Finally free from the interpreter’s gaze? Uncovering the hidden labor of gaze work for deaf consumers of interpreter services
Temas
Detalles
In this paper we explore how the pandemic-induced shift to remote video-mediated interpreting has uncovered the hidden labor of gaze work that deaf consumers have been obliged to engage in. We specifically focus on one group of deaf consumers of interpreter services: deaf academics. We consider the invisibility of gaze work prior to the proliferation of remote video-mediated interpreting and discuss where the back channeling expectation is coming from. While gaze work forms part of wider calculated consumer labor historically, this is something that deaf consumers seem now more resistant to engage in. In part this can be attributed to sensory overload and the need to manage multimodal resources. But it is also about exercising choices.We highlight the need for sign language interpreters to be educated in more specific ways with respect to gaze behaviors.It is evident that deaf consumers want interpreters to provide solutions to ensure that interpreter-mediated access is something that provides access, without the problematic addition of consumer labor