Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language Research Articles

The Vulnerability of Emerging Sign Languages: (E)merging Sign Languages?

Emerging sign languages offer linguists an opportunity to observe language emergence in real time, far beyond the capabilities of spoken language studies. Sign languages can emerge in different social circumstances—some in larger heterogeneous communities, while others in smaller and more homogeneous communities. Often, examples of the latter, such as Ban Khor Sign Language (in Thailand), Al Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (in Israel), and Mardin Sign Language (in Turkey), arise in communities with a high incidence of hereditary deafness. Traditionally, these communities were in limited contact with the wider deaf community in the region, and so the local sign language remained relatively uninfluenced by the surrounding signed language(s). Yet, in recent years, changes in education, mobility, and social communication patterns have resulted in increased interaction between sign languages. Rather than undergoing language emergence, these sign languages are now facing a state of “mergence” with the majority sign language used by the wider deaf community. This study focuses on the language contact situation between two sign languages in Kufr Qassem, Israel. In the current situation, third-generation deaf signers in Kufr Qassem are exposed to the local sign language, Kufr Qassem Sign Language (KQSL), and the dominant sign language of the wider Israeli deaf community, Israeli Sign Language (ISL), both of which emerged around 90 years ago. In the current study, we analyzed the signing of twelve deaf sign-bilinguals from Kufr Qassem whilst they engaged in a semi-spontaneous task in three language conditions: (1) with another bilingual signer, (2) with a monolingual KQSL signer, and (3) with a monolingual ISL signer. The results demonstrate that KQSL-ISL sign-bilinguals show a preference for ISL in all conditions, even when paired with a monolingual KQSL signer. We conclude that the degree of language shift in Kufr Qassem is considerable. KQSL may be endangered due to the risk of social and linguistic mergence of the KQSL community with the ISL community in the near future.

Visual foreign accent in an emerging sign language

Abstract In the study of sign language phonology, little attention has been paid to the phonetic detail that distinguishes one sign language from another. We approach this issue by studying the foreign accent of signers of a young sign language – Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL) – which is in contact with another sign language in the region, Israeli Sign Language (ISL). By comparing ISL signs and sentences produced by ABSL signers with those of ISL signers, we uncover language particular features at a level of detail typically overlooked in sign language research. For example, within signs we find reduced occlusion (lack of contact), and across phrases there is frequent long distance spreading of the nondominant hand. This novel study of an emerging language in a language contact environment provides a model for comparative sign language phonology, and suggests that a community’s signature accent is part of the evolution of a phonological system.

Novel compounding and the emergence of structure in two young sign languages

This paper investigates how structure emerges in a young language, focusing on compounding in two young sign languages, Israeli Sign Language (ISL) and Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL). We focus on novel compounds (tokens invented on the spot) to ensure that we are studying a productive process and to avoid issues contingent with lexicalization. We found that both languages make use both of compounding and size-and-shape classifier constructions (SASS-constructions), but ISL and ABSL have conventionalized different structures and the structures they do use are conventionalized to different degrees. We discuss the similarities and differences of those constructions in ISL and ABSL in the context of structure emergence and language evolution.

Emerging linguistic features of Sao Tome and Principe Sign Language

AbstractIn Sao Tome and Principe there are approximately five thousand deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals. Until recently, these people had no language to use among them other than basic home signs used only to communicate with their families. With this communication gap in mind, a project was set up to help them come together in a common space in order to create a dedicated environment for a common sign language to emerge.In less than two years, the first cohort began to sign and to develop a newly emerging sign language – the Sao Tome and Principe Sign Language (LGSTP). Signs were elicited by means of drawings and pictures and recorded from the beginning of the project. The emergent structures of signs in this new language were compared with those reported for other emergent sign languages such as the Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language and the Lengua de Señas de Nicaragua, and several similarities were found at the first stage.In this preliminary study on the emergence of LGSTP, it was observed that, in its first stage, signs are mostly iconic and exhibit a greater involvement of the articulators and a larger signing space when compared with subsequent stages of LGSTP emergence and with other sign languages. Although holistic signs are the prevalent structure, compounding seems to be emerging. At this stage of emergence, OSV seems to be the predominant syntactic structure of LGSTP. Yet the data suggest that new signers exhibit difficulties in syntactic constructions with two arguments.

