korean standard sign language is not a sign...
TRANSCRIPT
Korean “Standard Sign Language”
Is Not a Sign Language*
Jong Sup Jun
Program in Linguistics & Cognitive Science, Brandeis University
jongsup@brandeis‘ edu
In 1991, the department of education of Korea published the φ'icial Korean Standard Sign Language (KSDSL; S-K Kim et al. 1991). The biggest problem of KSDSL is that it is not a sign language, but a manually coded spoken Korean. In this paper, I criticize both theoretical and practical problems of KSDSL. From a theoretical perspective, KSDSL is founded upon such linguistically untenable assumptions that a natural language cannot have grammar, that a natural language is a language in the ideal world, and that descrψtive evaluation of a natural language can be done by non-native language users. From a practical perspective, I point out that deaf children learning KSDSL instead of KSL may have problems in their cognitive development. On top of these problems is a more urgent humanitarian need; i.e. deaf people in Korea have a human right to learn and use their native language, namely Korean Sign Language (KSL), in all areas of life. My claim is that we must replace the current Signed Korean with KSL for the real Korean Standard Sign Language.
1. Introduction: The Publication of Korean Standard Sign Language
S-K Kim (1993, 1998, 1999) and S-K Kim et al. (1991) define sign
language as “a mode of communication in deaf communities; a system of
symbols created or adopted by deaf people; a non-verbal language; a
• I am gratefi비 to Ray Jackendoff, Joan Mating, Edgar Zurif, Steven Pinker, Judy Keg!, Shanley Allen, Dawn MacLaughlin, Chungmin Lee, James Yoon, Soowon Kim, Sook Whan Cho, and Sea-Eun Jhang for valuable comments and useful correspondences at various stages of this paper. Thanks to two ASL speakers Rich Knopf and Sandy Wood, and Daphne Craft, ASL interpreter, for useful discussion about language and language policies. All eπors are of course mine.
212 Soyoung Suh Kim
visuo-motor system, and not a speech system”20. According to Ken don 1992, 432), “sign languages are systems of gesture used to replace speech
as a mode of communication”. Definitions vaη from person to person. But most scholars agree that a sign language is not a system of primitive
symbols, but a full-fledged natural language like any spoken language (C. Lee 1996; D-S Hwang 1998; Jackendoff 1994; Pinker 1994).
Deaf communities in Korea have used a full-fledged sign language, which is distinct from the Korean language. Following Perlmutter (1992),
I will call this language Korean Sign Language (henceforth, KSL ). The dialectal variation of KSL and the lack of scientific study of it have made
communication between deaf and hearing people difficult. And the need
for communication called for some standardization of the sign language.21 In 1990, the department of education of the Korean government asked
S-K Kim, professor of special education at Dankook Univ., to write an
instruction manual of a standardized sign language. S-K Kim, with Y-WKim and D-S Hwang, made an advisory board of 29 people, and publishedHangul-style Standard Sign Language (S-K Kim et al. 1991, governmentpublication) and Korean Standard Sign Language (S-K Kim 1993). This isthe system called Korean Standard Sign Language (henceforth, KSDSL)
in Korea these days, which is also what I criticize in this paper.
The biggest problem of KSDSL is that it is not a sign language. As the title Hangul-style Standard Sign Language (S-K Kim et al. 1991) suggests, the Korean Standard Sign Language acknowledged by the Korean government is not a sign language as a natural language, but an artificial sign system where signs are combined by grammatical rules of Korean,
20 농인 사회에서 사용되는 의사 소통의 양식이며, 주로 농인들에 의해만들어졌거나 채택된 기호의 체계로서 일종의 비음성 언어[이며,] 음성 체 계 가 아니 라 시 각 운동 체 계 . In the text, all English translations are mine. The original Hangul text is given in Footnotes. The English translation is approximate, and is not meant to be word-by-word translation. 21 See the Preface to S-K Kim (1993) for detailed discussion of the need for standardization.
