AquaBlue

Whys is that one particular word has different signs? For example I own many books, videos and DVDs on the subject of ASL and sometimes I find a word that illustrates the sign while another dictionary shows a totally different one. How do I know which is the most commonly used sign between the two (sometime three) signs?

Thank you.

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Chase

AB, ASL is no different than any other language on earth. They all have different words to say the same thing.

While ASL isn't based on English grammar, its signs are based on English words, and the history of English has causes it to assimilate many languages until it has more words than any other tongue on earth.

Until fairly recently, deaf people were more or less isolated into smaller groups, and those groups develop their own styles of sign, just like folks in Tea Neck, New Jersey, develop their own speech patterns which are different from people in Bastrop, Louisiana, which are different from those in Spokane, Washingtin.

I hope this helps answer some of your concerns.

AquaBlue

So different regions have different signs?

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Chase

It's not that simple. Some signs may be different, some may not. A deaf person across town from me may use a different sign to ask to use a washroom. He may sign "toilet" while I sign "restroom."

I felt the same frustration you feel when I was learning German. Spelling was wonderful, but all the many genative and dative cases in grammar nearly drove me crazy, because English rarely uses them. I wanted it to be simple, damn it!

Languages really resist neat pigeon holes.

AquaBlue

Got it. Thanks!

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AquaBlue

By the way, how do you sign the word Internet? I can't find that sign anywhere too.

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Byrdie714

Yes. There sre some regional signs. You can say that ASL has a dialect just like spoken English.

I think it's cool that there are many signs for one word like....Happy Birthday!

Chase

My sister (who knows everything, just ask her) says one way to sign "internet" is open hands in front of you touching middle fingers several times while moving hands in a horizontal circle.

Reba

The hand shapes are positioned like signing "CONTACT" but the movement is different. Instead of touching the two middle fingertips together, alternate them back forth. Indicates the information going back and forth.

Reba

That's similar to our sign in SC. The movement is just a little different. We use the back and forth direction for "INTERNET". We use the circular movement for "NETWORK", that is, many different people (or computers) interconnected.

Reba

Right. It's not just regional differences but also differences in register, age, sex, and race. Same differences in language that hearing people experience with their spoken languages!

dcraker

Hi, I felt that I wanted to say something about the different ways of signing one word.

I see that alot too, some is about location of where you learned it like some of the previous post already implies. But I also believe that sometimes it depends on the enunciation, much like how hearing people may change the way the speak on specific words, sometimes they are doing it to elaborate something or another.

One reason that I learned of why signs are so varied for something, is because it is not NATIONALLY TELEVISED. My GrandFather-in-law, had mentioned back in the days well before Television, that when you travel from one town to another or a different state, then you would hear variations of the same word.

I think that is what we face here.

Since we already have network channels dedicated to Black people, Bible folks, Music folks, Rappers, Spanish and all that.

Why don't we have an ALL DEAF channel, they can have Open-Caption on it. I guess it would be funny to be telling the person sitting next to you to turn up the sound. But I digress.

Well, that's my two cents. And of course it is my First Post.

AquaBlue

All that information is vital and very interesting. Thank you.

Welcome to the forum dcraker!

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jasin

Some are synonyms and some are variants. You see, this is what happens when you try an learn asl out of books and not from the deaf or with an instructor. By the way, local signs are signs that typically are signed only locally and you never see them in dictionaries. They are valid and a part of the language but they are signs for things locally. Like for example, the city I live in, the sign for that, a deaf person in another state would not know the sign for it. Its a small city I live in and the sign represents something only familar to people who reside in the town or have resided in the town.

Anij

Have you seen the ASL story based on the different ways to sign the english "run" it's awesome ... I can't remember how it goes, but I think there's somewhere between 8-12 different ASL signs for the english "run"

AquaBlue

wow!

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Ariakkas

there is also context.


I "love" you

i "love" the mets

I "love" dogs

are all signed different because they have different meanings.

VamPyroX

Some words have multiple signs to express the level of that word.

For instance, the word laugh has a few... to represent a small chuckle, a giggle, a laugh, a louder laugh, and a hilarious 'LOL' laugh.

The same goes for multiple words for one sign. That's where the problem sometimes happens because some deaf people who are vocabulary-limited will misunderstand one sign for another. I've had to help a few people with that. One guy knew grammar enough to know when a sign didn't make sense. So, he would ask me... "Hey, someone said... 'Blah blah blah BLAH blah blah.' When he said that 'BLAH', I know it as this word but it doesn't make sense in that sentence. What does that sign also mean?"

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deafskeptic

Here's another example - the signs for accident. I know two signs for it and I will use either one of them depending on the context. If I hear a horrific car crash just outside my apt, I will use this sign that uses two thumbs up and fists and then bring together both fists and hit them..

Now if I were to try to reach up to the dish in my self and as I strain to get the dish, I knock it off the shelf and it fell and broke, I'd use this sign that has four fingers together and thumb extended and then slide my hand past my mouth and along my jaw and say Opps that was a accident. I didn't mean to break it.

I remember once a dad who is Deaf (whole family is Deaf) and he showed me how the family signed porch. His daugther just fingerspelled porch while mom signed porch with a bent letter v and moved it from wrist to elbow. Dad signed it in the reverse. I found that very interesting I'm a sucker for anything that's language related.

It's like how hearing pronounce words.. For example, my little sister pronouces the word yeah this way: yeh? My great aunts would pronounce it this way: Yee-aah? So do I. My mother just says yes.

