Self-deprecating humor fail

Yesterday, at a conference, I was talking with a colleague who is rather important in her field. A woman who was also clearly an important person, and also clearly deaf, came up to speak to my colleague, suggesting that their two organizations might work together.

Her interpreter was signing everything we said. I recognized him, because he had, for the previous hour, been up in front of the room signing for a plenary session of the conference. I told her that I thought he had done a marvelous job during that session.

The woman informed me, proudly, that her interpreter is able to sign fluently in seven different languages.

“Wow,” I replied enthusiastically, “that’s remarkable!” adding, in my best self-deprecating manner, that I, on the other hand, am still working on my English.

She then asked me, very politely, what my first language was.

“Oh,” I stammered weakly, realizing only too late that something had been lost in translation, “my first language is English.”

One thought on “Self-deprecating humor fail”

  1. It’s interesting to think about how tonal cues like sarcasm can be translated into gesture. When translating between two spoken languages, the translator can pick up the sarcasm and modulate the voice accordingly in the other language. Actually, I wonder how sarcasm is expressed in sign language to begin with…

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