Daily Lobo: What are you majoring in?
Andriea Pirlot: I'm majoring in sign language, or I plan to, but I want to go to dental school.
DL: How does that work?
AP: I get my degree in sign-language interpreting, but I get all the prerequisites that you need for dental school, so I can still apply.
DL: Why sign language?
AP: I personally think it's like the coolest language ever. It's, like, my life goal to learn to fluently sign, and I think it would be really awesome to communicate with deaf people, like even when I'm a dentist if I could communicate with deaf patients.
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DL: What made you want to be fluent in sign language?
AP: My cousin is a sign-language interpreter and he works in Texas, so I think because I want to learn at least one second language and I can't learn Spanish or anything else. I want to do sign language because it's cool.
DL: Does sign language change your view of communication?
AP: It's really interesting, because I'm only in an intro class, but on Friday we met deaf visitors . and I actually got to communicate with deaf people, and I was really nervous at first, but when I was talking with them, they were all really cool. It was neat to have a conversation with them without, like, opening your mouth.
DL: What kind of perspective does that give you?
AP: It makes me see that sign language isn't just English with your hands. It's a completely different language, like Navajo or German . and thankfully UNM accepts it as a foreign-language credit.
DL: How hard would it be to go deaf?
AP: I think it would be totally hard. I can't imagine being deaf now, after I've heard so many things. Some people don't get to hear music and that sort of stuff. I mean, I think it's hard either way, but I think it's harder for you if at one point you could've heard but you can't anymore.
~ Pat Lohmann
