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Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF A DEAF NAMIBIAN
REFUGEE’S LIFE STORY
by
Ruth Zilla Morgan
A Dissertation
submitted to the
Faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences
of the American University
in Partial Fulfillment of
the Requirements for the Degree
of
Doctor of Philosophy
in
Anthropology
Signatures of Committee:
Chair:
Déan of the College School
^ 'n/?s Date
1995 The American University I 1 / • Washington D.C. 20016
THE AMER2CAN UNIVERSITY LIBRARY
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UMI Microfonn 9626228 Copyright 1996, by UMI Company. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code.
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Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF A DEAF NAMIBIAN REFUGEE’S LIFE STORY
BY
Ruth Zilla Morgan
ABSTRACT
This dissertation demonstrates how discourse analysis provides access to the ways
in which a Deaf Namibian uses available linguistic and cultural resources to construct an
identity via narrative. Life stories provide a way to analyze how individuals actively and
jointly interpret and negotiate their world view, as narrating a life story involves selecting and
interpreting culturally significant experiences.
The data were derived from videotaped interactions of a Deaf Owambo relating
his life stoiy in Namibian Sign Language to a group of Deaf Namibian peers. The structural
analysis focuses on repetition of temporal lexical markers and spatial features including
eyegaze movements, headtums and body shifts. Both temporal and spatial linguistic
repetition work together to structure the life story in terms of hierarchically organized units,
which the researcher terras in ascending order: epitopes, contratopes, chronotopes and
hemitopes. These units are inter-textually related and function to give the subject’s narrative
identity both structure and meaning.
The anthropological interpretation involved building a theoretical framework for
life story analysis. This framework demonstrates that the details of the structural analysis
are critical to a post-modern deconstruction of the text in terms of narrative identity.
However the structural analysis masks the unfinalizable fluid spatial elements of the text
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. which constitute the narrator’s construction of identity. The anthropological interpretation
of the textual construction of socio-cultural identity hinges on the interaction between the
narrative structure of the text, its thematic structure and the poetic use of spatial stylistic
devices. The essence of the narrator’s Deaf Namibian identity is contained in the dialogic
inter-textual relations.
Ill
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This dissertation is the culmination of a long process which started in 1983 when
I became interested in South African sign language while working at Baragwanath Hospital
in Soweto with a group of preschool Deaf children. I had begun to learn sign language from
Jabu Tshabalala. It is Jabu, to whom I owe the most for opening up the world of sign
language and Deaf culture to me. He died a year later during the political unrest of 1984.
I wish to thank William Leap, Ph.D., my advisor and chairman of my dissertation
committee, for helping me at critical points in the course of writing this dissertation.
I am also deeply indebted to the other members of my dissertation committee
Robert Johnson, Ph.D. and Brett Williams, Ph.D. Bob deserves special thanks for guiding
me through each step of the linguistic analysis. Through working closely with him, I learned
that rigorous attention to linguistic detail pays off in the end. I want to thank Brett for her
detailed reading of the text, editorial suggestions and encouragement.
There are other people who influenced my thinking in critical ways along the way
to whom I am grateful. In 1985 when I was doing preliminary Sign Language research while
studying Applied Linguistics at the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, my
advisor, Rosemary Lennard, Ph.D. encouraged me to come to the USA to obtain the
theoretical basis for pursuing this research. Scott Liddell, Ph.D. has been a major influence
on my present work. Scott was my advisor during my Masters in Linguistics at Gallaudet
University. I subsequently worked closely with him on the NSL dictionary project for which
IV
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. he was the consultant. He provided invaluable insights into the structure of NSL which
undoubtedly influenced this dissertation. His theoretical interest in imagery and the way that
space functions linguistically in ASL impacted the development of my thinking that
culminated in my ideas for ray doctoral research. Deborah Tannen, Ph.D. from Georgetown
University is responsible for both teaching me how to do discourse analysis and providing
an initial theoretical framework which formed the basis of my thinking about discourse and
which I continue to draw on. The seeds for this dissertation were sown when she encouraged
me to develop a paper I wrote for her in 1989 into a dissertation topic. In my discussions
with Peter Seitel, Ph.D., from the Center for Folklife Programs and Cultural Studies,
Smithsonian Institution, I gained a deeper understanding of the application of Bakhtin’s work
to my analysis, particularly with regard to the notions of finalization.
This dissertation is based on work supported by a Wenner Gren Predoctoral
Grant for Dissertation Research, a Dissertation Fellowship from The American University
and a Gallaudet University Small Grant Award for Namibian Sign Language Research. Any
opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those
of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of any of the above organizations.
I am of course the most indebted to the subject of this dissertation and to the
group of Deaf Namibians with whom I transcribed the data for this dissertation. At the time,
we were working on the Namibian Sign Language Dictionary Project funded by the United
Nation’s Council for Namibia. I had no idea at that time that I would continue working on
this data as part of my doctoral dissertation. I am particularly indebted to Marius
Ndilipunye Haikali for his invaluable assistance transcribing the data and for his input and
discussions concerning Namibian Sign Language.
My final thanks go to my family and friends without whom I could have never
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. written this dissertation. I wish that June Zimmer was alive to see the final result. June was
directly responsible for my decision to enter the M.A. in Linguistics program at Gallaudet
University in 1987. She inspired me to study sign language discourse through our many
conversations about her work on American Sign Language discourse. Debra Aarons
encouraged me to embark on this dissertation, discussed it with me endlessly and
painstakingly edited the final version. Karen Young tirelessly formatted and reformatted this
dissertation for days on end. My parents have offered much needed emotional and financial
support over the past nine years of my graduate studies in the USA. My partner, Candace.
Blase has gone beyond the call of duty, offering around the clock emotional and technical
support.
VI
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT...... ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS...... iv
LIST OF TABLES ...... x
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS...... xi
CHAPTER ONE: LITERATURE REVIEW AND METHODOLOGY...... 1 Data Selection And Methodology ...... 8 Goals and Objectives ...... 13 The D ata...... 14 Data Transcription ...... 16 Method For Structural Analysis ...... 17 Method For Spatial Metaphoric Analysis ...... 19 Anthropological Interpretation ...... 19 Conclusion ...... 20
CHAPTER TWO: THE RESEARCH CONTEXT...... 21 Deaf Namibian Refugees As A Linguistic And Cultural M inority 21 The Subject ...... 22 The Geographical And Political Context ...... 24 A Historical Sketch Of Owambo Resistance ...... 28 Life Story Text In English ...... 34
CHAPTER THREE: STRUCTURAL TEXT ANALYSIS ...... 40 Overview Of The Method And Findings Regarding Textual Structure According To Temporal And Spatial Markers ...... 40 Summary of Textual U nits ...... 63
ANALYSIS OF TEMPORAL PARTICLES...... 64
Linguistic Analysis of Lexical Repetition ...... 64 Repetition of ITNISH as an Involvement Strategy ...... 67 The Shape Of The Text: Lexical Repetition Of Time Particles As A Chunking Device ...... 68 FINISH ...... 68 Discussion Of Other Time Particles ...... 79
Vll
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Seasonal Time and Linear T im e ...... 94
ANALYSIS OF ACTORS AND EVENTS ...... 95
Lexical Repetition Within Epitopes ...... 95 Lexical Repetition Across Epitopes ...... 97 Analysis of Repetition of A ctors ...... 97 Repetition Of References To Self As Actor (ME) ...... 98 Family Members As A ctors ...... 102 Farm Animals As A ctors ...... 104 Lexical Repetition Of Actors As A Cohesive Device In The First H em itope...... 105 Lexical Repetition Of Actors Across Epitopes In The Second H em itope...... 105 Repetition Of Lexical Items Referring To The Narrator’s Construction Of A Deaf Community ...... 106 Analysis Of The Recurring Events ...... 109 Lexical Cohesion In The First Hemitope ...... 110 Lexical Cohesion In The Second Hemitope ...... 112 Summary Of Recurring Lexical Events ...... 124
ANALYSIS OF SPATIAL REPETITION...... 127
Spatial Discourse Contours ...... 127 Analysis: The Epitopic Use Of Space ...... 128 Epitopic Spatial Discourse Contours (ESDC’s ) ...... 129 Epitope Initial Eyegaze P atterns ...... 133 The Reversal Of The Direction Of Eyegaze Movement To The Right At The Beginning Of Epitopes Seven To F ifteen ...... 138 Epitope Final Eyegaze Patterns ...... 141
ANALYSIS OF SPATIAL OPPOSITIONS...... 147
Spatial Delineation of Topical Boundaries ...... 147 Sub-Texts Or Topics As A Separate Spatial-Oppositional System 148 Contrastive And Poetic Use Of Spatial Oppositions ...... 150 The Internal Oppositional Structure Of Nine Sub-Texts ...... 151 Ways In Which The Narrator Marks Left And Right Space ...... 152 Setting Up Oppositional Topics Spatially ...... 152 Using Space Contrastively To Set Up Topographical Oppositions 153 Poetically Stretching And Resolving The Opposition ...... 155 Conclusion ...... 160
CHAPTER FOUR: NARRATIVE IDENTITY AND THE NEGOTIATION OF SPACE AND PLACE...... 162 Juggling the Deaf and Hearing Worlds in Real Life and in the T e x t...... 177 Conclusion ...... 181
viii
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CONCLUSION...... 182
Theoretical Background Review ...... 182 Chapter by Chapter Summary ...... 185 Concluding R em arks ...... 187 General Anthropological Implications ...... 192
APPENDIX 1 ...... 194
APPENDIX 2 ...... 207
APPENDIX 3 ...... 211
APPENDIX 4 ...... 223
APPENDIX 5 ...... 230
APPENDIX 6 ...... 235
APPENDIX 7 ...... 241
APPENDIX 8 ...... 244
REFERENCES...... 253
IX
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. LIST OF TABLES
Table:
1. EPITOPES, SUB-EPITOPES AND TITLES...... 42
2. OVERVIEW OF MAJOR LIFE EPITOPES...... 66
3. SHOWING SPREAD OF RECURRING LEXICAL ITEMS ACROSS EPITOPES ...... 113
4. SHOWING INITIAL LOCATION AND SECOND LOCATION FOR EACH EPITOPE ...... 131
5. INDICATING THE DIRECTION OF MOVEMENT AT THE BEGINNING OF EACH EPITOPE...... 132
6. SHOWING PENULTIMATE AND FINAL LOCATION FOR EACH EPITOPE ...... 142
7. INDICATING THE DIRECTION OF MOVEMENT AT THE END OF EACH EPITOPE ...... 144
8. SHOWING OPPOSITIONAL THEMES EMERGING FROM CONTRATOPES ...... 158
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figure:
1. Map Showing Phineas’ Home in Namibia and in Exile ...... 25
2. The Narrative Shape According To "FINISH" ...... 45
3. Structuring Of Text According To The Time Markers: "FINISH", "WITH", "UNTTL", "W A IT ...... 46
4. Lexical Repetition Within Epitopes ...... 49
5. Contratopes Delineated By Spatial Mapping Of Oppositions ...... 51
6. Three Primaiy Chronotope Boundaries In Relation To Contratopes ...... 53
7. Chronotopic Boundaries According To "W A IT ...... 54
8. Hemitopic Boundaries ...... 58
9. Structuring Of Text According To Orientation, Epitopes, Contratopes, Chronotopes, Hemitopes And Coda ...... 61
10. Frequency and Occurrence of "ME" in First Hemitope and Second Hemitope of Life Story ...... 100
11. Event Structures Signal Chronotopic Hemitopic Boundaries ...... 121
12. Nothing To Do Frames Negative Events or Turning Points Which He Has To R esolve...... 124
13. Event Structures, Part, Chronotopic and Hemitopic Boundaries ...... 125
14. Internal Oppositional Structure Delineates Contratopes ...... 151
15. Metaphoric Spatial Mapping of Negative and Positive Sentiment onto Left and Right Sides of Signing Area ...... 172
XI
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER ONE
LITERATURE REVIEW AND METHODOLOGY
Literature Review
In the last decade, anthropologists have paid increasing attention to the discourse
or text making of their subjects, having realized that it is valuable as an entry point into
understanding notions of culture and agency (Rosaldo 1993, de Certeau 1984, Goodwin 1990,
Sherzer 1987, Friedrich 1986). This view of culture emphasizes the role of the individual
who uses language on a daily basis to reshape and recreate the culture of everyday life in
relation to other actors. The relationship between language and culture has been of interest
to anthropological linguists since the pioneering work of Sapir (1929) and Whorf (1956).
