162 - ASL: What music really looks like - Amber Galloway

You will not believe we got to talk to this beautiful, talented and amazing sign language interpreter of concerts and music. Amber Galloway Gallego is a world-renowned sign language Interpreter specializing in music. She has over 20 years of interpreting experience in hundreds of concerts, she proudly has a Master’s Degree in ASL/English Interpreting and holds several interpreting certifications. Responding to a desire from the deaf community to see, experience and connect emotionally to music in the same way hearing people do, Amber developed an immersive style that brings music to life in a way not often seen in music interpreting. Deaf people that truly love and adore music often request her because they know she will bring it. Amber has been featured in RollingStone, Oprah, The New York Times, Vibe and Out magazines. Vibe Magazine referred to her as the most recognized sign language interpreter, and “The Jay Z of Hip-Hop Sign Language”. On television and online, Amber has been featured in Totally Biased with W B Kamal, Jimmy Kimmel Live, TEDMED, TED X, and most recently, on the Steve Harvey show. She has also worked with a handful of musicians creating music videos in sign language on their platforms making music more accessible for their fans. She is known for her activism just as much as she is for interpreting work. Amber, who also is hard of hearing, uses her status and platform to fight for access and equality in the deaf community. When she's not interpreting, Amber is an adjunct Professor of ASL studies at Lamar University in Texas. Amber says that the deaf community taught her everything she knows and pulled her into this profession. She’s been around deaf people since she was five years old, but she acquired more fluency in college, when she really became heavily involved in the deaf community. At that time, she used to hold Friday night parties in her house with her friends, and they enjoyed signing songs to each other. And that’s when the epiphany moment happened. She had been taught that deaf people didn't like music, but hanging out with them she realized that all her deaf friends were enjoying music very much, so she felt the need to call out this false idea. Her friends were the first to push her to follow this career path, expressing that they wished interpreters looked like her and would do what she did. And she couldn’t help but wonder, why not? Amber reflects on the fact that sometimes (always, to tell the truth…) those that are able‑bodied will set up this idea of what a person that is not able‑bodied is supposed to be like, so they are the ones that actually create the barriers. So, that’s why she began to figure out how to give them what they wanted, and then the deaf community requested more and more access to concerts and to music, and then it became a huge part of her career, her passion and her love. She states that every decision she makes is based on what the deaf community wants and needs, not projecting on them limitations that are not informed by them, which is what the deaf community experiences every day, the barriers that people are creating in their name. Amber’s work is amazing, but what is really incredible about her story is that, after working as a sign language interpreter on a college campus, she got spinal meningitis. This disease almost took her life and brought about some neurological problems for her that resulted in her losing a great part of her hearing capacity. Yeah, I told you, pretty nuts. So, now she is hard of hearing and heavily depends on inner ears as well as hearing aids during the day. She’s not only working for the deaf community, but she also became part of it herself.