Will The Metropolitan Opera Allow the Deaf to Sing?

[UPDATE: September 12, 2023; our ASL Opera Project website is now live! Join us there for new videos, translation updates, and for consultation concerning the right interpretation of Opera in American Sign Language!]

[UPDATE: July 11, 2023.  Janna and I met with the Metropolitan Opera to discuss heightened ASL interpreting for their performances. The meeting was positive, forward-thinking, and hopeful! We will soon update with more information! Here’s the July 11 update!]

My delightful wife Janna Sweenie and I are big lovers of opera. Opera is the pinnacle of all the Performing Arts — Painting, Acting, Voice, Costumes, Lights and Sets — and when put together, in unison, in an exaggerated and elevated performance, the entire world glows and resonates! We have always been dismayed that opera is not often, if ever, interpreted in American Sign Language for the Deaf like all Broadway shows are interpreted. Janna and I are currently working on our “Opera Project” where she will present ASL renderings of famous opera arias. We will place those performances online as proof-of-concept. This is a challenging, but rewarding, and complex academic process of interpretation and adaptation, and implementation.

Here’s my Boles.tv live stream discussion of the Deaf singing at The Met:

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The Shape of Water: Guillermo del Toro and the Failure to Consecrate

Guillermo del Toro’s new movie — The Shape of Water — is a high-minded movie that looks great, sounds good, but ultimately fails to consecrate the point of the story: Communication Creates Love.

There are all sorts of movie tropes packed into the The Shape of Water — but the center of the swirling is a “mute” janitor, played by Sally Hawkins, who falls in love with a sea monster because they are able to communicate using American Sign Language; and that major flaw in discovery, reason, and accessibility, will serve as the remainder of my argument why The Shape of Water, in the end, fails as a facilitation for a grander, romantic, connection of human/serpent longing.

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For Deaf People Only: Our Latest David Boles Books Book!

After writing four books together in in 2014 alone, Janna and I are now pleased to announce our latest, and first, book published in the year 2015For Deaf People Only! — a brand-new David Boles Books Writing & Publishing book!

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Return of the Deaf-Mute: Our Next Deaf Culture Conversation

Did you know there’s a troubling, but rich, history using the term “Deaf-Mute” in America?  Janna and I have written a new book “conversation” about that pejorative label released by David Boles Books Writing & Publishing titled — Return of the Deaf-Mute: The Lost Legacy of the Greatest American Deaf Generation — and in our book, we examine the “Deaf-Mute” stereotype in history, its effect on common culture, and the role of human tolerance in society today. How did the “Deaf-Mute” label become such a colloquial monstrosity that it has repressed generations of Deaf people in America — just because it was a convenient, default, categorization that had nothing to do with context or fact of condition?

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Our Latest Book! Day One: Learning American Sign Language in 24 Hours

Our second American Sign Language book published in three weeks — Day One: Learning American Sign Language in 24 Hours written by Janna Sweenie and David Boles — is now available for purchase online as an eBook. You may read the book online, on your smartphone, tablet, computer or Kindle! You also get 150 free HD ASL videos for use with the book!  We invite you to join us in our ongoing effort to help propagate American Sign Language as a proper foreign language!

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Facebook Censors Boles Books Cover Advertising

Three days ago, after publishing our latest Boles Book — American Sign Language Level 5: A Field Guide for Advanced Communication Techniques for People with Other Disabilities — I unwittingly ran afoul of Facebook’s advertising rules.  I had “too much text” in my book cover image and so Facebook censored my $40.00USD boosted post promotion of my book midstream, effectively blocking my book cover image on their social network because my design aesthetic didn’t meet their advertising rules.

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Buy Our Book! American Sign Language Level 5: A Field Guide for Advanced Communication Techniques for People with Other Disabilities

Janna and I are pleased to announce our latest book is now available for purchase from Amazon — American Sign Language Level 5: A Field Guide for Advanced Communication Techniques for People with Other Disabilities written by David Boles, M.F.A. and Janna Sweenie, M.A. — yes, it’s an eyeful of a title, but that sort of specificity is necessary for this sort sort of real life ASL field guide.

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Continue reading → Buy Our Book! American Sign Language Level 5: A Field Guide for Advanced Communication Techniques for People with Other Disabilities