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Introduction to linguistics

Language as medium

Sign languages

Basic facts

Sign languages are languages that use the visual-manual modality to convey meaning. They are full-fledged natural languages with their own grammar and lexicon. Sign languages are not universal and not mutually intelligible with each other.

Both spoken and signed communication are types of natural language, since both emerged through an abstract, protracted aging process and evolved over time without meticulous planning. Sign language should not be confused with body language, a type of nonverbal communication.

Although signing is primarily used by deaf and hard-of-hearing people, it is also used by hearing individuals, such as those unable to physically speak, those who have trouble with spoken language due to a disability or condition, or those with deaf family members, such as children of deaf adults.

It is unclear how many sign languages currently exist worldwide. Each country generally has its own native sign language, and some have more than one. There are somewhere between 138 and 300 different types of sign language. Some sign languages have obtained some form of legal recognition, while others have no status at all.

History

5th century BCE - earliest written record of a sign language

16th century CE - first manual alphabet

1620 - first modern treatise of sign language phonetics

1698 - earliest known printed pictures of consonants of the modern two-handed alphabet

1755 - first school for deaf children

1864 - foundation of the only liberal arts university for deaf people in the world

Characteristics

Sings are the equivalent of words, which are made up of three main components:

Handshape: different configurations of fingers that are extended or bent. Most sign languages have about 30 distinct handshapes.

Location: locations on or near the signer’s body (about 10 locations) or in the space around it (based on oppositions of left and right, up or down, and forward or backward).

Movement: the direction that the hands move in. There are six basic directions which are modified in a number of different ways.

Just as words in spoken languages can be described as combinations of a limited number of consonants and vowels, signs in sign languages are combinations of a limited number of handshapes, locations, and movements. Typologically, the grammars of sign languages combine features that are common in spoken languages but which do not usually co-occur. On the one hand, they are largely analytic and depend on sign order. Sign languages are basically SVO, but with some flexibility. On the other hand, they have very rich morphology which is only sometimes applied.

Their morphology is mostly based on two processes. The first one is reduplication, i.e., repeating all or part of a sign. In many sign languages, nouns can be made from verbs by reducing and repeating the movement, so that SIT means “to sit” and SIT-SIT means “chair”.

The other process is internal modification. This means that one component of the sign changes while other parts do not. Some verbs, for example, can show the subject or object through the direction of movement. In other cases, verbs can indicate information about number by changing the handshape.

These two processes can be combined. Adjectives in ASL have up to 12 different aspectual forms made by modifying the speed and manner of movement along with the number of repetitions.

Sign languages are also about a lot more than hands. Non-manual elements such as facial, head, and shoulder movements are an integral part of sign language grammars and mark types of sentences and different parts of sentences like relative clauses.

Classification

Sign languages can be grouped in the following families: French Sign Language family, German Sign Language family, Vietnamese sign languages & some Thai and Lao sign languages, Arab Sign Language family, Indo-Pakistani Sign Language, Chinese Sign Language, Japanese Sign Language family, and BANZSL family.