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From:  "Angus B. Grieve-Smith"
Date:  Fri Aug 20, 1999  2:58 pm
Subject:  Re: Acronyms (one last time :-)


On Fri, 20 Aug 1999, Valerie Sutton wrote:

> Plus, Michael also devised a way to refer to dialects and several
> signed languages within one country. See his web page:

This is a good start, but it still privileges one signed language
as the "unmarked" language of a country. Take Canada for example. I
don't know everything about the situation there, so Canadian signers
please correct me if I'm getting this wrong, but "Canadian Sign Language"
is mutually intelligible with ASL, and is usually called "ASL," but the
"CSL" name is a political one. However, ASL is only used by a portion of
the country's signers; a large number of them use LSQ. Why was ASL chosen
to receive the name "Canadian Sign Language," when LSQ is the one that is
truly indigenous to Canada? What about the two other signed languages
listed as spoken in Canada, Eskimo Sign Language and Nova Scotian Sign
Language?

My point is that people setting standards have no business
furthering the dominance of one language group over another by setting one
up as the "default" for that country. I would suggest that wherever there
is a country with more than one signed language, or a SL with more than
one dialect, that ALL signed varieties be expressed with a suffix, so
"Canadian Sign Language" would be "sgn-CA-eng" to show that it is usually
spoken by people connected with the English Canadian cultures.

--
Angus B. Grieve-Smith
Linguistics Department
The University of New Mexico



  Replies Author Date
1708 Re: Acronyms (one last time :-) Michael Everson Fri  8/20/1999
1711 Acronyms - A suggestion barbara o'dea Fri  8/20/1999
1717 Re: Acronyms - A suggestion Angus B. Grieve-Smith Sun  8/22/1999
1709 Re: Acronyms (one last time :-) Valerie Sutton Fri  8/20/1999

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