Irish Sign Language Research Articles

Embodied Music: Interpreting Songs and Sounds through Irish Sign Language

Embodied Music: Interpreting Songs and Sounds through Irish Sign Language

The sound of silence: deconstructing notions of inclusion in career guidance on exploring the experience of deaf people

ABSTRACT Learning that “career” was not a definite sign in Irish Sign Language (ISL) and that “Career Guidance” was poorly understood by the Deaf community prompted a systematic literature review (SLR). An uncomfortable truth relating to Career Guidance emerged – “Inclusion” is not where we presume it to be at. This paper presents the results of the SLR and shares how the answers from a thematic analysis can – through a Universal Design (UD), and Universal Design for Learning (UDL) (Rose & Meyer, 2002) lens – guide developments for inclusive Career Guidance. This paper shares the story of “d/Deaf guidance” in the literature; the tensions between theory and practice in relation to inclusion (Quirke, 2022), and the themes identified from the SLR – themes the Deaf community believe are a Deaf gain.

Screens as Anthropomorphic Interfaces: How AI Changes Shakespearean Theatrical Publics

Abstract: Whom does the screen interface serve, and how do artificial intelligence (AI) tools affect theatrical publics across both the playing space and the playgoing space? Screens are a site where cultural and performative meanings are generated and negotiated. This article draws on interface theories to analyze the roles of screens in regulating publics' access to performance, producing new ambient conditions of theatergoing and changing the publics' relationships to themselves and to performance. Screens in All the World's a Screen , an Irish Sign Language production, served and became co-spectating theatrical publics. The organizers encouraged the theatergoing public to use an AI app on their phones, their anthropomorphized "machine guests," to obtain auto-captioning based on pose analysis of the actor and to receive retail suggestions that the AI deemed relevant. Operating both within and beyond the fabula of the performance, screens as anthropomorphic interfaces create multiple theatrical publics through an imperfect spectatorial proxy.

The Sound of Red in Green

In this essay, Lynn Buckle uses an interaction with one of her students to examine the language and image at the intersection of sign language and visual theory. Using Irish Sign Language, her students communicate with her to examine the subjectivity of color and visuals.

A cross-linguistic comparison of reference across five signed languages

Abstract Do signers of different signed languages establish and maintain reference the same way? Here we compare how signers of five Western deaf signed languages coordinate fully conventionalized forms with more richly improvised semiotics to identify and talk about referents of varying agency. The five languages (based on a convenience sample) are Auslan, Irish Sign Language, Finnish Sign Language, Norwegian Sign Language, and Swedish Sign Language. Using ten retellings of Frog, Where Are You? from each language, we analyze tokens of referring expressions with respect to: (a) activation status (new vs. maintained vs. re-introduced); (b) semiotic strategy (e.g., pointing sign, fingerspelling, enactment); and (c) animacy (human vs. animal vs. inanimate object). Statistical analysis reveals many similarities and some differences across the languages. For example, signers of each language typically used conventionalized forms to identify new referents, and less conventional strategies to maintain and reintroduce referents. Differences were mainly observed in relation to the patterning across animacy and activation categories and in the use of fingerspelled words from ambient spoken/written languages. We suggest that doing reference in these signed languages involves both signed language-specific and ecology-specific strategies. The latter may be attributed to the different social and historical trajectories of each language.

Crisis interpreting and Deaf community access in the COVID-19 pandemic

ABSTRACT Scientific and public health knowledge must be communicated efficiently to the public during a health crisis to allow communities to prepare, respond and recover. Public briefings and national campaigns are important components of this communication, and sign language interpreting may be an element of this process. This paper examines the experiences of sign language interpreters during the COVID-19 crisis in Ireland and the UK, and explores their role in providing access to scientific and public health information for the Deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) community. Findings are based on interviews conducted in the first half of 2020 with 16 Irish Sign Language (ISL) or British Sign Language (BSL) interpreters or science communicators, 11 of whom had direct experience of interpreting during COVID-19 briefings. These interviews constitute authentic accounts of sign language interpreters working during a global health crisis. Interviews were qualitatively analysed to discuss how specialised competence and scientific understanding factored into participants' experiences and to derive lessons to inform future crises.

