The Everyday ASL: A Working Philosophy

Everyday ASL, short for American Sign Language, has had a lasting effect on the consciousness of humanity. Everyday ASL has a profound ability to ground the experience of being Deaf.

Everyday ASL can be by its very nature not satisfactorily described on paper ... and in ASL itself. It is the art of union with human language. The user of ASL is a person who has attained that lanuage union, or who aims and believes in such attainment.

The question that then follows: "What is language?" The answer becomes a bit of a circular experience, because to compare and contrast language, we need to distinguish between sound-oriented/linear and sight-oriented/spheric languages.

It can seem impossible to provide words (linear) for that which is expressed in signs (spheric). Both students of ASL and Deaf people reading and writing experience this linear-language-versus-spheric-language contrast. Everyday!

Defining ASL is like defining an orange, from peel to seed. As a professor, my interest in everyday ASL grew and I have had some very profound experience. When I brought my Deaf guest, for example, to talk with my students, everyday ASL became the experience of reality.

Everyday ASL does not come when we are seeking it. It comes unaware and unannounced. Everyday ASL is not about using ASL but embracing the languiage and culture of the Deaf. At best everyday ASL informs us of something wonderful about being Deaf.