She worked many televised sessions and because Mayor Bloomberg has limited charisma, I understand, she quickly became the focus of all New Yorkers' attention. Her signing style is pure ASL, with a little "New York" body language, but her expressions are appropriate throughout. Not overdone, and correctly inflected. She signs very clearly for all levels of comprehension and language skills. Unfortunately, closed captioning doesn't help deaf people who are not fluent in English, as many New Yorkers are not.
Lydia Callis is charismatic, but no more so than many of the best sign language interpreters; rather it is the context (of hurricane preparation, serious information) and the poor speaking skills of Bloomberg that made her expressive style stand out so much, like how a diamond shines best when shown on dark velvet.
I also wonder if her build and size made people of a certain age recall Linda Bove on Sesame Street from the 70's through the early 90's.. Many commenters on the Youtube videos said viewers were memserized because they hadn't seen sign language before. But that's not true if they grew up watching Sesame street; perhaps they even saw this Sesame Street segment talking about how they, too, can have fun with sign language.
In any case, Lydia Callis's signing was remixed into gibberish and set to music. How weird it is to see emergency preparations and continuing information fragmented then remixed. ASL is a language, not a dance. The song is "The Sign" by Ace of Base (read lyrics here.) I read the lyrics and realized just how funny this remix is, and how it is indeed meant as homage. And to be fair, hearing speakers have been remixed like this, too.
Now let's talk about the parodies. Saturday Night Live (SNL) had a parody using an actor who did seem to be copying Linda Callis best as she could. She was at the signing level of a beginning ASL student; with bad or no inflection, choppiness. However, it was actually somewhat understandable, and indeed, with New Yorker attitude, and I did laugh at the made-up "sign" for Obama. Once I could get even bad beta captioning on, I could laugh at the made up sign for "Firemen", "policemen" and "EMTS." (Although one sentence looked a bit like "electrocute me for being openminded to some New Yorkers" while Bloomberg was saying power was back for most New Yorkers. Whoa! But this was just sloppy signing-- I saw her sign "finish" again and it was too high up, so I think she meant ELECTRICITY FINISH.)
In contrast, the mock Christie's "New Jersey Interpreter" didn't know any sign except "happy" and one or two other signs, and resorted to slang (loser), which in captioning I see refers to the Atlantic City Mayor Lorenzo Lightfoot, who refused to evacuate his town, and let's be honest, she seemed generally to be a slovenly barfly called up to sign for the governor without any credentials; obviously as untrained and unprofessional as you could get, even chewing gum.
The "mock interpreter" was largely relying on "New Jersey" big hair and attitude to give a visual contrast between NYC and NJ style. But really, Christie didn't use a sign interpreter at all onscreen. So sadly, even this stereotypical New Jersey Barfly interpreter parody was actually more interpreting than happened in real life, as this Youtube clip makes clearer.
And yes, Big Hair Lady could be exactly the sort of interpreter Chris Christie would hire. I hope not (interpreters have to be certified) but who knows? Interpreters should be used more in emergency TV broadcasts, in large metropolitan areas, since it provides accessibility to emergency broadcasts on public TVs even if the captioning is not turned on.
As a deaf person, my primary concern in seeing interpreters on-screen is not about the potential humor, it's about accessibility. Mayor Bloomberg did a good job there, but Christie didn't even plan for that.
So... I give SNL a C- on their parody. If they had a better signer parodying Lydia, it would have been a B, maybe even an A. I did like the "Spanish" message.
As for what is fair and not fair parodying of ASL, well,it's simple. Parodying sign language with gibberish to be funny is not cool, but mean. Try that on any signer, and you well may get the New York Salute in return.
If you still wonder what I mean by offensive gibberish, I suggest a brief look at the voice interpreting of this video: "The Interpreter Fiasco." In it, Doll discusses how insulting certain parodies can be (Mark and Cheslea Lately's parodies are highly offensive, while SNL is rated decent.)
Incidentally, any interpreters reading this who are curious as to how to be a better interpreter for the deaf (if not as famous as Lydia Callis), I would suggest you do exactly the dead opposite of what the CODA brothers do in their heavily sacrastic video: "What Deaf People Love About Interpreters."
Incidentally, if you can't face-read sacrasm in ASL, practice with this video. Watch it over and over until signed sarcasm seeps into your dreams and make you wake up in a cold sweat, screaming. You will never do sacrasm the dull, hearing way again, ever.
Thanks for reading. It's been a bewildering week watching sign language suddenly become a pop culture trend worthy of comment on late night shows and SNL. I think in hard times, people do want a laugh anyway they can get it.