Effects of Causal Connections on Memory of Discourse 213
which is a foreign language to deaf people. Such artificial sign systems as
KSDSL are called Signed Korean, Signed English, etc. in western
societies. Kendon (1992) points out that two sub-types of a sign language
are a primary sign language and an alternate sign language, and that an
artificial sign system like Signed English is neither a primaη sign
language nor an alternate sign language. That is, sign languages should be
strictly distinguished from artificial sign systems. On the other hand, S-K
Kim mistranslates the term Signed Korean into Grammatical Korean Sign
Language and Rule-Governed Korean Sign Language, and hides the fact
that KSDSL is not a sign language. 22
The purpose of this paper is to show theoretical and practical problems
of KSDSL, and to make suggestions to solve these problems. In section 2,
I will discuss theoretical problems of KSDSL 잠om the perspective of
contemporaη linguistics. I point out that S-K Kim ’s (1993, 1998, 1999)
crucial claims are based upon such linguistically untenable assumptions
that a natural language cannot have grammar, that a natural language is a
language in the ideal world, and that descriptive evaluation of a natural
language can be done by non-native language users. In section 3, I will
discuss practical problems of KSDSL. In particular, I show that S-K Kim ’s
practical spirit that motivated KSDSL is not consistent with previous
findings in the sign language literature, and that KSDSL may have
negative effect upon deaf children ’s cognitive development and learning in
general. Section 4 is a comparison of the situation of Korea with that of
the United States, where sign language studies and the p이icy for the deaf
are getting public support. Section 5 is the conclusion, and my suggestion
to solve the problems of KSDSL.
2. Theoretical Problems of Korean Standard Sign Language
2.1. Sign Language and Manually Coded Spoken Language
22 문법성 한국 수화 and 규칙성 한국 수화,respectively.
214 Soyoung Suh Kim
According to Kendon (1992), a prim따y sign language is a system of
sign that has developed naturally in a deaf society. American Sign
Language (henceforth, ASL) and KSL are good examples of primary sign
languages. The other sub-type of sign language is an alternate sign
language, which is developed for sociological reasons in a hearing
community. Kendon cites the sign system used by South-Western
American Indians in the 16th century as an example of an alternate sign
language. His guess is that the sign language must have been a lingua
franc a 없nong many Indian tribes with different languages at that time.
Unlike a primary sign language and an alternate sign language, a manually
coded spoken language like Signed Korean (=KSDSL) is an artificial
communication system, where signs are combined by the grammar of a
spoken language.
KSL does not have grammatical particles and inflections. KSDSL,
which is Signed Korean, however, has a number of artificial signs
corresponding to various particles and inflectional endings in Korean.
Many other particles and inflectional endings that do not have signs are
expressed by fingerspelling. Fingerspelling is a system of signs, where
each sign corresponds to a vowel or a consonant of Hangul or the Korean
alphabet. This way, signers of KSDSL are supposed to sign as closely as
possible to the Korean language.
The data in (1) illustrate how to sign in KSDSL following S-K Kim
(1993, 1998, 1999). The right-hand side of each arrow shows how to sign
the underlined part from the left-‘.
(‘‘ ") indicate signs of KSDSL. Parentheses indicate the use of
fingerspelling. Gloss and translation are minimized to save space.
(1) a. S쁘:i nophi sosa issta → “san” + (i)
mountain-NOM ‘There is a high mountain'
b. sayka 쁘고팩 → “wulta” + (n) + “ta”
cry-Pres-Dec ‘A bird is crying’
Eff농cts of Causal Connections on Memory of Discourse 215
c. ooalka-n cangmi → “ppalgahta” + (n)
red-Rel/A이 ‘a red rose’
d. os-ul oes-un chav '"7 “OS”+(ul)+“pesta”+(un)+( chay)
clothes-ACC take.off-Rel state ‘while undressed'
e. yelshimhi kongpu-ha-ko il-ha-n salam →
hard study-do-Cong work-do-Rel man
‘a man who studied and labored hard' “ye Ishim”+(hi)+“kongpu”
+“hata”+(ko)+“il”
+“han’ ,
f. cokwuk-i socwung-ha-m-띠 icci mala '"7
mother.land-NOM importance-do-Nominal-ACC
‘Don ’t forget the importance of your mother land'“cokwuk” + (i) + “socwunghata” + (m) + (띠)
g. cipey kaci mal-a-la → “kata”
+ (ci) + “anihata” + (ala)
go don ’t ‘Don ’t go home ’
As is clear from (1), the grammar of KSDSL follows the complex
morpho-syntactic rules of Korean. In order to sign in KSDSL, signers
must analyze a corresponding Korean sentence morpho-syntactically. With
no doubt, this is extremely difficult to do in conversational situations.
