2. The signs should be expansive—made from the shoulder, not from the elbow or wrist, just as a good walker swings from the hip, not merely from the knee or the ankle. Try a comparison of signs made from the elbow and those made from the shoulder, and you will quickly appreciate the beauty and force of the latter.
3. The idea found in a word or phrase should be translated, but not the literal meaning word for word. For instance, the sign for "meaning" or "intention" should be quite different from the sign for the "meaning" of a word. A "thin" person and a "thin" dress are not the same. There are three different signs for the little word "but," according as it is used as a conjunction, a preposition, or an adverb. "I am sick" and "I am sick of him" are not signed alike. The sign for being "satisfied" at the table, in the sense of having had sufficient to eat, is frequently misused for the proper sign of being "satisfied" with a person or his behavior.
4. Every sign should be clear-cut. Do not be careless. If a gesture should be upward, do not make it straight out in front of you, or downward. Do not abbreviate. And, above all, I would say to you College students, do not use slang signs just because they are amusing. Slang signs may corrupt good signs, just as spoken slang corrupts good English. As College graduates and students you will be looked up to as leaders in your own communities and you will frequently be called upon to express your ideas. If you cannot make yourself understood, if the only signs you know are slang, invented by a very small group of students and absolutely unintelligible to the deaf as a whole, of what real use is your College course? The members of the faculty at Gallaudet are sometimes said to be a group of good sign-makers. At any rate, they have had the advantage of studying under such men as Dr. Gallaudet, Dr. Fay, Dr. Peet, and others. With such examples and such teachers before you, you have a wonderful opportunity to learn the sign-language correctly. When you do not realize the importance of this, but carelessly go on making your own slangy signs, or making the wrong signs, you are giving the opponents of the language another chance to criticize it. A great step in advance was made at the last play given by the Jollity Club—not a single slang sign was used. It is only when the sign-language becomes what it was intended to be—dignified, expressive, and beautiful—that its opponents will be silenced. How soon that time will arrive depends on each one of us as individuals.
I plead with you all, not for more signs, or for signs instead of speech, but for better signs, in addition to better speech!
