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Sign Language
Language or not?
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History
• In 1755, Abbé de l'Épée founded the first school for deaf
children in Paris; Laurent Clerc was arguably its most famous
graduate. He went to the United States with Thomas Hopkins
Gallaudet to found the American School for the Deaf in
Hartford, Connecticut, in 1817.

• Gallaudet's son, Edward Miner Gallaudet founded a school

for the deaf in 1857 in Washington, D.C., which in 1864
became the National Deaf-Mute College. Now called
Gallaudet University, it is still the only liberal arts university
for deaf people in the world. Medium of instruction is by and
large ASL.
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Madan M. Vasishta, B.A. (History

and Psychology), M.A. (Deaf
Education) and Ph.D. in Special
Education. Born in India and
became deaf at age 11. He worked
as a farmer for 10 years and moved
to Delhi in 1961 where he first met
deaf people and learned to sign. He
taught photography in India and
worked with the All India
Federation of the Deaf before
coming to Gallaudet in 1967.
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International Sign (IS)

Also called Gestuno, International Sign Language (ISL),
International Sign Pidgin, and International Gesture
(IG)) is an international auxiliary language sometimes
used at international meetings such as the World
Federation of the Deaf (WFD) congress, events such as
the Deaflympics, and informally when travelling and
socialising. It can be seen as a kind of pidgin sign
language, which is not as conventionalised or complex
as natural sign languages and has a limited lexicon.
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Oralist traditions – Paris Congress

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IPSL
• The Indian deaf population of 1.1 million is 98% illiterate. In line with
oralist philosophy, deaf schools attempt early intervention with
hearing aids etc., but these are largely dysfunctional in an
impoverished society. As of 1986, only 2% of deaf children attended
school.
• Since 2001, a group at the Ali Yavar Jung National Institute for the
Hearing Handicapped (AYJNIHH) has been working on providing
teaching material and training teachers for ISL. The Rehabilitation
Council of India and the Ishara Foundation, are also involved in ISL
training, English through ISL, and interpreter training. A number of
vocational schools, e.g. ITI Secunderabad, use ISL for teaching. Other
institutes such as the All India Institute of Speech and Hearing
(Mysore) remain exclusively focused on oralism.
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Modality
SPOKEN LANGUAGES
• Auditory-vocal (aural-oral), perceived via hearing and
produced via speech
SIGNED LANGUAGES, OF THE DEAF
• Visual –gestural, perceived visually (by the eye) and
produced by manual gestures, head movements and
facial expressions
DEAF-BLIND
• Tactile gestural, perceived by the hand and produced
by the hand
• Video of Hellen Keller
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Myth 1: Signing is Pantomime

• Draw pictures in the air or act out their thoughts. Sign
languages lack internal structure
Signs are iconic – hugar (Spanish to play, and Hebrew he lives).
The same sign means possible in ASL and weigh in Finnish SL.
In Taiwan SL, possible is made with one hand: the little finger
touches the chin, and then the bent hand touches one side of
the chest and then the other
There is some iconicity, but spoken languages have iconic
words too. Sign-meaning pairing is arbitrary like sound-
meaning pairing.
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Iconic beginnings
• Etymologically iconic signs
become opaque to native
signers.
• JOT < PUT + PAPER
• This is comparable to English
compounds that have lost their
transparency.
always < all + ways (cf.
dialectal ‘all roads’)
cupboard < cup + board
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How do sign languages arise?

Spontaneous emergence
• Home sign
• Village sign
Some examples
• Nicaraguan Sign Language
• Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language
• Martha’s Vineyard Sign Language
Language movement, contact, and evolution
• Comparable to the emergence of pidgins and creoles
• ASL is one example of this
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Myth 2: Signing is Universal

• A single language used by deaf speakers all over the world. If true,
then
▫ You would understand what you see without transcripts or
interpretation
▫ You would not need any help understanding what any deaf
person says
▫ People from around the world would be able to communicate
with each other successfully and effortlessly in gesture
▫ There would not be many sign languages, nor regional variation
within each sign language
• Ethnologue lists 130 Deaf sign languages in the world
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Myth 3: Signing is a coded form of speech

