Social media influencer Nakia Smith signs in Black American Sign Language.

"English is not my first language," writes Nakia Smith on her TikTok account, although the 22-year-old grew up in Texas.

The young African American woman has been deaf since birth, and uses her large online following to promote her little-known dialect: Black American Sign Language.

In her video clips, she tells her 400,000 followers about the differences between her language and the standard American Sign Language (ASL).

Among other things, she signs with two hands rather than one, uses more space and makes more use of facial expressions.

Smith tells her followers that to sign "paper" in ASL, a person mimics a sheet of paper by tapping the left hand with the right hand, while moving the latter outwards. In Black American Sign Language, the person waves both thumbs outwards at shoulder level.

 Great variety

Those differences were also noted decades ago by Carolyn McCaskill, a professor at Gallaudet University in Washington, one of the largest institutions for the deaf and hard-of-hearing in the world.

As a child in Alabama, she first learned sign language at a school for deaf Black children, before going to study at a school for white children once segregation ended.

The earliest schools for the deaf and hard-of-hearing in the United States date from the early 1800s, but in 17 southern states and Washington, separate schools for Black students were established towards the turn of the century.

Thanks to the geographic remoteness of the communities, American Black Sign Language enjoys a rich variety, and some signs differ from one part of the American South to the next. Some remember a dire lack of resources at their schools, and untrained teachers who did not teach them the full diversity of standard American Sign Language.

 The TikTok logo is seen.

Emotional vs... robotic

Today, Black American Sign Language survives primarily by being passed on from generation to generation, as in the case of Smith, who learned it from her grandfather.

This makes it almost impossible to estimate how many people actually speak it, said McCaskill.

She hopes her center will serve as a base for the preservation of the dialect, but recognizes the importance of figures like Nakia Smith and her popularity on social media.

For her part, Smith wants more visibility for sign language, standard or Black, and would like to get involved in the entertainment industry to help bring about change.