Intelligent Sign Language Recognition System for E-Learning Context

In this research work, an efficient sign language recognition tool for e-learning has been proposed with a new type of feature set based on angle and lines. This feature set has the ability to increase the overall performance of machine learning algorithms in an efficient way. The hand gesture recognition based on these features has been implemented for usage in real-time. The feature set used hand landmarks, which were generated using media-pipe (MediaPipe) and open computer vision (openCV) on each frame of the incoming video. The overall algorithm has been tested on two well-known ASL-alphabet (American Sign Language) and ISL-HS (Irish Sign Language) sign language datasets. Different machine learning classifiers including random forest, decision tree, and naïve Bayesian have been used to classify hand gestures using this unique feature set and their respective results have been compared. Since the random forest classifier performed better, it has been selected as the base classifier for the proposed system. It showed 96.7% accuracy with ISL-HS and 93.7% accuracy with ASL-alphabet dataset using the extracted features.

Sense of Community: The Irish Deaf Community

There is a strong perception among members of the Irish deaf community that the community is in gradual decline, with dwindling traditional bases for producing Irish Sign Language (ISL) users. For instance, enrolments in residential schools for the deaf have been declining steadily, and the numbers involved in social, sports and cultural activities in the community have been falling. Technological advances, consolidation of educational policies for deaf children in mainstream education, and individualisation and increased social mobility have also had an impact on how this community operates. However, there is paltry research on how such changes have affected deaf community cohesion, especially in the Irish context. Therefore, this ongoing research entitled Sense of Community – the Irish Deaf Community, seeks to explore the notion and strength of community belonging amongst the deaf community in Ireland. This project report presents the results of one element of this research, i.e. an online survey study conducted in June 2020. Initial analysis of the results of this survey indicate that ISL is one of the primary bonds holding the Irish deaf community together and that issues that divide the community include trustworthiness, feelings of exclusion, and the notion of leadership.

Twenty-Five Years of Language Policies and Initiatives in Ireland: 1995-2020

Ireland is a multilingual country, home to at least 212 languages, as well as English, the Irish language - the oldest language in Europe still spoken as a vernacular - and our native Irish Sign Language, whose users’ rights have only recently been signed into law. This paper will consider the main issues in language education in Ireland today from primary to third level, together with the economic, geopolitical and cultural forces which influence the ways in which we engage in communication both at home and abroad. Following a brief examination of the history which has led us to this point, it will review a number of European policies which continue to shape the manner in which both Irish and Modern Foreign Languages are learned and taught in present-day Ireland. Finally, it will assess recent policies/strategies and initiatives published by Government, the strengths and weaknesses of language education here today, and propose some measures which could boost our national languages capacity in a world which, despite some impressions to the contrary, continues to be decidedly multilingual.

A commentary on: Reappropriation of Gendered Irish Sign Language in One Family

Barbara LeMaster’s article “Reappropriation of Gendered Irish Sign Language in One Family” in Visual Anthropology Review piqued my interest with its initial sentence: 
 The native vocabularies of one segment of the Dublin deaf community (i.e., primarily women over 70 and men over 55) contain different signs for the majority of common lexical items examined (LeMaster 1990). 
 From this I learned that there existed different female and male signs in Irish Sign Language. This intrigued me and led me to explore further, despite recognizing that I was probably out of my comfort zone. I would be addressing a topic of social history, through my lens of theoretical and empirical aspects of communication design. Curiously, I rejected a more comfortable choice of an article that uses an approach far more familiar to me: research analyzing the covers of introductory texts on cultural anthropology (Hammond et al., 2009). I am therefore acutely aware that the questions I ask about Irish Sign Language not only stem from another discipline, but also introduce different research methods. I also suspect that some of the issues I raise are covered elsewhere, either by LeMaster or by other researchers. This I regard as a positive sign of considerable overlap between our disciplines.
 In the following commentary on LeMaster’s article, I start with a brief account of what I consider to be main themes within the article. This is not a comprehensive summary, but sets the scene for discussion points. I then propose some general differences in approach and emphasis between the disciplines of visual anthropology, as represented in this article, and communication design. Although I have situated myself within a particular sector of communication design (in the introduction), I have nonetheless tried to cover a wider field encompassing design practitioners and historians. From more general topics, I narrow down to specific areas that might inform, or be informed by, graphic communication research: the process of language standardization and dictionary design. The final section on signs moves us some distance from LeMaster’s study. However, personally, one of the most exciting aspects of research is forging links between apparently disparate areas of research, which might require a leap in the dark.

