DIFFERENCES BETWEEN AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE (ASL) AND BRITISH SIGN LANGUAGE (BSL)

Abstract

Abstract In the communication of deaf people between themselves and hearing people there are three basic aspects of interaction: gesture, finger signs and writing. The gesture is a conditionally agreed manner of communication with the help of the hands followed by face and body mimic. The gesture and the movements pre-exist the speech and they had the purpose to mark something, and later to emphasize the speech expression. Stokoe was the first linguist that realised that the signs are not a whole that can not be analysed. He analysed signs in insignificant parts that he called chemeres, and many linguists today call them phonemes. He created three main phoneme categories: hand position, location and movement. Sign languages as spoken languages have background from the distant past. They developed parallel with the development of spoken language and undertook many historical changes. Therefore, today they do not represent a replacement of the spoken language, but are languages themselves in the real sense of the word. Although the structures of the English language used in USA and in Great Britain is the same, still their sign languages-ASL and BSL are different. Key words: communication, gesture, ASL, BSL, sign language, speech (ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.) Introduction In the communication of deaf people between themselves and hearing people there are three basic aspects of interaction: gesture, finger signs and writing (1). The gesture is a conditionally agreed manner of communication with the help of the hands followed by face and body mimic. The finger sign or dactilema is an arbitrary agreed position of the right hand fingers with which, a certain letter of the alphabet is denoted. Writing is a universal action for understanding between the educated people. The emergency of the gesture is unknown, as it is unknown when the speech emerged. All the theories that explain the emergency of the gesture, insist to connect speech and gesture either by supporting the sounds in the nature either by imitation of the movements in the nature. In either way, the gesture and the movements pre-exist the speech and they had the purpose to mark something, and later to emphasize the speech expression. But, the gestures can have an independent meaning, actually within the culture of deaf people they consist the system of conditionally agreed movements that is called sign language. Characteristics of the gesture * The signs are momentous and therefore made quick. But they can be described, recorded, drawn and then multiplied; * The gesture represents the essence of the word, for example father-mustache; * He is characterized with distinctive appearance, imitation of the work, for example house-roof, tailor-sewing; * The gesture is accompanied with face and body mimic; * The abstract words are narrowed down to concrete content, for example the gesture for the term god, is made by raising the pointing finger up; * The gestures are not differentiated, that means that one gesture can mark more terms, for example stamp-insurance decision, solution; * There are gestures that can not be understood when they are isolated, but only in a continuous line with other gestures; * The gestures have individual jargon and are distinctive from one area to the next; * The gestures as the words can be developed, perfected; * They are easily remembered and learned fast; * The gestures do not cause optical tiredness as it is the case with visual perception of the speech from the mouth; * The gesture can not be understood on a great difference, as it is a case with the sound and speech; * The gestures are different by sort and form and their understanding and use is dependant on the degree of education of the deaf person; * Because of their non differentiation if they are not followed by speech, they can lead to misunderstanding of what is said. …