Whorf sees language, culture and behavior as part of a network in which language and
cultural norms constantly influence each other. He did not limit the relationship between
language and culture to that occurring in one direction going from language to culture. In
his view language does not determine culture but instead influences and is influenced by
thought. Until the advent of the ethnography of speaking in the sixties, research on the
language-culture interface focused on a discrete aspect of language, such as syntax,
morphology or semantics. However as discourse analysis has developed, anthropological
linguists have found new ways to explore the language-culture relationship (Sherzer
1987:295ff) as it subsumes and moves beyond all of the traditionally discrete levels of
linguistic analysis (phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics).
The interest of anthropological linguistics in discourse analysis since the early
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 2 eighties has opened up new ways to explore the language-culture interface (Hymes 1981,
Halliday and Hasan 1989, Hanks 1989, Ochs 1988, Goodwin 1990). The discourse level of
analysis, owing its concern with actual utterances that real people use in everyday situations,
is ideally suited to investigate how people use spoken language in conversation and narrative
performance to maintain and recreate cultural identity (Tannen 1982,1984, 1989; Becker
1979, 1984,1988; Friedrich 1986, Bauman 1986).
Discourse analysis has enabled anthropological linguists to gain new insights into
the language-culture relationship. It has been used to clarify the ways in which people use
language to negotiate their social and material reality. In this framework, our thoughts,
behavior and social reality, all of which constitute what we think of as "culture" are not
independent of the language we use, but are embedded in, and actively constructed through,
our language use in social interaction (Goodwin 1990, Goodwin and Duranti 1992, Sherzer
1987, Ochs 1988).
...discourse is the nexus, the actual and concrete expression of the language- culture-society relationship. It is discourse which creates, recreates, modifies, and fine tunes both culture and language and their intersection, and it is especially in verbally artistic discourse such as poetry, magic, duelling and political rhetoric that the potentials and resources provided by grammar, as well as the cultural meanings and symbols are exploited to the fullest and the essence of language-cultural relationships becomes salient (Sherzer 1987:296).
Discourse analysts have applied the principles of conversational analysis to
narratives which are viewed as occurring in a conversation when one person takes charge of
the conversational floor, with the consent of the other conversational participants, by means
of a multi-unit or extended turn (Sacks, in Goodwin and Heritage 1990:291). Narratives
usually consist of a sequence of events which are temporally ordered, conversationally
constructed by an interlocutor in relation to an audience (Labov 1972:360 ff. Polanyi 1985:10,
Bauman 1986:7). The language-culture interface is accessed by analyzing the narrator’s use
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 3
of poetic devices, imageiy and symbolism in relation to the structural properties of the
language (Tannen 1989, Hymes 1981).
There is a rapidly growing body of research focusing on how people use language
to construct personal meaning and identity (Ginsburg 1987, Rosaldo 1993, De Certeau 1984,
Linde 1993, Miller et al 1990). In particular, Bakhtin’s notions of language and culture in
relation to the self provide a useful framework for understanding identity construction in
narratives. In his view, the self is constituted in language, and is never monologic but
consists of the interplay of a multitude of dialogized voices which he calls heteroglossia. The
arrangement and organization of these voices varies from individual to individual (Holquist
1990, Bakhtin 1981,1986).
It follows that according to this view of language and the self, individuals are
active agents in the way they culturally construct themselves through their selection and
arrangement of available voices. One way to understand this languaged self is by analyzing
texts polyphonically, identifying the different voices and their inter-relatedness.
...an utterance is a link in the chain of speech communication and it cannot be broken off from the preceding links that determine it from within and from without, giving rise within it to unmcdiated responsive reactions and dialogic reverberations (Bakhtin 1986:94).
Bakhtin’s analysis involved the key concepts of chronotopes, finalization and
unfinalizability that are critical in his consideration of the textual production of self (Holquist
1990:109ff, Morson and Emerson 1990:88ff). The notion of chronotopes refers to the ways
in which space and time interact, the ground against which the main characters develop
finalized selves that are in essence unfinalizable. The notion of "finalization" refers to the
completion or wholeness of an utterance that is always related to other utterances and to
which the speaker expects a response or active responsive understanding. This in turn
influences the style and compositional form of the utterance. Utterances are always finalized
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 4
whereas the internal self is always unfinalized but achieves a finalization in language that is
dependent on the audience, who, in turn, finalizes the narrator (Bakhtin 1986:90-96).
These notions of language as a means of finalizing the self that is presented to
the outside world (in contrast to the unfinalized inner self) and the inevitable dialogic
relationship between them, are key elements to understanding the construction of self in
language that is always directed at the "other", who finalizes the narrator. The narrator has
the opportunity to shape the form of the narrative so as to accommodate the audience who
will ratify the self that is presented. Although Bakhtin focused on the novel, his ideas have
served as a basis for many of the more recent studies in narrative analysis.
Scholars have renewed their interest in life story narratives as a way to access the
construction of self in and through language (Cipriani 1987, Gee 1991, Ginsburg 1987, Linde
1993, Riessman 1991, Saraceno 1987). Inherent in this research is the belief that individuals
are unfinalizable and continually create and recreate fictive narrative selves that differ
contextually, depending on the situation, the audience and the time of narration.
Furthermore, this research determines the specific linguistic details in personal experience
narratives which index implicit cultural meanings (Ginsburg 1989, Leap 1991, Polanyi 1985).
Life stories are a type of narrative that provides aecess into the ways individuals
actively interpret and negotiate their culture (Langness 1981:88). At the time of Radin’s
classic ethnographic stucfy (1983), [1926] of the life history of a Native American,
anthropologists thought that one individual’s life story was representative of an entire culture
(Langness and Frank 1981:64). Since 1945, life stories have been used to highlight social and
cultural phenomena. The life story texts themselves were not analyzed linguistically until
discourse analysis developed the means to do so.
In the present era of post-structural discourse analyses, the texts themselves have
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 5 become the focus of analysis (Riessman 1991, Linde 1993, Burgos 1989, Cipriani 1987). The
focus has also shifted to analyzing how individuals use life stories to shape and perpetuate
their culture (Spiro 1972 in Langness and Frank 1981:73, Riesmann 1991:44). According to
Riessman (1991) quoting Cohler (1982), life story narratives are reductions and distillations
in which the world is ordered and predictable. The telling of one’s life story involves
selecting and interpreting culturally significant experiences (Langness and Frank 1981:109-
111, Ginsburg 1987:624, Watson 1985:13).They are at the same time a representation of
reality as well as constitutive of reality. The audience is persuaded by the discourse to
believe the explanations of the narrator’s actions. Experiences are reinterpreted and new
meanings are collaboratively produced through the interaction (Riessman 1992:45, Linde
1993).
The fact that life stories are formed collaboratively in the context of an audience
is important in that they are not fixed entities, but change from telling to telling, continually
transforming past experiences and creating new meanings for the teller (Linde 1993). Burgos
(1989:30) stressed that the narrator produces a narrative identity of the self in which the
subjects develop a fictional unification of different stages of their lives. Linde called this the
management of temporal discontinuity. In the process of constructing their life stories,
people construct meaning for their lives by interpreting the past in the context of their own
culture (Cipriano 1987:42). The way that individuals evaluate and emphasize significant
experiences that they include in their life stories emerges in the linguistic form of the
narrative itself, and can be accessed linguistically through discourse analysis (Labov 1972,
Polanyi 1985, Linde 1993). Thus life stories are important sites of social-cultural identity
construction in which people make sense of their relation to themselves and to others. The
narrator usually tries to present a self that the audience will ratify. Narratives are thus
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 6 important for both creating our own internal private sense of self and for conveying and
negotiating that self with others. The narrative performance itself gives both form and shape
to the narrative identity.
Using discourse analysis to unpack the composition and shape of a life story
narrative, this dissertation examines how an individual builds a coherent life story narrative
and, thus, a coherent identity out of the linguistic and cultural resources available to him.
The structure of signed languages and the study of Deaf cultures provide the
opportunity to investigate the textual construction of narrative identity in a visual-gestural
language. However, there is a paucity of both text analyses and anthropological studies of
Deaf ethnicity. Text analysis for sign languages is a recent phenomenon which started in
1983, when a special issue of Discourse Processes (vol 6, no. 3) was devoted to American
Sign Language (Wilbur and Pettito 1983, Gee and Kegl 1983, Hoffineister and Gee 1983).
However there is only one paper in this volume (Wilbur and Pettito 1983) that applies the
methodology that conversational analysts use in their study of spoken languages and one
paper (Gee and Kegl 1983) that deals with the narrative structure of ASL.
More recently, Winston (1991,1993) used discourse analysis to demonstrate how
spatial referencing functions at the discourse level to produce textual cohesion. She
specifically examined how comparatives, performatives and time mappings are spatially
structured. She also demonstrated how spatial referencing functions to segment a text into
distinct topics or sub-texts.
Gee and Kegl (1983) analyzed an ASL narrative in order to identify the aesthetic
and expressive devices that a signer uses to construct a narrative. Using a stylistic argument,
they showed that there is a dialectical relationship between higher order pause structure and
narrative structure, in that the higher order pause structure reflects the narrative structure.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 7
in addition to which the narrative structure is determined by the higher order pause structure
(Gee and Kegl 1983:256).
