Fri. Mar 29th, 2024
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Kris Statlander uses sign language before and after matches in AEW, and she recently shared her thoughts on the matter. Statlander spoke with Jaychelle Nicole for a new interview and talked about how she started to use ASL on the independents and why she chose to do so. You can check out some highlights below, per Wrestling Inc:

On using sign language for her catchphrase: “I just wanted to do something different. I don’t actually know anyone that’s deaf. I don’t have a reason to know ASL. I know once I started doing it, some people were raising questions like ‘Do I have a reason to use it in my life?’ And I don’t. I just thought it was something useful to learn. It’s kind of an underappreciated language, so I figured ‘Why not? Try something different.’ It seems to be getting a really good reaction, which I’m very happy about. I’m not fluent in sign language, but I can do a basic sentence, like ‘Do you want water? Are you hungry? My name is Kris.’ I can do all that stuff.”

On using ASL before she was in AEW: “I originally got the idea to do sign language because on the indies, sometimes if I was the bad guy, I would do an F and a U. So I’d say an ‘FU’ during my entrance, and no one knew what it meant, but I did and it was funny to me. So sometimes I would do that, and that’s kind of where I got the idea to find a way to incorporate sign language a little bit more. It’s so different, especially if there’s a deaf person watching TV and see something like that, instead of having to read the subtitles all the time, so you can actually focus on the action for a moment. I think it’s a cool little way to reach out to that (underserved community). They’re just not communicated to, the deaf community, as often.”

Source: https://411mania.com/wrestling/kris-statlander-discusses-sign-language-aew-tv-learning-asl/