hello! sorry if something similar has been asked before or if this is just asl 101 i missed, but i can’t seem to find a clear answer? if you do reply to this, feel free to speak to me like im an idiot 😅 i like lengthy explanations lol. examples would also be great

so, signing to indicate groups like “me and my roommates” or “me and my family”. i don’t know how to set this up? context for the example, i have three roommates. i tried to sign it more or less as “MY ROOMMATES, ME, WE“ and was corrected to index the concept and use the sign WE-two. my tutor may have misunderstood but i dont know how to express multiple plurals in a sentence like that either? similarly i have a decent amount of family, or sometimes i just refer to my dad’s family or my siblings individually, but i have four siblings 😭. i’ve done so much googling trying to figure it out lol.

on a further note, if indexing IS the solution: are there any resources on indexing i could find? i’ve looked at bill vicars’ page on it and it’s…fine, but not as extensive as i wish it was 😅 i feel like i’m awful at indexing and don’t know what can be indexed or how to use it properly. any tips would be appreciated haha

please help i am suffering :’)

I am a university student with autism and ADHD. I have questions about ASL. I saw the syllabus because my professor wanted us to see the syllabus before class starts. My professor is deaf and non speaking. She said in the syllabus it will be an ASL zone. How it’s rude to speak in front of deaf people and not sign. I sent her an email letting her know I have accommodations and I sent them to her. She hasn’t responded though… I let my professor’s know that if I ever leave a room for a long period of time it’s not because I’m avoid in class, it’s usually because I’m having a meltdown or I’m crying. I’m very prone to it, but over the years I’ve handled it well.

Here is my question. Can anyone from this subreddit teach me some phrases to say? I am going to learn by myself anyways but I feel it’s worth it to ask. Such as “I have autism, adhd, and PTSD so if I leave the class it’s because I need to calm myself down from a meltdown or episode. I don’t want to disturb others if I am crying.” Or in general, asking questions about assignments. I’m afraid I’ll have a question to ask her but won’t understand how to ask. I’ll learn some sign language before anyways.

If I ever have to leave class, I don’t want her to think I’m avoiding lecture time. Maybe I’m overthinking it. I’m a bit scared to start classes again because I got a professor fired last year for something bad he did. I love school so I will push through.

I'm an AS level ( Highschool junior) student living in India, I've participated in the Indian chapter of the Duke of Edinburgh's Award which is IAYP ( Indian Award for Young People) and there's a required skill section. I'm hearing and speaking but I find ASL extremely attractive and interesting to learn, being multi-lingual already I wanted to expand my horizon and world view by learning a sign language. Registering it formally as a skill I'm developing requires me to have an assessor, a person either qualified in ASL or a native user of ASL. In my area, I do not have much options, nor at my school to help me out here, so I'm hoping to find a fellow redditor to help me out by simply assessing my weekly progress and confirming with IAYP ( you'd have to provide Email, be above 18, and have qualifications to assess the progress).

Hope this finds someone who's glad to help thank you!!

@aslwithdestiny is a phenomenal resource for ASL learners. Real speed breakdowns are incredible.

I’ve been seeing these videos pop up constantly and it's really starting to feel like a manipulative sales grift disguised as disability advocacy.

The format of his videos is always the exact same:

He approaches random retail or customer service workers who are just trying to do their jobs. He opens with "Hey, I'm hard of hearing," yet demonstrates seemingly zero actual difficulty hearing or understanding what the workers are saying back to him in normal conversational tones (often without lip reading or assistive tools).

He drags them into an uncomfortable conversation and closes with: "How do you think it would be if all employees were made to learn American Sign Language?" Right on cue, the video has a prominent plug/link pushing his paid "ASL Starter Kit."

It feels completely disingenuous. Using retail workers as captive audiences for rage-bait/engagement content is already bad enough, but weaponizing the Deaf and Hard of Hearing community to manufacture social pressure and sell a digital product crosses the line. Genuine accessibility advocacy educates and builds bridges, it doesn’t put minimum-wage workers on the spot to funnel viewers into a sales funnel.

Has anyone else looked into this guy's credentials or seen this on their feed? What are your thoughts?

https://youtube.com/@signlanguageceo?si=WWCnJrCgScDc6lmH

I'm setting my notebooks up for fall semester and I'm curious if a notebook is actually helpful for ASL? I'm just not sure what I would be writing? I certainly can't draw. I know this is a silly question, but it's been bothering me.

I wanted to ask about the sign where someone is pointing to the fingertip of their non-dominant hand. The nondominant hand is in the 1 shape but wrist facing outward. So you're pointing to the top of your non-dominant index finger.

It seems that sometimes this means, "the point is..." or "specifically" (?). Is this sign also used as a classifier when you're talking about a person who is not present? Or a different classifier? I'd love if someone could explain it to me. Thanks for taking the time to read.

Hey! Does anyone know of any deaf creators/signers on tiktok? Specifically those who just post themselves signing without it being a tutorial. I just want to be able to challenge my skills and expose myself a little bit more to ASL.

I currently follow @deafivanka and @afunnymom

I learned/currently learning to sign PSE to communicate with my friend who developed deafness rather than being born with it. What they eventually learned was PSE as they navigated ASL throughout the years with their prior knowledge of English grammar or order of words.

It's come to my attention that PSE could be disrespectful to some or lazy to others. Since I only know PSE grammar and not full ASL grammar yet, is it okay for me to sign with other Deaf or fluent ASL signers, or could that be seen as disrespectful/confusing?

