James.Womack@f14.n300.z1.fidonet.org (James Womack) (04/17/91)
Index Number: 14998
[This is from the Silent Talk Conference]
In recent years, ASL has been used in schools and colleges to
teach ASL as a foreign language. I still have one question. Spanish
is accepted as a foreign language and its literature is studied. ASL
is now accepted as a foreign language, but where is its literature?
Its literature is oral. We had to change the way people thought
about literature. They realized we were right. We have to be
careful when we talk about what literature means. Oral literature is
literature. If ASL h ad no literature then perhaps it wouldn't be
accepted as a foreign language. That really had an impact on me.
Also schools around the country are setting up deaf studies courses.
ASDB is doing that. That's an exciting idea to be establishing cour
ses in deaf studies. What is included in the deaf studies curriculum?
Suppose we are talking about a high school deaf studies class. ASL
literature can be a part of that course. ASL and the deaf experience
should be included in these courses for deaf children not just in the
courses for hearing students at the college level. Deaf children
should be learning about this too!
Ben Bahan, a deaf man who is the director of the Deaf Studies
Program at Boston University, and I have talked about this a lot. We
both have the same interest in traveling around the country giving ASL
storytelling performances. I give a fu ll two-hour performance which
includes eight or nine different stories in ASL. Some of the stories
are stories that I created myself. Others are old stories that deaf
people have told for generations. Others are translations from
English. I do t hree different kinds of stories. Most of my stories
are originals, stories that I made up myself. Ben and I do the same
thing traveling around the country telling our stories. What would
happen to those stories if something happened to me? My sto
ries would be gone. My work, my stories, would be gone with me.
Would peoople remember those stories, I would hope so. Do I have to
keep traveling and traveling around the country with my stories?
What's going to happen when I get old or have c hildren? Times and
circumstances change.
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