Im looking around at colleges and hardly any have a sign language program. I don’t get this, since ASLis the most used language in the US after english and spanish, and some colleges have minors in greek. Some places don’t even accept it as a foreign language credit. The only places that have majors or minors are in indiana and kentucky and ohio, and im on the east coast.
Why?
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Are you only looking at big universities, or also private colleges? It may be a language credit, but I can’t imagine it counting as a foreign language, as…. it is not foreign. Many colleges do not have teachers for this course, so it is taught in clubs instead, and that is very common. While ASL is useful here, the reason there are minors in other languages is because they can be used for business and travel in other countries, as well as their historical funtions (I am a classicist and had to learn latin and greek for archeological studies). ASL is EXTREMELY important, but it is an American language and will almost always be considered extracurricular. You will find a few schools that specialize in it, like the ones you mentioned in the mid-west. Go for it. I lived in Maine and went to private college in Indiana. Nice to get away 😉
To be honest, I don’t know why it’s not at many colleges like Spanish. I could only guess it’s because it’s not in high demand for a major in it. Like myself, I want to major in Korean I can all the colleges offering a major in it on one hand.
I went to search for ASL majors and there are some on the east coast.
Gallaudet University (Washington DC)
Gardner-Webb University (Boiling Springs, NC)
Keuka College (Keuka Park, NY)
Rochester Institute of Technology (Rochester, New York) has a major ASL-English Interpretation not just ASL.
Good luck!
A lot of east coast unis offer ASL classes and consider it as foreign language credits. Some unis offer it as a major or minor.
To get you started, the following unis do offer classes, and consider ASL as fulfilling foreign language credits (and many of these also offer majors/minors in ASL or related). These include: U Rochester, Gallaudet (of course), Northeastern, Rochester Institute of Technology, Valdosta State U, Towson State, Bloomsburg U of PA, Gardner-Webb U, U New Hampshire, Boston University, New York University, UMass Amherst, UMass Dartmouth, UMass Lowell, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, Bridgewater State U, Brown, U Virginia, U Georgia, U South Carolina, Yale, MIT, U Penn, Brandeis, NC State U, Swarthmore, Rutgers, and there are likely others, but these are the ones that I’m most familiar with.
Note that *every* public uni in Massachusetts considers ASL to fulfill foreign language credits. I just listed a few to get you started.