From the article:
The four great vows signedHow has being deaf shaped your experience of receiving and transmitting the dharma? I have to say first that it was an obstacle. Zen is very intimate—the transmission of the dharma hinges on discipleship. We gain access to our teacher’s mind through one-on-one transmission and exposure. I have had to rely on other forms of communication, and that affects the psychological dynamics of the teacher-disciple relationship. And being the only deaf person in the zendo has often been a very “othering” feeling. About a year and a half ago, I started the No Barriers Zen Temple in Washington, D.C., with the intention to work more intelligently with communities of differently abled people. It’s not a deaf-only space, but many members of the D.C. Deaf community join us, and we organize our services to accommodate them. What I’m aiming for with the center is a paradigm shift: when people from the general D.C. community come, I have to tell them that I need to get them a sign language interpreter. And they say, “Oh, no, no, I can hear.” And I say, “Right, but you can’t sign, so we’re going to need to get you a sign language interpreter.” They don’t get it! It takes a while for them to make the shift of “Oh, I need an interpreter because I’m functioning in a different space.” I’m not immune to those kinds of assumptions as a deaf person, by the way. I have a blind student who was talking to me once about all the accommodations that sighted people need. I said, “I don’t need accommodations. I’m not blind.” And they said, “Oh? What’s with all these lightbulbs? Lightbulbs are a sighted person’s accommodations.”
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Zen is a tradition that experiments with language. How does the use of ASL change a Zen expression of the dharma? That’s a really fun question. My teacher has encouraged me to interpret chants and teachings into ASL, which is a challenge because ASL is such a different language in the way that it functions and holds meaning. My first translation was the four bodhisattva vows, and I would sign it when the rest of the zendo was chanting. Certain members of our community were really supportive and wanted to learn it too, so a few of us would sign it together in the morning. And then it caught on like wildfire. Now on a Sunday you see the whole zendo signing the four bodhisattva vows while we chant. People at the zendo often tell me that the vows feel different to them when they sign. They’re becoming aware of the body consciousness of signing, the impact signing is having on them. The sign for “save” is a good example: [crosses closed fists over chest, uncrosses them slowly to open]. Signing this is such a liberating, opening feeling. Or here’s another example from the Verse of the Kesa: “Vast is the robe of liberation.” When you sign “vast,” your body must physically become vast. [Opens arms wide.] When you sign “robe,” you metaphorically don a robe. ASL functions as a technology, much like the early mudras do.