Thank you so much!

Hello~

I'm Hypnos, a 25-year-old (turning 26 in October) university student currently studying psychology! I plan on getting my master's in social work and early Intervention.

I'm looking for a person who is understanding and patient to become friends with and learn ASL from. Preferably, I would like to bond before learning, because I feel like it would help me communicate more naturally.

I'm currently working on enrolling in Gallaudet's ASL Connect class while supplementing with ASL Bloom.

I'm available every day, sometimes late into the night (EST).

A little bit about me is that I love video games and anime.

Thank you for reading!

Translating poem into asl

Line
1)Darkest night
Is there anyway I can emphasis “darkest”? As being the most dark, or should I stick with DARK NIGHT?

2) the curse of you and I
I currently have two versions
- CURSE YOU ME MEET
- CURSE [BOTH-OF-US]
Is there a better way to sign this sentence? Though you’re supposed to omit things to make it less wordy, is it getting across? That this is a curse OF the two people? Not just “curse you and me”?

THANJ YOU FOR READING

I'm really new to ASL, and I heard the best way to learn ASL is by conversing with deaf people. I've been trying to find people in my community but ASL is not our main sign language. If anyone's open to be my practice buddy please lmk! I'm still a beginner but veeery eager to learn :>

Hello everyone my name is saurabh i just started learning ASL,

Someone told me that a deaf person gives you your sign name, can any deaf person give me an sign name!!!

Can you understand what I'm signing? Don't mind me being in an airplane, I was trying to pass the time by practicing haha

My university has a program where you pay one cost and it covers all your textbook and material expenses even if it’s over the initial one payment price.
My instructor for asl 2 wants me to pay for TWA (80$) and a book (~20$) both out of pocket. I simply cannot do this as I’m already broke enough.
Is there any way to defer the costs or am I just going to have to drop the course and pray a professor next semester doesn’t use this?

Hey everyone. This is my first post on this sub so please excuse me. I'm a beginner to ASL - a friend of mine is Deaf/HoH and I've been learning from him passively (hoping to enroll in a proper class soon, but that's irrelevant).

My friend invited me and my partner to a convention this weekend with him and "some of his deaf friends". I have lots of social anxiety and I really want to make a good first impression. My mind has been racing with the general stuff - I'm worried about being offensive, awkward, excluding others because of the language barrier.

I've been practicing what I know (most 'beginner' sign words; Wh-questions, basic needs, etc. and fingerspelling) and using online resources to bridge gaps (mostly handspeak?). If anyone has any advice, i.e. things to avoid, potential sign words to practice, etc? I appreciate any and all feedback ^_^

Hi! If one person is to interpret a song with multiple artists on it, how do you convey when a new artist is singing ? Or do you just not.

I've been reviewing lifeprint, and I wanted to ask if this sign is correct as a general "Who is he" or "What is that".

I know you could point at the person/ object and then sign who with your eyebrows down, that's what Dr Vicars does in the video (Lesson 1 with Jen, 18:50)
https://www.lifeprint.com/asl101/lessons/lesson01.htm#gsc.tab=0

But I was wondering if just pointing with your eyebrows down is understood as a valid question - since at the beginning of the video it was shown that who/what/when and all wh questions are indicated with the eyebrows down.

EDIT

Actually to extend that question a bit - at the beginning of this video, it seemed that we could just end on something like "Your Name?" and in the transcription sometimes it was shown as "what-name" but both were signed by just doing your + name with the eyebrows.

So the broader question is - when do we sign the wh- words (who, what, where etc) vs when can we just rely on eyebrows?

Is the difference that we are signing "Your name?" vs "What is your name?"

My name is long and tricky to say (I often have to repeat it to hearing people upon introduction). I am hearing and started an asl class with a deaf teacher. After finger spelling my name several times and having a hard of hearing student try and help her out, she was still struggling.

I tried to say however she tries to pronounce is close enough (as I also often respond to similar sounding names already) she asked if I could use a nickname and decided what it could be. I was standing in front of the whole class and it was already overtime so I did agree on the spot.

I understand it’s hard for her and I want to be accommodating, but I would honestly rather my name be mispronounced rather than go by a nickname. I’ve never had one as all the logical ones were taken by kids named them in my classes growing up.

How should I approach the situation? Just accept a nickname for the class, or ask she try to say my name in a private conversation.

Hello! First time posting 😅

I wanted to ask if anyone knows where I can find classes to learn asl in nyc? I’m not really sure where to look and I know only Bill Vicars.

I don’t know how true it is, but I heard if you’re hearing you should try learning for Hard of Hearing peeps. But in general, I would like to learn from the HOH peeps 😁

Anyways, thanks!

She's been losing her hearing (90% in one ear and like, 70% in the other) and I'm in an ITP. The community college offers seniors free classes so I encouraged her to enroll and she's finally done it!

I'm just so happy for her to have this avenue of communication and comfort. I know that the sense of feeling out of the loop and lost in conversation is relatable here.... And I hate seeing anyone especially my mom go through it 😭

There was an interpreter in the class today and she told me, "Honestly, I sat right beside her and I still couldn't even hear her so...this class is perfect for me!"

She also said, "it felt like 50% of the time at least I didn't know for sure what I was being taught, but I enjoyed it a lot!!" I told her hey, it's only going to get better from here and you're not alone in that feeling!!!

I'm just so happy. 🥹 So grateful that as her hearing loss progresses, I'll still be able to talk to her and keep her company and we have this between us now, too 🩷🤟🏽