Sign Writing System of writing movement explained.

Sign Writing is a system of writing the movements and handshapes of sign languages . It was developed in 1974 by Valerie Sutton , a dancer who had two years earlier developed Dance Writing .

As Sutton was teaching DanceWriting to the Royal Danish Ballet, Lars von der Lieth, who was doing research on sign language at the University of Copenhagen, thought it would be useful to use a similar notation for the recording of sign languages . Sutton based Sign Writing on Dance Writing, and finally expanded the system to the complete repertoire of MovementWriting. However, only SignWriting and DanceWriting have been widely used.

From: SignWriting <DAC@SignWriting.org>
Subject: Feedback Literacy Group - 2 April 29, 1998

Dear List Members:

All participants in the Literacy Project receive free materials in return for their written feedback. They are asked to complete three reports. Here is the first report from the group in Canada:

SW Literacy Group #2: Private Tutor, Ontario, Canada
Contact Teacher: Kathy Akehurst
http://www.SignWriting.org/

From: "Akehurst"
To: "SignWriting" < DAC@SignWriting.org >
Subject: Re: Web Report #1
Date: Mon, 27 Apr 1998 10:45:28 -0400

1. Why do you want to learn SignWriting ?

We feel that it will add a rich dimension to ASL , as well as contribute research to a subject which will dignify and complement ASL as a complete language. We feel that, one day, this will be a widely accepted form of communication and we are pleased to be in 'at the beginning' of its emergence on a larger scale.

2. What have been some of your past frustrations when teaching?

In order to expand my students' horizons, I have often suggested that they 'read' certain things. Obviously, these things have been written in English. In order for them to benefit fully, their command of English must be very good or they are reduced to 'waiting' until someone is around to help them understand the written material. It is as if they must be extremely proficient at two complete languages in order to function. This has proved difficult for them and, while I (and they) feel it is helpful for them to learn English, I do feel that it should be in its proper place as a 'second' language.

3. Are you hoping that SignWriting might help? If so, in what way?

It will help the students in that it adds a concrete dimension, of which they can be proud, to an already dramatic and forceful language. It will certainly be a way for them to record and share their own thoughts, feelings and observations in their own language, and it will help those who are hearing skeptics to take ASL more seriously as a language - complete in its own right and worthy of respect and due consideration. If they wish to communicate with hearing people who do not sign they must write and I have noticed that, because their English grammar is not perfect (and who's is?), they are, on occasion, treated as if they were of lesser intelligence. I believe that, when SignWriting is accepted, people will realize that the d/Deaf are very good at writing their own language and only slightly less good at writing their second language - and since this is true of by far the majority of most people who learn a second language, it will be accepted as nothing to be looked down upon and certainly will not be taken as the 'last word' on their true intellect.

4. How would you like to use your web page on the SignWriting web site?

I imagine it would be helpful to post notes about our progress and any questions or concerns we might have as we proceed with the Project. As the instructor, I will be grateful for this forum to seek out advice and suggestions if I find that my teaching methods are not having the desired effect or if I encounter an area I find difficult to present in an easily understood fashion.

5. Please write any other information about your group.

Two of my students are older adults and were raised and educated at a time when signing was frowned upon, if not completely forbidden. They were both sent to oral schools and were lost and alone in that system. It is only now, all these years later, that they can begin to express their feelings about those early years and about their sense of discouragement and abandonment at how the hearing world then treated the deaf. They both learned a sort of sign language in secret, and are grateful (and proud) of the opportunity to now learn their 'own' language and be seen and admired for their proficiency with it. I'm grateful to be a part of that process. The exposure ASL has had in the media, etc. over the past years has helped open up many doors for them and they are taking full advantage of these opportunities. Of course, their own experiences in the past have helped them develop, in their cases, great compassion for others who are misunderstood or left to their own defences and they are widely respected and admired in their neighbourhood for their kindness and gentle, good humour.

The other deaf students are younger adults and have benefited greatly from the strides made in the Deaf community over the past years. They are of great help to all of us as regards the history, etc. of their culture and they are enjoying 'refining' their signing skills in ASL as they, too, learned a type of pidgin sign since there were no schools or anything in this area offering ASL instruction.

