I'm sure you've seen the video floating around Facebook: Two students at Washington University invented a pair of gloves that, when worn, can translate American Sign Language on the hands into spoken English. Lightweight and battery operated, these gloves are more user friendly than previous versions that attempted the same thing.
Recommended for you
The gloves take in information about the hand shape, location, palm orientation and movement and translate the sign or gesture into a close English equivalent. Don't get me wrong, I love the idea. If programmed properly with modifications to sense facial expressions, body position, movement, regional variations, personal signing styles and correct ASL structure, it might work. I can see a future for this device in every ambulance and emergency room, so that a Deaf person can at least communicate what hurts in the lag time before an interpreter can arrive. While I am very proud and excited to see young inventors take an interest in helping the Deaf community, I want to clear up some of the misconceptions surrounding this set of gloves.
This is an amazing concept, but just by watching the video, I can already see some major flaws. First off, this is not American Sign Language. ASL has its own grammar structure that is dramatically different than English. These gloves have been programmed to follow English word order and use English words, both of which are not characteristics of ASL. For example, a simple English sentence, "I am going to the store" can be interpreted in a variety of different ways, depending on the Deaf person. "Store will," "store me go," "store there? go will" and "store me need to" are just a handful of ways that it could be signed. There is no feasible way for the gloves to be programmed to recognize every single reiteration of even that sentence, and it only gets more complex from there.
Signs change depending on where you learned to sign. There are ASL "dialects," just like in English. Also, signs change from person to person, and one person may sign the same sign three or four different ways. The sign "know" is supposed to be up on the temple, but can be signed on the cheek, the chin, or even the shoulder, depending on how lazy or tired you are. Native signers also sign things differently than newer signers in a way that would be impossible to document every variation.
ASL is full of idioms that do not directly translate to English, just like any language. Idioms like "train gone sorry" and "touch finish" mean nothing without the cultural background to understand them. Also, a lot of signs vary depending on facial expressions and body language. Also called non-manual markers, these simple but crucial aspects are a key part of ASL. You cannot correctly interpret anything without also analyzing facial features. The gloves won't be able to catch things like sarcasm, and could easily use incorrect vocabulary because it doesn't know the context of the conversation. Many signs have more than one meaning: the sign for "probably" (most likely will happen) is the same sign for "maybe" (might happen" and "ehhh" (most likely will not happen). The only difference is facial expression.
Secondly, the student inventor demonstrating the gloves signs almost every sign wrong. Even if ASL did use words like "and" and "in the" as part of a regularly structured sentence, the signs are still wrong. "Inventors," "and," "we," "prize" and "in the (when referring to being a part of)" are all incorrect. I'm not sure how well a translation product will work if it is programmed incorrectly.
Most importantly, though, is I fear that people will use this as an excuse not to learn sign language for their loved ones. I can easily see this being used as a substitute for having real interactions with Deaf family members, i.e., "I can understand him. Why do I need to learn to communicate back?"
We have to be careful and monitor which situations the gloves are used in, and make sure that it is not getting in the way of real communication. There
are companies formed and run by Deaf people that are
working on similar inventions, who have yet to unveil their inventions because they know how important it is for them to be accurate. ASL is a dynamic language that is shifting and changing every day. If the gloves are outdated or worse, inaccurate, it can cause a lot of problems that can hurt a lot of people.
