手语双语研究对聋人教育的启示

The insight of sign bilingualism research on deaf education

手语语言学研究指出,自然手语跟口语一样有各方面的语法特征。这些研究让我们了解到聋人是健听社群内一个拥有其自身语言文化的族群。由于社会语言状况跟教育的关系,聋人可以接触手语和口语这两种语言,从而获得手语双语的能力。手语双语以前只是一个概念,并没有实质的科学考察。最近手语语言学及聋童手语语言获得研究的兴起,不但有助于探讨聋童如何从聋父母身上获得自然手语,还可以了解他们在从小的口语训练到入学后跟社会接触等环境下如何发展手语双语。虽然这类研究还在起步阶段,但现有的成果已让很多学者重新思考聋人各种沟通媒介的作用,也启示了聋人教育的发展方向。最后本文讨论聋童手语双语的发展,除了可以在聋校的环境推行外,也可以在融合教育的大前提下,尝试手语双语共融教育这一崭新教育模式。

Sign bilingualism in the past was just a concept with very little research.Recently,research into Sign Linguistics and sign language acquisition by deaf children not only helps us understand how deaf children acquire natural sign language from deaf parents,but also how they grow up being sign bilingual with processes demonstrating code-switching or code-blending phenomena.Relevant research findings have also begun to stimulate many researchers to reconsider the different modes of communication engaged by deaf people and the use of natural sign language in deaf education.The paper proposes that sign bilingualism can be carried out not just in deaf schools,but also in a co-enrollment setting against the general backdrop of inclusive education.The paper ends by describing some relevant research projects conducted in China and Hong Kong that is based on sign bilingualism and co-enrolment in deaf education.