#deaf wizards

So, this idea came to me when my sister was wiggling her fingers to attract a kitten.

Why?

Well, the sign language for "spell" (like spelling a word, idk if it's the same for magic spells) is basically just wiggling your fingers.

So I thought, "Hmm... Wouldn't it be cool if wizards could cast spells with sign language?"

Imagine, you are about to duel some other wizard and they start waving their hands in the air and making weird motions. "Ha. What an idiot, you have to say an incantation to cast a spell, not whatever that is." You think. When suddenly, WOOOMPH. The other wizard cast some kind of wind spell idk and you are knocked to the ground. How could this be? Well, it's siGN LANGUAGE YA DUMB WIZARD, PAY ATTENTION.

I could not figure out how to make this rebloggable, so I'm cutting and pasting it here and adding a link back to the original:

Ms. Duane: First of all, I'd like to say that I love that you're on tumblr and so engaged with your fans. Thank you! My question is: have you ever thought about Deaf wizards? I assume some exist, and that there's a sign version of the Speech, but if they're profoundly deaf, do they understand the spoken version? Do others understand their signs? Have you ever thought about including physically disabled people in your stories? (This is a personal interest, so I'm curious!) Thanks! :)

Hey there! Briefly — yes, physically challenged wizards are a lot on my mind. Yes, there are deaf wizards. Yes, there are non-audible recensions of the Speech (on Earth and absolutely elsewhere, because there are lots of species who don’t work in audible sound): yes, there are human wizards who exclusively sign — there are some of them in the upcoming Games Wizards Play, in fact. In one chapter Nita notes this for the first time and thinks (a) “Wow, have I been sheltered, how has this not come up for consideration before?” and (b) Wow, he looks like he’s dancing, how cool is that?! — because the nonverbal recensions of the Speech really put a human through their paces, physically speaking. One great master of that aspect of the Art who we see in passing is a jazz dancer of tremendous skill, and watching him just gives Nita chills, thinking (in passing) of her mother.

I need to do a post about this later in more detail. But in brief: yeah. :)

it'd be like silent movie sass

which would make it so much funnier