Some insight into the relationship between language and thought can be achieved through a comparison between American Sign Language and English. This paper discusses several studies on this topic and defines some of the problems. The author feels that the deaf using American Sign Language cannot be considered linguistically deficient. A structural analysis of sign language reveals phonemic, syntactic, and semantic features in a rich, complex structure. The author presents an evaluation of competence in expressive and receptive English. There is an analysis of American Sign Language and a discussion on acquisition and the effects of an early use of sign language. The author summarizes studies comparing hearing and deaf subjects on nonverbal cognitive tasks and criticizes a language deficiency experiment. A list of references is included. (VM)