How It’s (Not) Done!

REVIEW ARTICLE: HOW IT'S (NOT) DONE! Dennis R.Cokely Whoever said "Don't judge a book by its cover" surely must have meant this book by Humphrey and Alcorn (HA). Quite frankly, the cover is the best part of this book. What exactly is so troublesome about it? Consider the following points. Plagiarism or carelessness? We expect authors to act in an ethically appropriate manner when using information and ideas first published by others. Certainly this is true when the information being presented is taken verbatim from another's work. Even if an author intends to modify the material, credit should still be given to the original source. Ethical authors generally handle this by using such statements as, "The following discussion is based on Smith (19--)," or "This is adapted from Smith (19-). There are a number of instances in So You Want to be a Sign LanguageInterpreter?in which HA fail to act ethically; e.g. consider HA's Figure 4-1 on page 88. This full page table is captioned "Labels Ascribed to Deaf Individuals in Professional Journals 1920-1990." This is identical to Table 2 on page 36 of Harlan Lane's book The Mask of Benevolence, except that Lane entitled the table "Some traits attributed to deaf people in the professional literature." However, HA make no attempt to give credit to Lane for compiling and presenting the material in a published book. Similarly, the discussion of register and the five specific registers named by HA (pp. 276-280) derives from the work ofMartin Joos (1967). Here again HA make no attempt to indicate the source oftheir ideas and words. 1 So You Want to be a Sign Language Interpreterby Janice H. Humphrey & Bob Alcorn. 1994. Paperback. Somewhere, TX: H& H Publishers . $49.95. @1994, Linstok Press, Inc. ISSN 0302-1475 Cokely The number of instances in which HA present published information as their own or allow the reader to assume that it is theirs is uncomfortably high. If the authors' failure to give credit where credit is due is willful and intentional, this is plagiarism plain and simple. If the failure is unintentional, then it reveals the authors' gross carelessness and disregard for quality and accuracy. This reviewer, however, simply finds too many times when HA fail to acknowledge others' work to make "Oops! we forgot," acceptable as an excuse. Content, sloppiness &bias A reader has certain reasonable expectations of any text on ASLEnglish interpretation, particularly one meant for use as an introductory textbook. One of these is that the work will be free of cultural inaccuracy and above all cultural bias. But HA make far too many unsubstantiated, sweeping, and often inaccurate generalizations about cultural norms, values, and expectations. This is especially troubling when they add mistaken examples presumably to lend credibility to their generalizations. On pages 276277 , when discussing "Frozen texts," HA offer this illustration: Practically no one at the ball park really listens to or says the pledge to the flag with impassioned meaning. Ifsomeone said (with meaning) "Ipledge allegiance to the flag ... " In ball parks in the United States, at least, the Pledge of Allegiance is not said, but instead The Star Spangled Banner is sung or played while the spectators stand. A minor detail? Perhaps, but it serves as a small indication of the overall quality of the book. Here and elsewhere in the text, various points that HA try to make become muddled because of the imprecision of their examples . There is also a troubling matter of subtle cultural bias appearing in several places in the text. Consider the chart on page 103 (Figure 4-4) "Comparison of Deaf and Hearing Values (C)." In this chart HA adopt a decidedly non-objective tone in comparing the sets of proposed values; e.g. they state that Deaf people use electronic mail and TTYs for communicating, and that hearing people use "... Fax, phone and gadgets" (emphasis mine) to communicate. But the term "gadget" is quite relative; I dare say that for the majority of the non-deaf population TTYs, flashing alarms, and decoders would be considered "gadgets." Elsewhere in the same chart HA also state that before communicating, Deaf people "... really need to know who a...