The task of using text analysis to understand the construction of Deaf culture is
at the beginning stages as is evident in work by Bahan (1991, In Press) and Zimmer (In
Press). Zimmer examined the use of lexical repetition both to structure ASL protest
speeches and create meaning. She compared ASL and Black English speeches and found
that the same meaning making and structuring strategies were used in both cultures, both
of which have oral traditions. These strategies were used to a far lesser extent in standard
English speeches.
The only other research demonstrating cultural cuing by ASL texts has been done
by Bahan (1991, In Press). He deconstructed his own narrative performance using a
combination of literaiy analysis, discourse analysis and cultural analysis. He analyzed the
story grammar in terms of lines, stanzas, strophes, topic units, chapters and parts. He
demonstrated that an analysis on the line and stanza level reveals information about language
use, whereas an analysis on the stanza and strophe level reveals information about Deaf
cultural values and rules for behavior. Moreover, an analysis on the strophe, topic and
chapter level reveals information about the narrator's stylistic devices, the characters involved
and shows changes in perspective. He thus used this tripartite analysis: linguistic, cultural
and literary, to understand the "Eagle Fable" as a cultural construction. His analysis
supported his claim that ASL has an oral literature.
The anthropological research on Deaf communities has also been scarce (Carmel
1987, Erting 1982, Padden 1980, Padden and Humphries 1988, Rutherford 1993). However
at the international Deaf Way conference in Washington D.C. in 1989, more than six
thousand people from Deaf communities in more than eighty countries came together to
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 8 attend a conference and festival to celebrate Deaf cultures (Erting et al 1994). The
proceedings of this conference included a section on Deaf culture in which thirty six
presentations primarily by Deaf authors represented Deaf communities from twenty different
nations (Erting et al 1994). Four of these presentations dealt with African Deaf communities
in South Africa (Simmons 1994), Subsaharan Africa (Devlieger 1994), Burundi (Sururu 1994)
and Ghana (Okyere and Addo 1994). A common theme running through these papers is the
dominance of the pathological view of deafness, oral education and the consequent lack of
recognition of signed languages and socio-cultural aspects of Deafness. Deaf people in
Burundi and Ghana lack access to the hearing culture as this aecess is largely transmitted
through spoken language.
The most obvious identifying feature of Deaf cultures is their use of signed
language. The influence of signed language on the social and material reality of Deaf people
raises interesting questions about the effects of a visual-gestural language on the nature of
Deaf people’s cognitive, social and material reality. Anthropological and linguistic research
has validated the existence of a Deaf culture in the United States which is expressed and
negotiated through American Signed Language (Carmel 1987, Erting 1982, Rutherford 1993).
There is also an awareness among Deaf people and researchers of the need for more
research on signed languages and Deaf cultures in other countries.
Data Selection And Methodology
I use a case study methodology to demonstrate how a Deaf heterosexual male
Owambo Namibian uses his signed language to construct his complex social-cultural identity.
A case study methodology is ideally suited to discourse analysis based research, which yields
rich data for extremely detailed and in-depth miero-analysis. Since the pioneering research
of Geertz (1974) and Turner (1957), anthropologists arc increasingly turning to dense case
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 9 studies in an attempt to understand the complexity of cultural construction in the world
where different ethnic groups are no longer distinct and homogeneous entities (in Rosaldo
1993:93-96). Case studies are ideally suited to an investigation of the individual as an agent
actively constructing cultural identity and negotiating different intersecting cultural identities
that are shaped by historical and political processes. The interaction between individual
agency, or the actor’s perspective, and received cultural structures is a central issue in
processual cultural analysis. Everyday practices, social inequality and processes of social
transformation become central research topics (Rosaldo 1993:104-105).
There have been no published in-depth studies of Deaf African communities or
the use of discourse in these communities. There have been a few unpublished preliminary
and superficial investigations of African signed languages (Frishberg n.d., Aramburo 1987,
Lewis 1994). In this dissertation, I use a Namibian Sign Language (henceforth NSL)
narrative as the primary data. This dissertation investigates how an individual manipulates
and transforms the available linguistic and cultural resources to express and construct his
own cultural identity as a Deaf Owambo, in the context of social and political inequality.
The goal of this dissertation is to deconstruct a life story narrative to examine
the textual construction of the narrator’s self. As I have chosen a signed language life story
as my data, I examine two aspects of discourse structure that have been found to be critical
in ASL, namely, temporal lexical (Zimmer In Press) and spatial repetition (Winston 1993).
In my analysis, I demonstrate first how a Deaf Namibian signer structures his
Namibian Sign Language life story narrative in terms of spatial and temporal repetition. I
focus on how the signer uses spatial and temporal patterning both to structure his narrative
and create metaphorical meaning. The structure of the narrative cues the shape of a
coherent and cohesive narrative identity. This does not mean that the narrator’s own notion
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 10 of his inner self is organized coherently or cohesively. As Bakhtin says, the inner self is
expressed in terms of fragments of language that are unfinalized (Morson and Emerson
1990). It is the act of narration itself that finalizes the self that is presented to the audience
in a life story narrative. It is only in the narrative that the narrator is able to construct a
finalized coherent and cohesive self. I build on Winston’s (1993) research in which she
demonstrated how a signer used space as a cohesive strategy to tie different parts of an ASL
lecture together into a coherent whole. In addition, I demonstrate how the signer exploits
the structure of his signed language, manipulating it in novel ways to produce temporal and
spatial figurative language in order both to construct and express his social-cultural identity.
I use lexical repetition as an entry point, as this has been found to be an
important structuring strategy in spoken and signed oral narratives (Tannen 1989, Johnstone
1987, Labov 1972, Zimmer In Press). In particular, Hymes (1981) found that Native
American narratives were structured in terms of repetition of temporal particles. In a pilot
study (Morgan 1989), I found that the repetition of temporal markers functioned to segment
the NSL narrative into episodic units.
I use spatial repetition as a means of accessing both the structure of this signed
language text and the narrator’s use of metaphorical meanings. ASL text analyses have
shown that these texts are spatially structured (Winston 1993). Research on metaphors in
ASL have shown that they are also spatially structured (Moy 1989). This dissertation
includes a focus on both the spatial structuring of the life story text and spatially structured
figurative language as a means of cuing cultural construction of identity.
Fernandez (1986) argues that individuals use tropes to argue persuasively as they
construct the identities that they want others to recognize. Tropes function primarily to
establish the way individuals perceive their own identity as well as their relations to each
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 11 other, in what Fernandez refers to as "domains of belonging". How we perceive ourselves
and how others perceive us depends on the tropes we use in our language. In order to
explore the construction of a languaged social-cultural identity which individuals actively
create in relation to the linguistic and cultural constraints, I investigate the way an individual
transcends these constraints by transmuting or stretching them so as to invent new,
idiosyncratic, and personalized cultural and linguistic forms.
I use Friedrich’s concepts of "linguistic relativity" and "poetic indeterminacy" as
a framework for looking beyond linguistic structural rules and constraints to where the true
force of what a language can express uniquely resides. This figurative usage of language is
called "poetic indeterminacy." The idiosyncratic blending of the individual imagination and
the structure of the language gives rise to what Friedrich considers to be most interesting
about that language, its poetic force (Friedrich 1986).
Interesting issues arise concerning the "stretching" of signed languages, as
opposed to spoken languages, in the reconfiguration of complex identities in narrative
performances. As signed languages are visual-gestural by nature, they offer grammatical
spatial resources which can be exploited in unique and interesting ways. The figurative use
of signed languages has only recently begun to be investigated (Moy 1989, Neumann 1994,
Bahan 1991).
Moy has demonstrated that figurative language in ASL differs from that of
English, as the language itself is structured metaphorically. He has shown that metaphors
are an inherent part of the organization of the phonological and morphological structure of
ASL. He sees iconicity in ASL in terms of structured systems of visual metaphors. For
example, time is expressed in terms of the spatial domain. The abstract timeline in ASL
reflects the metaphor that "time is moving object". Future time is shown in front of the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 12 signer, present time is indicated on the signer's body and past time is shown behind the
signer.
In English, by contrast, this metaphor is not expressed phonologically or
morphologically but lexically, in expressions such as "Time flies", "the time will come when..."
(Lakoff and Johnson 1980). Thus Moy emphasizes that a major difference between English
and ASL is that metaphor is instrumental in the organization of the phonological and
morphological levels of ASL. Thus, in ASL, future time is always spatially expressed by signs
that move forward and past time is always spatially expressed by signs that move backwards.
However, metaphors are structured lexically in English, where one concept "time", is seen
in terms of another "moving object" in the utterance "time flies". If signed languages are
structured metaphorically in terms of space, then the languages have an internally fixed
metaphoricity which is used automatically by all signers.
The question that arises is, how do signers manipulate their language in novel
and idiosyncratic ways to use it creatively? Is all use of signed language poetic as it is
inherently metaphorical? I hypothesize that the structure of the language naturally lends
itself to poetic and iconic usage, as there arc spatial grammatical resources which the signer
can manipulate in a multitude of ways, sometimes figuratively, sometimes referentially. For
example, the signer can create images by combining handshape and movement morphemes
in a multitude of ways, using spatial resources that are not present in spoken languages. By
studying the use of spatial figurative devices we can gain insight into the construction of
visual-gestural meaning or Fernandez’ "domains of belonging" that have not yet been
explored in spoken languages (Fernandez 1986). Recent research has begun to examine the
use of paralinguistic features, such as eye gaze, on the discourse level in English (Kendon
1992, Goodwin 1992). However this research has not focused on figurative language use.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 13
Signed languages lend themselves to such research into figurative language as
they have an inherently spatial grammatical system at the disposal of every fluent signer.
This has been well documented (Liddell and Johnson 1988, Liddell 1980, Liddell In Press,
Liddell and Metzger 1995). The degree to v/hich signers exploit this ability to create tropes
using spatial resources probably depends on the individual imagination and likely varies from
signer to signer.
In this dissertation, I investigate how a Deaf Namibian signer exploits the
structure of Namibian Sign Language (NSL), stretching it beyond its structural constraints
in novel ways to produce figurative language which both constructs and expresses his social-
cultural identity.
Goals and Objectives
The general issue this dissertation addresses may be stated in terms of the
following questions:
1. How does a Deaf Namibian use a life story narrative performance to actively
create, negotiate and transform complex cultural identities?
2. What are the linguistic and symbolic cultural resources that this individual
exploits in his construction of narrative identity?
I plan to answer these questions with data from a life stoiy. I use a definition
of culture in which individuals are actively involved in socially constructing and negotiating
their own culture through language, and in which language and culture mutually influence
each other (Becker 1979, Friedrich 1986, Goodwin and Heritage 1990, Halliday 1989).
Building on Basso (1989), Polanyi (1985) and Sherzer (1987), I hypothesize that
Deaf Namibians also use narrative to maintain and recreate their culture, that is, they use
their own signed language to construct their own cultural meanings. I use discourse analytic
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 14 methods to deconstruct one life story in order to explore how the narrator uses different
components of the language (in particular his use of time and space) to create cultural
meaning: identity and solidarity with a group of Deaf peers.
