Cruises, cookies, mysterious shooting: Down in Alabama al.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from al.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
By Nancy Prater
Many assume you need a voice and hearing to communicate. You don’t. You just need two people who want to communicate, and the rest will work out.
Accounting Assistant Teresa Hendon was born deaf. She attended the Alabama School for the Deaf in Talladega from September 1968 until she graduated in 1983. She began her career in data entry at Alabama Power Corporate Headquarters in 1983 and transferred to the Remittance Processing Center (RPC) in 1991.
“My job as a manager is to learn how to communicate with people by any means necessary,” said Accounting Manager Chris Barnes. “I don’t know sign language, but we have figured out how to communicate without using our voices. We use gestures with our hands and body language.”
Black, Deaf and Extremely Online
On TikTok and in virtual hangouts, a younger generation is sharing the origins and nuances of Black American Sign Language, a rich variation of ASL that scholars say has been overlooked for too long.
Nakia Smith’s popular TikTok videos celebrate the history of Black American Sign Language and delight in its divergences from standard American Sign Language.Credit.JerSean Golatt for The New York Times
Published Jan. 23, 2021Updated March 25, 2021
“I have to make sure my hands are not ashy before I sign,” Nakia Smith, who is deaf, explained to her nearly 400,000 followers.
In one of the dozens of popular videos she posted to TikTok last year, Ms. Smith compared her habit of adding a quick dab of lotion to her hands before she starts signing to the sip of water a hearing person takes before beginning to speak.
Dale County woman wins national honor southeastsun.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from southeastsun.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.