The KSL grammar, however, is completely different from the KSDSL
grammar. There are no such things as grammatical particles and inflections.
The data in (2) illustrate how to sign simple sentences in KSL. Following
D-1 Suk (1989), signs are expressεd in square brackets ( < > ). To save
space, non-manual signal lines are omitted, and gloss and translation are
minimized. 23
(2) a. pelsse wasse? '"7 <ota> + <pelsse>
already come COME ALREADY
23 The data in (2) are excerpted from ‘Co Hyen-Wu Sensayng Lecture Note on Oct. 24,1999 ’ available from Chollian Sign Language Community (www.chollian.net).
216 Soyoung Suh Kim
‘Have you already come? ’
b. cikum myech sini? → <sikan> + <elma>
now what time TIME HOW.MUCH
‘What time is it now? ’
c. musun il hani? 7 <il> + <mues>
what work do WORK WHAT
‘What do you do? ’
d. elmaey sassni? → <ton> + <elma>
how.much buy MONEY HOW.MUCH
‘How much did you pay for that? ’
Comparison of (I) with (2) shows how different KSL is from KSDSL,
and how difficult it would be for a KSL signer to sign in KSDSL. To deaf
people in Korea, Korean is a foreign language, and so is KSDSL. It is
certainly a pain for a KSL signer to sign in KSDSL.
KSL has not been studied very much from a linguistic perspective, and
hence it is not easy to present the KSL grammar systematically. 24
Nevertheless, numerous studies of other sign languages like ASL show
that sign languages are full-fledged languages like spoken languages. First
of all, the general process of acquiring a sign language as one ’s first
language is the S없ne as the general process of acquiring a spoken
language as one ’s first language. Bonvillian, Orlansky & Novack (1983),
Mcintire (1977), Wilbur & Jones (1974) show that children learning ASL
as the first language express their first words at similar ( or even earlier)
age as children learning spoken English as the first language. Newport &
Meier (1985) show that the two-word stage for ASL children matches with
the two-word stage for English-speaking children, and that the thematic
relationships of the two words are not different between these two groups.
Schlesinger & Meadow (1972) show that ASL children go through such
24 S-E Jhang has done some fine linguistic works on KSL. See S-E Jhang (2000), andreferences therein.
Effects of Causal Connections on Memory of Discourse 21 7
general stages found in any spoken language acquisition as the
overgeneration period. These studies are just the tip of the iceberg that
show similarities between the sign language acquisition and the spoken
language acquisition.
A sign language is grammatically as complex as any spoken language.
For instance, Klima & Bellugi (1979), Newport & Meier (1985), and
Wilbur (1987) are the studies showing how complicated the ASL grammar
is. They all conclude that the ASL grammar is not derived from the
grammar of a spoken language, and is as full-fledged as any other natural
language grammar. Sign languages even have cheremes, corresponding to
phonemes of spoken languages, and a complicated rule system for
cheremes, so that it is even possible to do phonology with sign languages.
Because a sign language is a natural language, there are native signers
for a sign language who use the language fluently. On the other hand, a
manually coded spoken language does not have a native signer. No one
can sign in a manually coded spoken language fluently. Because KSDSL is
a manually coded Korean language, no one can sign in KSDSL fluently.
Even S-K Kim and his colleagues who created the system cannot sign in
KSDSL with native language fluency.
With this contrast between a sign language and a manually coded
spoken language in mind, I will discuss theoretical problems of KSDSL
from a linguistic perspective in 2.2 and 2.3.
2.2. Natural Sign Language vs. Rule-Governed Sign Language
Unlike Kendon (1992), S-K Kim (1993, 1998, 1999) considers a
manually coded spoken language as a kind of sign language, and calls a
real sign language natural sign language, and a manually coded spoken
language rule-governed sign language. His distinction between natural
sign language and rule-governed sign language is grounded upon two
linguistically untenable assumptions.
