Megan, a woman incarcerated at the Ohio Reformatory for Women, is pictured at right leading fellow ASL interpreters performing during the second annual Sunflower Arts and Music Festival. Megan has been signing since she was 15 and began leading ASL choirs at ORW in 2007. Through her involvement with the Harmony Project’s Prison Arts program, she teaches other women ASL interpretations of a variety of songs performed both in singing and signing.
(Journal-Tribune photo by Kayleen Petrovia)
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The Sunflower Arts and Music Festival at the Ohio Reformatory for Women is marked by the sounds heard throughout the day.
Feet stomping on plastic bleachers.
Tissue paper sunflowers crumpling as they’re waved in the air.
Men’s and women’s voices belting out choruses together.
Applause erupting after spoken word performances.
But Megan, a woman incarcerated at the Ohio Reformatory for Women, knows that’s not the experience for everyone.
“There are deaf women who are in prison too,” she said. “Who speaks for them?”
For nearly 30 years, Megan has been passionate about connecting with those in the hard of hearing and deaf community.
She began learning American Sign Language (ASL) when she was 15 after a friend at church lost his hearing. Along with his family, Megan learned ASL so he would have another person his age to sign with at church.
Now 44 years old, Megan is still actively using ASL to make connections and build relationships.
“I never could’ve imagined when I was 15 how this would affect my life,” she said.
While she is not deaf or hard of hearing, Megan is a crucial part of the community at ORW in her role as an ASL interpreter.
She also teaches other interested women how to sign and has taught ASL choirs at the prison since 2007.
Through ORW’s connection with the Harmony Project, Megan said she has the opportunity to participate in a nonprofit that shares her commitment to “connecting minority groups and lifting them up.”
The group’s work was highlighted at ORW during the second annual Harmony Project Sunflower Arts and Music Festival, celebrating the work of the Sunflower Children’s Hospice in Bloemfontein, South Africa.
The Harmony Project aims to bridge communities and empower people through the arts, education and volunteerism.
The Columbus-based nonprofit’s Prison Arts program allows incarcerated people to express themselves through music and share their experiences together.
For the second time, women at ORW were joined by men in the Harmony Project from Pickaway Correctional Institution and Madison Correctional Institution to share their musical talents.
Through participation in the program, incarcerated women also get to build virtual connections with the children hospitalized in South Africa, often staying apart from their mothers.
For Megan, the beauty of the program is in its ability to help people transcend boundaries, whether that’s where they live or the language they use to communicate with each other.
“It’s taught me that if we bring our voices together, we can make a difference,” she said.
In her second season with the Harmony Project and after decades of interpreting, Megan is keenly aware of the power of words.
“It’s an honor,” Megan said. “An honor to be someone’s connection to a sense they don’t have.”
In teaching ASL interpretation of songs, Megan is mindful to communicate that it is not just which signs that are used, but how they are used, that matters.
If a portion of a song is sang louder, she shows fellow interpreters that the signs need to be made bigger.
She reminds them that facial expressions are important to show the mood of the words being performed.
Megan also notes that ASL performers should bounce to the beat of the music to convey the full experience.
While teaching, she shares her thought process and demonstrates a specific signing of songs but Megan understands that it isn’t set in stone – signing is open to interpretation.
She said she was happily surprised to see another ASL interpreter guiding the men in their performances.
When songs included the word “joy,” Megan said she noticed that she would use a different sign than her fellow interpreter.
“That’s why it’s called interpreting, not translating,” she said. “A word can mean a different thing to me than it can to you.”
Megan said she hopes to continue to open lines of communication and new understanding through the rest of her time at ORW and once she returns home, where she plans to seek a career as an ASL interpreter.
In the meantime, she is eager to tell those she teaches that it isn’t just an activity at ORW – “this can be a profession.”
More importantly, though, she hopes to share the feeling she first felt at 15, signing with her friend at church, and now as an adult, interpreting at a music festival at ORW.
“That was exhilarating!” Megan said, grinning as she searched for a word to match her experience signing.
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Incarcerated men and women who participate in the Harmony Project’s Prison Arts program recently performed during the second annual Sunflower Arts and Music Festival. The festival is named for the group’s connection with the Sunflower Children’s Hospice in Bloemfontein, South Africa. Children there get to see videos of the musical performances and, in return, sent a video in which they told those at ORW, “We love and we wish we could be with you.”
(Journal-Tribune photo by Kayleen Petrovia)