The codas do not sign although they receive sign very well. Their parents thought they would be doing them no favour by teaching them to sign since this was so looked down upon at the time and they did not want to expose their children to ridicule. Now they realize that they were in error and the children (varying in ages from 23 to 12) are quite intrigued with what they are learning. As well, because (as mentioned above) of the sign language exposure in the media of late, they are enjoying some attention for how 'cool' it is that they are learning to sign! While it was not really our intent to be 'cool', it is a means to the end of having American Sign Language receive the respect and consideration now so long overdue.

Kathy Akehurst

http://www.signwriting.org/

If you would like to post a response to this message, send your email message to: mailto: DAC@SignWriting.org and write " PLEASE POST TO SW LIST " somewhere in your message.

Valerie :-)

mailto: DAC@SignWriting.org http://www.SignWriting.org

Valerie Sutton at the DAC
Deaf Action Committee For SignWriting
Box 517, La Jolla, CA, 92038-0517, USA
(619)456-0098 voice
(619)456-0010 tty
(619)456-0020 fax

SignWriting is a way to read, write, and type the movements of signed languages.

The SignWriting ® Web Site
...read, write, and type all Sign Languages...

Sign Languages are now written languages!


Webmaster
Valerie Sutton
Sutton@SignWriting.org

Visual Languages

Sign languages' relationships with oral languages

Laban Movement Analysis> Video images of American Sign Language usage

The Deaf World Web home page

HandSpeak: A Sign Language Dictionary Online

American Sign Language Browser
Wait a few minutes to see a movie of someone doing the word you wanted to see.

SignWriting - is a way to read, write, and type the movements of signed languages. Learn about Valerie Sutton and DACS Sutton Movement Writing & Shorthand is a complete movement notation system for recording all body movement. The system includes five sections:

  1. DanceWriting - records dance choreography
  2. SignWriting - records signed languages
  3. MimeWriting - records classic mime and gesture
  4. SportsWriting - records gymnastics, ice skating, karate
  5. ScienceWriting -records physical therapy, body language, animal movements, and other forms of movement. MESSAGE TO THE SIGNWRITING EMAIL LIST

Koko.org - The Gorilla Foundation
Established in 1976, The Gorilla Foundation/Koko.org promotes the protection, preservation and propagation of gorillas. A primary focus involves teaching a modified form of American Sign Language to two lowland gorillas, Koko and Michael.

Could Bonzo Go To College MAY 6, 1996 TRANSCRIPT Do chimpanzees have language skills? Paul Hoffman, editor of "Discover" Magazine takes a look at both sides to the story.

Sign language babies "babble" 9/501
Babies exposed only to sign language learn to babble in sign - and their hand babble mimics the sign language their parents use, just as verbal babble sounds like speech. The finding supports the idea that children are born with a propensity to learn language, regardless of how that language is mediated.
Laura Ann Petitto at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, and her colleagues studied two groups of hearing babies. Half had hearing parents, the other half had profoundly deaf parents who used sign language. The researchers videotaped each of the babies at six, ten and 12 months and at each session tracked the movements of their hands using LED sensors.
The researchers found that both groups of babies waved their hands around at high frequency. But analysis of the sensor data revealed that only the sign-exposed babes produced low-frequency rhythmic hand activity.
This low frequency movement is temporally similar to what's seen in genuine sign language. What's more, the low-frequency hand movements tended to be within the "sign phonetic" space in front of the baby's body - just as a signer's activity would be - whereas the high-frequency movements were mostly outside it.

Babies babble in sign language too 7/15/04
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99996154 Journal reference Cognition (vol 93, p 43)
Babies exposed to sign language babble with their hands , even if they are not deaf. The finding supports the idea that human infants have an innate sensitivity to the rhythm of language and engage it however they can , the researchers who made the discovery claim.
Everyone accepts that babies babble as a way to acquire language, but researchers are polarised about its role. One camp says that children learn to adjust the opening and closing of their mouths to make vowels and consonants by mimicking adults, but the sounds are initially without meaning.
The other side argues that babbling is more than just random noise-making. Much of it, they contend, consists of phonetic-syllabic units - the rudimentary forms of language.
Laura-Ann Petitto at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, a leader in this camp, has argued that deaf babies who are exposed to sign language learn to babble using their hands the way hearing babies do with their mouths.

