Good call from U of M:
The University of Michigan-Flint is the latest school in the state to accept American Sign Language as a foreign language.
The Flint Journal reported Friday the decision follows years of effort by Jill Maxwell of [sic] for the designation. Maxwell graduated in December and substitute teaches at the Michigan School for the Deaf in Flint.
The 32-year-old DeWitt resident argued it was discriminatory not to accept ASL for second language requirements.
Yes, ASL is a foreign language to English speakers. It has its origins in spoken English, but it’s grown and changed since then, and (most importantly) it’s not mutually intelligible with English.
D.J. Trela, dean of UM-Flint’s College of Arts and Sciences, says faculty studied the issue for 14 months.
I hope they spent the 14 months hashing out the procedural details, and not just wondering if it was actually a different language. They could have asked a linguist.
9 February 2009 at 2:09 am
There are lots of like questions/situations that could easily be solved by just asking a linguist. Too bad they never think of that.