First, S-K Kim implicitly - but not explicitly - assumes that a natural
218 Soyoung Suh Kim
sign language lacks complex grammatical structures.25 Obviously, this
assumption cannot be maintained seen from many linguistic studies of
ASL introduced in 2.1. Even though the evidence in 2.1 is mostly drawn
from ASL, and the study of KSL is relatively sparse, the fact that KSL is a
natural language that has a good number of native signers suggests that the
KSL grammar should be as complex enough as ASL or any spoken
language.
Secondly, S-K Kim considers a natural sign language not as an existing
sign language, but as an ideal language we can find in our dream. He
explicitly states this assumption, as follows (his 1998, 245; 1999, 15).
In order to clarify the syntax of a natural sign language, we must
analyze a sign language that has developed without being affected by a
spoken language. Since it is almost impossible to find such a language, we
can say that it is almost impossible to clarify the syntax of a natural sign
language.26
Unlike S-K Kim ’s assumption, a languagε does not disappear even after
it is affected by another language. If anything, the language affected by
another language does exist as it stands, and the modem linguistics
respects such an affected state of a language as the language ’s current state
in its historical development. That is, even if KSL were affected by
Korean, we could respect the current state of KSL, and study KSL as a
natural sign language.
The discussion so far shows that S-K Kim ’s distinction between natural
sign language and rule-governed sign language is grounded upon wrong
25 Otherwise, he must explain why a natural sign language cannot be called a rulegoverned sign language. 26 자연 수화의 통사 규칙을 밝히기 위해서는 구어의 영향을 받음 없이발전된 수화를 분석해 보아야 하는데, 그러한 수화를 찾아내기란 거의 불가능하다고 할 수 있으므로, 자연 수화의 통사 규칙을 밝히는 연구 역시 거의 불가능하다고 할 수 있다.
Effects of Causal Connections on Memory of Discourse 219
assumptions. In the next sub-section, I will show S-K Kim ’s crucial
mistake in establishing the standard of KSDSL.
2.3. Foreigners Cannot Establish the Standard of a Language!
KSDSL involves a more serious problem than the two problematic
assumptions discussed in 2.2; i.e. KSDSL was designed on the assumption
that the standard of a language can be established by foreigners' vote for
acceptability.
S-K Kim (1993, 1999) pays attention to the department of education ’s
assessment principle for standard Korean that the standard Korean is a
modem Seoul dialect used by educated people, and explicitly sεts up a
parallel assessment principle for KSDSL that the standard sign language is
a modem sign language used by teachers of special education and the
personnel of societies for the deaf. 27 Despite apparent parallelism, there is
a huge difference between these two assessment principles. The term
educated people in the assessment principle for standard Korean refers to
native speakers of Korean. On the other hand, the teachers and the
personnel in the assessment principle for the standard sign language do not
necessarily refer to native signers. In principle, there must be native
signers among teachers of special education and the personnel of societies
for the dεaf. But the reality is that most of the teachers and the personnel
in deaf institutes are non-native (hearing) signers. As evidence for this,
consider how many native signers there are in S-K Kim ’s advisory board
for KSDSL. S-K Kim says that there were 29 people in his advisory board,
only 7 of which were native signers. The other 22 were non-native
(hearing) signers. That is, KSDSL was designed by the committee of 29
people, 22 of which were foreigners to the target language.
27 표준어는 교양 있는 사람들이 두루 쓰는 현대 서울말로 정함을 원칙으로 한다 (The Standard Korean Enactment, Ch. I, Line I, Mar. I, 1989), and 표준 수화는 수화를 사용하는 특수 학교의 교사와 수화 교육을 담당하고 있는 대표적인 농인 단체의 직원이 두루 쓰는 현대 수화로 정함을 원칙으로 한다 respectively.
220 Soyoung Suh Kim
The major methodology in designing KSDSL was voting. Whenever the
29 people had disagreements about possible signs and acceptability, they
voted for whether a particular sign should be allowed in KSDSL or not.
