SOCIOLINGUISTIC VARIATION IN AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE.Ceil Lucas, Robert Bayley, and Clayton Valli. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press, 2001. Pp. xviii + 238. $55.00 cloth.

2002 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 641-642 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy Reagan
Keyword(s):  
American Sign Language ◽  
Sign Language ◽  
Kansas City ◽  
Language Variation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Washington Dc ◽  
American Sign ◽  
Sociolinguistic Variation ◽  
Comprehensive Description ◽  
Gallaudet University

This is the seventh volume in the highly acclaimed “Sociolinguistics in Deaf Communities” series published by Gallaudet University Press. This volume is the first major attempt to document and analyze linguistic variation in American Sign Language (ASL). Based on seven years of research spread across the United States, including data collected from seven sites (Staunton, VA; Frederick, MD; Boston, MA; New Orleans, LA; Fremont, CA; Olathe, KS, and Kansas City, MO, together; and Bellingham, WA), Sociolinguistic variation in American Sign Language is a major contribution to the growing literature on the linguistics and sociolinguistics of ASL. It seeks to “provide a comprehensive description of the variables and constraints at work in sign language variation” (p. xv), building on the existing linguistic literature dealing with ASL. It succeeds admirably, if not in providing the final word on these complex issues, then by offering not only fascinating insights into sign language variation but also an empirical database that is unmatched in its depth and breadth in the field.

STORYTELLING AND CONVERSATION: DISCOURSE IN DEAF COMMUNITIES.Elizabeth Winston (Ed.). Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press, 1999. Pp. x + 240. $55.00 cloth.

2001 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 566-567
Author(s):  
Christine Monikowski
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
American Sign Language ◽  
Sign Language ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Washington Dc ◽  
American Sign ◽  
Sign Languages ◽  
Discourse Patterns ◽  
Gallaudet University

In this latest volume of the Sociolinguistics in Deaf Communities Series, Winston has included not only discourse analysis of American Sign Language (ASL) but also of sign languages native to Bali, Italy, and England. She offers a fascinating look at the “intricate discourse patterns that have evolved in different languages” (p. ix). Her work should be required reading for all teachers of sign language as well as teachers of interpreters. This book will also appeal to sociolinguists; language use in the community is clearly the overriding theme.

Ceil Lucas, Robert Bayley, & Clayton Valli, in collaboration with Mary Rose, Alyssa Wulf, Paul Dudis, Susan Schatz, & Laura Sanheim, Sociolinguistic variation in American Sign Language. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press, 2001. Pp. xvii, 237, appendices, index. Hb $55.00.

2002 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 128-131
Author(s):  
Richard J. Senghas
Keyword(s):  
American Sign Language ◽  
Sign Language ◽  
Mexican Descent ◽  
Washington Dc ◽  
American Sign ◽  
Phonological Variation ◽  
Sociolinguistic Variation ◽  
Extensive Experience ◽  
The One ◽  
Unexpected Findings

Sociolinguistic variation in American Sign Language is the successful result of applying sociolinguistic theory and methodology originally developed for spoken languages to American Sign Language (ASL). The product of several years of study conducted by a team of researchers, this book is more than just an exercise; both expected and unexpected findings are presented, thereby confirming and advancing the sociolinguistics of signed languages in particular and of language in general. Lucas and Valli bring to this work extensive experience with sign language linguistics; they are joined by Bayley, who is known for his work on Tejano English and Spanish variation among immigrants of Mexican descent. The statistical findings provide the necessary bridge between context and environment, on the one hand, and internal constraints, on the other, to explain the range of variation represented at phonological, syntactic, and lexical levels in ASL. Explicitly building on Weinrich, Labov & Herzog's notion of orderly heterogeneity (14, 193–94; cf. Weinrich, Labov & Herzog 1968), the book provides useful examples and analysis for sign language linguists, and it would do well as a source for graduate and advanced undergraduate courses where materials beyond a primer of sociolinguistics are needed. For those more established in the field, the authors respectfully (and graciously) challenge several frequently cited findings concerning variation in ASL, such as Woodward & DeSantis' (1977) claims about negative incorporation and Liddell & Johnson's (1989) explanations for phonological variation in forms of the sign deaf.

