Continuation of development of skills in ASL with emphasis on
advanced comprehension and expression, increased exposure to more
complex grammatical structures, further study of deaf folklore,
and cultural aspects of language use.
Athena Title
American Sign Language II
Equivalent Courses
Not open to students with credit in AMSL 1020E
Prerequisite
AMSL 1010 or AMSL 1010E
Semester Course Offered
Offered every year.
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Student Learning Outcomes
At the end of this course students should be able to describe effects of Deaf folklore on survival of ASL and Deaf Culture.
At the end of this course students should be able to explain factors influencing the construction of ASL and types of variations.
At the end of this course students should be able to identify and produce basic sentence types in ASL.
At the end of this course students should be able to describe and utilize movements of inflections for temporal aspect.
At the end of this course students should be able to demonstrate and recognize more complex grammatical features, including noun/verb pairs, compounds, contractions, loan signs, classifiers, and plurals.
At the end of this course students should be able to receptively exhibit mastery of ASL dialogues and narratives.
At the end of this course students should be able to expressively exhibit mastery of ASL dialogues and narratives.
At the end of this course students should be able to explore the culture and daily lives of deaf people in America and in other countries where sign language is used.
At the end of this course students should be able to explore differences in technologies that influence communication in American and global Deaf cultures.
Topical Outline
I. What is ASL?
A. History
B. Role of ASL in deaf community
C. Bilingualism and language contact
II. Sign formation and variation
III. Sign types
A. Noun/Verb pairs
B. Compounds
C. Contractions
D. Loan signs
E. Idioms
F. Classifiers
G. Plurals
IV. Time signs and modulations
A. Non-manual adverbs
B. Regularity
C. Duration
V. Numbering
A. Money
B. Age
C. Ordinal
D. Cardinal
VI. Sentence Types
A. Questions
B. Statements
C. Commands
D. Rhetorical
E. Conditionals
VII. Role shifting
VIII. Adjectives and attributing qualities to others
Cross Cultural Issues
(1) Compare cultural differences among deaf Communities in developed countries and
developing countries (e.g., Deaf women wearing niqab/hijab in Muslim countries and
how this clothing item influences their ability to use facial expressions).
(2) Compare and contrast available technologies such as closed captioning,
videophones, etc. in American and developing countries (e.g., New Zealand does not
offer or mandate closed captioning and videophones for the Deaf).
