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Okay, so I've been posting a bunch under my "Signed Languages" filter, which most of you are not on, because it's a small subset of my circles... but twice, recently, under that filter, I claimed to have learned ASL from Dr. Larry Flesicher (who died in 2009). And then, today, I decided to Google the "ASL, S.U.N.Y. Stony Brook, 1991" to see what I could find about him.
...And it turns out, I learned ASL from Dr. Larry Forestal, who is still very much alive and kicking... Ooops? Um, in my defense, this was twenty years ago? and I don't think we called him by his last name anyway (since we were first year foreign language students, and clueless as all get out)? And I may have been reading the news of Dr. Flesicher's death online, without my glasses?
Anyway, Look what I found! ... I made it into The New York Times! (not by name... But I was one of the "more than 30 students [who] held a protest earlier [that] month," mentioned in the article). The full article is behind the cut. I'm posting this out-of-filter, because there are several teachers, former teachers, and soon-to-be-teachers in my circles, so the subject might appeal on those grounds.
( Campus Life: SUNY, Stony Brook; Sign Language: Foreign Or Merely an Easy A? (New York Times, May 26, 1991) )
I knew the anti-ASL argument was bogus at the time... I don't know how many students actually did get A's. But we were given work in that class... And no, we didn't "speak," but we were required to sign in class.
But now that I've followed along with people working as college and university instructors, I really know their argument was bogus:
"Too many students get A's!"
(actually, you counted wrong)
"Well, it's American Language... That's not foreign!"
(But Navajo is?)
"Well, it's only taught by Adjunct Professors! Everyone knows they're not real scholars."
---
That last one is the kicker, ain't it? Especially since, I bet, every one of the tenured professors making that argument back then were Adjunct Professors, once upon a time...
...And it turns out, I learned ASL from Dr. Larry Forestal, who is still very much alive and kicking... Ooops? Um, in my defense, this was twenty years ago? and I don't think we called him by his last name anyway (since we were first year foreign language students, and clueless as all get out)? And I may have been reading the news of Dr. Flesicher's death online, without my glasses?
Anyway, Look what I found! ... I made it into The New York Times! (not by name... But I was one of the "more than 30 students [who] held a protest earlier [that] month," mentioned in the article). The full article is behind the cut. I'm posting this out-of-filter, because there are several teachers, former teachers, and soon-to-be-teachers in my circles, so the subject might appeal on those grounds.
( Campus Life: SUNY, Stony Brook; Sign Language: Foreign Or Merely an Easy A? (New York Times, May 26, 1991) )
I knew the anti-ASL argument was bogus at the time... I don't know how many students actually did get A's. But we were given work in that class... And no, we didn't "speak," but we were required to sign in class.
But now that I've followed along with people working as college and university instructors, I really know their argument was bogus:
"Too many students get A's!"
(actually, you counted wrong)
"Well, it's American Language... That's not foreign!"
(But Navajo is?)
"Well, it's only taught by Adjunct Professors! Everyone knows they're not real scholars."
---
That last one is the kicker, ain't it? Especially since, I bet, every one of the tenured professors making that argument back then were Adjunct Professors, once upon a time...