The following is exceipted from S-K Kim (1999, 94-5) for illustration of
their methodology:
We had an assessment meeting, and decided to allow the 33 signs [in
KSDSL] which at least three out of the four deaf signers and at least three
out of the four hearing signers accepted. 28
We decided to take as standard signs only the signs whose common use
at least four out of the seven deaf signers and at least five out of the nine
hearing signers agreed upon. 29
We surveyed two he뼈ng signers, who were experienced sign
intetpreters, three times for their opinion, and asked the entire advisory
board for their opinion. Then, we decided the syntax of KSDSL following
common and reasonable opinion. 30
Clearly, what S-K Kim considers as common and reasonable opinion
was the foreigners' vote for KSL. The goal of contemporary linguistics is
to study the language competence internal to a (native) language user. S-K
Kim ’s assumption that the standard of a language can be established by
28 사정 회의를 개최하여 조사 결과를 가지고 논의를 하였으며, 논의 끝에 농인 4 명 중 3 명 이상과 일반인 4 명 중 3 명 이상이 맞다고 답한 33 개 기호만을 표준 기호로 정하도록 하였다. 29 조사에 응해 준 농인 7 명 중 4 명 이상과 일반인 9 명 중 5 명 이상이 상용되는 기호라고 답한 기호만을 표준 기호로 정하기로 하고, 30 수화 통역 경험이 많은 2 명의 일반인을 대상으로 3 차에 걸쳐 그들의의견을 묻는 조사를 하고, 다시 사정 위원 전원을 대상으로 그들의 의견을 물었으며, 보편성과 합리성이 있는 의견을 받아들여 문장 표현 방법을 정하였다.
Effects of Causal Connections on Memory of Discourse 221
foreigners' vote for acceptability cannot be maintained at all 잠om a
contemporary linguistic perspective. For all the reasons discussed in 2.2
and 2.3, I claim that KSDSL was founded upon wrong assumptions from a
theoretical perspective.
3. Practical Problems of Korean Standard Sign Language
3 .1. Practical Spirits of KSDSL
S-K Kim (1999, 25) expresses the practical spirits of KSDSL, as
follows.
We decided that sentences in the standard sign language should be the
combination of signs of a natural sign language and fingerspelling
following the grammar of the Korean language, because we assumed that
the literacy of deaf children would be improved when they were taught a
grammatical sign language. 31
However, when we study previous studies comparing children learning
ASL with children learning Signed English, we immediately see that S-K
Kim ’s assumption is hard to maintain.
For instance, in many studies, children learning ASL from their deaf
parents arε compared with children with hearing parents who are not
exposed to ASL, but to Signed English (Brill 1960; Quigley & Frisina
1961; Stevenson 1964; Meadow 1967; 、'emon & Koh 1970; Stuckless &
Birch 1966). These studies all point to the fact that children learning ASL
directly from their deaf parents do significantly better than children with
hearing parents in reading, writing, vocabulary, math ability, etc.
Furthermore, Schlesinger & Meadow (1972), Charrow (1974), Gregory
31 ‘한글식 수화 ’ 표준화 과정에서 자연 수화의 기호와 지문자를 병용하여 문장을 국어 문법에 맞게 표현하도록 정한 것은, 농아동에게 문법성 수화를 가르치고 이를 쓰게 할 때, 그들의 문자 언어 수행 능력이 향상될 것이라는 가정 때문이었다.
222 Soyoung Suh Kim
(1976), Wilbur (1976), and Weber & Weber (1981) show that when a deaf
child learns ASL first, ( s )he finds it much easier to learn spoken English.
These studies undermine S-K Kim ’s assumption that Signed Korean
will help deaf children improve literacy. In fact, he was aware of these
studies well, and equivocated his position at various places in his writing.
If the assumption were correct, we should expand the distribution of
Hangul-style sign language. If the assumption were wrong, however, we
should stop our on-going projects of distributing Hangul-style sign
language such as editing the middle school textbook of KSDSL. (his 1999, 25)32
If it turned out that the exclusive use of fingerspelling is more efficient
than Hangul-style sign language, it would be desirable to exclusively use
finger spelling instead of using signs and fingerspelling together. (his 1999, 26-7)33
No study has proven the assumption [that Signed Korean will improve
literacy]. ... If it turned out that the use of a grammatical sign language,
unlike our expectation, does not help deaf people improve their literacy, it
would be desirable to develop the grammar of a natural sign language, or
to use fingerspelling instead of using a grammatical sign language that is
hard for deaf people to use. (his 1999, 118)34
32 그 가정이 타당하다면 ‘한글식 수화 ’의 보급을 확대해야 할 것이며, 그가정이 잘못된 것이라면 현재 추진 중에 있는 ‘한글식 수화 ’ 보굽 사업 (중학 수화 교과서 펀찬 등)을 중단해야 할 것이다. 33 지문자의 전용 효과가 ‘한글식 수화 ’의 사용 효과보다 높은 것으로밝혀진다면, 교육에서 기호에 한계가 있는 수화와 지화를 병용하는 것 [= 현행 한국 표준 수화] 보다는 지문자를 전용하는 것이 바람직할 것으로 생각된다. 34 그 가정 [= 수식 한국어가 문자 언어 수행 능력을 향상시킬 것이라는가정]이 타당하다는 것을 밝힌 연구는 없다· … 문법성 수화의 사용이
Effects of Causal Connections on Memory of Discourse 223
In short, S-K Kim himself was not sure about his assumption that
Signed Korean would improve literacy.