Of the body and the hands: patterned iconicity for semantic categories

abstractThis paper examines how gesturers and signers use their bodies to express concepts such as instrumentality and humanness. Comparing across eight sign languages (American, Japanese, German, Israeli, and Kenyan Sign Languages, Ha Noi Sign Language of Vietnam, Central Taurus Sign Language of Turkey, and Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language of Israel) and the gestures of American non-signers, we find recurring patterns for naming entities in three semantic categories (tools, animals, and fruits & vegetables). These recurring patterns are captured in a classification system that identifies iconic strategies based on how the body is used together with the hands. Across all groups, tools are named withmanipulationforms, where the head and torso represent those of a human agent. Animals tend to be identified withpersonificationforms, where the body serves as a map for a comparable non-human body. Fruits & vegetables tend to be identified withobjectforms, where the hands act independently from the rest of the body to represent static features of the referent. We argue that these iconic patterns are rooted in using the body for communication, and provide a basis for understanding how meaningful communication emerges quickly in gesture and persists in emergent and established sign languages.

Reactive effort as a factor that shapes sign language lexicons

Many properties of languages, including sign languages, are not uniformly distributed among items in the lexicon. Some of this nonuniformity can be accounted for by appeal to articulatory ease, with easier articulations being overrepresented in the lexicon in comparison to more difficult articulations. The literature on ease of articulation deals only with the active effort internal to the articulation itself. We note the existence of a previously unstudied aspect of articulatory ease, which we call reactive effort: the effort of resisting incidental movement that has been induced by an articulation elsewhere in the body. For example, reactive effort is needed to resist incidental twisting and rocking of the torso induced by path movement of the manual articulators in sign languages. We argue that, as part of a general linguistic drive to reduce articulatory effort, reactive effort should have a significant effect on the relative frequency in the lexicon of certain types of path movements. We support this argument with evidence from Italian Sign Language, Sri Lankan Sign Language, and Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language, evidence that cannot be explained solely by appeal to constraints on bimanual coordination. As the first exploration of the linguistic role of reactive effort, this work contributes not only to the developing field of sign language phonetics, but also to our understanding of phonetics in general, adding to a growing body of functionalist literature showing that some linguistic patterns emerge from more fundamental factors of the physical world.

The emergence of the phonetic and phonological features in sign language

Sign languages offer a unique and informative perspective on the question of the origin of phonological and phonetic features. Here I review research showing that signs are comprised of distinctive features which can be discretely listed and which are organized hierarchically. In these ways sign language feature systems are comparable to those of spoken language. However, the inventory of features and aspects of their organization, while similar across sign languages, are completely unlike those of spoken languages, calling into question claims about innateness of features for either modality. Studies of a young village sign language, Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL), demonstrate that phonological structuring is not in evidence at the outset, but rather self-organizes gradually (Sandler et al 2011). However, our new research shows that signature phonetic
 features of ABSL already can be detected when ABSL signers use signs from Israeli Sign Language. This ABSL ‘accent’ points to the existence of phonetic features that may not be distinctive in any sign language but can distinguish one sign language from another, even at an early stage in the history of a language. Taken together, the findings suggest that physiological, cognitive, and social factors are at play in the emergence of
 phonetic and phonological features.

The noun–verb distinction in two young sign languages

Many sign languages have semantically related noun-verb pairs, such as ‘hairbrush/brush-hair’, which are similar in form due to iconicity. Researchers studying this phenomenon in sign languages have found that the two are distinguished by subtle differences, for example, in type of movement. Here we investigate two young sign languages, Israeli Sign Language (ISL) and Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL), to determine whether they have developed a reliable distinction in the formation of noun-verb pairs, despite their youth, and, if so, how. These two young language communities differ from each other in terms of heterogeneity within the community, contact with other languages, and size of population. Using methodology we developed for cross-linguistic comparison, we identify reliable formational distinctions between nouns and related verbs in ISL, but not in ABSL, although early tendencies can be discerned. Our results show that a formal distinction in noun-verb pairs in sign languages is not necessarily present from the beginning, but may develop gradually instead. Taken together with comparative analyses of other linguistic phenomena, the results lend support to the hypothesis that certain social factors such as population size, domains of use, and heterogeneity/homogeneity of the community play a role in the emergence of grammar.

