Implementing Language Policy for Deaf Students in a Texas School District

Abstract

Language policy implementation is a complex, multilayered process. Understanding this process can be achieved by identifying the agents, layers, and processes of language planning and policy activities, analyzing the layers independently, and examining the relations among the layers. Considering these dimensions, this article explicates how U.S. special education policy functions as de facto language policy for deaf students. Turning to implementation in local contexts, data from a larger multi-sited, qualitative case study of a Texas school district is presented to show how individuals act as policy-implementing agents and how their beliefs about language and education policy influences the policy discourses they take up and the degree to which they open up multilingual, multimodal ideological and implementational spaces within deaf education policies.

Keywords:

• agency
• deaf education
• implementational space
• language ecology
• language policy
• sign language

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am indebted to Francis M. Hult for his constructive feedback and insightful comments on this article. Similarly, I thank Larry Siegel for his helpful comments.

Notes

¹I use the term deaf to refer to individuals with hearing loss who use sign language as their primary mode of communication. The medical and legal communities view deafness as a disabling condition (Ramsey, 1994). The deaf community rejects this view and argues, instead, that deaf individuals belong to a linguistic and cultural minority group that uses sign language as its natural mode of communication (Ladd, 2003; Mesthrie, Swann, Deumert, & Leap, 2000; Muhlke, 2000).

²For a list of schools for the deaf, see http://clerccenter.gallaudet.edu/Clerc_Center/Information_and_Resources/Info_to_Go/Resources/Websites_of_Schools_and_Programs_for_Deaf_Students_.html

³Pseudonyms are used for the school district, the middle school campus, and participants.

⁴See http://www.nad.org/issues/education/k-12/bill-of-rights

⁵Only a general description of the district policies is provided in an effort to maintain the school district's anonymity.