Sign Language Studies (SLS)

JOSEPH J. MURRAY Linguistic Human Rights Discourse in Deaf Community Activism Abstract The past three decades of activism for linguistic human rights (Skutnabb-Kangas 2000) have witnessed examples of language planning by various national and supranational actors in national and international spaces, with an exchange of ideas and strategies employed by national, regional, and worldwide organizations. In many countries a key goal of deaf-led advocacy organizations has been promotion of the right to use sign language in a variety of settings, from those involving the larger society to those surrounding deaf children’s use of sign language.These organizations maintain that this is a core right, one that can ensure that deaf people are able to fully participate in society at large.This article traces the formation of a sign language– based human rights discourse by deaf communities and outlines what appear to be the main tenets of this discourse. It examines the histori- cal period preceding the era of sign language legislation to explain why a particular form of language planning—status planning—fgures so prominently in legislative measures to date.The application of this discourse can be seen in an overview of the legal recognition of sign language in subnational, national, and international settings. A look at research on the outcomes of existing legislation (and legislative eforts) reveals that subsequent outcomes have not fully realized deaf organizations’ stated linguistic human rights goals. A specifc failure noted by deaf organizations is that current legislation has not brought about legally codifed sign language rights for deaf children. Joseph J. Murray is an associate professor in the Department of ASL and Deaf Studies at Gallaudet University,Washington, DC. 379 Sign Language Studies Vol. 15 No. 4 Summer 2015 380 | Sign Language Studies The Turn to Linguistic Human Rights Deaf community organizations’ current focus on linguistic human rights was not inevitable. In fact, a wide variety of issues related to deaf people demands attention. As with other people with physical, sensory, or cognitive diferences, deaf people are either unemployed or underemployed (World Report on Disability 2011). In some countries today deaf people are denied basic citizenship rights, such as equal voting rights during public elections (World Federation of the Deaf 2014).While Deaf community organizations in Western countries ad- vocate for bilingual education for deaf children, in many other areas of the world, deaf people do not have access to any school whatsoever. The World Federation of the Deaf (WFD) estimates over 80% of deaf children do not have access to education (World Federation of the Deaf, n.d.). Clearly, a range of challenges exists for deaf people and deaf community organizations, challenges that vary due to developed or developing country status, rural or urban status, political system, gender, and other factors. Currently a number of organizations of deaf people have designated linguistic human rights as one of their key priorities. A 2014 WFD survey of its 133 member organizations, made up of one national as- sociation of deaf people per country, asked deaf associations to share items from their present strategic plans. The WFD uses the World Bank’s classifcation of countries by gross national income to deter- mine membership fees, and this article adopts the same classifcation when reviewing the data presented here. Of the 73 countries that returned the survey, 49 had strategic plans, and 48 listed their main objectives. The data from the survey have not been fully analyzed as of this writing, but an initial review shows wide heterogeneity in strategic goals across country income categories. Economic develop- ment, employment, and capacity-building objectives, while perceived as more common issues in low-income countries, are also strategic priorities for high-income nations as well.At the same time, advocacy for implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and goals related to sign language rights and/or sign language planning activities also feature as strategic goals in countries in each income category. Advocacy for human rights via sign language, seemingly more prevalent in developed countries, Linguistic Human Rights Discourse | 381 is nonetheless found across all three World Bank categories (World Federation of the Deaf Ordinary Member Survey 2014). This turn to sign language rights and human rights discourse ofers deaf advocacy organizations a way of packaging a number of rights within a framework that seems to ofer relatively simple legislative solutions to complex problems related to the full acceptance of deaf people as linguistic minorities and their participation in the larger society.According to this framework, deaf people can achieve equality when national sign languages are given full support by governments and society.The reality has proven to be diferent, however (also see De Meulder and McKee and Manning, this issue). In this article I describe some central tenets of this human rights discourse by reviewing public documents from international organizations in which a human rights discourse based on sign language rights has emerged and been articulated. Little work has been done on the emergence and transmission of this discourse among national deaf advocacy organizations (for one upcoming study, see De Meulder forthcoming), but the phenomenon of transnational activism in deaf communities has been noted in the contemporary era (Valentine and Skelton 2007) and in the nineteenth century (Murray 2007). It is useful to view the deaf community’s sign language based rights discourse as a form of language planning activity.The promotion of legislation related to sign languages is a form of language planning. Reagan (2010) describes four aspects of language planning relevant to sign languages: eforts to set spheres of use for languages, such as designating ofcial languages, is status planning.This has been the dominant focus of much linguistic human rights efort by deaf communities. Corpus planning is concerned with the standardization and elaboration of a language. Corpus-planning bodies include language-planning councils. Adam (this issue) writes of power dis- parities that lead to standardization eforts in sign languages, both within a nation and across several nations.Anyone familiar with sign language research will be familiar with a number of corpus-planning measures that have occurred with regard to sign languages in the past few decades. Acquisition planning involves policies that are de- signed to increase the number of users of a language. A key area of acquisition planning has long been educational policy.The teaching 382 | Sign Language Studies of a language ensures its transmission to a new generation of users. As will be seen, in acquisition planning for deaf children, the current wave of advocacy for linguistic human rights has been unable to achieve widespread instrumental rights.Attitude planning involves eforts to change individual and group attitudes about a language or ways of using language (such as opinions about monolingualism and bilingualism) (Reagan 2010). The basic contours of this human rights discourse in deaf communities can be found in several documents released by the World Federation of the Deaf and the European Union of the Deaf (EUD). A 2009 Global Survey Report issued by the WFD, which positions claims to equal citizenship for deaf people as a “paper status” unless governments take measures to promote the use of sign languages and allow deaf people to access information in sign language. “It is thus necessary to recognise and promote the use of sign languages to secure that the fundamental right to freedom of expression and opinion is granted to Deaf people” (Haualand and Allen 2009, 22).The report contains an illustration (fgure 1) that gives sign language a central role in the attainment of human rights.The report also outlines four “basic factors for human rights of deaf people.”These are: • “Recognition and use of sign language(s), including recognition of and respect for Deaf culture and identity • Bilingual education in sign language(s) and the national language(s) • Accessibility to all areas of society and life, including legislation to secure equal citizenship for all and prevent discrimination • Sign Language interpretation.” (Haualand and Allen, 2009, 9) Three of these four points explicitly mention sign language as fundamental to the achievement of human rights, covering status, acquisition, and attitude planning activities.The illustration in fgure 1 further emphasizes the need for sign language in the realization of access and in the prevention of discrimination. The report further notes that “When Deaf people, whose natural language(s) are sign language(s), are denied the use of sign language in interaction with other people or experience discrimination in various areas of life because they use sign language, the consequence is violation of their human rights” (Haualand and Allen 2009, 9).The phrase “discrimination . because they use sign language” points to a view of deaf people as primarily Linguistic Human Rights Discourse | 383 Figure 1. Basic factors for human rights for deaf people. World Federation of the Deaf Global Survey Report (Haualand and Allen 2009). a linguistic minority, one whose rights need to be respected in order to prevent discrimination and ensure equality. Indeed, the report states

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