I specifically use a discourse analytic approach that considers contextual aspects
of performance in the construction of identity during narrative performances (Goodwin 1992,
Kendon 1992). The interaction of the narrator with the audience in any particular setting
will influence the structure or form of the narrative. An important theoretical assumption
of this study challenges the myth that there is a unitary unchanging narrative ethnic identity.
Instead, I argue, ethnic identity changes according to contextual factors such as the setting
and the audience. I specifically investigate the self-eonscious production of narrative identity
in a formal setting where white hearing researchers, in addition to Deaf peers and hearing
teachers, are present.
The Data
Based on the research discussed above, 1 use discourse analysis to show how
meaning is structurally encoded in a text (life story narrative). I have selected the life story
of Phineas, a Deaf Gwambo male signer in his late twenties for this analysis. I had initially
recorded and transcribed the life stories of the entire group of six Deaf Owambo males
whom I worked with on the Namibian Sign Language Dictionary Project for a period of 15
months from September 1988 to December 1989.
The videotaped narrative data provided a record of all six Deaf peers signing
their life stories in a formal setting to the rest of the group after they arrived in the U.S. A
white South African unknown female and her white male American consultant were behind
the video camera.
I obtained this data within days of the arrival of the group of deaf Namibians,
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 15 before they had any chance to learn American Sign Language which could have
contaminated their language use.
The day after I met this group, with whom I was to work for the following fifteen
months developing a dictionary of Namibian Sign Umguage, I asked them if I could record
their life stories, so as to have a record of their own Namibian Sign Language as they used
it amongst themselves, before it might be contaminated by American Sign Language. They
agreed, and Phineas was the first to tell his stoiy, the explication of which constitutes the
data for this dissertation. The context in which he told his story was formal: the Conference
Room at the International Center for Deafness at Gallaudet University. The six Deaf
Namibians and their two hearing teachers sat around the conference table, while I
videotaped each narrative in turn. I instructed the group to sign the stories as naturally as
they could, without using signing that approximated spoken language word order. I was
interested in the sign language they used amongst themselves. Phineas volunteered to start
with his story. I selected this life story as it was both rich and dense in meaning and form.
Another reason was that it was the only narrative that the group of Deaf Namibians and I
transcribed and analyzed together over a six month period during the dictionary project.
I selected Phineas’ five minute text for this micro-analysis as he was the only
signer whose life story was obviously characterized by head movements, head turns and
eyegaze shifts. This was immediately apparent to me on viewing the videotape of his life
story. In contrast, the other life story narratives did not exhibit this kind of head and
eyegaze involvement. As I was interested in analyzing how individual signers idiosyncratically
manipulate the grammatical and cultural resources of NSL to construct unique identities,
Phineas’ life story was best suited to my research.
Another factor that I considered in selecting this life story was that Phineas was
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 16 the first to narrate his story to the others in the group and thus his story was not influenced
by those of the others. His narrative performance was also of interest to me, as he was the
only group member who had not had any education until the age of nineteen. He was the
only subject who did not know the spoken or written language (Oshivambo) used by his
hearing community. Thus his NSL could not have been influenced by spoken language
structure. In addition, his knowledge of written English was limited to the vocabulary level
and he had not gained control of rudimentary English sentence structure. His life story was
therefore, a form of Namibian Sign Language that had not been influenced by the spoken
or written languages used in the hearing community. The group agreed that he was a skilled
story teller, although they thought his language use was sometimes "different" from theirs.
They attributed this to the fact that he had not come into contact with any other Deaf
people until the age of nineteen and that the "home sign" system he used with his mother
still influenced his signing of NSL. However, after we had transcribed this narrative as a
group, there was consensus that Phineas was a sophisticated user of NSL and that what they
had originally assumed to be "home sign influence" was his ability to manipulate the grammar
of NSL in creative ways.
Data Transcription
Traditionally discourse analysts have worked on spoken language conversations
and used audio tape-recorders to obtain their primarily auditory data (Tannen 1984,1989,
Bauman 1986). However, researchers are starting to use video-recorders so as to capture
paralinguistic features and gestural details (Kendon 1992, Goodwin 1992). The analysis of
signed language text requires video-recording as the language itself is visual. Both the lexical
signs and the accompanying non-manual signals need to be transcribed into written English
glosses and analyzed in detail. This involved watching them repeatedly on a videotape
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 17
recorder using a slow motion replay control knob.
In order to analyze the videotaped life story data, I first transcribed the life story
together with the entire group of six Deaf Namibians and their two hearing teachers. We
worked together collaboratively on a daily basis for six months in order to complete this task
to everyone’s satisfaction. We used English glosses (Klima and Bellugi 1979, Liddell 1980,
Baker and Cokely 1980).
As the focus of my analysis is the use of space as a means of constructing
identity, I needed to devise a way to transcribe both the manual (use of hands) and the non-
manual (use of body) spatial features of NSL. I coded the following non-manual spatial
markers which have been identified as significant in the grammar of American Sign Language
(Liddell 1980, Valli 1987) as follows: headnods (hn). headturns to left or right (htl or htr),
prolonged hold of the final phonological segment of a sign (H), headtilts to the left or right
(headtilt), articulation of sign in signing space on left (L), articulation of sign in signing space
on right (R), use of central signing space (C), eyegaze to left or right (Lgz or Rgz), hands
in neutral position (P) (APPENDIX 1).
Method For Structural Analvsis
Following Hymes (1989), Gee (1991) and Chafe (1980), whose work all
demonstrates that the actual performance of the narrative cues its interpretation by the
audience, I asked my consultant (a Deaf Namibian signer other than the narrator) to identify
the central idea around which each line is grammatically organized. Gee (1991) states that
"each line is about one central idea...topic or argument around which a line is syntactically
or intonationally organized." The line includes background information about the central
idea. I used a signer of NSL to identify each piece of new information in the narrative using
his intuitions about the beginning and end of each central idea or topic. I noticed that non
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 18 manual markers always occurred at the juncture between lines. I then examined the non-
manual markers that occurred at these junctures and discovered that the narrator marked
these transitions by a headnod, a change in eyegaze and/or head position or a prolonged
hold of the last sign of the preceding line. There was always a non-manual marker or
combination of markers at line divisions. I called each piece of new information an idea
unit. The transcript now was laid out in terms of 51 lines, each representing an idea unit.
In order to code the non-manual signals, I entered each lexical item (sign) on a new line on
the left hand side of the page and entered the corresponding non-manual signals on the right
hand side of the page (APPENDIX 1). This also allowed me to ignore the left to right
convention of writing English and to concentrate on the structure of each "line" without
interference from written language conventions.
The following discourse analysis employed a "bottom-up" approach, using the
transcription as the starting point. I proceeded step by step to understand my data, each
step emerging from the preceding part of the analysis. I lay out each step below and discuss
the details of the analysis in chapter three.
Following Hymes (1989) and Gee (1991), in order to understand the way the
narrator uses notions of time to structure his narrative identity, I grouped the lines into
episodes according to the repetition of temporal markers. A pilot study revealed that my
subject used time markers, in particular the aspect marker FINISH to segment the text into
episodes. In chapter three, I detail the use of both one and two handed FINISH which
enabled me to analyze the way notions of time were used to structure the epitopic units in
the text (APPENDIX 3).
Following Tannen (1989), I then analyzed the structure of the narrative in terms
of lexical repetition both within and across episodes so as to gain insight into the narrator’s
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 19 construction of textual cohesion (see Chapter Three). I use Halliday and Hasan’s definition
of cohesion which is based on the links between utterances that clue speakers and hearers
to interpret the underlying meaning of the text (1987:9) The cohesive ties are one way of
cuing the meaning of the text which is contained in underlying propositional connectors.
Linde (1993) also discusses the coherence systems in life stories which involve common sense
knowledge shared by the speaker of a language. This indicates the way Phineas manages to
obtain a cohesive and coherent construction of his identity (APPENDICES 4-7).
Method For Spatial Metaphoric Analvsis
The next part of the analysis, detailed in the section on spatial repetition in
chapter three, focused on the signer’s use of spatial repetition to construct meaning. I first
identified the signer’s use of patterned repetition of eyc-gaze movements and the use of the
left, central and right signing space. I did this by transcribing the data in a different form,
by literally mapping his use of the left, central and right parts of the signing space onto three
columns on the page, namely, left, central and right. (APPENDIX 8).
Following Lakoff and Johnson (1986) and Moy (1989), I finally analyzed the use
of spatial metaphor to identify what is culturally salient by identifying which meanings are
mapped onto specific visual linguistic forms. As metaphoric mappings are partial by nature,
what is selected to mark meaning is culturally or individually salient. An analysis of the
underlying metaphoric structure used in these NSL life story texts provided insight into the
way Deaf Namibians perceive and construct these individual and social identities.
Anthropological Interpretation
The anthropological analysis followed the structural linguistic analysis, and
examined what is linguistically available in NSL and the individual imagination interface to
create this Deaf Namibian’s construction of self, in relation to both the hearing "other" and
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 20 Deaf community.
Conclusion
This dissertation aims to investigate the interaction between the following three
aspects of a Namibian Sign Language life story:
1. The finalized compositional structure (chunking of text into hierarchical units
according to repetition of lexical temporal markers and repetition of spatial
markers signalled by eyegaze movements).
2. The unfinalizablility of the stylistic structure (stretching the spatial resources of
the grammar of the language to produce idiosyncratic patterning of eyegaze
movements).
3. The finalized thematic structure (indicated by lexical repetition of key words
signalling thematic content within and across different structural units of
analysis).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER TWO
THE RESEARCH CONTEXT
Deaf Namibian Refugees As A Linguistic And Cultural Minority
The specific linguistic community that my subject belongs to is a small group of
Black Deaf Namibian refugees who use a variety of Namibian Sign Language. I came into
contact with this community in 1988 when I began training a small group of Deaf Namibians
to make a dictionary of their sign language (Morgan ei al 1991). The purpose of this project
was to promote Namibian Sign Language as a legitimate language with its own linguistic
structure in a country where signed language has no legitimacy (Morgan et al 1989). In
Namibia, Deaf people are considered "dumb", with the inherent implication that they are
incapable of using language proficiently. Signed language is seen as being primitive
gesticulating, something less than a real language.
After eighteen months of exposure to Namibian Sign Language, and daily
intensive work with this group, I was convinced that these Deaf people were bound together
by more than their signed language. The literature on Deaf culture reveals that Deaf people
have their own culture and signed language which signals cultural membership (Carmel 1987,
Erting 1978, Johnson and Erting 1982, Padden 1981). Stokoe et al 1976,1980).
