When Bill Stokoe went to Gallaudet to teach English .... American Sign Language (ASL) was thought to be no more than a form. of pidgin English. But Stokoe believed the "hand talk" his students used looked richer. He wondered: Might deaf people actually have a genuine language？ And could that language be unlike any other on Earth？
When Stokoe analyzed his students' signing, he found it was like spoken languages, which combine bits of sound -- each meaningless by itself -- into meaningful words. Signers, following similar rules, combine individually meaningless hand and body movements into words. They choose from a palette of hand shapes... They also choose where to make a sign... (and) how to orient the hand and arm... A common underlying structure of both spoken and signed languages is thus at the level of the smallest units that are linked to form. words.
The title of the passage suggests that American Sign Language

A. imitates spoken English.
B. cannot be spoken.
C. requires special intelligence.
D. is cognitively complex.