I’m not a Chris Christie fan.
On Monday, he signed a bill that makes me dislike him a little less.

Bill S1760 is a bill which requires high schools in the state of New Jersey to allow students to take American Sign Language (ASL) as their foreign language requirement.

This is a big deal because it means that more students will be exposed to Deaf culture, which means more students will learn about how to interact with people who are d/Deaf.

As a deaf person, that makes me really happy. It makes me hopeful that in the future, more people will be able to communicate with people I know and am friends with in an equal way. I’m trying to learn how to sign, and it’s tricky because as an adult in a suburban area, there aren’t a lot of places where I can learn how, but I’m hopeful that maybe with students in the high schools having access to ASL instructors, I might be able to get my foot in the door to have access to a language that I need to learn in order to access parts of my world which are not presently open to me.

I live inbetween the deaf and the hearing. I am not fully hearing, I am not fully deaf, but I often miss things that hearing people do because of my deafness. I miss things.

One of the biggest reasons for why I think this is a good thing is because it makes d/Deaf people visible. It makes us seen.

The only thing I caution people against when it comes to this discussion, is that taking ASL shouldn’t be considered the “cool” option. If you take ASL you’re learning a language, and like every other language that you could study – whether it’s French, or Spanish, Chinese or Italian, is that you need to learn about and respect the culture that comes with that language. I hope that when NJ high schools introduce these courses to their attendees, it will come with the understanding that you don’t just learn the language, you also learn how to support people within that culture. I hope they will teach that if you see a d/Deaf person signing, you shouldn’t run up to them and start speaking ASL at them as though you’re the awesome hearing person who learned THEIR language.

I hope that with ASL in schools, we will see more inclusion, and more understanding.

And for myself, I’m just glad to see the state I live in support the community I belong to just a little bit more than it did before.
This is how we include other communities and people with disabilities – by promoting their languages, by teaching our children about their cultures,  and by treating them as equals, not as monsters kept in the closet.

When I was in school, we would do a day where we learned about braille, a day where we learned about ASL, these days would be the only point at which you would learn about people with disabilities, or the lives that they lead. For me, that meant that growing up, I had few connections to the world of the disabled, and didn’t know how to identify as a disabled adult. Seeing things like this doesn’t just make me happy for able bodied students – it means that disabled students will have a touchstone within their curriculum to help them connect with a vibrant community they may not have had access to before.

{This post is supported by my Patreon campaign. Like what you see? Pledge to support feminist sonar! Already a supporter? Thank you for your generosity and supporting freelance scholarship.}