September is National Deaf Awareness Month (in the US). We celebrate deaf, deafblind, and deafdisabled people and their intersectional experiences and contributions to the world. 1/n
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My take, as a deaf linguist, is that signed languages are worthy of study as much as spoken languages are -- but they exist in the bodies of deaf people and shouldn't be fetishized or romanticized. it bothers me when hearies talk about signed languages as exotic objects to access and acquire. 2/n
I'm very aware that the whole enterprise of linguistics tend to involve a degree of "fascination" w/ certain languages or sounds (how many linguists do you know have IPA tattoos). That's okay, but we can do better about how we talk about deaf people & signed languages w/out being demeaning. 3/n
Linguists have a moral responsibility for how we frame deaf people and signed languages and to talk about discrimination that shapes our lives & realities. I would expect the same for other minoritized languages & communities that we cover in our classes, presentations, & publications! 4/n
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