Last Updated on Monday, 18 June 2012 21:18 Written by Betsy Brown Monday, 18 June 2012 15:12
Guam News - Guam News
Guam - In the past if a person who can't hear or speak wanted to communicate with someone over the telephone they would use the TTY, a phone system that voices typed text through an operator.“Really the TTY is very old technology,” Yona Resident Chris Pangelinan told PNC through an interpreter. “Personally it was very hard to express yourself because sign language is a very visual language so all of the intonation is visual so with that it is very difficult to express tone and feeling and just emotion through limited just short text.”
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Pangelinan says a new technology from ZVRS pairs video and an interpreter together to allow him to communicate in a more personal way with anyone, whether they understand sign language our not. Pangelinan uses the “Z” technology to talk with his high school friend Yenter Tu, who lives in Texas and is also deaf. Tu is a sales associate for ZVRS and is currently on Guam to introduce the technology to the community.
According to Tu, Z technology breaks the barriers of communication between those who can hear and those who can't
“Right ya so its great because I can use a video phone and write a little message to my hearing friend or something write 'Sorry I can't make it home right now 2you know a hearing person can do that all the time,” Tu said through his interpreter. “Well we can use the video phone and we use this technology we can type it in and we can sign to the phone and sign it to an interpreter and they'll they'll forward the call.”
Z technology comes on four different devices that can all be synced to the same number.
“Its great if you wanna call 911 or anything it basically gives us access to the hearing world, it equalizes the playing field” said Tu.
Pangelinan, who is also the President of the Guam Association of the Deaf says a presentation on Z Technology will be given on July 7th from 10am-4pm in the University of Guam auditorium.
“I just wanted to recommend that whoever is a government person whoever owns a business whoever works with deaf people, whoever owns a business, whoever is an educator of deaf folks, please come,” Pangelinan said. “Please come to this meeting because it is important for you to understand what is the technology available for access.”
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