William Stokoe (pronounced Stokie) (1919 - 2000) was a scholar who researched American Sign Language (ASL) extensively while he worked at Gallaudet University. From 1955 to 1970 he served as a professor and chairman of the English department at Gallaudet. He published Sign Language Structure and co-authored A Dictionary of American Sign Language on Linguistic Principles (1965). Through the publication of his work he was instrumental in changing the perception of ASL from that of a broken or simplified version of English to that of a complex and thriving natural language in its own right with an independent syntax and grammar as functional and powerful as any found in the spoken languages of the world. Because he raised the prestige of ASL in academic and educational circles, he is considered a hero in the Deaf community. 1919 (MCMXIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... This article is about the year 2000. ... A scholar is either a student or someone who has achieved a mastery of some academic discipline. ... American Sign Language (ASL, also Amslan obs. ... Gallaudet University was the first school for the advanced education of the deaf and hard-of-hearing. ... 1965 (MCMLXV) was a common year starting on Friday (link goes to calendar). ... The word deaf, can have very different meanings based on the background of the person speaking or the context in which the word is used. ...

Writing system for American Sign Language

Stokoe invented a written notation for sign language, as ASL had no written form at the time. Unlike SignWriting, which was developed later, it is not pictographic, but drew heavily on the Latin alphabet. Thus written form of the sign for the 'mother' looks like U5x. The 'U' indicates that it is signed at the chin, the '5' that is uses a spread hand (the '5' of ASL), and the 'x' that the thumb touches the chin. Stokoe coined the terms tab, dez, and sig, meaning sign locataion, handshape, and motion, to indicate different categories of phonemes in ASL. The Stokoe notation system has been used for other sign languages, but is mostly restricted to linguists and academics. Sign Writing is a system of writing the movements and handshapes of sign languages. ... In human language, a phoneme is the basic theoretical unit that can be used to distinguish words or morphemes. ...

See Stokoe notation under construction The Stokoe notation for American sign language (ASL) was the first writing system designed for a sign language. ...