The Namibian Deaf group had a rich Deaf culture which emerged from their
stories about the Deaf school in Namibia (Ashipala ei al 1994). They do not self-identify on
the basis of the medical model in which deafness is seen in pathological terms (Woodward
1982). Instead, these individuals identify themselves as a politicized minority group with
21
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 22 their own signed language and Deaf culture, active in the struggle of their people for
independence. These Deaf individuals had all escaped from Namibia to Angola in the late
1970’s, in order to join the struggle for independence that was based in Angola. During their
ten years in exile in the refugee camps in Angola, they started a Deaf school for themselves.
The selected community may, at first glance, seem small. However, there is a
paucity of research on the language-culturc interface concerning any Deaf communities in
Africa. This dissertation is the first to do detailed research on language and culture within
Deaf African settings.
The Subiect
I call the subject Phineas, using a pseudonym to protect his identity. He is a deaf
Owambo man who was in his late twenties when 1 first met him in September, 1988. He had
arrived in the USA a few days before our meeting, with a group of 5 of his Deaf peers and
two hearing teachers from the South West African People's Organization (SWAPO) refugee
camp they referred to as "Kwanza" in Angola, where they had been living in exile for the past
ten years.
Phineas’ story is set in northern Namibia and Angola and spans the 28 years of
his life, ending with his arrival at Gallaudet Universi ty. He grew up in a country at war with
South Africa, where he was oppressed both as a Black Namibian and as a Deaf* person.
Phineas joined the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) in 1980 when he
decided to cross the Angolan border not far from his home into exile where SWAPO
operated.
Until he was nineteen years old, he lived in a remote rural Owambo village in
* In this dissertation, I use the term "Deaf’ to refer to the culiural :is|k;cIs. v a lu e s, a n d lifestyles of D eaf people. This distinction was first made by Woodward (1972).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 23 Northern Namibia, not far from the Angolan border. He was the only deaf person in his
village and he could not remember ever meeting another deaf person in Namibia. He spent
his childhood and teenage years immersed in the hearing Owambo culture of his family and
village. He told me that together with his mother, he developed a sophisticated gestural
system which he used to communicate with his immediate family. Phineas never acquired
any spoken Oshivambo which was his family’s first language. As he never went to the Deaf
School in Namibia, he could not read or write.
In order to fully understand the external institutional forces that shape Phineas’
construction of a specifically Deaf Namibian cultural identity within his narrative, the
political-historical, linguistic and cultural context a fleeting deaf and hearing individuals in
Namibia must be examined. Phineas’ present cultural identity as a Deaf SWAPO political
refugee cannot be separated from the cultural, linguistic and economic historical forces that
have shaped his world (Sider 1986,1987).
Phineas hints at these forces implicitly but does not explain them explicitly within
his life story. His omission of political factors in his life story is striking given his obvious
politicization as a SWAPO member. This could be attributed to his censoring the details of
highly sensitive SWAPO information which he needed to safeguard due to my presence (a
white hearing South African researcher whom he did not know or trust at this point in time)
and the presence of his hearing male teacher who constantly reminded the group about the
danger of releasing information about the secret nature of SWAPO’s activities. My presence
could have influenced him not to include political information concerning the South African
occupation of his home in Namibia and the educational problems faced by hearing and Deaf
Namibians subjected to South Africa’s Bantu Education policies. The presence of his
hearing teachers acted as a deterrent against making public political conflicts concerning
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 24 Deaf autonomy which existed between the hearing and Deaf SWAPO members of the group.
At the time of narration (1988), the Namibian struggle for independence was not over.
Namibia achieved independence at the end of 1989 while Phineas was at Gallaudet
University in the USA on a U.N. sponsored Namibian Sign Language Dictionary Project.
I include the following details of the history of the political resistance of the
Gwambo’s to provide the reader with the contextual information necessary to situate this life
story in space and time. However, I do not attempt to link Phineas’ narrative to the broader
political, historical context from which it emerges as he omits all references to this larger
context. However the history of his people is primarily a story of resistance to oppression
and in the end, I discover that his life story is essentially structured around his resistance as
a Deaf Owambo Namibian to oppression.
The following political and historical account provides the history of the
economic and political forces that have shaped both Namibian society and the Namibian
struggle for independence (Mbuende 1986, Gorbunov 1988). I am including the details of
the colonization process so as to provide the context from which Phineas’ personal resistance
emerged. As the Owambo people have a history of resistance to the forces of colonization
which dates back to before 1894. In order to understand the colonization process and the
indigenous resistance to it, some details regarding topographical aspects of Namibia need to
be considered.
The Geosraohical And Political Context
Namibia, with a population of about one and a half million, lies in the south
western region of Africa between the Atlantic Ocean on the west and the Kunene and
Kavango Rivers in the north, which naturally separate it from Angola to the north and
Zimbabwe and Zambia to the north east. (Figure I ) The language spoken by the Owambos,
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 25 who make up half the present population of the country, is Oshivambo. There are eight
subgroups within the Owambos, each with its own dialect of Oshivambo and separate
economic and political structure. (Mbuende 1985. Mclbcr 1986, Knappert 1981).
lumnd# ^
Engttta School for th« Doaf Oahikuku • Phinaaa' Homa ' * Cshakatl - Koepltal
NAMIBIA
BOTSWANA
Figure 1: Map Showing Phineas’ Home in Namibia and in Exile
Phineas’ kraal (a circle of huts surrounded by cultivated land) lies in the northern
dry regions of Namibia near the intersection of the Kunene River with the Angolan border,
in an area that the Germans named Owamboland. Later the South Africans named it
Owambo, one of this regime’s ten "homelands". Tiie Owambo people used to occupy the
land on both sides of what is now the Angolan border. Owambo lies north of Etosha Pan
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 26 between the Kunene and Kavango Rivers and is bordered by Kaokoveld to the west and
Kavango to the East. To the south is the Kalahari and beyond that the central plateau
hardveld. Northern Namibia was a war zone during the 1970’s after SWAPO launched their
military struggle for independence from South Africa. The South African Defense Force
deployed their troops in the border region.
Phineas’ hearing community lives approximately a forty-five minute drive from
the nearest town, Oshakati, where the South African controlled Deaf School for Namibia is
located. Ironically, in his narrative, Phineas states that this school was very far away. This
is probably because he had no access to it or the deaf students who went there. He tells us
his mother refused to let him attend this school and omits to mention that the reason was
its location in a war zone filled with land mines and occupied by the South African Defense
Force. Four of the Deaf Namibian delegation to Gallaudet University did attend this school
for black Deaf children during the 1970’s before going into exile.
However, Phineas never went to this Deaf school and remained isolated from all
contact with Deaf people as he grew up in his kraal in the dry arable savanna, where since
pre-colonial times the Owambo people have practiced subsistence farming and small stock
breeding. However, colonialism, specifically in the form of the German and then the South
African regimes, had reduced their territory to a "homeland", removed their rights to their
land, killed off the majority of their livestock and limited their access to arable land, forcing
the Owambos into a migrant labor system to supplement their tradition of subsistence
farming in order to survive (Mbuende 1986, Melber 1986).
Consequently there were no adequate schools in Owambo, as the South African
Bantu Education system and Christian National Eiiucalion aimed to produce manual laborers
for the South African State (Hartwig and Sharp 1984). Their homeland had become a
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 27 source of labor to replenish the workers needed by the South African factories, mines and
farms. Subsequently there was inadequate health care with limited medical facilities (Melber
1986, Mbuende 1986).
The situation for Deaf Owambo's was bleaker than for their hearing
counterparts. There was one school for d.c Deaf, in Oshakati, which was under the control
of the South African Department of Special Education. I remember attending a conference
for teachers of Deaf South African schools in 1984 where it was proudly announced that a
Namibian Deaf school had been established in the minefields of Owambo. This was the only
available school for Deaf children from all over Namibia. The South African government’s
Bantu education system affected the Deaf students in the following ways: In the same way
that private mission schools were taken over by the government in the 1960’s as an
instrument of state control, the school for the Deaf was relocated by the South African
Special Education Department in 1974 to Oshakati and taken over by this department.
Mother-tongue instruction in signed Oshivambo was instituted in keeping with the policy for
total communication for black Deaf South African schools. There was no instruction in
English. Deaf students were worse off than their hearing counterparts as there was only one
school that they could attend and there was no high school education for Deaf students.
In addition to being oppressed by the laws of apartheid, and the constant threat
of the South African Defense Force near their homes and school, the Deaf group reported
that they had also experienced discrimination by the larger hearing black community of which
they formed a part. They experienced linguistic oppression in that their indigenous sign
language was not accepted or known by hearing people. As a result they could not have full
access to their education which was conducted for the most part by hearing teachers in
signed Oshivambo.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 28 The Deaf school, like all South African Deaf schools located in homelands,
focused on teaching the students manual skills such as sewing and knitting for the girls, with
mechanics and woodwork for the boys. Students might have acquired rudimentary literacy
skills in Oshivambo by the time they graduated from the school. Students who completed
this education remained illiterate in English.
To the south of Phineas’ village lies the Kalahari and across the eastern border,
Botswana. South Africa lies to the South and at the time Phineas arrived in the USA, where
he told his stoiy. South Africa still illegally occupied Namibia, which they had done since
their 1914 invasion at the outbreak of World War One.
A Historical Sketch Of Owambo Resistance
A brief historical sketch of pre-eolonial life in Namibia and colonial activity
concerning Germany, and South Africa’s involvement in Namibia provides the historical-
cultural context of Phineas’ intersecting and dialogized traditional Owambo and national
Namibian identities. Both identities encompass resistance to intrusion. His later
politicization and rejection of his traditional Owambo identity in favor of a trans-tribal
national Namibian identity must be understood in terms of the impact of colonization and
the South African occupation on the Owambo and other Namibian people.
Under the South African regime, on the basis of apartheid’s land distribution and
group area laws, the parts of the country with mineral resources and agricultural potential
were reserved for whites and the rest was carved up into ten "homelands" to which people
were relegated according to ethnicity. Owambo"s were legally restricted to their Owambo
"homeland" under. As in all "homelands", there were no employment opportunities, forcing
men to become migrant laborers in the mines, farms and factories of the whites. Women,
older people and children, who were not considered to be viable labor resources, were left
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 29 to eke out an agricultural subsistence in their kraals without adequate medical care or
education.
The early peaceful resistance attempts of SWAPO met with South African police
brutality in the early 1960’s, forcing the resistance movement into exile, first in Tanzania and
later in Angola. During the 70’s, the bush war intensified close to the Angolan border,
where Phineas’ people lived. Accordingly the South African army stationed its troops there
to fight against SWAPO’s incursion from Angola. Faced with the option of Bantu
Education, which prepared Africans for manual labor to support the white regime and life
under an oppressive system, young people from all over Namibia banded together and in
small groups crossed the Angolan border to join SWAPO’s struggle for independence.
The Namibian people have resisted intrusion even before the arrival of the
Germans. The history of intrusion that Namibians have been forced to live with and its
impact on their social, political and economic organization will add to our understanding of
Owambo resistance to the South African regime, which Phineas perpetuated in his own life
as a Deaf Owambo Namibian.