Discovering sign language

2019 ◽  
pp. 81-90
Author(s):  
François Grosjean
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
American Sign Language ◽  
Sign Language ◽  
Research Program ◽  
Deaf Child ◽  
The United States ◽  
American Sign ◽  
The World ◽  
Set Up ◽  
The Right

The author discovered American Sign Language (ASL) and the world of the deaf whilst in the United States. He helped set up a research program in the psycholinguistics of ASL and describes a few studies he did. He also edited, with Harlan Lane, a special issue of Langages on sign language, for French colleagues. The author then worked on the bilingualism and biculturalism of the deaf, and authored a text on the right of the deaf child to become bilingual. It has been translated into 30 different languages and is known the world over.

LEARNING TO SEE: TEACHING AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE AS A SECOND LANGUAGE (2nd ed.).Sherman Wilcox and Phyllis Perrin Wilcox. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press, 1997. Pp. x + 145. $19.95 cloth.

1998 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 124-125
Author(s):  
Timothy Reagan
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
American Sign Language ◽  
Sign Language ◽  
Communicative Competence ◽  
Washington Dc ◽  
American Sign ◽  
Language Structure ◽  
University Level

American Sign Language (ASL), both as the focus of scholarly study and as an increasingly popular foreign-language option for many secondary and university level students, has made remarkable strides during recent years. With respect to the linguistics of ASL, there has been a veritable revolution in our understanding of the nature, structure, and complexity of the language since the publication of William Stokoe's landmark Sign Language Structure in 1960. Works on both theoretical aspects of the linguistics of ASL and on the sociolinguistics of the Deaf community now abound, and the overall quality of such works is impressively high. Also widely available now are textbooks designed to teach ASL as a second language. Such textbooks vary dramatically in quality, ranging from phrasebook and lexical guides to very thorough and up-to-date works focusing on communicative competence in ASL.

Location variation in Hong Kong Sign Language (HKSL)

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wai Yan Rebecca Siu
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Work Environment ◽  
American Sign Language ◽  
Sign Language ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
American Sign ◽  
Sociolinguistic Variation ◽  
Citation Form ◽  
Hong Kong Sign Language ◽  
New Zealand Sign Language

Abstract This paper presents results from a study of sociolinguistic variation in Hong Kong Sign Language (HKSL). Specifically, it reports findings about location variation in a class of signs like know that are produced at/above the signer’s forehead in their citation form, but are sometimes articulated at a lower location in everyday conversation. Eight hundred tokens of target signs from 40 signers were analyzed. As also found in studies of location ‘dropping’ in similar signs in American Sign Language, Australian Sign Language, and New Zealand Sign Language, variation in HKSL correlates with linguistic and social factors in a systematic way (Lucas, Bayley, & Valli, 2001; Schembri, McKee, McKee, Pivac, Johnston, & Goswell, 2009). A comparison of findings across these four languages is presented and discussed. The results of the present study suggest that a set of forehead-located signs that express the names of deaf schools may have affected results due to their salience. The work environment (i.e., sign language related work roles) of participants may also affect ‘careful’ versus lowered production of forehead signs.

Six Types of Waiting in Berlin, 2017

2021 ◽  
Vol 120 (2) ◽  
pp. 279-283
Author(s):  
Christine Sun Kim ◽  
Amanda Cachia
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Health Insurance ◽  
American Sign Language ◽  
Sign Language ◽  
The United States ◽  
Daily Basis ◽  
Grocery Store ◽  
American Sign ◽  
Written Form ◽  
Doctor's Office

In Six Types of Waiting in Berlin, Christine Sun Kim’s drawings provide a fascinating constellation of cultural and sensorial experiences with time. Originally from the United States, the artist shares her account of how time (and waiting) is measured differently according to the cities in which she has lived, with each place having its own advantages and drawbacks. While each environment in which one must tediously wait—an immigration office, the health insurance office, the doctor’s office, the bank, an art supplies shop, and the grocery store—is familiar, the subtext of the drawings is how the artist’s relationship with time is also measured by her style of communication. Kim uses American Sign Language and asks questions in a written form using an iPhone on a daily basis as she goes about her chores. “Crip time” is thus also punctuated by the pauses in writing/scrawling questions, in reading, and the creativity involved in ad-lib responding between deaf and non-deaf sensorial modalities.

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