LA VIE DEAFIE

ANGEL
Who died?

BENNY
Manualism

ANGEL, ROGER, COLLINS
Sign language

BENNy
You make fun yet I'm the one
Attempting to do some good
Or do you really want a language
That even monkeys are taught
To use?
Deafie, Deafie
A fallacy in your head
This is oralism
Deafie is dead.

MARK
Dearly beloved we gather here to say our
Goodbyes

COLLINS & ROGER
Dies irae, dies illa, kyrie eleison
Yitgadal v'yitkadash (sign in foreign sign languages)

MARK
Here it dies, no one knew its worth
The late great language of mother earth
By these rights when we
Celebrate the birth
In that little school for the deaf in Paris
We raise our glass – you bet your ass to
La vie deafie

ALL
La vie deafie
La vie deafie
La vie deafie
La vie deafie

MARK
To signs of inspiration
Fingers playing, making
gestures that mean something
The need to express
To communicate
To going against the grain
Signing insane, signing wild,
To communication, to acception,
To Open and closed captions,
To starving for attention
Hating convention, hating pretension
Not to mention, of course
Hating AGB and Milan (Alexander Graham Bell)
To practicing your speech
Everyday to please them
To signs – To protest-
To EMG – to choice (Edward Miner Gallaudet)
To the N-A-D (National Association of the Deaf)
To the Baby Sign fad
To being an us for onceinstead of a
Them!!

ALL
La vie deafie, la vie deafie

Mr GREY
Ahhemm

MAUREEN
Hey mister, we're capital D Deaf

WAITER
So that's five Deaf signers, four hard of hearing
Three deaf studies majors, two CODAs that can sign
And one deaf without sign skills

ROGER
How?

COLLINS
I understand

MIMI
If you speak and sign

WAITER
and thirteen signers in all
is that it here?

ALL
A – S – L! (American Sign Language)

MIMI & ANGEL
To hand-crafted signs
Made in by the third world deaf
To TC, to speech, to ASL and Cued Speech (TC - Total Communication)

To black shirts, to Line 21 , to I love you

To Jack Gannon and Deaf Heritage

MAUREEN & COLLINS
Expression, inflection, to causing a
Commotion,
Ambition, equation,

MARK
Deaf President Now

MAUREEN & COLLINS
Advocation, A-D-A, to lawsuits when it's due

COLLINS
To Veditz

ANGEL
To Eastman

4 GIRLS
To Signing Time too

COLLINS & ROGER
Marlee, Bernard, Linda and Deanne

COLLINS
Dummy Hoy

ROGER
Shoshannah

MAUREEN
To Deaf Way!

DEAF PEOPLE
To Clerc, to Cogswell. Thomas Gallaudet too

MARK & MIMI
Why Gally students went to the (Gally - Gallaudet University)
capitol
To blow off E Zinser

ALL
La vie Deafie

Mr GREY
Deaf?

MAUREEN & JOANNE
Deaf and Proud

ANGEL & COLLINS
CODAs!

MARK, ANGEL & MIMI
Deafies, Hearies, interpreters
Hearing aids, cochlear implants
F M Systems
TTY, text, sidekicks and pagers
Flashing doorbells bright red
Children of a Lesser God

ALL
To Sorenson, to Hamilton, to sprint
CSD
Video relay, ASL students, ABC
To no shame – never playing the Name
Game

COLLINS
To name signs

ALL
To translation, its between Terp and me (Terp - shorthand for interpreter)
To PSE (Pidgin Signed English)

BENNY
Waiterwaiterwaiterwaiter

ALL
LA Vie Deafie

COLLINS
In honor of the death of Manualism an
Impromptu salon
Will commence immediately following
Dinner
Maureen Johnson, just
Back from her spectacular one-night
Engagement at the eleventh street lot
Will perform in French Sign language

Backwards with the opposite hands while
Trying to fingerspell "cat" and "dog" at
The same time
Which she ain't ever studied.

ROGER
And Mark Cohen will preview his new
Documentary about the cochlear
Implant controversy within the deaf
community

MARK
And Mimi Marquez, clad in a cochlear implant
Will perform her famous listening test
To the sounds of computer beeps warbling
And Roger will attempt to interpret
A totally confusing English song
That doesn't remind us of ASL 1 students


COLLINS
Angel Dumott Schunard will model the
Latest hearing aids
From Canada while accompanying herself
On the 10 plastic pickle tub

ANGEL
And Collins will recount his exploits as
Anarchist-
Including the tale of the successful
Reprogramming of the R.I.T. (Rochester Inst. of Tech)
Virtual reality equipment to self-destruct
As it broadcasts the words

ALL
Actual Reality – Act up – Fight Audism!

MIMI
Excuse me – did I do something wrong?
I get invited – then ignored all night long

ROGER
I've been trying – I'm not lying
No one's perfect. I'm not hearing

MIMI
Life's too short babe, time is flying
I'm looking for CIs that goes with mine (Cochlear Implants)


ROGER
I should tell you

MIMI
I'm not hearing too

ROGER
I should tell you

ROGER & MIMI
CIs

ALL
A – S – L!

MIMI
Battery break

ROGER
You?

MIMI
Me. You?

ROGER
Mimi