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The burgeoning of research on signed language during the last two
decades has had a major influence on several disciplines concerned
with mind and language, including linguistics, neuroscience,
cognitive psychology, child language acquisition, sociolinguistics,
bilingualism, and deaf education. The genealogy of this research
can be traced to a remarkable degree to a single pair of scholars,
Ursula Bellugi and Edward Klima, who have conducted their research
on signed language and educated scores of scholars in the field
since the early 1970s.
"The Signs of Language Revisited" has three major objectives:
* presenting the latest findings and theories of leading
scientists in numerous specialties from language acquisition in
children to literacy and deaf people;
* taking stock of the distance scholarship has come in a given
field, where we are now, and where we should be headed; and
* acknowledging and articulating the intellectual debt of the
authors to Bellugi and Klima--in some cases through personal
reminiscences.
Thus, this book is also a document in the sociology and history of
science.
This book brings together papers which address a range of issues
regarding the nature and structure of sign languages and other
gestural systems, and how they exploit the space in which they are
conveyed. The chapters focus on five pertinent areas reflecting
different, but related research topics: * space in language and
gesture, * point of view and referential shift, * morphosyntax of
verbs in ASL, * gestural systems and sign language, and * language
acquisition and gesture. Sign languages and gestural systems are
produced in physical space; they manipulate spatial contrasts for
linguistic and communicative purposes. In addition to exploring the
different functions of space, researchers discuss similarities and
differences between visual-gestural systems -- established sign
languages, pidgin sign language (International Sign), "homesign"
systems developed by deaf children with no sign language input,
novel gesture systems invented by hearing nonsigners, and the
gesticulation that accompanies speech. The development of gesture
and sign language in children is also examined in both hearing and
deaf children, charting the emergence of gesture ("manual
babbling"), its use as a prelinguistic communicative device, and
its transformation into language-like systems in homesigners.
Finally, theoretical linguistic accounts of the structure of sign
languages are provided in chapters dealing with the analysis of
referential shift, the structure of narrative, the analysis of
tense and the structure of the verb phrase in American Sign
Language. Taken together, the chapters in this volume present a
comprehensive picture of sign language and gesture research from a
group of international scholars who investigate a range of
communicative systems from formal sign languages to the
gesticulation that accompanies speech.
Classifier constructions are universal to sign languages and
exhibit unique properties that arise from the nature of the
visual-gestural modality. The major goals are to bring to light
critical issues related to the study of classifier constructions
and to present state-of-the-art linguistic and psycholinguistic
analyses of these constructions. It is hoped that by doing so, more
researchers will be inspired to investigate the nature of
classifier constructions across signed languages and further
explore the unique aspects of these forms. The papers in this
volume discuss the following issues: *how sign language classifiers
differ from spoken languages; *cross-linguistic variation in sign
language classifier systems; *the role of gesture; *the nature of
morpho-syntactic and phonological constraints on classifier
constructions; *the grammaticization process for these forms; and
*the acquisition of classifier forms. Divided into four parts,
groups of papers focus on a particular set of issues, and
commentary papers end each section.
Classifier constructions are universal to sign languages and
exhibit unique properties that arise from the nature of the
visual-gestural modality. The major goals are to bring to light
critical issues related to the study of classifier constructions
and to present state-of-the-art linguistic and psycholinguistic
analyses of these constructions. It is hoped that by doing so, more
researchers will be inspired to investigate the nature of
classifier constructions across signed languages and further
explore the unique aspects of these forms.
The papers in this volume discuss the following issues:
*how sign language classifiers differ from spoken languages;
*cross-linguistic variation in sign language classifier systems;
*the role of gesture;
*the nature of morpho-syntactic and phonological constraints on
classifier constructions;
*the grammaticization process for these forms; and
*the acquisition of classifier forms.
Divided into four parts, groups of papers focus on a particular set
of issues, and commentary papers end each section.
