I know the differences in the alphabet. I’m currently studying American sign language and am fairly good at it, I know fsl and asl are similar i was wondering how different they really are and if it’d be easy to learn the differences in signs and culture in french sign language already knowing american sign language, or if it’d be like having to learn the language all over again
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ASL has its roots in Old French sign language. Though some signs are the same, they are not mutually comprehensible. ASL has a lot of signs from the local sign languages that were around before Laurent Clerc became the teacher in the first official school for the Deaf. Think of it this way, Spanish and Italian are both Romance languages since they have their roots in Latin and even though they share some similarities (vocab. syntax, etc.) they are not mutually comprehensible and have false cognates (a word that looks like one in the other language but carries a different meaning) so there might be a sign in LSF (Langue des signes françaises) that looks like one in ASL but it carries a different meaning. On the other hand, since they are related it might be easier to learn LSF than BSL (British Sign Language) since they are related just like it would be easier for an Italian to learn Spanish rather than Japanese. So to answer your question, yes you will have to learn from scratch since it is after all a different language though you will encounter similarities though I wouldn’t cling to this hope if I were you.
Try this out (knowledge of French would help):
http://ufr6.univ-paris8.fr/desshandi/supl/projets/site_lsf/accueil/accueil.php