Infrared diodes

Petitto believes that the hand-babbling is functionally identical to verbal babbling - only the input is different. But critics counter that deaf children cannot be directly compared with their hearing counterparts.
Now Petitto and her colleagues have tested three hearing babies who, because their parents are deaf, were exposed only to sign. Three control infants had hearing, speaking parents.
To analyse the hand movements of the six children, the researchers placed infrared-emitting diodes on the babies' hands, forearms and feet. Sensors tracked the movements of the babies' limbs as they engaged in a variety of tasks, including grasping for toys and watching two people communicate.
Petitto reasoned that if her opponents were right, then what the babies did with their hands would be irrelevant - and indistinguishable. Instead the team found that the two groups had different hand movements.

Pattern recognition

Sign-exposed babies produced two distinct types of rhythmic hand activity, a low-frequency type at 1 hertz and a high-frequency one at 2.5 hertz. The speech-exposed babies had only high-frequency moves.
There was a "unique rhythmic signature of natural language" to the low-frequency movements. "What is really genetically passed on," Petitto says, "is a sensitivity to patterns."
But Peter MacNeilage, of the University of Texas at Austin, is not persuaded. "She makes a blanket statement that there is an exact correspondence between the structures of speech and sign," he says. "But there is no accepted evidence for this view at the level of phonological structure or in the form of a rhythm common to speech and sign."

Tactile Languages

AMERICAN INDIAN UNIVERSAL SIGN LANGUAGE When a boy, from 1884 to 1894, the author lived on the edge of the Sioux Indian Reservation in Dakota Territory, located at Fort Sully, Cheyenne Agency, Pierre, and surrounding sections. He worked on the cow range and associated continuously with Indians. He learned some of the Sioux language. and made a study of sign. Since then, for many years, the interest has continued, and all known authorities on 'sign have been studied, as well as continued investigations with Blackfoot, Cheyenne, Sioux, Arapahoe, and other Indians of recognized sign-talking ability.

Amer-Ind Gestural Code Based on Universal American Indian Hand gestures .
RKS ~ "Tribes having never met and not knowing each other's language could non-the-less communicate in this way. It was a common form of communications with whites, especially on first contact.
"Gesture, for example - the nongramatical expressive movements we all make [shrugging shoulders, waving good-bye, brandishing a fist, etc] - is preserved in aphasia, even though Sign is lost, emphasizing the absolute distinction between the two. Patients with aphasia, indeed, can be taught to use "Amerindian Gestural Code", but cannot use sign, any more than they can use speech.
[Seeing Voices by Oliver Sacks, P.75 of the paperback edition]
If a language used by non-human primates can be taught to aphasiacs then this is proof positive that that

language is gesturally based, or an extension of gestural code and not a language in the sense of that used by humans.

simple gestural code is very effective. The deaf can make themselves understood to non-signers very effectively on a daily basis and have done so for millennia. Explorers discovered numerous new tribes throughout history and managed to not only communicate with them, but to initiate trade, get directions etc - all using simple gestural code.
The gestural code referred to by Oliver Sacks can be taught to deaf aphasiacs who have lost the ability to sign, indicating that this level of communication is not mediated by the human 'language' centres. "

American Sign Language video shows the moves based on Amer-Ind Gestural Code.

Baby Sign Language

Nonprofits sponsor Earth Day "interspecies chat" with Koko

HotBraille - Free Web-based Braille Transcribing Service
Here you can send Braille letters, learn more about Braille, and meet other people who share your interest in Braille.

Brain scans reveal the basis of language
Brain imaging studies at McGill University in Montreal have overturned conventional theories about the way that humans acquire and process language. Researchers have compared findings from profoundly deaf people who communicate in sign language with those from people with normal hearing. " Sign languages offer a clear window through which we can examine the biological foundations of language ," psychologist Laura-Ann Petitto. "The two groups are not only using different perceptual modalities - sound versus sight - but different areas of the brain are involved in motor control of the tongue and hands."
Pettito and brain imaging specialist Robert Zatorre are using positron emission tomography (PET) scans to investigate oxygen uptake in the brain as a way of gauging its physiological activity while carrying out basic language tasks. The results are correlated with those from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to identify precisely which anatomical structures are involved.
Petitto is looking at which parts of the brain are involved in processing language. The work builds on earlier studies by Ursula Bellugi at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California. Bellugi demonstrated that signing is a true language controlled by the right hemisphere of the brain, the hemisphere involved in spoken language, rather than by the left hemisphere, the side associated with spatial skills.
--snip--