TerpTheatre’s production of Police Deaf Near Far (2012, in partnership with Oakland University) told the story of Stinger, a Deaf man killed during an interaction with a police officer. The production echoed the often tragic real-world encounters between law enforcement and members of the Deaf, hard of hearing, and DeafBlind communities. The publicity trailer video for Police Deaf Near Far featured footage from the 2010 shooting of John T. Williams, a Deaf Native American wood carver in Seattle, Washington (see trailer below).
National Public Radio has released a brief interview with Williams’ brother and friend. In it, Williams’ brother pleads for improved relationships between police officers and Deaf people.
“I’ve asked many times, bring me this policeman, let me share a day with you, what it would’ve been like to carve with John,” Rick says. “I want them to know him the way I did. He was one of the finest.”
The NPR site includes a transcript of the interview:
[pl_button type=”primary” link=”http://www.npr.org/2016/10/07/496867205/years-after-police-shooting-woodcarvers-brother-remembers-the-man-he-lost” target=”blank”]Read/Listen on NPR[/pl_button]
See the PDNF trailer on our PDNF Archive:
[pl_button type=”primary” link=”https://terptheatre.org/police-deaf-near-far/” target=”blank”]PDNF Archive Site[/pl_button]
Danny McDougall, PhD, CSC — “Dr. Danny” — owns and manages TerpTheatre. Since 1986, he has interpreted in hundreds of plays, musicals and other performances on stage – most in the shadowed style. He teaches and lectures on the theory and practice of theatre interpreting. Danny is the chair of Sign Language Studies at Madonna University, and holds a PhD in Translation and Interpretation from Heriot-Watt University – where his dissertation explored the relationship between space and meaning during interpreted theatre performances.