This book brings together papers which address a range of issues
regarding the nature and structure of sign languages and other
gestural systems, and how they exploit the space in which they are
conveyed. The chapters focus on five pertinent areas reflecting
different, but related research topics:
* space in language and gesture,
* point of view and referential shift,
* morphosyntax of verbs in ASL,
* gestural systems and sign language, and
* language acquisition and gesture.
Sign languages and gestural systems are produced in physical
space; they manipulate spatial contrasts for linguistic and
communicative purposes. In addition to exploring the different
functions of space, researchers discuss similarities and
differences between visual-gestural systems -- established sign
languages, pidgin sign language (International Sign), "homesign"
systems developed by deaf children with no sign language input,
novel gesture systems invented by hearing nonsigners, and the
gesticulation that accompanies speech. The development of gesture
and sign language in children is also examined in both hearing and
deaf children, charting the emergence of gesture ("manual
babbling"), its use as a prelinguistic communicative device, and
its transformation into language-like systems in homesigners.
Finally, theoretical linguistic accounts of the structure of sign
languages are provided in chapters dealing with the analysis of
referential shift, the structure of narrative, the analysis of
tense and the structure of the verb phrase in American Sign
Language. Taken together, the chapters in this volume present a
comprehensive picture of sign language and gesture research from a
group of international scholars who investigate a range of
communicative systems from formal sign languages to the
gesticulation that accompanies speech.
The burgeoning of research on signed language during the last two
decades has had a major influence on several disciplines concerned
with mind and language, including linguistics, neuroscience,
cognitive psychology, child language acquisition, sociolinguistics,
bilingualism, and deaf education. The genealogy of this research
can be traced to a remarkable degree to a single pair of scholars,
Ursula Bellugi and Edward Klima, who have conducted their research
on signed language and educated scores of scholars in the field
since the early 1970s. The Signs of Language Revisited has three
major objectives: * presenting the latest findings and theories of
leading scientists in numerous specialties from language
acquisition in children to literacy and deaf people; * taking stock
of the distance scholarship has come in a given field, where we are
now, and where we should be headed; and * acknowledging and
articulating the intellectual debt of the authors to Bellugi and
Klima--in some cases through personal reminiscences. Thus, this
book is also a document in the sociology and history of science.
Once signed languages are recognized as natural human languages, a
world of exploration opens up. Signed languages provide a powerful
tool for investigating the nature of human language and language
processing, the relation between cognition and language, and the
neural organization of language. The value of sign languages lies
in their modality. Specifically, for perception, signed languages
depend upon high-level vision and motion processing systems, and
for production, they require the integration of motor systems
involving the hands and face. These facts raise many questions:
What impact does this different biological base have for
grammatical systems? For online language processing? For the
acquisition of language? How does it affect nonlinguistic cognitive
structures and processing? Are the same neural systems involved?
These are some of the questions that this book aims at addressing.
The answers provide insight into what constrains grammatical form,
language processing, linguistic working memory, and hemispheric
specialization for language. The study of signed languages allows
researchers to address questions about the nature of linguistic and
cognitive systems that otherwise could not be easily
addressed.
Once signed languages are recognized as natural human languages, a
world of exploration opens up. Signed languages provide a powerful
tool for investigating the nature of human language and language
processing, the relation between cognition and language, and the
neural organization of language. The value of sign languages lies
in their modality. Specifically, for perception, signed languages
depend upon high-level vision and motion processing systems, and
for production, they require the integration of motor systems
involving the hands and face. These facts raise many questions:
What impact does this different biological base have for
grammatical systems? For online language processing? For the
acquisition of language? How does it affect nonlinguistic cognitive
structures and processing? Are the same neural systems involved?
These are some of the questions that this book aims at addressing.
The answers provide insight into what constrains grammatical form,
language processing, linguistic working memory, and hemispheric
specialization for language. The study of signed languages allows
researchers to address questions about the nature of linguistic and
cognitive systems that otherwise could not be easily
addressed.
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