Encyclopedia in American Sign Language

Fri Mar 9 22:52:23 UTC 2007

I have sent in a reply to the Wikipedia. ;)

Adam

On 3/9/07, Valerie Sutton <signwriting at mac.com> wrote:
>
> On Mar 9, 2007, at 2:00 PM, Pharos wrote:
> > I just wanted to clear this up.  Wikipedia already has an article on
> > SignWriting, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SignWriting
> >
> > What is being proposed is an entirely new Wikipedia, covering all the
> > topics any encyclopedia would, in American Sign Language, just as
> > there are Wikipedias in French ( http://fr.wikipedia.org/ ) and
> > Spanish ( http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/ ).
> >
> > Please comment on the proposal page and sign up there if you are
> > interested in participating.  It will only be created if a certain
> > number of people written sign language-users express interest.
> > Thanks.
>
>
> ---------------
>
> Hello Pharos -
>
> Are you asking us to write the Wikipedia in written American Sign
> Language in SignWriting? We can do that, and I would vote for that...
>
> Signing up for it would mean that someone who knows American Sign
> Language can write the articles in written SignWriting...and there
> are skilled people who can do that ...
>
> We have new software too, SignPuddle 1.5, that can produce written
> Sign Language Literature documents, and perhaps we can assist in
> creating the web pages needed...Is that what you are talking about?
> It is a huge job to translate a whole Wikipedia into any language,
> but it can be done ... we could start with a small portion of it and
> go from there...
>
> We have a little funding for producing written Sign Language
> literature right now, and we could apply that towards writing some
> articles for an encyclopedia and use that as a springboard for doing
> more work in the future...Does Wikipedia have funding to help us with
> the translation process? Or perhaps we could write a grant together?
>
> It would certainly be a very important historic event, to have an
> entire encyclopedia written in the movements of American Sign Language!
>
> I assume that Wikipedia can be written in Chinese and other
> languages? So you are handling other written scripts other than the
> Roman alphabet? You mention Spanish and French below, but those
> languages use the same Roman alphabet used to write English, but our
> written ASL uses SignWriting symbols, as you know.
>
> SignPuddle software can write email in SignWriting and literature in
> SignWriting...so we could work with your programmers to make sure
> that our ASL encyclopedia would be something you can post with no
> trouble...We are working towards the day when people can add their
> own Sign Language literature on the web, so we could apply that to
> Wikipedia someday...so that others can post their own SignWriting
> corrections and comments just as they do right now with the Roman
> alphabet in other languages...
>
> So I say YES to the proposal if Wikipedia is interested...
>
> I just went up on your web site on this link:
>
> >> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/
> >> Wikipedia_American_Sign_Language_2
>
> I can see that SignWriting was discussed there...
>
> I clicked on EDIT, but it looks like a huge job to do the editing and
> I am on a deadline right now to finish our software by next week...so
> I would be grateful if someone else could propose to use SignWriting
> to write an American Sign Language Wikipedia?...it could bring
> SignWriting users funding for doing the translation and writing work...
>
> Perhaps in April I can add to the Wikipedia voting page above...
>
> no matter what, please know we are interested...
>
> And i hope someone on the SignWriting List can help too...go to the
> above web page and click on the word EDIT in the corner to make your
> statement that we could write Wikipedia in American Sign Language
> using SignWriting...
>
> Many thanks!
>
> Val ;-)
>
>
> ---------
>
>
>
> >
> > On 3/9/07, Valerie Sutton <signwriting at mac.com> wrote:
> >> SignWriting List
> >> March 9, 2007
> >>
> >> Can anyone write an article about SignWriting for Wikipedia's new
> >> section on American Sign Language?...Here is a message I just
> >> received:
> >>
> >> --------
> >>
> >> From: pharosofalexandria at gmail.com
> >>         Subject:        Encyclopedia in American Sign Language
> >>         Date:   March 9, 2007 1:28:29 PM PST
> >>         To:       Sutton at SignWriting.org
> >>
> >> You may be familiar with Wikipedia, the free volunteer-written
> >> encyclopedia, which exists in many languages.  The English Wikipedia
> >> is at http://en.wikipedia.org/
> >>
> >> There is currently a proposal for a Wikipedia in American Sign
> >> Language, and I thought that the members of the SignWriting community
> >> should be aware of this.
> >>
> >> The proposal is here:
> >> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/
> >> Wikipedia_American_Sign_Language_2
> >>
> >> It would be great if you could share this information on SignWriting
> >> forums and mailing lists, and please comment at the proposal page
> >> (just click "edit").
> >>
> >> I am not a sign language user myself, but I thought I could help in
> >> informing you of this proposal.  Feel free to ask me if you have any
> >> general questions relating to what Wikipedia is or how it works.
> >>
> >> Thank you
> >>
> >>
> >>
>
>
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