American Sign Language (ASL or AMESLAN)

“ It’s not mouth stuff – it’s brain stuff”(Bill Stokoe)

Is sign language the same worldwide?

There are sign language families just as there are spoken language families. In the European Union for example, 23 official spoken languages and 31 sign languages have been documented (Wheatley and Pabsch 2010). The boundaries between spoken languages and those between sign languages do not always coincide.

The 2013 edtition of The Ethnologue –an encyclopedic reference work cataloging all of the world’s 6,909 known living languages - lists just 137 ‘Deaf sign languages’, although there are more known but undocumented sign languages.

However, as the international Deaf community is a highly mobile community, there is also a contact variety of sign called International Sign. This is not a standardised international language but is a form of communication which draws on the context of each situation and the language backgrounds of the people involved in the contact.

Differences between Signed and Spoken Languages

(also applicable to ASL)

Iconicity and arbitrariness Simultaneous and sequential

structure

Similarities between Signed and Spoken Languages

(also applicable to ASL) Duality of patterning Morphology Reciprocity Linguistic productivity Phrase structure

Sign language

A sign language (also signed language or simply signing) is a language which uses manual communication and body language to convey meaning.

Signing is also done by persons whocan hear, but cannot physically speak.

Just as no one can pinpoint the origins of spoken language in prehistory, the roots of sign language remain hidden from view.

What linguists do know is that sign languages have sprung up independently in many different places.

Signing probably began with simple gestures, but then evolved into a true language with structured grammar.

Sign languages generally do not have any linguistic relation to the spoken languages of the lands in which they arise.

Historical timeline 5th century B. C. – one of the earliest

written records of a sign language recorded in Plato’s Cratylus.

Aristotle was the first to have a claim recorded about the deaf. He believed that people can only learn through hearing spoken language. Deaf people were therefore seen as being unable to learn or be educated at all.

Geronimo Cardano – the first scholar who identified that learning does not require hearing (16th century).

1620 – Juan Pablo de Bonet, a Spanish priest, published Reduction of letters and art for teaching mute people to speak in Madrid, considered the first modern treatise of sign language phonetics.

Not until the 1700s, in France, hearing people paid attention to deaf people and their language. Religion was an important factor.

Organized deaf education was non-existent until around 1750.

1750, France – the foundation of the first social and religious association for deaf people by Charles-Michel Abbe de l’Epée, a French Catholic priest.

1755, Paris – the foundation of the first school for deaf children.

1771, France - Charles-Michel Abbe de l’Epée established the first public free deaf school, the National Institute for Deaf-Mutes.

1800s – Laurent Clerc, one of de l’Epée’s school graduates, brought the French signing teaching method to the United States.

1817 - together with Rev. Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, Laurent Clerc create the American School for Deaf, the first permanent school for the deaf in the U. S.

1857 – Thomas Gallaudet’s son, Edward Miner Gallaudet founded a school for the deaf in Washington, D. C., which in 1864 became the National Deaf-Mute College.Now called Gallaudet University, it is the only liberal arts university for deaf people in the world.

Although de l’Epée claimed that sign language is the native language for the deaf, Samuel Heinicke believed in Oralism.

Oralists wanted to stop school from teaching in ASL, then the method of instruction in all schools for the deaf.

None was more fervent than Alexander Graham Bell.

1880, Milan – the International Congress on the Education of the Deaf proscribed the use of sign language in schools.

1960 – William Stokoe, scholar and hearing professor at Gallaudet University, published a dissertation, Sign Language Structure, that proved ASL is a genuine language with a unique syntax and grammar. From this time on, ASL was recognized as a national language.

1995 – Heather Whitestone became the first deaf woman to be named Miss America.

Sign language components Hand gestures Facial expressions (eyebrow motion, lip/mouth

movements) The space surrounding the signer is used to describe

places and people that are not present. In 1960, William Stokoe described signs as

combinations of particular values of what he called “aspects”:

1. the hand configuration of the sign;2. its place of articulation at some point on or near the

signer’s body3. the movement of the sign.

William Stokoe’s definition of sign:

Specific handshape + palm orientation+

movement in a particular location

ASL The pioneers of sign language

linguistics were trying to prove that ASL was a real language and not just a collection of gestures.

“Real languages” theory

ASL vs. BSL American Sign Language

and Irish Sign Language belong to the LSF (langue des signes française) family, which is unrelated to BSL, and BSL and LSF are not mutually intelligible.

Because of the vast territory and little contact between signers, there are today several varieties of ASL in the United States, including one used by southern black signers.

In North America, the same conditions led to the appearance of French Canadian SL, Alaskan Native SL, and Nova Scotia SL.

The BSL family includes BSL, Australian Sign Language and NZ Sign Language. These sign languages are similar enough for people who know any one of them to be able to understand Deaf people who use one of the others.

ASL vs. BSL Emerged from FSL Influence upon other sign

languages, or other regional varieties of ASL.

Thai SL is a mixed language derived from ASL and the native SLs of Bangkok and Chang Mai, and may be considered part of the ASL family.

American Sign Language is used in the USA and in the English-speaking parts of Canada by over a half million people, making it the fourth most widely used non-English language in the U. S.

It is used in Great Britain

It has no resemblance with ASL

ASL vs. BSL BSL and LSF are not mutually

intelligible.

Neither of them resembles with spoken English.

ASL Signs do not correspond to words and

the “phonology” and syntax is spatially organized rather than linear.

Like spoken languages, it includes grammatical categories, however it does not have signs for function words.

References Crystal, David, The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language Stokoe, William, 1960, Sign Language Structure: An Outline

of the Visual Communication Systems of the American Deaf Carroll, David W., Psychology of Language Leach McGuire, Gigi, American Sign Language and the

second language learner: the influence of modality on adult second language acquisition

Durr, D. 1985, The Hands of Time: An Exploration into Some Features of Deixis in American Sign Language.

Wolkomir Richard, 1992, American Sign Language: ’It’s not mouth stuff - it’s brain stuff.’

Wikipedia.com Youtube.com

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