Dedicated gestures and the emergence of sign language

Sign languages make use of the two hands, facial features, the head, and the body to produce multifaceted gestures that are dedicated for linguistic functions. In a newly emerging sign language — Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language — the appearance of dedicated gestures in signers of four age groups or strata reveals that recruitment of gesture for language is a gradual process. Starting with only the hands in Stratum I, each additional articulator is recruited to perform grammatical functions as the language matures, resulting in ever increasing grammatical complexity. The emergence of dedicated gesture in a new language provides a novel context for addressing questions about the relationship between the physical transmission system and grammar and about the emergence of linguistic complexity in human language generally.

New perspectives on duality of patterning: Introduction to the special issue.

This special issue assembles a number of papers that present recent work on the nature and the emergence of duality of patterning. Duality of patterning (Hockett 1960) is the property of human language that enables combinatorial structure on two distinct levels: meaningless sounds can be combined into meaningful morphemes and words, which themselves could be combined further. We will refer to recombination at the first level as combinatorial structure, while recombination at the second level will be called compositional structure. According to Hockett (1960), duality of patterning is a design feature of human language (meaning that all human languages have it) while it is also unique to human language. He argued that it evolves when a growing number of meanings need to be expressed, so that combinatorial structure helps to keep signals distinct. More recently similar arguments have been made on the basis of mathematical and computational models (e. g. Nowak et al. 1999; Zuidema and de Boer 2009). Although it seems to be uncontroversial that recombination of meaningful elements (i.e. compositional structure) is needed for an unlimited system, the relation between an unlimited set of signals and recombination of meaningless elements (i.e. combinatorial structure) is less clear. 1.1 Is duality of patterning a design feature? On the one hand, simple combinatorial structure has been found in vocalizations of adult male putty-nosed monkeys with a relatively limited set of signals (Arnold and Zuberbuhler 2006; Yip 2006), indicating that duality may not be uniquely human and that it may occur in systems in which it is not needed to keep signals distinct. On the other hand, there is some evidence that duality of patterning is not required for a human language. Combinatorial structure does not appear to have crystallized in a recently emerging sign language: Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language even though it is a fully expressive language (Sandler et al. 2011). In the ~75 years since its emergence, Al Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL) has come to serve all the communicative functions usually associated with language and has been shown to have compositional structure at the levels of morphology (Meir et al. 2010) and syntax (Sandler et al. 2005; Padden et al. 2010). However, the community has not yet converged on a conventionalized level of meaningless elements, although the beginnings of phonology can be discerned (Sandler et al. 2011). The ABSL findings show that a language without a clearly phonological level of structure is possible. This contrasts with more established sign languages, whose lexical signs are made up of meaningless contrastive units belonging to the categories of handshape, location, and movement.1 While there is a degree of linear organization in the combination of elements in a sign, certain key formational elements combine with one another simultaneously and, as a result, a likely holistic source is often quite transparent. Because sign languages have a strongly iconic base, so that language users needn’t distinguish large sets of purely arbitrary holistic auditory signals, the ABSL researchers suggest that the development of a large vocabulary before holistic gestures are decomposed into a system of meaningless elements might be easier in signed than in spoken languages. However, as Blevins (2012) shows using data from spoken languages, iconicity is not a necessary condition for isomorphism between the two levels of structure to occur frequently in a language, and explanation of the evolution and predominance of dual patterning remains a challenge. We see then from the case of ABSL that the need to express a large set of signals does not necessarily lead to combinatorial structure, while conversely from the animal systems, it appears that combinatorial structure does not necessarily need a very large set of signals to emerge. As combinatorial structure is the main defining characteristic of duality of patterning, it appears that both the status of duality of patterning as a design feature of language and the evolutionary pathways leading to it need to be rethought.

The emergence of duality of patterning: Insights from the laboratory

AbstractThe concept of duality of patterning (henceforth DP) has recently begun to undergo new scrutiny. In particular, the fact that Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL) does not appear to exhibit a layer of meaningless units (Sandler et al. 2011) casts doubt on the universality of DP as a defining feature of natural language. Why, then, do the vast majority of the world's languages exhibit DP? Two hypotheses have been suggested. The first is that DP is a necessary solution to the problem of conveying a large number of meanings; the second is that DP arises as a consequence of conventionalization. We tested these hypotheses in an experimental-semiotics study. Our results supported the hypothesis based on conventionalization but were inconclusive with regard to the hypothesis based on the number of meanings. At the same time, the task of measuring DP in an experimental-semiotics study presented interesting challenges, suggesting that the concept of DP may need some overhauling.