In pre-colonial Namibia, the Owambo s were one of several small and separate
social groupings (comprising one or more ethnic and sub-ethnic groups) who were then
politically and economically autonomous (Mbuende 1986:21). The Owarabo’s lived in the
central part of what is today the northern zone of Namibia extending from Etosha Pan in the
South across the border to Okassubga in the southern part of Angola. They were flanked
by the Okakoa in the west and the Kavango in the east. Ovamboland was not policed by
Germany and remained outside of direct colonial control, which they restricted to their
"southern zone". However, Owambo’s were active in sheltering people from other ethnic
groups in the southern zone who were actively resisting German rule. When South Africa
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began its 1915 occupation, Owamboland came under their control.
Before colonization, missionaries arrived in the early 1800’s and thus began the
alteration of the social and economic organization of Namibia. Copper mining was initiated
in the 1850’s. The Germans arrived in Namibia in 1883, and controlled most of the country
by 1885 except the far northern territory (where the Owambo live) and succeeded in
colonizing it by 1894. The Germans were intent on separating the Namibian people from
their means of production, land and livestock. The German troops used the tactic of "divide
and conquer" and separated the people according to ethnicity into smaller political and
geographical entities. From 1894-1903, they waged localized wars on subgroups of Nama
and Herero. People were impoverished as they were restricted to demarcated areas. Their
access to new grazing ground and hunting ground was blocked. Groups were forced to sign
treaties.
The Germans secured Hereroland by restricting both Herero land ownership and
the flow of arms from the Owambos in the north. They fixed the northern and southern
borders, separating the Herero’s from the Nama in the South and the Owambo in the North.
The troops impounded thousands of Herero cattle, which crossed the southern border in
1895. They seized 12,000 cattle from Hereto groups who revolted to resist their onslaught.
In 1896, the Germans created a northern buffer zone between Hereroland and
Owamboland by introducing 25 Boer families to the area. The aim was to separate the
Herero’s from the Owambo’s and stop the ammunition flow. In 1903, seventy-five percent
of the land had to be sold to Whites and the remaining twenty-five percent was to become
"Native Reserves".
The Herero, Damara and Nama people in the south who had had half their land
stolen by the Germans declared war against them in ! 904. Three years later the Germans
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defeated the Nama, killing 10,000 (over 50%), 65 000 Hereros (85%), and a third of the
Damara. During the genocide, 14,000 prisoners were taken and sent to work. People fled
north, where the Owambo’s sheltered them. The Germans defeated them in 1907 and
introduced an oppressive system which eventually was refined into the apartheid system by
the South Africans. By the end of the war, the Germans had captured or destroyed almost
all African owned livestock. They forbade Africans to breed cattle or keep horses. They
confiscated their land and forbade them to obtain land or have rights over their land.
(Mbuende, 1986:63).
In 1907, the Germans introduced a system of pass and vagrancy laws, which
forced people to work for the Germans as migrant laborers in their farms and mines. By
1910, over 10,000 Owambo contract workers were working in the southern mines and
railways, where wages were low and the men lived in compounds. The Germans succeeded
in establishing the groundwork for the development of capitalism in Namibia. They now had
a laboring class without access to the means of production.
In 1914, after World War I started. South Africa invaded Namibia under Britain’s
instructions and took control over Owamboland. In 1918, with the defeat of Germany, the
war ended. In 1921, the League of Nations gave South Africa a mandate to administer and
govern Namibia with the aim of leading it to independence.
Between 1923 and 1937, the South African government aggressively segregated
and relocated Namibians to the African reserves set up by the Germans, where people did
not get adequate jobs, housing, health or education. These reserves were in desert areas
where people could not subsist agriculturally. This forced people to work as migrant laborers
in the white controlled mines, railways, factories and farms. By 1928, only 22% of adult
males were in the reserves. The reserves aimed to produce migrant workers who retained
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 32 limited access to means of production and also had to sell their labor power in order to
subsist (Mbuenda 1986:85).
In 1945, when World War II ended, the U.N. decided that Namibia and all
former German colonies should become independent. However the South African
Government convinced the UN that Namibia should be incorporated into South Africa. The
UN voted to this effect in 1946. The South Africans did not provide much education in
Namibia. In 1948, the era of apartheid began when the South African National Party came
into power. By 1953 the Nationalist Government had passed the infamous Bantu Education
Act.
In 1957, the precursor to SWAPO. the Ovamboland People’s Congress, renamed
the Owambo People’s Organization in 1958, was ibrmed by migrant laborers. The OPC
developed into SWAPO in 1960. In 1959 the South African Police killed 11 and wounded
54 Africans who were involved in a resistance campaign against forced removals in Windhoek
to the Katatura township. Nujoma, the leader of SWAPO, fled into exile in Tanzania. In
1960 OPO changed its name to the South West Africa People's Organization and petitioned
the UN 120 times, demanding independence by 1963.
The South African government resorted to militarism and building the economy
in order to perpetuate the survival of the ruling elass/apartheid, etc. In 1961 they launched
a military industry, and encouraged foreign investment in the mining industry. By 1963, the
South African Government set up the homeland system in which Namibia was divided into
one white and ten black white ministates. People were relocated into these "homelands"
according to ethnicity. This was implemented in 1968 with the Development of Self-
Government for Native Nations in South West Africa Act. "Native Nations" including
Ovamboland were formed by the South African Government, with the aim being for the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 33 South African government to retain sovereignty over the mineral rich central plateau and to
relegate sovereignty over impoverished desert areas to the "homelands". As these
"homelands" were not economically viable, the residents would be forced to work in the
"white homeland". The "homelands", like the "reserves" were centers for cheap labor for the
white settlers.
In 1971, a ruling by the International Court Of Justice, confirmed the UN
resolution of 1966 in terms which South Africa was illegally occupying Namibia. Thereby
the UN took responsibility for Namibia under the UN Council for SWA. In 1971-72, thirty
thousand migrant laborers went on strike. In addition, high school students went on strike
against Bantu Education. Peasants revolted against the homeland system.
In 1975 Angola became independent from Portugal. Thousands of Namibians
crossed the Angolan border, to cross into Zambia where the military wing of SWAPO, which
had started a war against South Africa in 1966, was located. The whole northern zone
became an operational area in 1975. It was a few years after this event that Phineas and his
fellow Deaf comrades left Namibia to join SWAPO.
The U.N. recognized SWAPO, whom they supported financially as the
government in exile of Namibia. Scholarships were set up to send SWAPO scholars all over
the world. The U.N. supported the group of Deaf Namibians, including Phineas, who came
to the USA from Angola in 1988 for further education. South Africa was still illegally
occupying Namibia in 1988 at the time Phineas narrated his life story. The South West
Africa People’s Organization (SWAPO) finally achieved independence, fourteen months
later, in November 1989, allowing Phineas and his cohort to return home to independent
Namibia. For this group, the SWAPO struggle for independence was finally over, however
their Deaf struggle would only be beginning. Bearing in mind the historical, economic and
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cultural forces acting on Phineas’ world, wc can see liow he reconstructs his life stoiy from
a personal position of agency and resistance to oppressive forces.
Life Storv Text In English
I provide Phineas’ lifestoiy in English narrative form below. The complete
transcription based on the NSL original is in APPENDIX 2. I have included the original line
and episodic structure of the narrative in this translation. From the information that he has
included in this first episode I have deduced that he is addressing the camera and therefore
a potentially bigger audience who are not present and therefore unknown and to whom he
must identify himself.
The immediate audience comprises eight people: six of his Deaf Owambo peers
and two hearing Owambo teachers who know his name, where and when he was born, that
he is Deaf and how he lost his hearing. Present but not sitting at the table are the two white
hearing English speaking researchers whom he has recently met and whom he knows have
no understanding or knowledge of Namibian Sign Linguage. The researchers are standing
behind the video camera and may be included in his potential audience after they have
learned NSL.
Episode 1:
line 1: I am Phineas Kimis.
line 2: I was born in 1960, in Namibia.
line 3: I am a Deaf person who has no hearing.
line 4: I lost my hearing when I was a young child , I was hospitalized.
line 5: I was treated for a prolonged illness with repeated injections. And that was that.
Episode 2:
line 6: My father, mother, brothers and sisters and myself went to look for transport to
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 35 get from the hospital to the general store in Oshikuku near our home,
line 7: They took me home from the hospital to my Owambo kraal (homestead),
line 8: I became healthy now that I had arrived home and we were done with the
hospital.
line 9: Time passed, we children all grew up with my family and their sheep and cattle
on the farm. And that was that.
Episode Three:
line 10: It rained on the land and we used oxen to plough the land,
line 11: Mother planted the seeds. And that was done.
line 12: It rained on the land and we hoed the land, the plants grew and we harvested
the millet. And that was done,
line 13: In the sweaty heat of July wc harvested the erops. And that was done,
line 14: Together with my brothers and sisters we picked the millet, carried it in baskets
on our heads to the storage place where we poured it out. And that was done,
line 15: Then we picked the sugar cane, cut off the tops of the plants and filled our
baskets which we carried to the same place where we poured out the millet.
And that was that.
Episode Four:
line 16: After the harvest we herded the cows and goats into the fields where they could
graze on the stalks.
line 17: Together with my mother, my brothers and sisters we pounded the millet with
a big thick pounding stick. We formed a circle and performed a kind of dance
as we moved in unison rhythmically from one foot to the other as we pounded
the millet.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 36 And that was that.
Episode Five:
line 18: The windy season arrived when the wind never stops blowing.
line 19: It was the time when we lifted a basket of grain that we tilted at an angle. I
shook it from side to side so that the heavier grain remained and the wind
carried away the lighter waste particles.
And that was that.
line 20: And we were done with that.
Episode Six:
line 21: We all, us children together with mother and father gathered in one place.
line 22: We removed the kernels of millet from the cobs. There were many cobs and as
we picked off the kernels we used one hand to sweep all the kernels to one side
and the other hand to toss the cobs to the other side. And we were done with
that.
line 23: We then carried the baskets of sorted giain on our heads to the storage huts
where we poured out the millet kernels. And that was that.
Episode Seven:
line 24: I thought about what to do next and asked for mother’s help as I wanted her
permission to go to the Deaf school in Oshakati which was far from our village.
Although I pleaded with her. Mother adamantly refused to allow me to go,
reiterating "never".
line 25: I gave up as mother had said "Never" so adamantly.
line 26: I gave up, I was bored as there was nothing to do but wait through an endless
succession of tomorrows. And that was that.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 37
Episode Eight:
line 27: I thought and thought, "where could I find a school here?"
line 28: I wondered as there was no one here wiio could sign.
line 29: I decided that I wanted to cross the Angolan border.
line 30: I needed to learn English. In 1980.1 got help and learned a lot of English. And
that was that.
Episode Nine:
line 31: My arrival in Angola meant independence had arrived. And that was that.
