Excerpt from the article:

Twenty students are holding several animated small-group discussions, but no one in this Northern Illinois University classroom utters a word.

Their fingers weave in complex patterns as they converse in American Sign Language, which the university has declared an official foreign language.

To the students, the new label is fitting: They say that American Sign Language is distinct from spoken English and that its coursework provides a new perspective akin to the cultural immersion they’d experience in French, Spanish or other traditional language classes.