The emergence of complexity in prosody and syntax

The relation between prosody and syntax is investigated here by tracing the emergence of each in a new language, Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language. We analyze the structure of narratives of four signers of this language: two older second generation signers, and two about 15 years younger. We find that younger signers produce prosodic cues to dependency between semantically related constituents, e.g., the two clauses of conditionals, revealing a type and degree of complexity in their language that is not frequent in that of the older pair. In these younger signers, several rhythmic and (facial) intonational cues are aligned at constituent boundaries, indicating the emergence of a grammatical system. There are no overt syntactic markers (such as complementizers) to relate clauses; prosody is the only clue. But this prosodic complexity is matched by syntactic complexity inside propositions in the younger signers, who are more likely to use pronouns as abstract grammatical markers of arguments, and to combine predicates with their arguments within in a constituent. As the prosodic means emerge for identifying constituent types and signaling dependency relations between them, the constituents themselves become increasingly complex. Finally, our study shows that the emergence of grammatical complexity is gradual.

The gradual emergence of phonological form in a new language.

The division of linguistic structure into a meaningless (phonological) level and a meaningful level of morphemes and words is considered a basic design feature of human language. Although established sign languages, like spoken languages, have been shown to be characterized by this bifurcation, no information has been available about the way in which such structure arises. We report here on a newly emerging sign language, Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language, which functions as a full language but in which a phonological level of structure has not yet emerged. Early indications of formal regularities provide clues to the way in which phonological structure may develop over time.

Prosody and Syntax in Sign Languages.

Prosody and Syntax in Sign Languages.

Language is shaped by the body

AbstractSign languages provide direct evidence for the relation between human languages and the body that engenders them. We discuss the use of the hands to create symbols and the role of the body in sign language verb systems, especially in two quite recently developed sign languages, Israeli Sign Language and Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language.

The Roots of Linguistic Organization in a New Language.

It is possible for a language to emerge with no direct linguistic history or outside linguistic influence. Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL) arose about 70 years ago in a small, insular community with a high incidence of profound prelingual neurosensory deafness. In ABSL, we have been able to identify the beginnings of phonology, morphology, syntax, and prosody. The linguistic elements we find in ABSL are not exclusively holistic, nor are they all compositional, but a combination of both. We do not, however, find in ABSL certain features that have been posited as essential even for a proto-language. ABSL has a highly regular syntax as well as word-internal compounding, also highly regular but quite distinct from syntax in its patterns. ABSL, however, has no discernable word-internal structure of the kind observed in more mature sign languages: no spatially organized morphology and no evident duality of phonological patterning.

In the Beginning was the Word

All linguists assume that the meaning of a complex syntactic expression is determined by its structure and the meanings of its constituents. Most believe that the meanings of words are similarly compositionally derived from the meanings of their constituent morphemes. The classical lexicalist hypothesis holds instead that the central basic meaningful constituents of language are not morphemes but lexemes. This article supports that hypothesis with evidence from syntax, lexical semantics, and morphology. Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL) is a new language that is compositional down to its smallest pieces, in which these pieces are lexemes. ABSL shows that a language can emerge very quickly in which lexemes are basic. Next comes evidence against the claim that newly derived words diverge from compositionality only because they are stored in memory. Finally, Hebrew verb roots are shown to have robust morphological properties that bear no relation to meaning and little to phonology, leaving room for morphemes within a lexeme-based framework, but not as the basic meaningful atoms of language.*

The emergence of grammar: Systematic structure in a new language

This report contains a linguistic description of a language created spontaneously without any apparent external influence in a stable existing community. We describe the syntactic structure of Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language, a language that has arisen in the last 70 years in an isolated endogamous community with a high incidence of nonsyndromic, genetically recessive, profound prelingual neurosensory deafness. In the space of one generation from its inception, systematic grammatical structure has emerged in the language. Going beyond a conventionalized list of words for actions, objects, people, characteristics, and so on, a systematic way of marking the grammatical relations among those elements has appeared in the form of highly regular word order. These systematic structures cannot be attributed to influence from other languages, because the particular word orders that appear in Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language differ from those found both in the ambient spoken languages in the community and in the other sign language found predominantly in the surrounding area. Therefore, the emerging grammatical structures should be regarded as an independent development within the language.