Language is "Cool"

I recently read an article that popped up on my Facebook feed because a friend liked it. It was about not calling Sign Language "cool," and though I do get the point of it, I really think we should call it cool. I think its awesome. All language is cool.

ASL and all the others out there, are awesome and cool the same way any language is. Partially because it helps communication between people who otherwise would not be able to communicate well, but because language is cool. I might not be able to understand something like Arabic, but when I am told how they change what a word means by extending something out or like Thai, adds marks around the letter to get a whole different sound, or how the only "dead*" language to ever come back and become a major language again is Hebrew, I am amazed by how amazing humanity really is.

"ASL (and all sign languages—remember, there isn’t just one!) is a language every bit as much as English, with its own rules of grammar, its own syntax, morphology, phonology, and semantics. It is not “cool” or “interesting” or “awesome," but rather a practical and evolving way of communicating that deserves as much respect as any spoken language."

Here is a link to the full Article.

I agree with the above quote, They do deserve respect, but showing the world parts of your language that is more than just communication, but also art and passion is one of the most amazing parts of language. The people that can learn another language, especially one that is very different from their native tongue, I think are amazing. Language and its etymology are a fun pastime for me. I love to know where they came from. Sometime I want to sit down and have someone show me some of the signs and tell me how did this come around, what is the root of this sign.

The author does make a few great points and is probably the reason they wrote it. When someone who can hear, goes on to TV shows and signs for a group of hearing people as entertainment, can diminish the effects of the "coolness" of what they are doing. It does become about the interpreter instead about the greatness of the language. It becomes the art and honor of the hearing.

The video of a woman signing to an Eminem song, is great and cool. If a deaf person can get the feeling from the video of what he meant in his song, then that video has done more good than most people will ever do for anyone with a hearing impairment. I could be wrong on this, but isn't it the same as a poet standing up before an audience, sure he's up there to make a name for himself, but he is using the language he knows as art. If we are to only use Sign Language as a tool, it defeats the power that it has. Language is as much art as a painting is, if we use it that way.

I do not know ASL or any other language other than my poor English, but language in all its form, written, spoken, or signed, is a beautiful and wonderful thing. I agree with the author that the interpreters should be in the background, "fade away" as she called it so that the deaf can be center of the art and coolness of their language. But if it takes a hearing person to show the world the art and beauty of the signing like an English speaker to show me how cool another language is, so that someday the whole world will look on and whisper about the beautiful art they see when someone is signing a poem or something, then more power to the people who can sign. You are all amazing people.




*I understand that Hebrew never really died. But the people that spoke actual Hebrew was very small, and usually only a few of the religious leaders.