Episode Ten:
line 32: Before we set up the school I had wondered: "where are the other Deaf students
who are the same as me?"
line 33: We asked a hearing man called Ever Tiniony (our commander or boss) to assist
us as we needed a teacher for our Deaf School. He agreed to help and taught
us the alphabet. Ever chose me first for the class, then he chose you; he chose
Nango third, Zack fourth, Daniel fifth, Hcnock sixth; Marius, who was really
young at the time, was chosen seventh; Hcnock was chosen eighth; he was older
than Marius then; Timony was chosen ninth, who was younger than Henock,
Damon was chosen eleventh, Theresa was chosen twelfth.
line 34: The two teaching assistants, Thabitha and Rauna were chosen thirteenth and
fourteenth, they each helped with a group of students, Rauna with the younger
students, Thabitha with the older students. And that was done.
line 35: Ever taught the grade two group. Sackcus passed grade two. Laban passed
grade two. Henock passed grade two. Unfortunately I failed grade two and had
to repeat it. Ever selected three new students for the grade two class - he chose
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 38 Damona thirteenth, Peter fourteenth and he chose someone else fifteenth.
These new students joined me in the grade two group,
line 36: He taught the grade four class where the others were taught,
line 37: He taught me in grade two, I passci! alter struggling and working hard. I went
into grade four with my group and we passed. We skipped Grade five and
caught up to the others in grade six. Wc all finally passed and graduated
together. And that was that.
Episode Eleven:
line 38: I reflected on the fact that I had learned a lot of English at school, I was now
free to do what I wanted,
line 39: I decided that I wanted to go to Luanda to find work so that I could earn money
to get things at the store like vaseline and soap. 1 worked there until 1987 and
I was done with that.
line 40: I was now ready to return to Kwanza-sul. 1 packed my things up and loaded
them onto the truck for the journey back to Kwanza where I could continue
learning a lot. And then that was done,
line 41: Both Peter and Daniel remained at home in Luanda whereas I returned to the
Deaf community at Kwanza,
line 42: Kalile was experiencing problems while teaching at Kwanza. Kalile got tired of
these problems and decided to move away. He moved to Luanda where he
found work. Kaupa was also in Luanda,
line 43: I stayed at Kwanza in contrast to my friends in Luanda. And that was that.
Episode twelve:
line 44: At Kwanza I visited the young women whom I saw around. I visited with them
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 39
and hung out with these young women whom I wanted to befriend. I told them
how I wanted to work and entertained them with my stories. However they
didn’t appreciate me or my stories and rejected me.
And that was that.
Episode thirteen:
line 45: There was nothing left for me to do besides to concentrate on my work....And
that was that.
Episode fourteen:
line 46: And then I got extremely sick, I had malaria which they treated me for by giving
me injections. I eventually recovered. And that was that.
Episode fifteen:
line 47: I waited patiently at Kwanza for a long time while I thought about where I could
find a school where there would he other Deaf people like myself so I could
further my education.
line 48: I flew to the USA together with other Deaf peers (from Kwanza) and we arrived
here to start school.
line 49: The houses were strange and not the same as the ones in Angola and nobody
knew me here.
line 50: I have never seen such a place before now and I have nothing to do here.
line 51: I waited and waited until eventually the head of the Deaf group from Gallaudet,
Titus, told us that we needed to wait until after the weekend until school started
on Monday. So there was nothing to do except wait, we waited through
Saturday and waited through Sunday, doing nothing, no classes, just waiting for
Monday ....
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER THREE
STOUCTURAL TEXT ANALYSIS
Chapter Three comprises an in-dcptli structural text analysis, which details the
temporal and spatial structuring of this life story into a hierarchically organized system of
textual units. I first provide an overview of my analysis which yielded these units in order
to present the reader with the findings of this text analysis. 1 decided to do this due to the
unwieldy length of the linguistic analysis in which 1 substantiate each claim regarding the
temporal and spatial structuring of the text with the necessary supporting textual evidence.
For obvious reasons it is important to include these details of the linguistic argumentation
which comprise the chronological method I htive followed and the evidence I use to support
my claims regarding the structure of the text. 1 have divided the linguistic analysis into two
major sections; temporal and spatial structuring of the text.
Overview Of The Method And Findings Regarding Textual Structure
According To Temporal And Spatial Markers
I begin with an overview of the structural analysis of Phineas’ life story according
to spatial and temporal repetition which function to structure the narrator’s narrative
identity in this rendition of his life story.
My analysis of repetition of temporal lexical forms and of spatial features (as
evidenced by patterning of eye-gaze movements, head turns and placement of signs in the
signing space) focused on how time and space function together to structure Phineas’ life
story. This investigation reveals that recurrence of lexical temporal particles, eyegaze
40
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 41 movements, headtums and bodyshifts are instrumental in chunking the narrative into four
types of hierarchically organized structural units, which I term (in ascending order): 1)
epitopes, 2) contratopes, 3) chronotopes and 4) hem itopes.
In addition, further support for the existence of these textual units comes from
examining all occurrences of non-temporal lexical repetition which add to the cohesive
structure of this narrative by binding utterances eohesivcly together within epitopes and
hemitopes.
The inspiration for the -tope (Greek for space) terminology comes from
Bakhtin’s use of the term "chronotope" (time/space) for narrative units in which time and
space are inherent properties of any text and cannot be separated from the events that are
grounded within them. (Holquist 1990:115-126). The textual units I identify in Phineas’
lifestory are all signalled linguistically both temporally and spatially and in order to
emphasize this I term them epitopes, contratopes. chronotopes and hemitopes which I
describe in turn.
1. Epitopes refer to the fifteen structural units I identify as "episodes" in the text
above. Some of these epitopes are further divided into sub-epitopes (TABLE 1). I coined
this term to highlight the interaction of space and time. There is no time without an event.
Thus events or episodes are inseparable from the time in which they are realized. I
therefore chose the Greek locative prefix "cpi-" which compounded with "-tope" (space)
refers to the smallest textual units in which time and space intersect.
Epitopes refer to discrete chronologically sequenced life events occurring in both
physical and textual space. Phineas indicates his experience of time in the real world by his
repetition of temporal linguistic markers which move the narrative chronologically through
physical time - the time particles occurring at the beginning and end of epitopes. He
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 42 indicates physical space in the text by mapping real world events onto specific locations in
the signing area as well as by the patterning of hcadturn movements (to the left / center/
right) and eyegaze movements (to the left / center / right). Each epitope uses textual space
and time to reconfigure and reconstitute discrete life events grounded in physical time and
space. Epitopes thus function to finalize and structure physical time and space in the
narrative for the audience.
Each epitope is an instance of a linguistically temporally and spatially bounded
event which is finalized by the temporal particle two-handed FINISH. In table one, I have
given each of these epitopes a title as they arc self contained entities with no leakage of
content across two-handed FINISH boundaries. TABLE 1 indicates that two-handed
FINISH functioned differently from one handed FINISH (glossed as FINISH2b) which
bounds sequential events within an epitope.
TABLE 1
EPITOPES, SUB-EPITOPES AND TITLES
epitope line title 1 1-5 Who I am in terms of my origins (Namibian) and Deaf as a result of early childhood illness 2 6-9 Back home with my family 2a 6-8 My family took me home from the hospital to recover Growing up on farm with goats, cows, parents and siblings 2b 9 3 10-15 Growing and Harvesting the crops 3a 10-11 -Rainy season -plough fields, mother planting -Rainy season-hoc fields, crops grow, ready for harvest 3b 12 -Dry season -Siblings harvest millet 3c 13 -Siblings harvest sugar-canc 3d 14 3e 15
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 43
4 16-17 After the harvest the animals graze on the remaining stalks while mother and children pound the millet 5 18-19 The windy season - separating edible grain from waste particles 6 20-23 Family prepares millet for storage 6a 20 -Completion of wind separation process 6b 21-22 -separating millet kernels from cobs 6c 23 -putting in storage huts 7 24-26 Giving in to mother who refuses to let me go to the Deaf 8 27-30 School 9 31 Thinking about alternative Deaf Schools, leaving for Angola Gaining independence 10 32-37 Founding our Deaf school 10a 32-34 -Selecting / Identifying original Deaf students -Progress through school 10b 35-37 Moving between two Deaf communities: the refugee camp 11 38-43 at Kwanza and the capital city Luanda -finished school, finished learning English, free to leave Kwanza to go work in Luanda 11a 38-39 -my return to Kwanza -leaving the Deaf community in Luanda although there are 11b 40 problems at Kwanza which cause other Deaf to move 11c 41-43 there. 12 44 Meeting young women at Kwanza - no luck 13 45 Resigned to working at Kwanza 14 46 Malaria and Recovery 15 47-51 Leaving Angola, arriving in the USA in search of more education
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 44 The formulaic recurrent use of FINISH at the end of each epitope gives the
lifestory its characteristic rhythm and shape. This repetition of FINISH functions
aesthetically as an involvement strategy on the musical or rhythmical level (Tannen 1989)
(Figure 2). In addition, FINISH functions as an involvement strategy on the sense making
level, to maintain watcher involvement by introducing an element of suspense and
anticipation about what will be narrated next.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 45
KEY: 1. one dot (.) equals one line of the text 2. a double line ( = = = = ) equals a two luinilcd l-INISIl episode boundaiy 3. a single line ( ------) equals a one handed I-INISII sequential event within a single episode
epitope line episode line 1 1 25 2 26 3 4 8 27 5 28 29 2a 6 30 7 8 y 31
2b 9 lOa 32 33 3a 10 34 11 lOb 35 3b 12 36 37 3c 13 lia 38 3d 14 39
3e 15 lib 40
4 16 lie 41 17 42 43 5 18 19 12 44
6a 20 13 45
6b 21 14 46 22 15 47 6c 23 48 49 7 24 50 51
Figure 2: The Narrative Sliajie According To "FINISH"
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 46 Some of the epitopes begin with the recurring temporal particles WITH
(10,11,15), UNTIL (epitopes 4,5,6,14) which signal a change in narrative time. WITH and
UNTIL occur epitope initially to mark the beginning of a new life event (see Figure 3 and
diseussion of WAIT, WITH, UNTIL in analysis).
epitope line title 1 1 . WHO ! AM... 2 . 1960(born) 3 . 4 . 5 .
2a 6 . BACK HOME WITH MY FAMILY 7 . -returning home from hospital 8 .
2b 9 . WAITFUTURE+ + -growing up on farm
3a 10 . GROWING AND HARVESTING CROPS 11 . -rainy season
3b 12 . -rainy season
3c 13 . -dry season
3d 14 . -siblings harvest millet
3e 15 . -siblings harvest sugar-cane
4 16 . UNTIL -animals graze left-over stalks, mother and dm jioiind millet 17 .
5 18 . UNTIL WINDY SEASON 19 .
6a 20 . UNTIL PREPARING MILLET FOR STORAGE -completing wind separation of grain 6b 21 . -separating kernels from cobs 22 .
