What are the differences between ASL and BSL?

The most obvious difference between ASL and BSL is that they are two completely different languages. American Sign Language was formed thanks to a deaf French person named Thomas Gallaudet was brought to America found the first deaf school in the USA. British Sign Language is different in so many ways to American Sign Language-and in many ways the way that the two countries handle their Sign Languages is really different.

In America there are only 10 states that officially recognise ASL as the official language of the deaf people in that states. They are Alabama, Colorado, Georgia, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Montana, Oklahoma, Rhode Island and Utah. The other 40 states in the USA recognise ASL as a foreign language that students can get a credit for if they do it at school. (Nad.org. 2016. STATES THAT RECOGNIZE AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE. [online] Available at: <https://www.nad.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/List_States_Recognizing_ASL.pdf> [Accessed 13 May 2021]. )

The signing in this video really shows just how different these two languages really are, the alphabet especially in ASL. The alphabet and numbers in ASL are so completely different from BSL, for example the vowels in BSL are done using your thumb and four fingers and there is a lot of two hands work for the rest of the alphabet whereas the vowels in ASL and the rest of the alphabet is done with one had.