‘It will make more people feel included if they can talk to them in their first language’: The experience of university students with an intellectual disability engaging in a formal Irish Sign Language Course

Accessible Summary Learning a second language can provide people with more opportunities to be included in society. For example, they could have more opportunities for employment, social activities and travel. However, people with intellectual disabilities are typically not given the opportunity to learn a second language because people think they do not have the ability to learn more than one language. This study looked at the experiences of university students with intellectual disabilities who took part in an Irish Sign Language course. The study used a focus group (a group interview) to speak to six university students with intellectual disabilities and found that students spoke about their experience with learning Irish Sign Language, the class design and the importance of learning Irish Sign Language. This study showed that people with intellectual disabilities critically reflected on their experience of learning a second language. More research is needed to see if this finding is common amongst individuals with intellectual disabilities. AbstractBackgroundOpportunities for people with intellectual disabilities to become bi/multilingual tend not to be widely available despite demonstrated linguistic and extralinguistic advantages associated with an ability to use more than one language. This article focuses on the learning experiences of students with intellectual disabilities in learning Irish Sign Language (ISL) as part of a university course tailored for students with intellectual disabilities.MethodsThe sample consisted of six adults with intellectual disabilities who were enrolled in a full‐time university programme in Ireland. Students were required to take a 12‐week course entitled Language and Society, which included ISL lab sessions. A focus group was conducted asking questions that focused on the students’ experience of taking part in a formalided ISL class.FindingsThree themes were generated in the analysis of the data: learning ISL, class design and implications of taking an ISL course. Findings showed that participants reflected critically on their learning experiences, their expectations of learning ISL, class content and social implications of learning ISL.ConclusionThis study demonstrates the potential of people with intellectual disabilities to be able to critically engage in second language learning.

Qualitative research within the Deaf community in Northern Ireland: A multilingual approach

In this methodology article, the authors illustrate how they conducted multilingual qualitative research in an exploration of the barriers that Deaf people in Northern Ireland face when attempting to access the system of justice. The authors’ research practices are informed, to the extent possible, by the principles of community-based participatory research (CBPR). They explore the challenges of conducting research in American Sign Language (ASL), British Sign Language (BSL), and Irish Sign Language (ISL), and spoken English, facilitated by sign language interpreters fluent in BSL and ISL. Centering the research on the lived experiences of Deaf people who navigate the system of justice, the authors implemented CBPR-informed research methods, which ultimately led to sustained discussion and joint action by the authors and members of the Northern Ireland Deaf community aimed at the removal of barriers that Deaf people face when interacting with the justice system. By writing about their methodological approach in Northern Ireland, the authors wish to be transparent about their work in the hope that other researchers can replicate their successes and avoid the limitations of conducting this work in partnership with members of the Deaf community in other countries.

