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ASL Grammar: Cross-language or inter-language recognizability.
Discussing English in ASL is not the same as using "Signed English" nor Signing Exact English.
In bilingual situations during which an ASL signer is specifically attempting to express a specific English phrase such as the title of a movie that includes the word "of" -- and maintain inter-language recognizability of the English phrase the signer may choose to map to the English word "of" by either fingerspelling "of" or using the sign sometimes labeled as CONNECT which has a variety of meanings including but not limited to "connect, join, of, member, affiliated with, link together, two links of a chain, etc..) If a person isn't specifically mapping ASL to English then signing the word "of" may not be needed.
The point here is that whether or not the use of the CONNECT sign or the fingerspelling of the word "of" is grammatically correct in ASL depends on the purpose for which ASL is being used.
There are those who will state that the above situation means that a signer is using "Signed English."
That is incorrect. The signer is using ASL to map to English.
So in a way it could be claimed that the person was "signing English" but let's realize here that "Signed English" is not the same thing as using ASL to express an English concept.
Maybe it would help if we approached it this way:
"Signing about English"
is not the same as
"Signed English."
Signing in ASL in a way that allows you to make clear or discuss with another ASL signer a specific phrase in English is still Signing in ASL. The topic just happens to be English. If you sign in ASL to discuss math you aren't doing "signed math" you are signing ASL about math.
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