A Sociolinguistic Study on Deaf People and Their Sign Languages in Asia

本研究调查了越南、新加坡和泰国的聋人及其手语的情况。主要是：(1)聋人社会；(2)聋人教育；(3)信息保障；(4)手语研究。这三个国家的残疾人法律保障了他们的基本权利，他们的生活环境也出现了好转。然而，手语翻译的培训体系并不完善，越南和泰国由于地形问题，方言较多，存在着全国性的手语问题。这使得他们很难建立一种标准的国家手语。现在他们正在研究方言的多样性，并试图克服阻碍他们尝试标准化手语的问题。通过这项研究，清楚地表明，聋人正在朝着他们面临的政治、法律、教育和语言问题的解决方案前进。他们参与了许多比日本更先进的活动，他们对更多地参与一般社会的态度是非常积极的。特别是在越南和泰国，他们把注意力转向聋人的教育问题，特别是聋人的高等教育问题。这两个国家的教育情况可以为日本重新审视其聋人高等教育制度提供很好的借鉴。为了激发他们的能力，提高他们的教育水平，他们对此有强烈的需求。

In this research, the situations of deaf people and their sign languages in Vietnam, Singapore and Thailand were investigated. The main items to be discussed here were: (1) deaf society, (2) education for the deaf, (3) information guarantee, (4) studies on sign languages.In these three countries, laws for disabled people have assured their fundamental rights and their living environment has taken a favorable turn. However, the training system of sign language interpreters is not working well.The national sign language problems in Vietnam and Thailand exist because they have a lot of dialects due to the topographical problems. This makes it difficult for them to establish a standard national sign language. Now they are researching the diversity of dialects and trying to overcome the problems blocking their attempt to standardize their sign language.Through this research, it has been clearly shown that deaf people are moving towards solutions for the political, legal, educational and linguistic problems they are facing. They are involved in many activities which are more advanced than those in Japan and their attitude towards becoming more involved in general society is very positive. Especially, in Vietnam and Thailand, they have turned their attention towards deaf education problems, particularly those of tertiary level education for deaf people. The educational situations in these two countries can be good models for Japan to review its tertiary education system for deaf people. It is strongly demanded by them in order to elicit their abilities, and to raise their educational level.