The intersectional identities and lived experiences of Signing Latinx are insufficiently documented. Reflecting on my own lived experiences, I began to question traditional research paradigms that often neglected the stories shared by individuals from different communities within the larger Signing Latinx community. As I was introduced to Critical…

International Sign (IS) and American Sign Language (ASL) have both been used as lingua francas within international deaf contexts. Perspectives on the uses of IS and ASL as lingua francas in such contexts are connected to discourses pertaining to the form, function, status, value, languageness, and global reach of IS and ASL. While there are some…

All parents of deaf or hard of hearing children face challenges as they strive to provide an environment rich in language for their child. For parents on active duty in the military, however, perhaps this challenge is most acute. Faced with decisions about their child's medical or educational needs, military families must act despite geographic…

Young children do not develop language skills by studying grammar and rules for forming sentences. Children's brains are wired to acquire language naturally; all they need is exposure. Many opportunities for language learning are lost to deaf children if they are not surrounded by other signers. In fact, the loss can be so severe that deaf and…

Deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) children experience systematic barriers to equitable education due to intentional or unintentional ableist views that can lead to a general lack of awareness about the value of natural sign languages and insufficient resources supporting sign language development. Furthermore, an imbalance of information in favor of…

In October 2023, a new deaf student, "Zuri," showed up in my second grade classroom. This often happens. Parents move into and out of the district for work, and it is common to get a new student in the middle of the year without warning. Zuri's eyes were wide when she came into the classroom, and she looked scared. Who were all these…

Research interest in heritage speakers and their patterns of bilingual development has grown substantially over the last decade, prompting sign language researchers to consider how the concepts of heritage language and heritage speakers apply in the Deaf community. This overview builds on previous proposals that ASL [American Sign Language] and…

We have written this article as performative co-autoethnography in which we focus on a crisis of communication we experienced as deaf/nondeaf collaborators. We bring together Deleuze's concept of 'becoming-other' with Guattari's concept of 'a-signifying semiotics' to demonstrate how a focus on the affective dynamics of a-signification allows us to…

This paper attends to languaging in the context of visually oriented communities of sign language users through the concept of "chaining." I define chaining as the patterned, routine ways of interlinking different linguistic and multimodal elements. The goal of this paper is to discuss the concepts of chaining, languaging and…

In the 21st century, providing accessibility for all to all products and platforms including cultural and literary products is one of the most important fields of study embraced in translation and interpreting studies, media accessibility studies and others. With governments and international organs like the UN and EU working towards full…

As a response to the ban on singing and playing woodwind and brass instruments, and with the heightened exposure of Auslan interpreters in the media due to COVID reporting, many music teachers considered Auslan choirs to be a safe singing-replacement activity for end-of-year performances. Auslan holds deep cultural significance to the Deaf…

This article discusses some issues in Canadian sign language recognition in light of the federal government's recent introduction of an "Accessible Canada Act" and related deaf community activism. We identify gaps in knowledge surrounding sign language use, including communicative practices of deaf Indigenous peoples, and outline the…

This article gives a first overview of the sign language situation in Mali and its capital, Bamako, located in the West African Sahel. Mali is a highly multilingual country with a significant incidence of deafness, for which meningitis appears to be the main cause, coupled with limited access to adequate health care. In comparison to neighboring…

This article shares the story of Jose, a student that presents an extreme example of what can happen to deaf and hard of hearing children in our nation's schools when assessment data is either inaccurate or ignored and parental input is absent. Presenting a unique challenge to the educational system, each deaf or hard of hearing child is at the…

The focus of this article is the experiences of Deaf Philadelphians vis-à-vis language policy and practice at PSD. We delineate the official and unofficial communication philosophies and pedagogies from the school's inception to present day, providing a framework for understanding the trajectory of linguistic freedom and restriction of its…