The assumption that a manually coded spoken language will help
literacy, in fact, has a long history. In the U.S., for instance, the
assumption that Signed English will help learn English has driven many
schools for the deaf to adopt Signed English as the primaη means of
education. Schick and Moeller (1992) and Baynton (1996), however, argue
that the popular assumption just sounds right, but that there is no e、ridence
showing that manually coded English helps learn English. Baynton
criticizes people for having done experiments in language planning with
deaf children with virtually no supporting evidence for their experiments.
In the next sub-section, I will show a morε serious problem than the
assumption that a manually coded spoken language will help literacy;
namely, possible problems of cognitive development.
3.2. Language Acquisition and Cognitive Development
Since Singed Korean officially became the standard sign language m
Korea, the scientific study of KSL, not to mention teaching it to dεaf
children, has been neglected in general. Textbooks for deaf education are
written for Signed Korean. One must learn Signed Korean to be a certified
sign language interpreter. Interpreters use Signed Korean on TV. At some
schools for the deaf, children are severely rebuked for using KSL instead
of Signed Korean. In reality, deaf children with hearing parents are
deprived of chances to learn KSL at school. Then, what would happen if a
deaf child did not learn KSL as his/her first language? In this sub-section, I
want to warn that deaf children may have problems in their cognitive
예상과는 달리 농인의 문자 언어 수행 능력을 개발하는데 도움이 되지 않는
것으로 밝혀진다면, 농인이 쓰기에 불편한 문법성 수화를 쓰는 대신 자연
수화 고유의 문법을 발전시커거나 수화 대신 지문자의 사용을 강구하는
것이 바람직할 것으로 생각된다
224 Soyoung Suh Kim
development when they do not learn KSL as their first language.
KSL is the native language for the deaf people in Korea. As a result, the
delay of learning KSL is the delay of the first language acquisition. Then,
what would happen if learning KSL were delayed until after one ’s critical
period? The Genie case in introductory linguistics textbooks certainly
suggests something to this question. That is, if deaf people did not learn a
natural sign language until after their critical period, it would be
impossible for them to learn any language as their native language. On top
of this tragic situation, many researchers W없n negative effects of the delay
of one ’s first language acquisition. Steven Pinker (p.c. ), for instance,
points out that the delay blocks access to vast amount of information that
is constructed only by language, which may cause problems to cognitive
development. Judy Kegl (p.c.) points out that the children who did not
learn their first language before age 7 cannot learn any language as their
first language in the future, and that memory and various cognitive
functions depending upon memory may not develop properly. Bonvillian,
Charrow & Nelson (1973), too, indicates that the deaf are not deficient in
intelligence, and that increased use of a natural sign language is helpful in
intellectual problem solving.
One may argue that the warning about cognitive development is just a
warning with uncertainty. It may be a warning from a small number of
scientists. From a practical point of view, however, the question of
whether the current KSDSL is really worth maintaining despite its
potential fatal effects is worth asking. In some sense, if a deaf child in
Korea is not growing up intellectually properly, it may be because the
child is deprived of chances to learn KSL as his/her first language.
4. Comparison with America
In this section, I will compare the situation of Korea with that of the
U.S., where sign language studies and the p이icy for the deaf are getting
public support. One important difference between Korea and America is
Effects of Causal Connections on Memory of Discourse 225
that the debate between ASL and Signed English has a long history in
America, whereas people in Korea do not even know that Signed Korean
has officially become the standard sign language in 1991. I hope that this
paper could bring the issue to active discussion in Korea, so that the
debate between KSL and Signed Korean becomes substantial. There are
several other notable differences.