• A manual code – derived from speech like writing or Morse
code
If signs are coded speech
▫ One to one relationship between signs and spoken
language
▫ Codes are structurally different
▫ Codes do not have native speakers
• At what linguistic level would this coding happen?
 Sounds? Cf. Cued speech
 Words? Parts of words? Cf. SEE (Signing exact English) etc.
 Spelling? (Finger spelling)
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CUED SPEECH & FINGERSPELLING

• Cued speech is a system of communication used with and
among deaf or hard of hearing people. It is a phonemic-based
system which makes traditionally spoken languages accessible
by using a small number of handshapes (representing
consonants) in different locations near the mouth
(representing vowels), as a supplement to lipreading. Invented
to improve literacy.
• Fingerspelling
Manually coded languages (MCLs) are representations of
spoken languages in a gestural-visual form; that is, "sign
language" versions of spoken languages. (Signing Exact English,
keeps the exact representation of English grammar and
vocabulary)
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Fingerspelling
Plate from John
Bulwer's 1648
publication
Philocophus, or
the Deaf and
Dumbe Man’s
Friend
(London).
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Sign languages evolve naturally

• Plato's Cratylus, where Socrates says:
• If we hadn't a voice or a tongue, and wanted to express things
to one another, wouldn't we try to make signs by moving our
hands, head, and the rest of our body, just as dumb people do
at present?
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Why study different modalities?

• Nature of human language and its universality is
revealed if the organisational principles are the same
in different modalities
• Studying different modalities tells us what is modality
specific and what isn’t
▫ Pauses in speech are present in speech only because
of the constraints of breathing and speaking
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‘Phonetics’ of Sign Languages

• Phonetics, study of sounds
• Phonetics also as the study of speech production
• Signs = words, have discrete components that
are combined
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Articulatory parameters of signed languages

• In speech we talk about features (voicing, nasality, manner,
place etc.) and about segments made of them.
• Empirically, we use the minimal pair test
• In signing too, by observation we can isolate the articulatory
parameters
• One interesting difference between signing and speech:
speech requires linear temporal order because of the nature
of the speech mechanism and because of the way auditory
input is processed; in signing the primes co-occur, and be
interpreted multiply – because of the manual/visual channels.
• First characterised by Stokoe – he calls them cheremes
(cherology, from the Greek word for hand, cheir)
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Parameter 1: Location Apple-onion video

Luck
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Signing space
• The general area in which signs may be produced; for
example ASL has very few signs articulated below the
waist
• Location has to do with the exact location with respect
to the signing space where the sign needs to be made
• The signing space can be extended or reduced. When it
is reduced, the signs will move closer to the centre of
the speaker, this is whispering. Increase in the space for
signing signals yelling.
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Parameter 2: Movement
• Chocolate-church video

Tough-
Physics
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Can and shoes

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Primary movements
• Straight vs. arc vs. hook (7)
• Vertical vs. horizontal
• Towards vs. away from the body
• Unidirectional vs. bidirectional

Secondary movements
• Wiggling or hooking fingers
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Parameter 3: Handshape

Like vs.
White
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Hand configuration
• Perceptually most
distinct and salient
• Universal across sign
languages
• Used most frequently
in each sign language
• Acquired earliest
• Phonologically less
restricted
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Marked handshapes
• 20+ in ASL
• Articulatorily and
perceptually more
complex
• Less common in and
across sign languages
• Acquired later
• Phonologically more
restricted
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Parameter 4: Orientation

Meet,
I meet
you
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Orientation
• Various parts of the hand (palm, fingertips) can be
oriented differently.
• Up or down
• In or out
• Ipsilateral (right hand faces right) or
• Contralateral (right hand faces left).
• Analogously for left hand
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Parameters combination
• Hand configuration
▫ 19 values
• Place of articulation
▫ 12 values
• Movement
▫ 24 values
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Facial features
• Head movement or tilt and facial expression

"It's you?!?! I wouldn't have thought that

it would be you! I'm surprised by that."
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Question? "WH" question facial expression:

"eyebrows down.” WHO and WHERE
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1. Finish
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2. Knock it off!
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3. "Aw, go on, you're teasing me!" , "I'm not falling for that--
you silly!"

