When examining a language, it is helpful to look at the family to which it belongs to help understand its anthropological development. For a language such as French or German, a fair amount of speculation has been done about Indo-European and can prove useful in understanding the history of the language. ASL is an entirely different case-- as has already been demonstrated, it is distinct and complete enough to stand on its own as a language, and yet it is not spoken or written and is therefore hard to classify. It can't be considered an Indo-European language, but one can't help but wonder how deaf Indo-Europeans communicated, for deafness is surely not a new condition, relevant only to the last few centuries. It seems the best classification we can give to ASL is as a member of a larger family, known as sign language.

"Sign language" is in itself a dangerous term. It is often used interchangeably with ASL or to refer to communication of the deaf in general. The Online Encyclopedia Britannica defines sign language as "any means of communication through bodily movements, especially of the hands and arms, used when spoken communication is impossible or not desirable." So, the term is actually quite broad and covers a great deal more than just ASL. Some examples of sign language that are not independent language systems of their own are:

• gestures, used by most people in addition to regular speech
• signals used by specific professions (equipment operators, bookies, air traffic controllers)
• personal sign systems (baseball signs, different for each team)

We can define "sign language" then as a broad term intended to include a wide range of nonverbal communication. In such, sign language has probably existed longer than spoken language (Encyclopedia Britannica Online). Our own gesturing is evidence that it is somewhat natural for us to use our hands while we speak, and certain gestures are still more efficient than words. For example, telling someone to go "over there" without gesturing might be confusing and need more verbal explanation. But with a simple pointing gesture, the phrase becomes perfectly clear, and a specific location can be indicated non-verbally.

There is very little information available about the usage of sign language up until about the 16th century, when people began to believe it would be possible to educate the deaf and specific sign systems began developing. (See history.) All that can be said is that is was used, probably mostly on an individual basis. Deaf people had to figure out a way to communicate with hearing people around them, and they would devise personal means of communication that were often unique to them and unintelligible to others. The specific sign systems that did develop (French Sign Language, for example) did so when an effort to educate deaf people was combined with certain common "signs" already used by a large number of people in the area. The same phenomenon led to the creation of ASL-- when French Sign Language was brought to America, it combined with preexisting signs to form a unique and independent language.