Workshop/Course Description

This workshop will explore relationships between Semantics and Classifiers in American Sign Language. Participants will have the opportunity to discover how their classrooms teaching can take advantage of their own innate abilities as they relate to body language, gestures, and facial expressions in their ASL instruction. Participants will apply these ideas to ASL Semantics and Classifiers. My goal is to help ASL teachers figure out how to break the fear that is typically associated with using ASL Classifiers in the classroom.

 

• Participants will discover how their innate use of body language, gestures, and facial expressions can enhance their ASL instruction.

• Participants will be able to compare semantics and classifiers in ASL.

• Participants will demonstrate an increased comfort with teaching ASL classifiers

 

BIO

Andrew Bottoms, fondly known as Anbo, was raised in North Carolina and is second generation in a Deaf family. He is currently faculty at Boston University in the Deaf Studies program and offers ad hoc consultancy in the domain of American Sign Language and Deaf Studies instruction. He holds two Bachelor’s degrees, one in American Sign Language (ASL) and the other in Deaf Studies, and a Master’s degree in Sign Language Education from Gallaudet University. His passion and fervor toward teaching ASL parallels his values in the sharing of the language and culture embodied by ASL. His innate aptitude and specialization lie in the sphere of ASL Literature. He prides himself on his commitment to Deaf youth and promoting linguistic access as a human right for all Deaf people. Inherent in his ideology is ensuring that Deaf children are able to navigate their identity via a community rich in ASL, Deaf literature and Deaf history. An avid jet setter, he has traveled the globe and enjoys meeting Deaf people around the world, which further advances his contributions to the field.