American Sign Language In The Deaf Community

American Sign Language is a visual language that is used by the Deaf community in the United States and English speaking parts of Canada. Though a broad and complex language, ASL enables signers to convey abstract ideas by utilizing facial expressions, hand movements, and body positioning to convey meaning. The space in front of the signer’s body is very important because that space helps convey distance, contrast between people, places, things, or ideas, and it helps express concepts of time. While every facet of expression is vital to take notice of, valuable information about the grammar of the message is conveyed in the facial expressions. Just as there are various forms of verbal semantics, ASL has various forms of sign used for different purposes. For instance, fingerspelling can be used to specify brand names or represent names of people or places which has no sign equivalents. It can be used to bring clarity to a message as well. The same is understood when attempting to get a Deaf person’s attention, a simple tap on his/her shoulder would imply the same as a verbal call. There are certain responses in the Deaf culture that are inappropriate in the hearing …show more content…
Within this community, its members are interdependent and rely heavily on one another’s support. This facilitates not only a social commitment to their group but it causes long lasting relationships within the Deaf community to thrive. The Deaf culture is one that has made great strides since the beginning. Even when confronted with the threat of sign communication diminishing, the emergence of American Sign Language enables the Deaf community to communicate with the rest of the world, in so, bridging the gap in communication amongst the hearing and the