The second strategy in this research emerged as a response to the limitations of the first strategy, shifting the focus away from technological solutions toward exploring models of bilingual stage storytelling. This approach involved attempts to create a shared stage language for mixed Deaf and hearing audiences, investigating the relationship between sign languages and spoken languages in dramaturgy, rhythm, and pacing, as well as their interaction with other elements of stage storytelling – music, space, light, video projection, and silence.
In creative practices, particularly within the contexts of the performances NOT WHAT WE AGREED and SLABODKÄ–S VYŠNELÄ–, it became evident that the search for bilingual storytelling often operates through a dynamic of leading and following roles, creating power tensions and limiting truly equitable collaboration. In some cases, spoken language functioned as an accompanying element to sign language; in others, it assumed the leading role.
Practice revealed that such language blending inevitably alters the rhythm, tempo, and dramaturgical structure of the performance.
The second strategy thus helped clarify that, while bilingual stage storytelling can increase accessibility, it often gets caught in the logic of power hierarchies and becomes a transitional phase – one that leads to the broader question: is it possible to create collaboratively in a way where theatrical narrative is shaped not through the combination of languages, but through nonverbal, physical, and intersemiotic performative logic?