Source: lifeprint.com
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Other non-manual gestures

• The sign NOT YET is made with the mouth open
and the tongue slightly out. The sign is similar to
the sign for late
• The sign OVER is made with the lips protruded
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Late

Not
yet
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Phonetic Inventories
• Dragon shape of TSL is not available in the
inventory of ASL and conversely, the T shape of
ASL (sign for letter T) is not available in TSL.
• The elbow is an active articulator in TSL but not in
ASL
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Phonology of Sign - Assimilation of signs

Name vs. Know,

how might we sign,
I know you, I’m
named etc.
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One- & Two-handed signs

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Phonotactics: Constraints on 2-handed signs

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Type 1
Two hands same shape; Both hands move
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Type 2

• Two hands
same shape;
One hand
moves.
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Type 3

• Two hands
different
shapes; One
hand moves
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Type 4
• Two hands different shapes; both hands move
• This is not permitted in ASL
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Other syllable constraints

If there is a handshape change in the sign and also a movement
component, the handshape must change during the movement;
the sign is ungrammatical otherwise (not articulatorily difficult –
example, like)

• The speaker uses the dominant hand

(right or left always) and never switches.
• Also the non-dominant hand can only do a
small range of things: symmetrical movement;
stationary while dominant hand moves;
if both hands move, then non-dominant hand
bears the same shape and orientation
as the dominant hand.
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So far
• Signs – arbitrary meanings
• Signs – composite of features along four
parameters (each meaningless)
• Inventory of such features is language specific
• One handed and two-handed signs – constraints
on how two-handed signs are configured
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Morphology - Inflection
• Negation – a rapid turning over of the hand –
reverses the orientation of the hand in the root
word; exact form varies (similar to in-, im-, ir-, il-
etc.)
• Like:
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Like – Don’t like

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Want-Don’t want
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Know-don’t know
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Inflecting for subjects and objects - I give

you
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• You give me
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Me give him
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• ??
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Help
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I help you
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You help me
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??
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Other verbal inflections - aspect

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Aspect, inflections

Hurry: Increased
speed, reduced
signing space
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Derivation, verbs to nouns

Movement
makes the
derivational
difference
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Related verb-noun pairs

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Compounding
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GIRL, SAME AND SISTER

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BOY, SAME, BROTHER

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MOTHER, FATHER, PARENTS

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JESUS, BOOK, BIBLE

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LOOK, STRONG, RESEMBLE

 Modalities of Production
Speech Signing

One articulator (Vocal tract) Two articulators (hands), plus

face/body
Asymmetric Mirror-image symmetric

Invisible to addressee Visible to addressee

Invisible to speaker Generally visible to signer

Breathing, vocalization, pitch, Gesture area, size of space,

timbre, pausing, silence rhythmic structures, pausing,
78 silence
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Evidence about Production

• Production is harder to study than comprehension
• Much of what we know about production comes from Speech
Errors
▫ Slips of the Tongue, Hand, "Freudian" slips
• Errors are
▫ not random - they're systematic
▫ only some of all the possible kinds of errors actually happen
▫ and some types of errors are much commoner than others
Error patterns provide us clues about the system and how it
works
Some Things Errors Tell Us
That toy sure makes a great mouse.
That toy sure makes a great mouse.
That mouse sure makes a great toy.
• We sometimes say a word too early (= Anticipation)
▫ So, the word must be “in mind” & “ready” to say well
ahead of its time
▫ Planning: This is what allows us to speak fluently much
of the time
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How far ahead is this plan?

