites or pubs/clubs) or you have to be quite (like libraries or offices (I know its not a requirement but it helps my concentration in work if people aren't talking around me)) and you were able to talk without having to shout at each other.

cosmicfart

if they should know sign language then should also know braille surely?

goose2005

Nodin wrote: »

They're topical, and its the muslims week off. It happens. By the end of this month, maybe mid may it will be 'bosoms' that occupies our sages. Same every year.

No, May is gypsy month. I hear they steal our babies and feed them to swans, and then eat the swans. It's a disgrace, Joe.

CrazyRabbit

All they need to learn is:



And then they should learn Polish, Romanian etc.

kowloon

Gardai should be allowed to take language courses as extra training, shouldn't be forced on them though. Would be useful if there was a spread of Gardai fluent in different languages across the different districts.

crazygeryy

they are well aquainted with rape.why not sign language as well.

WindSock

Everyone in the world should know sign language.

Aishae

theres too many different regional sign languages to know them all! but knowing your regional one can help you, or at least the fingerspelling can - only 26 signs to learn!

Yeah but how do you explain to the person that you are bringing them to the station if they can't understand you? That would be, for that person, a scary experience - not knowing what the hell is going on.

i was only thinking that - if s garda comes up to me, i say i cant understand what he's saying as im deaf. so he bundles me into a squad car - id be sh^tting myself wondering was i just arrested?!

its all very well saying 'they can write it down' but the amount of times i ask people to write things down (banks, offices and yeah in the garda station once as i was looking for driving licence applications - the box was empty) and - to 'save time' they keep repeating what they said, louder or slower or rephrasing it and im just thinking 'for the love of god will you write it the f^^^ down.... we'd be finished already if you had' but thats a pretty common thing with people all round....
it gets easier wih age - no one really wants to mess with me now :cool: (well, it's easier for people to be narky or less helpful towards kids)

making sure the garda learned isl would be too costly. but they could really overhaul their disability equality training (awareness - how to deal with these occasions etc) but thats not just the garda... any service industry could benefit

Knasher

Aishae wrote: »

i was only thinking that - if s garda comes up to me, i say i cant understand what he's saying as im deaf. so he bundles me into a squad car - id be sh^tting myself wondering was i just arrested?!

its all very well saying 'they can write it down' but the amount of times i ask people to write things down (banks, offices and yeah in the garda station once as i was looking for driving licence applications - the box was empty) and - to 'save time' they keep repeating what they said, louder or slower or rephrasing it

Serious question, how did you know they were repeating only louder?

Aishae

Knasher wrote: »

Serious question, how did you know they were repeating only louder?

as i was with someone who could hear - i suppose im lucky they didnt defer to them instead as thats what used to happen when i wasnt alone (i guess its just a disability you comne across a lot so you arent sure how to handle it)
also - i cant lipread much. but when someone is practically shouting its usually pretty obvious as it distorts the face

Stercus Accidit

Pen and paper is perfectly sufficient until they get to the station, where an interpreter would be called as in all situations where there is a communication issue.

This is hardly rocket science, everyone on this forum could be deaf and we are communicating just fine.

Terrontress

I remember a lad called Garda Kenneth Burns. He was maybe based in Templeogue or Rathfarnham.

He encountered a deaf person and realised that his lack of sign language was a barrier so he went off and studied ISL and became quite proficient.

As a result of his efforts he was given a Presidential award.

This would have been in 2001 or 2002.

I'd say there are many Gardai learn all manner of subjects using their own initiative.

policarp

WindSock wrote: »

Everyone in the world should know sign language.

Everyone in the world should know Esperanto, as well.

johnmcdnl

guards should use notepad and marker

nice little simple cost saver there instead of trying to teach every guard in the country sign language for the couple times in their careers that they'll be needed to use it

after all there's probably more polish/lativans etc etc in the country than deaf people... so it'd make more sense to teach them polish first

Savage Tyrant

Most of them should know this sign...

InTheTrees

It makes a hell of a lot more sense than requiring them to speak irish for gods sake.

They have to speak irish right now dont they? Are there more or less irish speakers than signers?

_Cato_

I think they should start with English.

MagicSean

I'd be very interested in learning sign language. I tried before on my own but it turned out i was learning the American version.

panda100

I started learning ISL last year as I work in the disability arena and wanted to bulk up my cv a bit. Its no more difficult to learn than Spanish or French.

It's not a problem in this country, but I have heared stories of deaf people being shot at and wounded by security forces in other countries , as they failed to answer when challenged.

amacachi

fluffyorganic1 wrote: »

It would've been an advantage to the guards in Mayo at the shell protest:D

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_SWF9i3Vzpac/TMRaNW725eI/AAAAAAAAA0U/1xDNJJbSUU0/s1600/Rude+Daniel+Radcliffe.gif

prinz

panda100 wrote: »

It's not a problem in this country, but I have heared stories of deaf people being shot at and wounded by security forces in other countries , as they failed to answer when challenged.

The man was killed the last big news example. Seattle I think it was.

Aishae

prinz wrote: »

The man was killed the last big news example. Seattle I think it was.

wow - seattle. when you mentioned it in an earlier post i figured you were talking about eg. israel not a supposedly well developed and peaceful country that has a thing called 'equality laws' (so supposedly, people are more aware of disability)

Terrontress

Aishae wrote: »

wow - seattle. when you mentioned it in an earlier post i figured you were talking about eg. israel not a supposedly well developed and peaceful country that has a thing called 'equality laws' (so supposedly, people are more aware of disability)

I think that it's fair to say that American police are a lot more trigger happy than in most developed and peaceful countries.

holystungun9

hondasam wrote: »

what is it with all the garda threads ?

The guards are like, so hot right now.

Earthhorse

Sign language is no different to any other foreign language that a Gard might not know; Spanish, French, German, Polish, Chinese? Should Gards have to learn them? No, but they're more likely to encounter a situation where they would come in handy. The only lanaguages they should have to know are English and Irish because they are our national languages. For all other situations a translator will suffice.

amacachi

Earthhorse wrote: »

Sign language is no different to any other foreign language that a Gard might not know; Spanish, French, German, Polish, Chinese? Should Gards have to learn them? No, but they're more likely to encounter a situation where they would come in handy. The only lanaguages they should have to know are English and Irish because they are our national languages. For all other situations a translator will suffice.

You flipped your logic nicely halfway through there. I'd be pretty sure they'll come across more people who know any of French, German or Spanish but not English than they're going to come across people who only understand Irish.