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Anij

Yeah ... sometimes the multiple ways are due to a difference in meaning:

Run (run to the store, run in a stocking, run slang for intestinal issue, run as in election, run as in water, run as in jog ...)

fall ( fall down/fall in love, fall for, fall aka autumn)

and then there's just variation in language ... due to subtle meaning shifts ...
the way we sign "love" (4 ways that I can think of)
or "Friend" (depending on how close they are)

and then casual variation
I happen to know 4 signs for battery , 2 for office, 2 for lunch & dinner, 2 for deaf ( the usual way, and the way IKJ signs it) etc

sometimes the variations are loaded (signed differently for a purpose) such as RUN, LOVE, FALL, etc.

and sometimes random - I sign lunch EAT+NOON , or "L" tapping my mouth area 2x - one is canadian, the other is what I learned in the USA - there's no reason I switch back an forth, I just do

Buffalo

Aren't you surprise that we do have regional signs just like the hearing people do have regional accents? I can count about 5 different signs for 'early'.

I remember a lady who visited my school and ask the students what we prefer to see on the tv 1) captions or 2) interpreter that is in the inset of the tv screen. We all voted for captions because of that regional signs (and we need to improve our English).

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AquaBlue

A regional sign (word) is not the same as a regional accent. They are two different things. A word (sign or not) is not equal to an accent (a sound).

Five different signs for early...that's crazy.

Maybe Costello should produce separate dictionaries: one per region. Or at least have websites (like ASLPro or ASL Browser) that do the same thing. And if I may be blunt, having different signs per region is not logical because it only brings confusion to the singer(s). What if an Interpreter had to do his/her duty with two folks from different regions. He/she would have to adjust to cater to each person's known signs. That's nuts.

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Buffalo

I came up with the 'regional sign' because it is the best words I can think of. Do you have a better word(s) for my 'regional sign'?? Regional accent had to do with the way a hearing person said the word so why not regional sign for the way a Deaf person sign the word?

The interpreter would use the locally signs. The deaf person who move to the new place is going to have to learn the local signs fast. I have done that myself when I moved. Hey - hearing people do have trouble understanding the accent from elsewhere like the southern accent. If the southern accent is real bad, I have a very hard time understanding that person.

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Phillips

Also I always watch My Interpreter's read lip with signs!

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Anij

Here's my take on sign variants (regional signs etc) meaning multiple signs for a single gloss meaning.

I think we sometimes thing of variation as a bad thing ... ASL students certainly seem overwhelmed - but actually it's a really GOOD thing. It's a sign that ASL is alive and well ... that it's growing and maturing naturally as a language.

Before people were able to travel around as easily or communicate across wide areas (video phone etc) ASL (as with all languages who develop in semi-isolation) was much more regionalised, as new words were needed ( for technology etc) the local group came up with a sign... used it, accepted it, but was aware that it would be regional.

As the ASL community has become more "North American" individually we're exposed to more regional signed because people travel around more - there's the internet and video phone ... we "see" more differences in our language than we had in the past.

Within Canada there are at least 4 "regions" for Sign - within these there are regional variants because they draw from different historical sign languages ... ASL, LSQ, LSF, BSL etc. because of that we see different signs for things like "OFFICE" or "HOSPITAL" - however theres something interesting that happens as well ... as we interact with the regions sometimes a preference for a sign is found (4 sign choices, becomes 1) ...

It's kind of like when the Canadian $2bill was replaced with a coin ... at first the new coin had many different (spoken, not signed) names "twoonie","toonie","bearback","duece""doub-loon","two-piece" etc ... but with usage we came to call it a "toonie" ... the regional wording because national.

Anyways ... as the North American ASL community continues to mature, we see more continuity - it happens naturally as we see and adopt ASL knowledge from various Schools (Def schools, Colleges etc) as well as Coastal differences, and even Ethnic variations (we see this happen with country and state/city signs too). There used to be a million different signs for "email" (I still fingerspell it, but I'm not the "norm") ... but through usage we see more standardization now.

Now all that being said - regionalization can be frustrating ( just like in english ... is it a shopping cart, a buggy, a trolly, a cart, a pushcart? and ALL those are just in the USA) but I always smile when I see the regional signs ... it shows that we're growing ... that ASL is developing in a natural, healthy way - and THAT is a wonderful thing to see !!!

P.S. just to add an odd personal quirk into the mix ... I sign birthday as "BORN+DAY" except if I only have one hand free ( usually due to holding cake, soda etc while signing happy birthday) If I only have one had free I flip to the birthday sign that starts like "FAVORITE" ~ no real reason other than it's more suited to single handed signing ... LOL

Etoile

There most certainly are accents in ASL. Just about every feature of a spoken language is also present in ASL. While I agree with you that word choice does not mean an accent, that doesn't mean ASL signers don't have accents. Instead of the spoken English accent meaning the sounds you make when speaking, it is the ASL accent meaning the movements you make when signing. A southern drawl means sounds are drawn out, right? Well, some people might sign more slowly, or with a certain looseness, etc. Don't let your beliefs about spoken language (which is made from sounds) color your beliefs about visual language (which is made from movements) - they are still languages.
Not really...how about this?

You can call it soda, pop, cola, co-cola, coke...that's at least five words for an English concept too.
I am a VRS interpreter, so I work with people from around the United States every day. Sometimes I have to ask for clarification. It's not that big a deal. Nobody "created" sign language, so it's not "logical" - it's evolved the way all languages evolved. There are certainly many illogical things about English; why do we say "He ran to the store" instead of "He runned to the store?" It's just