Review: Belonging: An Autoethnography of a Life in Sign Language, by O’Connell, Noel

Review: <i>Belonging: An Autoethnography of a Life in Sign Language</i>, by O’Connell, Noel

Deaf Activists and the Irish Sign Language Movement, 1980–2017

There is a dearth of qualitative research concerning deaf people's experiences of participating in the Irish Sign Language (ISL) recognition movement, and this limits our ability to understand the opportunities and constraints they encountered as they negotiated their way toward the passing of the ISL Act 2017. While ISL is unique to Ireland, it is also of crucial importance to deaf people's identity and the quality of their social and educational life. The aim of this qualitative study is to reveal the primary findings derived from interviews with nine deaf activists who participated in this study. Framed within the social movement theory and the Freirean concept of critical consciousness, the study illuminates the background on how and why deaf activists managed to overcome some significant challenges during the ISL movement. The findings show that deaf activists successfully negotiated their way through the political and legal system to achieve their goal. Discussions and conclusions drawn from the findings suggest that deaf people have the potential to be both agents of social change and effective social movement activists. Finally, the article seeks to be added to the canon of literature on sign language studies and the emerging research on sign language recognition.

Special Nature of Verbs in Sign Languages

This paper is concerned with the special nature of Sign Language verbs, in particular to this research, Irish Sign Language (ISL) verbs. We use Role and Reference Grammar (RRG) (Van Valin 2005) to provide a definition of the structure of lexical entries that are sufficiently rich and universal in nature to represent ISL verbs. This work is part of research work in the development of a linguistically motivated computational framework for ISL. We use RRG (Van Valin and LaPolla 1997) as the theoretical framework of this study. RRG takes language to be a system of communicative social action, and accordingly, analysing the communicative functions of grammatical structures plays a vital role in grammatical description and theory from this perspective (Van Valin 2005). Using RRG provides significant theoretical and technical challenges within both RRG and software.&#x0D; We provide an account of the morphological and grammatical information that can be found within ISL verbs. We use the Signs of Ireland corpus (SOI) to access the relevant linguistic data pertinent to ISL (Leeson et al, 2006). Further to this we use ELAN software as an application tool, which allows us to view the corpus and collate relevant linguistic phenomena pertinent to ISL. We utilise the Event Visibility Hypothesis (EVH) (Wilbur 2008) in the development of our proposed lexicon architecture. We refer to Articulatory Structure Level (Murtagh 2018) in the development of a linguistically motivated computational definition of lexicon entries that are sufficiently robust in nature to represent ISL verbs within the RRG lexicon. We utilise this new level of lexical representation (Pustejovsky 1995), which describes the essential (computational) phonological parameters of an object as defined by the lexical item to cater specifically for the computational linguistic phenomena consistent with signed languages, in particular to this research ISL, enabling us to provide an adequate account of ISL verbs within the RRG lexicon.

In Search of ISL's Pre-History

Irish Sign Language (ISL) became a recognised language in the State with the passing of the 2017 Irish Sign Language Act. It is a language that has been shown to not only be a fully-fledged language, but one that exhibits complexity and significant variation by gender and age. Research into the linguistics and sociolinguistics of ISL has been carried out over more than thirty years, and it is almost twenty years since the establishment of Trinity College's Centre for Deaf Studies, source of much of this research. But an examination of the historical records reveals an even greater complexity. Modern day ISL is descended, in the main, from the signed languages that were used in Cabra's Catholic Deaf schools from the 1840s, but little is written about other signed languages, and variations thereon, that have existed on this island over the last 200 years. This article attempts to show that the history of Irish signed language(s) used by Deaf people is neither the story of signing systems invented by hearing people, nor of a single genesis leading in a straight line to modern ISL - but a layered and diverse account of social, historical, educational, and language change.

