Among the focus of language policies addressing sign languages have been efforts to achieve official recognition for various national sign languages, coupled with the recognition of the language rights of d/Deaf people. The recognition of sign languages has most often taken place as a result of lobbying efforts by national Deaf communities,…

This article discusses the rationale for using language diaries as a method to evaluate language use and language choice in multilingual contexts, as well as the benefits and limitations of this approach vis-à-vis other research methods. This is illustrated using examples from two contexts: Flemish Sign Language/Dutch bilinguals in Flanders and…

Learning a visual language gives hearing mothers the possibility of participating in their deaf children's culture. Yet, mothers also grapple with the demands of an unmarked global hearing culture, especially as their children's deafness becomes mediated by technology and medical intervention, under the guise of progress, social mobility, equity,…

This book challenges the reader to consider issues of language and linguistic discrimination as they impact world language education. Using the nexus of race, language, and education as a lens through which one can better understand the role of the world language education classroom as both a setting of oppression and as a potential setting for…

Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) children need to master at least one language (spoken or signed) to reach their full potential. Providing access to a natural sign language supports this goal. Despite evidence that natural sign languages are beneficial to DHH children, many researchers and practitioners advise families to focus exclusively on spoken…

Deaf-Latinx K-12 students are the largest group of racially minoritized students in the US, lagging far behind the complimentary proportion of Deaf-whites in obtaining degrees. Educational institutions have sustained and reproduced privilege and inequality patterns. This article explores how using Deaf-Latinx Critical Theory (Deaf-LatCrit) in…

The monolingualism of New Zealand has often been remarked on, but statutory and demographic changes in recent years suggest a shift away from the dominance of the English language. New Zealand now has two official languages, the indigenous Maori language and New Zealand Sign Language, and census data report a decreasing proportion of monolingual…

A sign bilingual approach to the education of deaf children was first introduced in the UK in 1990. This paper reviews the growth of sign bilingual education in the UK and documents significant milestones in the development of sign bilingual policy and practice since the 1980s. This overview demonstrates how key issues in sign bilingual education…

Despite the society's growing understanding of sign languages, particularly American Sign Language (ASL), there is still a profound limitation on the availability of literary, linguistic, historical, and other reference materials related to them because of the lack of a commonly accepted writing system. This article transcribed and analyzed a set…