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The ACLU of Delaware filed a complaint arguing that too many Deaf children are being referred to Deaf schools. When the ACLU of Delaware filed a complaint against the Delaware Department of Education earlier this month, calling for the investigation into the Department's treatment of Deaf children, it raised some eyebrows. When they argued that the state was keeping Deaf students from the Least Restrictive Environment by sending them to the Deaf school, more eyebrows were raised. When they further argued that Listening and Spoken Language, a trademarked certification for oral-only education given out solely by AG Bell association, designated by some in the Deaf community as a hate group and who claim they can "make Deaf people hear", was the "gold standard" for Deaf education...well, you can imagine what happened next.... [more inside]
posted by Toddles on Dec 28, 2023 - 27 comments

Finding a visual way to represent an inner identity can be complicated. (WaPo Gift) For much of American Sign Language's history, those who have had the most power to disseminate signs have been straight, White, cisgender people. The rise of video-based social media is allowing ASL to spread more rapidly and is empowering the Deaf queer community to exert more influence over American Sign Language. [more inside]
posted by Toddles on Jun 29, 2023 - 1 comment

A pioneer in the study of the biological foundations of language who was among the first to demonstrate that sign language was just as complex, abstract and systematic as spoken language Dr. Bellugi and Dr. Klima, who died in 2008, demonstrated conclusively that the world’s signed languages — of which there are more than 100 — were actual languages in their own right, not just translations of spoken languages. Non-paywalled [more inside]
posted by Toddles on Apr 24, 2022 - 10 comments

Here's Why It's Actually A Nightmare. Hearing people would probably think I’m the lucky one ― the success story ― because I can talk. But I agree with my [Deaf] friends. [more inside]
posted by Toddles on Apr 11, 2022 - 14 comments

Why Name Signs Matter in ASL Shortly after the 2020 presidential election, five women joined forces with a mission: assigning Vice President-elect Kamala Harris a name sign, the equivalent of a person’s name in American Sign Language. Ms. Gooden, one of the five women who came together for Ms. Harris’s name, said that as the conversation around a possible name sign for the vice president started taking shape on social media, non-Black and non-Indian deaf individuals — mostly men — were leading the dialogue. For the women involved, it was key that Black and Indian deaf women were part of the process, given Ms. Harris’s background. (NYTimes article available from Internet Archive) [more inside]
posted by Toddles on Jul 16, 2021 - 14 comments

Language welcomes, but it also excludes. The fundamental injustice of the baby sign-language trend is that our culture touts the benefits of signing for hearing children, but disregards A.S.L. for the deaf children who need it the most. [more inside]
posted by Toddles on May 25, 2018 - 21 comments