First, as I pointed out in section 1 and 2.1, a manually coded language
like Signed English is not considered as a sign language in America. On
the other hand, in the tradition made by S-K Kim in Korea, Signed Korean
is considered as a kind of sign language. My claim throughout this paper is
that Signed Korean is not a sign language.
Secondly, America does not have the federal government ’s standard
sign language, nor is it easy to find the need for such a standard language.
This situation is analogous with these two countries' policy about standard
spoken languages. In America, there is no such thing as fedεral
government ’s standard English. According to O ’Grady, Dobrovolsky &
Aronoff ( 1997), America does not have a legal standard language; many
core dialects of English are scattered throughout geographical regions; and
all of these core dialects of English are considered as standard. In Korea,
however, people want to standardize everything, and the government plays
an active role in standardizing language. As a result, only a Seoul dialect
used by educated people is considered as legally standard. Korean people
in general do not like differences. They are proud of being one ethnic
origin, of having one culture, and of using one language. They do not want
to acknowledge the fact that the deaf people in Korea use a different
language from Korean. According to S-E Jhang (2000), the single
language policy in Korea is one reason for emphasizing Signed Korean
nationwide. This is a non-negligible difference between Korea and
America.
Thirdly, many American colleges and universities support ASL
interpreters in all classrooms. Furthermore, 122 universities, as of Mar. 19,
226 Soyoung Suh Kim
2002, accept ASL in fulfillment of foreign language requirement. 35 Such
academic support is hard to find in Korea.
Finally and most importantly, the movement of Deafness as Culture in
America is noteworthy. According to those who advocate deafness as
culture, deafness is not a handicap to be cured. Deaf people are not
patients, but a linguistic minority. It is hearing people’s dogma to put deaf
people in the patients ’ category, and to enforce hearing people ’s culture
and language on the deaf. In short, deaf people are a minority that has
often received undue discrimination because of their physical
characteristic which is neither a deficit nor a handicap. The situation in
Korea, where hearing people enforce Signed Korean on the deaf people by
law, is the opposite to the spirit of the movement of deafness as culture.
Whether you agree with deafness as culture or not, one important message
from this movement is that we have to approach the problem of the deaf
from the perspective of the deaf. 36
5. Conclusion: Do we Really Need Justification?
In this papeζ I have shown many theoretical and practical problems of
KSDSL. What I have aimed at in the end is self-evident. A scientific study
of KSL is urgent. A full description of the KSL grammar should be done
immediately. In the long run, we must replace Signed Korean with KSL
for the real Korean Standard Sign Language. This is not only theoretically
correct, but also practically right.
But do we really need justification? Do we really have to see whether
Signed Korean helps learn Korean, or whether Signed Korean hinders
cognitive development? Do we really need scientific evidence to claim
that the Korean deaf people should be allowed to sign in KSL? My answer
35 까1anks to Sherman Wilcox and his web page (http://www.unm.edψ∼wilcox/ASLFL/aslfl.html). 36 See Hoff-Ginsberg (1997), Dolnick (1993), Lane (1984), and Padden & Humphries(1988) for more about Deafness as Culture.
Effects of Causal Connections on Memory of Discourse 227
is No, we don't. Using one ’s native language is a human right. As pointed
out by Martin (2001, 116) and the pronouncements of the Linguistic
Society of America (March, 1996), “any linguistic minority has a human
right to use the language of its preference in all areas of life”. When deaf
people want to sign in their native language, they do not have to provide
any justification.
Deaf people ’s recollections show why this is a humanitarian issue rather
than a scientific issue. Nover (1995, 129), for instance, reports that deaf
children and adults complain about Signed English as “more alienating
and less human-oriented than ASL”. Graybill (1996), in recollecting her
childhood at schools for the deaf, says that the children were “bats끼 since
they were dormant during day when they had to sign in Signed English,
and they were active and jovial at night in the dorm when they could chat
in ASL 잠eely with one another. Deaf study belongs to humanitarianism
before a scientific inquiry. This is why it is important to know that the
current Korean Standard Sign Language is not a sign language.
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