About 60 supporters rallied together in the rain on Boston University’s Marsh Plaza Wednesday afternoon in an attempt to educate the community on deaf culture and criticize BU’s policy on American Sign Language.
Despite the rain, students and other advocates marched around Marsh Plaza shouldering signs spelling out their points, including “If ASL isn’t foreign, why can’t you understand me**?” They also clapped and signed the chant, “We want ASL now.”
The rally and subsequent panel discussion, coordinated by the Deaf Studies Club and other deaf studies students, were the two biggest events of the group’s Week of Silence, a week meant to help raise awareness about ASL and deaf culture.
College of Arts and Sciences freshman Halley McBride said the rally was organized last Sunday when John Pirone, a representative from the Massachusetts State Association of the Deaf, told the group about a rally he had attended. She said through an interpreter that the group liked the idea because it was a visual event and would attract people’s attention.
The rally drew in several students passing by – some asked questions about the issue and others started marching.
“It’s different to see people walking around,” School of Education junior Jen Cabelli-Lattimer said. “It raises curiosity.”
After about 40 minutes of circling the plaza, everyone gathered to the CAS side of the plaza to listen and watch various testimonials and speeches from students and Pirone about the unfairness of BU’s attitude toward ASL. The rally then dismissed to the SED building for the panel discussion.
The panel featured CAS French and Linguistics professor Carol Neidle, Framingham Learning Center for Deaf Children Middle School Supervisor Patrick Costello and Northeastern University Foreign Language Department Chairman Dennis Cokely.
Cokely, who was invited by the Deaf Studies Club, also attended the rally because of his long-standing interest in supporting the deaf community. He called BU’s policy regarding ASL “archaic and close-minded.”
“When you reject the language, you reject the culture,” Cokely said.
Cokely said Northeastern recognizes ASL as a foreign language and the language is the second most popular language in the department, after Spanish. The school also offers an ASL major, three dual majors, an interpreting major and routinely has about 350 students in the full-time program, Cokely said. He also pointed out that Northeastern officially began recognizing ASL in 1993, one year before BU’s last battle over ASL policy.
Neidle was the faculty sponsor for the cause in 1994 and also sponsored the proposal submitted Tuesday calling for the school’s recognition of ASL. The 1994 proposal was debated for three years and ultimately rejected. She also said the current student-led movement is very similar to the one submitted a decade ago and “the facts are still on our side.”
BU Deaf Studies Club President Becky Williams, a School of Education junior, said through an interpreter that she was happy with the turnout – which included hearing, non-hearing, signing and non-signing people – especially considering the rain. Williams said the group is more concerned about changing the mindset of the students and community than influencing BU administration.
“It’s important to start there and then approach the administration,” she said through an interpreter.
With circling students signing back and forth, smiling and even laughing aloud at times, McBride said the rally was designed to take a calm, academic stand for recognition.
“We’re not here to anger anyone,” McBride said through an interpreter. “We’re just here to educate and open people’s eyes.”