Eleanor Rigby, ASL

I recalled an old song, ancient, actually:

All the little people, where ^do they all come from?"

All the little people, where ^do they all belong?"

Of course that's wrong. It's lonely people not little people.

That would have been helpful for an intro to the next Ptahhotep maxim about friends. I'll use it anyway. Let it be wrong. No one cares.

This video is blessedly short. Shorter than my critique of it. She's very good showing the song. So what is it about her handwriting that's bugging me?  Why am I so fussy? I hate myself sometimes.

Her "people" sign goes straight down as the "personification" sign does, as a double karate chop indicating the torso, but her style for "people" does properly use two "P" hand shapes. Her style turns "people" into a "person."

Handspeak: [people asl] Signing Saavy [people asl]

"People is two "P" hand shapes bouncing around. You can go simply boink boink with two "P" shapes, for 4 people, or you can rotate them around like peddling a bicycle, to show a crowd, but when you go straight down slowly outlining the torso of a single body then you turn people into a singe person.

Two open flat hands as two karate chops going straight downward means "er" in English added to a word to change it to a person doing the thing that preceded the sign, such as "paint" + "er" or "teach" + "er".  It's used a lot. It's a very useful sign. An enclitic particle, to we grammarian types. <--- improper grammar.

Europeans do the same thing more eloquently with one hand, thumb and index finger moved straight downward, outlining a human torso. I like their way better than ours.

"Eleanor Rigby" is shown as a big fat "E, R" instead of it being spelled rapidly as a Selectric typewriter. God, those things were cool. I loved those typewriters. They gave me the idea of holding my wrist in the air firmly in place as the typewriter's ball, rigidly as the typewriter does, and spelling words rapidly as that like b-r-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-p so fast and so clearly it makes your head spin and with no doubt what was just spelled because each letter is perfectly formed so that it reads like something typed, Jeff taught me that, and done just like that interchangeable ball typewriter.

Jeff was a mind-blowing speller. Best of all the deaf. Clear as a bell. Perfect hand forms. No slurring. And his actual handwriting is also textbook perfection. He's a veritable schoolbook calligrapher.

But she doesn't do that. She supposes you already know the name. "E,R" for "Eleanor Rigby" is  like the K-Mart thin textile version of jeans compared with Detroit Denim quality of jeans.

Similarly, "Father McKenzie" is shown as the old sign for "preacher" the one that refers to the white collar. And she adds a reversed "M" sign going back the opposite direction from the neck band to substitute for "McKenzie." So you must know the name "Father McKenzie" in the lyrics to know what she's doing. She does not say "Father" + spell "McKenzie" for her there is not enough time. She cannot spell clearly fast enough. So she gives us the Play-Doh version instead. This is why I'm so bugged all the time.

"Preach" is an Obama tautologic sign, the Chef Boyardee "fine" sign, an "F" hand configuration tapped twice in the air as if delicately annoyingly pontificating. For "Preacher" then, the "er" personification sign is added. Here she uses this sign for "sermon" that nobody hears.

So then, "Father McKenzie writing a sermon that nobody hears" is shown (old school) "preacher" white collar, backward M from chest right to chest left, a wholly idiosyncratic signal substituting for McKenzie, writing a "preach" that nobody hears. It's goofy AF and and that's why I'm bugging a little bit as I watch it.

"No one is safe" where "Safe" is conflated with "Save." The signal given means "save" as in save up to buy a bicycle, or save something for the future. Tapping coins into a purse, similar to the sign for "potato" that indicates the eyes of a potato. "Safe" as in unharmed is near to the sign for "Liberate."
Signing Saavy [safe, not harmed].

See how English synonyms and homonyms can goof you up in other languages? The concept of save something for the future is not the same thing as safe from harm, and both of those English words have various meanings that are shown differently as signs. Save a rescue animal is a different idea from a safety box with a combination lock. She shows us literally, "no one saves (up)". She's thinking in English words and not thinking in concepts, not thinking about people being safe and how to show that concept. This is why I'm so fussy. In hieroglyphs they'd be completley different signs.

She shows us "join" for "belong." "Join" as the links of a chain, the linkage coming together from opposite sides, the joining of them being the thing, while "belong" is that same linkage shoved forward hard as an established linkage, really belonging, unbroken when shaken; it's a not so subtle difference using the same hand configurations. For her there is no difference between them, so there is no difference in conceptualizations and if I didn't already know the lyrics then I wouldn't know if she's saying "Where do they all join?" or "Where do they all belong?" Good Lord, I'm fussy.

Good background. Well chosen. Very nice. Plain with no distractions.

Bad neck scarf, too distracting for the essential area of signs.  We translator types avoid all distracting clothing and jewelry.

Technically, very bad text over content, the English lyrics are covering the lower portion of signs. Poor camera setup that doesn't show the waist and causes the conflict of text added over the lower signs.

Thick, slow signing. Like piping text on a cake with a big fat fitting laying down thick layer of cursive writing with all the loops closed, or a giant bread pretzel that's closed to a huge lump of hard bread. "Past" for example. Used in the phrase "where a wedding has been"; a backward flick over the shoulder. We learn it as pushing something behind us over our shoulder. She flicks her "Past" downward like tossing a tissue over her shoulder or shooing a fly from her shoulder.  You'll notice the CODA signers in the video for "Somebody That I Used to Know" video does the same sign like an open hand brushing past the side of her face backward, flicked twice, a beautiful way of showing "something back there." Not fully formed, not shoving something back, just chopping something back there. The two styles show the difference between someone who uses the language everyday and speaks as if talking to someone they know, contrasted by someone just now learning the language from a class or a book, using textbook style and not getting it exactly right. Her flicking down back there "Past" for English "has been" bugs me while Azora's brush by the face "Past" delights me with her breezy expert insouciance.

She's beautiful when she smiles.

And tie back your g.d. interfering hair.