Deaf Residential Schools in the US...

[Valerie Sutton]

SignWriting List
January 12, 2007

On Jan 12, 2007, at 11:09 AM, K.J. Boal wrote:

>> It's all about RESPECT.  Children should see from day one that their
>> teachers respect sign language as a language, and showing respect  
>> for the
>> written form is about that.
>
> Which will be a more convincing argument once SW is more generally  
> recognized as a valid writing system . . .  sorry, but right now  
> there are too many "experts" and, honestly, too many Deaf who  
> either don't know about SW or are against it.  I don't think I  
> could argue yet that SW is "the written form" of sign language  
> until it has been accepted and used by more of the Deaf community.


Kelly Jo!
I know you are playing devil's advocate...so let me play angel's  
advocate and give you my point of view on writing and what it means...

Why put the ignorance of others as more important than the thousands  
of people who are writing sign language daily and reading in it right  
now?...To discount their accomplishments and say they are not writing  
or reading the language, which is the implication, is just as unfair,  
as ignoring other people's complaints about it. Both sides deserve  
equal respect!

I learned the other day that 70 per cent of Pakistan's population  
cannot read and write, but there is still a written form for the  
Pakistani spoken language...so numbers of users is not the issue...if  
one person can write a newspaper in a writing system, then there is a  
written form for that language...even if only 30 per cent of the  
population can read it...or 2 per cent or whatever...but if you  
interview a person in Pakistan who cannot read and write, I bet he or  
she would not be able to tell you what he or she is missing...because  
they would never have imagined it as a part of their own lives to  
begin with...

The majority of the population in England in Shakespeare's day, were  
illiterate and did not even understand what reading and writing was,  
but none the less,  when Shakespeare wrote a play, he was using the  
written form for English... What was he writing with? chicken  
scratches? smile...there were a small percentage of people in his day  
that could read and write and that was all that mattered, to make it  
a written form for the language...but believe me...in Shakespeare's  
time many many people were against reading and writing...the majority  
in fact...that was for rich people...and there were arguments against  
creating schools because everyday people did not need to learn to  
read and write...that was their argument against reading and writing...

Meanwhile Shakespeare wrote his plays, no matter what, in a written  
form for English...while this debate was going on...

James in Nicaragua has written some 40 books for his students  
(yes...a very long list) in Nicaraguan Sign Language in  
SignWriting...Did he not write it in a written form for the language?  
if not...then what was he writing in?

Just because other Nicaraguans may not know right now that there is a  
way to write, does not mean the written form does not exist...and  
there is no other writing system that can write literature in sign  
language other than SignWriting...the Stokoe system has never  
published a story with punctuation...only SignWriting has punctuation  
for sentences...so there isn't another one for writing literature in  
the world that I personally know of...

Just my beef...to place the fact that people are afraid of  
change...to put their opinion first, when they have never have been  
properly introduced to the writing system at all... and ignoring the  
vast amount of work already accomplished...is not a balanced picture...

Others do this all the time and I have to vent - ha!

There are many definitions of what "the written form" means...for me  
it means that for the first time we have the chance and the choice to  
be able to read and write Sign Language Literature if we choose to,  
and people who are against that just need to have a little more  
contact with it and they will agree and be pleased...

So yes...there is a written form for any signed language in the  
world, and I use it everyday...and more people will in time...

My two cents!

Val ;-)