Sign Languages in Village Communities: Anthropological and Linguistic Insights

book: Sign Languages in Village Communities

Open Access Published by De Gruyter Mouton 2012

Sign Languages in Village Communities

Anthropological and Linguistic Insights

Edited by: Ulrike Zeshan and Connie de Vos

Volume 4 in the series Sign Language Typology [SLT]

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781614511496

Overview
Contents

About this book

The book is a unique collection of research on sign languages that have emerged in rural communities with a high incidence of, often hereditary, deafness. These sign languages represent the latest addition to the comparative investigation of languages in the gestural modality, and the book is the first compilation of a substantial number of different "village sign languages". Written by leading experts in the field, the volume uniquely combines anthropological and linguistic insights, looking at both the social dynamics and the linguistic structures in these village communities. The book includes primary data from eleven different signing communities across the world, including results from Jamaica, India, Turkey, Thailand, and Bali.
All known village sign languages are endangered, usually because of pressure from larger urban sign languages, and some have died out already. Ironically, it is often the success of the larger sign language communities in urban centres, their recognition and subsequent spread, which leads to the endangerment of these small minority sign languages. The book addresses this specific type of language endangerment, documentation strategies, and other ethical issues pertaining to these sign languages on the basis of first-hand experiences by Deaf fieldworkers.

Author / Editor information

Ulrike Zeshan and Connie de Vos, International Institute for Sign Languages and Deaf Studies, University of Central Lancashire, UK.

Supplementary Materials

Contents

Topics

Frontmatter Open Access Download PDF	i
Contents Open Access Download PDF	v
Acknowledgements Open Access Download PDF	1
Introduction: Demographic, sociocultural, and linguistic variation across rural signing communities Connie De Vos and Ulrike Zeshan Open Access Download PDF	2
Part I. Rural signing varieties: Description, documentation, and fieldwork practice
Being a deaf white anthropologist in Adamorobe: Some ethical and methodological issues Annelies Kusters Open Access Download PDF	27
Colour signs in two indigenous sign languages Dany Adone, Anastasia Bauer, Keren Cumberbatch and Elaine L. Maypilama Open Access Download PDF	53
Demarcating generations of signers in the dynamic sociolinguistic landscape of a shared sign-language: The case of the Al-Sayyid Bedouin Shifra Kisch Open Access Download PDF	87
The Kata Kolok perfective in child signing: Coordination of manual and non-manual components Connie de Vos Open Access Download PDF	127
The survival of Algerian Jewish Sign Language alongside Israeli Sign Language in Israel Sara Lanesman and Irit Meir Open Access Download PDF	153
Signing in the Arctic: External influences on Inuit Sign Language Joke Schuit Open Access Download PDF	181
An exploration in the domain of time: From Yucatec Maya time gestures to Yucatec Maya Sign Language time signs Olivier Le Guen Open Access Download PDF	209
Deaf signers in Douentza, a rural area in Mali Victoria Nyst, Kara Sylla and Moustapha Magassouba Open Access Download PDF	251
Language ecological change in Ban Khor, Thailand: An ethnographic endangerment Angela M. Nonaka Open Access Download PDF	277
Working with village sign language communities: Deaf fieldwork researchers in professional dialogue Hasan Dikyuva Open Access Download PDF	313
Language index Open Access Download PDF	405
Subject index Open Access Download PDF	408

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter Mouton
Audience: Institutional Libraries, Students and Researchers of Sign Languages, Linguistic Typology, Language Endangerment and Revitalization, Language Documentation, Contact Linguistics, Linguistic Anthropologists; Deaf Studies and Gesture
Pages
- Front matter: 7
- Main content: 413
Keywords: Sign Language; Language Typology; Visual Communication; Endangered Languages and Fieldwork

eBook

Published: October 30, 2012
ISBN: 9781614511496

Hardcover

Published: October 15, 2012
ISBN: 9781614512035