The purpose of this document is to outline and explain the specific requirements that the LISTEN system will fulfill, as well as the constraints under which the system is operated. Readers of this document should have a general knowledge of computers and computer architecture.

1.2 Scope

The Americans with Disabilities Act was a landmark piece of legislation requiring government and private business to make appropriate facilities and services available to all Americans with disabilities. Its scope is vast, requiring that obstacles in the path of participation for all Americans be removed. While compliance from a physical standpoint for disabilities of a mobility nature is easy to gauge, compliance is much less simple for those with hearing disabilities. Sign language interpreter is not a common choice in profession, and given the small number of deaf Americans when compared to the populace in general, it’s no surprise that there’s often no interpreter available.

Arguments have been put forth that literate deaf citizens can make use of printed and written materials, without suffering any ill affects, or disadvantage when compared to their hearing able counterparts. While this is indeed true in the case of forms and other written materials, it fails to take into account situations where an interpreter would be most useful, such as public meetings, lectures, and civil gatherings. Lack of an interpreter in these cases can lead to deaf citizens being excluded from public participation in events that affect their lives.

Also often ignored is the psychological effect that the lack of an interpreter, can have on an individual. Forced to rely on written communication or an interpreter, a deaf individual is forced into a situation where personal autonomy must be sacrificed as a cost of entrance into society. This is both inconvenient, and more importantly unjust.

LISTEN will not be a panacea for deaf-hearing communications. The limited scope of the project necessarily means that the communication is one way. But as a piece of software utilized to allow a deaf individual the opportunity to provide himself with the ability to provide his own interpretation, LISTEN will provide both personal utility, and personal empowerment to deaf individuals.

1.3 Definitions

GUI: Graphical User Interface.

LISTEN: Language Interpreter and Sign Translator for Educational Needs.

ASL: American Sign Language. This version of Sign Language does not have the same grammatical structure as the conversational English used by the non-deaf community.

Signed English: Signed English is a version of Sign Language that shares the same grammatical structure as the conversational English used by the non-deaf community.

Fingerspelling: The act of translating a word using the sign language alphabet.

Interpreter: A member of the non-deaf community whose occupation is to translate spoken word into either Signed English or ASL for a member of the deaf community.

1.4 Overview

This document outlines the LISTEN project with respect to functionality and context. It details the system entities, data flow, and human interfaces of the project. Interface demonstrations have been created, though are subject to change through the full development process.

1.5 Roles and Responsibilities

Jennifer Crowell - Project Lead, System Designer. Currently employed as a developer for Lockheed Martin, Jennifer brings to this project both her extensive experience as developer and her personal connection to the deaf community.

Abraham Evangelista - Video Producer, Documentation Lead. Having lived and worked with language disparate groups, Abraham is all too familiar with the difficulties that language barriers present. His work in television industry will provide video production expertise to this project.

Sugnesh Patel - Integration Specialist, Tester. As a speaker of several languages, Sugnesh is aware of the difficulties involved in multilingual communication. Along with his experience with the .net development platform, Sugnesh also brings to this project his extensive experience as a tester and system integrator.

Susan Philip - Lead Tester, Quality Assurance. Susan was responsible for developing the prototype and testing the projects during her co-op with Blue Cross. She also holds a bachelor‘s degree in Computer Application from Marian College in India and was part of the senior project team. She brings to the project her interest in application development, and a keen eye for vigorous testing.

Kulvir Singh - Interface specialist. Kulvir worked in the Software Integration and Testing group at Comcast his last co-op as a GUI Tester and MFC application bug fixer. His responsibilities include the implementation of the GUI interface for the LISTEN system and creating the help files.