Yet another example of how vlogs serve the Deaf Community in a way that few, if any, communities are served–
NAD and the United States IRS have teamed up to create public service announcements in ASL, made available online regarding tax filing information.
Right now, there are only three vlogs available concerning the 2007 Economic Stimulus Check at http://blogs.nad.org/advocacy/esp/ However, NAD recently announced that four more will be created and made available at a later date.
If you view the first vlog, you will notice that it uses graphics to buttress the message much in the same way a print information sheet would (the part where the signer indicates downwards to an onscreen graphic of an IRS check).
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How is this unique to the Deaf Community? This is an entirely visual presentation made in ASL (audio voiceover and open-captioning notwithstanding). Other communities that have similar needs would be minority language speakers within the United States. The IRS website publishes information in a wide array of languages. Closer still would be illiterate minority language speakers. The IRS website can easily create podcasts/audio clips of a person speaking in the minority language. Only a Deaf person would need an entirely visual clip– a vlog.
Deaf people would have a choice of viewing English text, reading on-screen captions, and seeing the ASL interpretation of the information presented. A number of communication modalities are provided for Deaf members that come from different parts of the Deaf Community spectrum.
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It would be interesting to speculate regarding the development of these PSAs. Why was a woman chosen to present these? Was it because she was the best signer available out of the Washington DC pool of IRS employees? Was it because she’s a woman? To me, she projects a matronly image, which may be conducive to giving advice. As the person in these PSAs, she represents the face of the IRS to Deaf people who view these PSAs.
Another issue is how easily are these PSAs found? I was directed to one link from the NAD announcement, and had to follow another link on the first page to find another page with these PSAs. Spanish language links are available up front at the top of most of the IRS webpages I navigated through, but the ASL PSAs were further down the page once I found the correct page (”Flyers, public service announcements and other marketing products for IRS’s partners and others” to “Economic Stimulus Payment Basics (three 30 sec clips) American Sign Language with English transcript” which led me to the NAD blog webpage that I’ve already posted above).