The Technology I am goin to talk about is called DeepASL. This technology is used to break the language barriers put in place for hearing and hard of hearing individuals. It is a small device, chapstick sized actually, that tracks the movements of a person’s hands while they sign to translate into English. As of right now, there is no need for anything other than the device itself, though the developers hope to make it include other Sign Languages at which point it would need connected to a phone like Siri or Alexa.
DeepASL was developed by a group of students at Michigan State University: Mi Zhang, Biyi Fang, and Jillian Co. They wanted to help break the barriers between hearing and hard of hearing people, but knew there was already technology to put English into American Sign Language (ASL), they wanted something for the other parties as well. There are many problems this helped solve, the users will no longer have to guarantee an interpreter will be present when they go to meetings, people of the Deaf community will now have more job opportunities, and I think think the biggest would be that their privacy is no longer compromised by having an interpreter present for their doctor appointments or other health related things. They will be able to have the same communication as we do and not have to worry about people not understanding them.
I think the only potential drawback is that there isn’t currently a way for English to be put into ASL with the same device, you have to have multiple devices for multiway interpretation still. I do believe the widespread use of this device could honestly help change how people in the Deaf community live. They wouldn’t have to constantly worry about needing an interpreter or that they can’t get a certain job because of the lack of communication possible. Also, this device is already available for $78. That cost is nothing compared to the cost of having an interpreter at the ready for every doctors office or store or for the person to pay for themselves for events. That one time cost is less than two hours of having an interpreter present.
I would like to add that, though I think this technology is amazing, it is honestly kind of sad the lengths we will go to not have to learn something for other people. I genuinely believe it would be so much more beneficial if we just made ASL mandatory in schools like we do with Spanish. The only reason someone who is deaf needs an interpreter is because we refuse to learn Sign Language.
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