[Noisebridge-discuss] ASL group?

[Sai Emrys]

On Sun, Jul 12, 2009 at 10:42 AM, Mikolaj Habryn<dichro at rcpt.to> wrote:
> Would love to learn - neither know any deaf people nor plan on any
> picking any up in the immediate future, but I see endless practical
> applications nonetheless. Is it feasible to just work from one of the
> books you mentioned if starting from scratch?

IMO, it's feasible iff you have a sufficiently fluent informer.
Unfortunately, ASL vocab is relatively poorly conveyed in any medium
I've seen; even in video, many people will be unclear on what aspects
of a sign are crucial and what are idiosyncratic, until they know the
overall patterns. So without one, you'll mislearn vocab - and it's not
a language you can realistically practice through text. It'll be
easier of course if you have learnt a second language or two before.

FWIW I use it relatively frequently IRL despite hardly ever seeing my
one deaf (not D) friend. OTOH, I have a neurological problem that
causes me to occasionally lose the ability to speak (but not sign), so
I have a bit more motivation than most people.

The materials I used were:
* Signing Naturally - relatively normal 2nd language course, a bit
handholdy and low on explicit grammar for my (linguist) taste
* American Sign Language Green Books, A Teacher's Resource Text on
Grammar and Culture - very good; explicit explanations of grammar, but
assumes knowledge of some vocabulary and other basics
* The Signs of Language 1 & 2 - accessible research, mostly for
linguistically geeky people like me; very interesting though

I make no claim that Signing Naturally is especially good, as I've not
experienced other series of the same intent; it was simply adequate.
The only competitor I'm aware of, though, is the Green Books series.

I may still have some of those lying around, though I think I sold
'em. They're pretty easy to get at any used book store near local
ASL-teaching colleges though.

- Sai