Lexical Frequency Analysis of Irish Sign Language

Word frequency has a significant impact on language acquisition and fluency. It is often a point of reference for the teaching and assessing of a language and indeed, as a control for psycholinguistic studies. This paper presents the results of the first objective frequency analysis of lexical tokens from the Signs of Ireland corpus. We investigate the frequency of fully lexical, partly lexical and non-lexical signs in Irish Sign Language as they are presented in the corpus. We confirm the accuracy of the lexical gloss frequency data with a supplementary corpus subset that is tagged for grammatical class and additional insights from previous lexical frequency studies conducted for American Sign Language, Australian Sign Language, British Sign Language and New Zealand Sign Language. This approach has informed us that signers who learn the 100 most frequent signs in Irish Sign Language, will know a third of the language’s vocabulary. This study has found that, in the main, frequency statistics from Irish Sign Language are in line with previous studies and that the text type and annotation strategy can significantly impact results. We found that, without a formalised lexicon, lexical glosses fell short of the requirements for a lexical frequency analysis. However, supported by grammatical class data, frequency data may be reported for symbolic units.

Bridging the gap

The European Language Portfolio (ELP) has been widely implemented to support the development of learner autonomy in the teaching and learning of spoken languages, but, until this study, had not been implemented with learners of sign languages. Across 2017–18, we developed and piloted a sample ELP for Irish Sign Language (ISL), which fed into work on the development of an ELP for sign language learners, under the umbrella of the PRO-Sign 2 project (European Centre for Modern Languages). We piloted the ELP with a cohort of ISL learners in the second year of their Bachelor in Deaf Studies, who perform at A2-B1 level on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) (2001; Leeson et al., 2016). All are learning ISL as a second language (L2), and are acquiring this sign language in what is, for them a new modality (M2). We met students on four occasions across 2017–18 to explore how/if use of the ELP in the ISL classroom supports the development of robust self-evaluation skills, and how the ELP enhances student-reported perception of motivation and autonomy. We report on the process, and present a grounded theory (Glaser &amp; Strauss, 1968), “Bridging the Gap”, drawn from key concerns of these ISL M2L2 learners at A2–B1 level.

Embodiment in Irish Sign Language Passives

Taking a cognitive linguistic approach, this paper explores passive constructions in Irish Sign Language (ISL). Adopting Foley &amp; Van Valin’s (1984) concept of ‘macroroles’, we introduce the prototypical passive construction in ISL, a construction that incorporates several elements including a shift in focus from the Actor to the Undergoer, the recruitment of body partitioning, the use of an empty locus for establishment of an unspecified actor/s, and potentially, a body lean which may be coupled with averted eyegaze. We explore the viewpoint shifts that this construction allows signers, which support the cognitive grammar emphasis on the importance of construal. We also introduce a related category of constructions which recruit the signer’s body as a surrogate for unspecified actors. Unlike the prototypical passive, these constructions are less complex in that they do not recruit body partitioning, body leans or averted eyegaze. However, they are interesting because they seem to demand inferential readings where the surrogate represents external actors or, metonymically, institutions. In particular, we discuss the use of the signer’s body to represent an unspecified Actor and consider the role of embodiment as a lynchpin for understanding how passives operate. We present examples from the Signs of Ireland corpus and from the European Commission funded Medisigns project to illustrate these constructions in ISL.

Hands in Motion

Irish Sign Language uses a one-handed alphabet in which each fingerspelled letter has a unique combination of handshape, orientation, and, in a few cases, path movement. Each letter is used to represent a letter from the Latin alphabet (Battison, 1978; Wilcox, 1992). For ISL learners, fingerspelling is a strategy that is used to bridge lexical gaps, and so functions as an interlanguage mechanism, which we hypothesise is more prevalent for new learners (A-level learners in the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) (Council of Europe, 2001). Across 2018–19 we marked up a subset of data from the Second Language Acquisition Corpus (ISL-SLAC) for use of fingerspelling. Here, we document how these learners use fingerspelling, and explore the phonology of the fingerspelled items presented by M2L2 learners (handshape, location, movement and orientation), comparing to the production ofnative signers’, drawn from the Signs of Ireland corpus. Results indicate that ISL learners make greater use of fingerspelling in the initial phases of acquiring the language, and that, over time, as they develop a robust lexical repertoire, they reduce the frequency of fingerspelling. Fingerspelling also provides a strategic interlanguage that can be reverted to when vocabulary is unknown.