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What recreational facilities should La Jolla be providing for its
youngsters, particularly middle schoolers?
They have plenty already.
Make the Rec Center kid-friendly.
Unlock school playgrounds.
Year-round junior lifeguards.

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 Transfer Riford Center to La Jolla Foundation
</opinion/254188-transfer-riford-center-to-la-jolla-foundation>
Feb 25, 2009
 
 Letters to the Editor: Feb. 26, 2009
</opinion/254186-letters-to-the-editor-feb.-26-2009>
Feb 25, 2009
 
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</opinion/254185-trustees-view-san-diego-school-district-facing-tough-decisions>
Feb 25, 2009
 
 Community view: Early education funding a plus for youngsters
</opinion/254183-community-view-early-education-funding-a-plus-for-youngsters>
Feb 25, 2009
 
 Is a uniform parking time a good idea?
</opinion/254067-is-a-uniform-parking-time-a-good-idea>
Feb 21, 2009
 

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7 votes


LJ woman develops writing tool for sign language users
Feb 18, 2009
 By Spreeha Debchaudhury
- La Jolla Light

				
		</content/img/f253903/signwriting2-5.jpg>		
		Valerie Sutton talks about SignWriting at her La Jolla home.
/Photo by Spreeha Debchaudhury/		
				

For those gifted with the ability to hear, it is hard to imagine a deaf
person's world, in which everyone is eternally lip-synching. There is
motion and vibration, but no sound.

Some once had the ability to hear but lost it due to illness or old age,
and others are born deaf. These "native signers" use sign language at
home as their first language.

However, without a codified language, the transition to English can be
very difficult, as they have no standard for comparison.

Enter SignWriting - brainchild of former ballet student Valerie Sutton
of La Jolla.
SignWriting involves actually writing down the motions used in any
particular sign language.

For the first time, deaf people have a written language of their own
that then can be fairly readily translated into English or vice versa,
she explained.
The concept started back in 1974, and it is now in its 35th year.

*Committed to project*
"I've made it my life's work," she said in an interview. "I do nothing
but [work on] SignWriting all day."

Ironically, SignWriting had its start in a very different area - ballet.
At age 15, when studying for professional ballet, Sutton created for her
own use a stick-figure writing system that she called DanceWriting. At
19, she moved to Copenhagen, Denmark, to study with professors at the
Royal Danish Ballet, where she taught it to many masters in the field.

Her work made its way into the newspapers, and attracted the attention
of Lars von der Leith and his team of sign language researchers at the
University of Copenhagen, who asked her to write some of the signs from
videotapes they had of signers.

*Tools available*
Now, the SignWriting system has several software programs, an online
dictionary, and several works of famous literature translated into
SignWriting, a system with thousands of users across the world,
constantly continuing to improve under Ms. Sutton's capable guidance.

"Nobody ever thought it would happen," she said of her invention, "but
it did, because I believed in it."

She said she wants to be able to allow born-deaf people from around the
world to read and write their own sign language, as one would with
English and then have a standard for comparison when they enter the
school system.

*Studies abroad*
In a recent study, Dr. Mohammad Abushaira at Jordan University found
that students that learned SignWriting did twice as well in tests, etc.
at school than those that didn't, according to Sutton's Web site,
_www.signwriting.org_ <http://www.signwriting.org>.

She said she also intends to have more works of literature translated
into SignWriting, so that deaf people can have them to read in their own
language.

She says the beauty of the system is that it writes motion, so the signs
can be mixed and matched to fit all sign languages, much like the
letters of the Roman alphabet can fit most languages.

"Most people never thought sign language could be ? written ? but [when
people] see a Wikipedia article in SignWriting, it really sinks in that
SignWriting has become a true written language," Abushaira said.

*Lessons in SignWriting*



------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Spreeha Debchaudhury*
Spreeha Debchaudhury will be a senior at La Jolla High School this year.
She was selected by the Junior Statesman Foundation to attend the
Democratic Convention and will be posting reports from Denver on our Web
site.


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Mar 2, 2009
 
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Feb 27, 2009
 
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Feb 26, 2009
 

		
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Feb 27, 2009
 
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</entertainment/254172-reel-review-stereotypical-international-fails-to-impress>
Feb 25, 2009
 
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</entertainment/253868-reel-review-push-hangs-on-murky-plot-outlandish-stunts>
Feb 18, 2009
 
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</entertainment/253864-exhibit-tips-hat-to-environment>
Feb 18, 2009
 
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</entertainment/253638-reel-review-hes-just-not-that-into-you-a-good-time-overall>
Feb 11, 2009
 
 Death Cab for Cutie on tour
</entertainment/253637-death-cab-for-cutie-on-tour>
Feb 11, 2009
 

	
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</video/>

2008 La Jolla Christmas Parade
</video/251531-2008-la-jolla-christmas-parade>
Dec 11, 2008
 
Skydiving with an Inflatable Shark
</video/250887-skydiving-with-an-inflatable-shark>
Nov 21, 2008
 
Congressmen-elect Jared Polis </video/250478-congressmen-elect-jared-polis>
Nov 10, 2008
 
Barack Obama's Acceptance Speech
</video/250324-barack-obamas-acceptance-speech>
Nov 5, 2008
 

		
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