• Sometimes not far enough!
▫ Your mouth catches up to the end of what you have planned
▫ You pause or stumble if you start to say a word before it's "ready”
 Pauses, filled pauses, & dysfluencies more likely before harder-
to-retrieve words
 Listeners know this & make predictions based on it
▫ Occasionally start wemto say a word before fully deciding
between options
 The drug laws have gotten much stuffer ... I mean, tougher
(stiffer).
 It’s a parial … a parallel process (serial)
• What else does That toy sure makes a great mouse show?
▫ We sometimes say a word later than intended
▫ Perseveration errors
Especially if:
▫ The word that should go in that position is already "used up"
& a word that was supposed to go earlier is still "available“
▫ Exchange errors
• Some more errors:
▫ Work is the curse of the drinking class.
▫ Freud made a Fordian slip.
▫ Imagine getting your model renosed.
• So, parts of words can slip. What kinds of parts?
• Morphemes, usually
• And some more errors:
▫ With this wing I thee red.
▫ Children sure can wreck your knife light.
• So, individual phonemes can slip
• Are all kinds of sounds equally likely to slip? No.
▫ The single most common kind of slip is the exchange of first
consonant or consonant cluster of 2 words – onset switch
 We're supposed to get flow snurries today.
▫ Spoonerism
 You’ve tasted the whole worm.
 May I sow you to a sheat?
▫ Errors on vowels/nuclei (burst of beaden) & final
consonants/coda (knife light) much rarer
Some More Types of Errors
Target Outcome
Addition: impossible > implossible
Deletion: processing > prossing
Shift: It sure runs out fast. > It sure run outs fast.
Strand: Drink is the curse of > Work is the curse of
(+Exchange) the working class. the drinking class.
Substitution: Liszt's Second > Liszt's Second
Hungarian Rhapsody Hungarian restaurant
Malapropism (= amusing whole-word substitution)
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W (Dubya in action)
• A tax cut is really one of the anecdotes to coming
out of an economic illness
• I'm a person who recognizes the fallacy of
humans.
• We need to change that attitude about how
prolific we can be with the people's money
• [The Space Shuttle] Columbia carried in its payroll
classroom experiments from some of our students
in America.
Error types
• Errors occur on many linguistic units, but some units are much
more "slippable"
• Out of all Errors:
▫ 35% = single phonemes (usually consonants)
▫ 33% = whole words
▫ 17% = morphemes
▫ 5% = consonant clusters
• And some types of errors don't happen on all kinds of units
▫ Shifts & Strands happen only with Function Morphemes
▫ But all other errors are far more common on Content
Morphemes
• These patterns provide clues about how production works

Rev Spooner at work
fighting a liar
you hissed my mystery lecture
cattle ships and bruisers
nosey little cook
a blushing crow
tons of soil
our queer old Dean
we'll have the hags flung out
you've tasted two worms
our shoving leopard
a half-warmed fish
is the bean dizzy?
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lighting a fire
you missed my history lecture
battle ships and cruisers
cosy little nook
a crushing blow
sons of toil
our dear old Queen
we'll have the flags hung out
you've wasted two terms
our loving shepherd
a half-formed wish
is the Dean busy?
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Slips of the hand

• 131 signing errors
77 from videotapes of conversational narrative
signing
54 from reported observations from researchers
98 were judged by the signers themselves as being
deviant from the intended signs (immediate self-
correction 43 or later reported during review 55)
Not articulatory assimilation or lapses in muscle
control or individual mannerisms
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 Modalities of Perception
Speech
Ears - auditory
Omni-directional
Speech concentrated in certain
frequencies of human hearing
Distance limits? Barriers? Noise?
Darkness?
Speaker’s voice competes with
addressee’s voice
Signing
Eyes - visual (& tactile?)
Subscribed visual angle
Foveal vs. peripheral vision;
cones and rods
Distance limits? Barriers? Noise?
Darkness?
Signer and addressee can
overlap without apparent
conflict
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What is signing?
Signing is
• A mode of producing and perceiving specific primary
human languages, ASL ≠BSL; ASL ≠ LSF
• Different sign languages are not mutually intelligible to
native signers
• Not transparent to non-signers, but perhaps more
obviously iconic than (most) spoken languages
• Capable of all expression available to other modes of
human language
• Meets the duality of patterning criterion for human
languages
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Sign writing
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Idioms
• TRAIN GONE = missed opportunity to know what is being talked
about
• CIGARETTE GONE = missed opportunity to know what is being
talked about. Note, this is a clever twist on the "train gone" idiom
since some people say, TRAIN BACK! But you can't bring back a
smoked cigarette.
• FINISH TOUCH = been there
• FISH = "I am done. It is over." This is a pun / idiom based on the
fact that many deaf when doing the sign for "FINISH" make a
mouth movement that looks as if they were saying the word
"fish.“
• BASEMENT = Stayed home, didn't go out.
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Poetry