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Sign languages are languages that use the visual-manual modality to convey meaning, instead of spoken words. Sign languages are expressed through manual articulation in combination with non-manual markers. Sign languages are full-fledged natural languages with their own grammar and lexicon. Sign languages are not universal and are usually not mutually intelligible, although there are also similarities among different sign languages.
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Nicaraguan Sign Language is a form of sign language which developed spontaneously among deaf children in a number of schools in Nicaragua in the 1980s. It is of particular interest to linguists as it offers them a unique opportunity to study what they believe to be the birth of a new language.
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The recorded history of sign language in Western societies starts in the 17th century, as a visual language or method of communication, although references to forms of communication using hand gestures date back as far as 5th century BC Greece. Sign language is composed of a system of conventional gestures, mimic, hand signs and finger spelling, plus the use of hand positions to represent the letters of the alphabet. Signs can also represent complete ideas or phrases, not only individual words.
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Ka'apor Sign Language is a village sign language used by the small community of Ka'apor people in the Brazilian state of Maranhão. Linguist Jim Kakumasu observed in 1968 that the number of deaf people in the community was 7 out of a population of about 500. This relatively high ratio of deafness led to both hearing and deaf members of the community using the language, and most hearing children grow up bilingual in the spoken and signed languages. The current state of the language is unknown. Other Indigenous tribes in the region have also been reported to use sign languages, and to communicate between themselves using sign language pidgins.
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References
- ↑ Adamorobe Sign Language at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- ↑ Nyst, Victoria; Baker, Anne (2003). "The phonology of name signs: a comparison between the sign languages of Uganda, Mali, Adamorobe and The Netherlands". In Baker, Anne; van den Bogaerde, Beppie; Crasborn, Otto (eds.). Cross-linguistic perspectives in sign language research: Selected papers from TISLR 2000. Hamburg: Signum. pp. 71–80.
- ↑ Nyst, Victoria (2004). Verb series of non-agentive motion in Adamorobe Sign Language (Ghana). Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research 8, University of Barcelona, 1 October 2004.
- ↑ Kusters, Annelies (2012). ""The Gong Gong Was Beaten"—Adamorobe: A "Deaf Village" in Ghana and its Marriage Prohibition for Deaf Partners". Sustainability. 4 (12): 2765–2784. doi: 10.3390/su4102765 .
- ↑ Kusters, Annelies (April 2014). "Language ideologies in the shared signing community of Adamorobe". Language in Society. 43 (2): 139–158. doi:10.1017/S0047404514000013. ProQuest 1510382407.
- ↑ Nancy Frishberg (1987). Ghanaian Sign Language. In: Cleve, J. Van (ed.) Gallaudet encyclopaedia of deaf people and deafness. New York: McGraw-Gill Book Company.