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 47
6c 23 . -putting millet in storage
7 24 . GIVING IN TO MOTHER’S REFUSAL TO LET ME GO TO DEAF SCHOOL 25 . 26 . WAIT TOMORROW+ +++ +
27 . 28 . THINKING ABOUT ALTERNATIVE DEAF SCHOOLS, LEAVING FOR ANGOLA 29 30 1980
9 31 GAINING INDEPENDENCE
10a 32 WITH FOUNDING DEAF SCHOOL 33 -selecting original Deaf students 34
10b 35 -progress through school 36 37
11a 38 WITH MOVING BETWEEN 2 DEAF COMMUNITIES:KWANZA& LUANDA
39 1987 -finish school, finish learning English, free to leave Kwanza to go work in Luanda
11b 40 NOW ...UNTIL -my return to Kwanza
11c 41 -leaving Deaf in Luanda while other Deaf move from Kwanza to Luanda 42 43
12 44 MEETING YOUNG WOMEN AT KWANZA - BAD
13 45 RESIGNED TO WORKING AT KWANZA
14 46 UNTIL MALARIA AND RECOVERY
15 47 WAIT+ + + WITH LEAVING ANGOLA, ARRIVAL USA, IN SEARCH OF EDUCATION
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 48
48 . 49 . 50 . 51 . WAIT UNTIL WAIT (deaf boss instructions) WAIT UNTIL WAIT (through weekend, start mon) WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Figure 3: Structuring Of Text According To The Time Markers: "FINISH", "WITH", "UNTIL", "WAIT’
Further thematic evidence for the existence of epitopes is the presence of lexical
cohesion as demonstrated by the lexical repetition of actors and events within epitopic
boundaries. This repetition of lexical items does not leak across epitopic boundaries. In
Figure 4 to follow, I list the titles I have constructed to demonstrate the significant content
material of each epitope. Each title contains only the repeated lexical items for that epitope
and thus reflects what is significant in each epitope. There is no leakage of significant
content across epitopic boundaries.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 49
Epitope One: ME HEARING-GONE BACKSIDE-INJECT Epitope Two: FATHER MOTHER ME I.,OOK-FOR-(way home from) HOSPITAL Epitope Three: RAIN FARM-LAND PICK-MILLET CARRY-BASKET-ON- HEAD Epitope Four: no lex.repetition (herding animals into harvested fields to graze, mother, me and siblings pound millet) Epitope Five: WIND-BLOW Epitope Six: SWEEP-MILLET-KERNELS-TO-ONE-SIDE,TRANSFER- COB-TO-OTHER-HAND-DROP, CARRY-BASKET-(to- storage-hut) Epitope Seven: ME, MOTHER (told me that she would) NEVER (allow me to go to deaf school so I had to) S'l'AY Epitope Eight: ME THINK (no other deaf school here so I went to Angola to search for a deaf) SCHOOL (where 1 could learn) ENGLISH Epitope Nine: COME (arrival in Angola) Epitope Ten: EVER (our teacher) HELP(cd us by) TEACH(ing at the) SCHOOL (we set up). He PUT (us) in groups together and CHOOSE thirteen DEAF students (tor) GRADE TWO and FOUR. He TEACH (until) wc PASS(ed). Epitope ME THINK ME (go to) LUANDA (for) WORK (after that the Eleven: truck) DROPped-(me)-OFF (at) KWANZA Epitope VISIT(ing) and SEE(ing) GIRLS (at) KWANZA, (becoming) Twelve: FRIENDS, GOOD. Epitope No lexical repetition -after rejection by girls nothing to do but Thirteen: work Epitope No lexical repetition -sick with malaria, recovery after injections Fourteen: Epitope ME FLY (to USA) with DEAF, DON'T KNOW (these houses Fifteen: or people), NOTHING-TO-DO UNTIL (our deaf boss tells us that school starts Monday except) WAIT....
Figure 4: Lexical Rcpetitiuii Within Epitopes
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 50 My spatial analysis which tracked patterns of eyegaze and headtum movements
interacting with the physical placement of signs within the signing space reveals that each
epitope is also spatially signalled by an eyegaze movement which moves (tyclically starting at
the center and moving leftward/rightward before terminating in central space. I term this
patterning of direction of eyegaze movements spatial discourse contours.
The discourse use of space at the beginning and ends of epitopes thus signals
epitopic contours which function to structure the epitope spatially in terms of contours and
thereby let the receiver know where the narrator is relative to the beginning and end of the
epitope. In addition these spatial discourse contours function to define hemitopic boundaries
(see discussion of hemitopes).
2. Contratopes are a separate system of 10 contrastive topical textual units which frame each
topic. These frames are spatially constituted by contrastive topics, similar to the comparative
frames that Winston (1993) identified in her analysis of an ASL lecture in which the signer
sets up each contrastive element on opposite sides of the signing area in order to highlight
the contrast as evident in Figure 5.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 51
ITOPELEFT RIGHT
1. hospital...... home s ic k ...... healthy
2. inedible waste ...... food
3. Namibian Deaf school ...... mother
4. No other alternative . . . .
5. younger students ...... older students
6. grade fo u r ......
7. refugee cam p...... city (Luanda)
8. women ...... rejected, alone
9. . . . sick......
10. leave A ngola......
Figure 5: Contratopes Delineated By Spatial Mapping Of Oppositions
Physical time is signalled at the beginning of some contratopes by a temporal
marker e.g., WAIT (Frames 2 & 10) or WITH (Frames 5 & 1). All contratopes except for
the final contratope in the narrative are terminated liy the temporal marker FINISH (one
or two handed FINISH). Thus eontratope final boundaries and epitopic or sub-epitopic
boundaries are co-terminus. Contratopes may span one or more epitopes.
Some of these contratopes contrast topographical locations in the sense that they
refer to two different locations in the real world, e.g.. the hospital on the right vs. the village
on the left, the state Deaf school on the right vs. the village on the left, the refugee camp
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 52 on the right vs. the city on the left, Angola on the right vs. the USA on the left.
Other contratopes do not represent two physical locations in the real world but
represent two contrasting entities (Winston 1993) e.g., inedible waste on the right vs
producing edible food on the left, younger students on the right vs older students on the left,
students in grade four on the right vs students in grade two on the left, hearing women on
the right vs the narrator on the left. These contratopes use space contrastively to elaborate
the topic and involve the audience in details and imagery concerning Phineas’ agricultural
subsistence with his family, his involvement in forming the Deaf school in exile and what led
to him leaving Angola. These contratopical frames arc grouped together to form
chronotopes and do not cross chronotope boundaries.
3. Chronotopes are larger textual units in which both physical and textual time and space
intersect (see chronotopic boundaries in Figure 6). They arc composed of one or more
spatially structured contratopes according to their occurrence in the same country (physical
space) over an extended time period in Phineas' life (physical time).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 53
Key: chronotope boundary CONTRATOPE LEFT RIGHT 1. hospital...... home sick...... healthy 2. inedible w aste ...... food 3. Namibian Deaf school ...... mother 4. No other alternative ...... relocate to Angola + + + + + + 4- + + + + + + + + 4~ + + + + + + + + 5. younger students ...... older students 6 . grade four ...... grade two 7. refugee camp ...... city (Luanda) 8. w om en rejected, alone 9...... sick ...... ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 10. leave Angola arrive USA
Figure 6: Three Primary Clirono(o|>c Boundaries In Relation To Contrato|>es
Figure 6 indicates that chronotopic boundaries are co-terminus with spatially
determined contratopic boundaries and arc signalled in the text temporally by the time
marker WAIT in conjunction with other time particles which occur at the end of
chronotopes.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 54
KEY; ■ + + + + chronotope boundary Part one: BECOMING DEAF AS A CHILD Orientation epitope 1 2a + + + + + + + ■ Part two: GROWING UP WITH FAMILY IN RURAL NAMIBIA Namibian Chronotope epitope 2b WAIT FUTURE+ + 3 4 5 6 7 WAIT TOMORROW-}- -I- -I- -I- -f
Part three: LIFE IN EXILE WITH DEAF PEOPLE IN ANGOLA Angolan Chronotope epitope 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
Part four: ARRIVING IN USA FOR MORE DEAF EDUCATION USA chronotope epitope 15 WAIT-n--}- WITH -)-4-}--}--}--}--(--l-- Part five: NOTHING-TO-DO EXCEPT WAIT coda epitope 15 WAIT UNTIL WAIT (deaf boss instructions) WAIT UNTIL WAIT (through weekend, start monday) WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Figure 7: Chronotopic Boundaries According To "WAIT'
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 55 I identified a five part narrative structure signalled by eaeh oceurrence of WAIT.
The beginning and end of the narrative correspond to the initial and final structural elements
of a narrative identified by Labov, namely the orientation and the coda (Labov and Waletslty
1967, Labov 1972). The first part corresponds to Labov's orientation. The orientation
functions to introduce the actors, time, place and circumstances of the narrative. Phineas
indicates that this narrative is about himself, and establishes the time of his birth in his
countiy of origin in part one. The orientation thus situates the narrative in the timeless
space of the narrator’s birth.
Parts two, three and four contain the body of the narrative and are signalled by
the time marker WAIT which situates them in real time. ! call these chronotopes as they
occur in different geographical locations. They are the Namibian, the Angolan and the USA
chronotopes respectively. The narrative ends with the fifth part corresponding to Labov’s
coda, indicating the end of the narrative by bringing the lifestory into the present which is
characterized as timeless by an increase in the number of repetitions of WAIT.
WAIT bounds the beginning and end of the Namibian-as-home, family,
subsistence farming chronotope, characterized by seasonal, cyclical time. The first
chronotope occurs after the introductory orientation epitope and extends to the middle of
the narrative. WAIT FUTURE4-4- signals the beginning of this chronotope which is
terminated by WAIT TOMORROW 4- 4- 4- 4- 4-, marking the end of the Namibian chronotope
and Phineas’ imminent relocation to Angola. WAIT TOMORROW4-4-4-4-4- also signals
a hemitopical boundary (occurring mid-narrative at line 26, out of a total of 51 lines).
The Angolan chronotope (characterized by linear time) extends from epitope 8
to the end of epitope 14. The final American chronotope coincides with the bulk of epitope
15. The sequence of five instances of WAIT in the final line at the end of this epitope
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 56 indicates the end of the narrative by bringing (lie narrator into the present time. The
recurrence of WAIT signals the last part of the narrative, bringing the narrator into the
unfinalizability of the present orientated towards an unknown future. Interestingly there is
no FINISH marker at the end of this narrative.
Each chronotope begins with a new topic concerning a different country which
he perceives positively and sets up on his left. Phineas elaborates the initial topic of eaeh
chronotope by moving back and forth from left to right (where contrasting events within the
positively perceived country are established rclaiionally).
These topical oppositions function as spatial cohesive devices within chronotopes.
Consequently they may cross epitopic boundaries within the chronotope. I claim that spatial
contrasts delineate a system of sub-texts or topics organized around oppositions in this
lifestory.
The spatial oppositions which frequently function to elaborate the topics in terms
of oppositions that can be perceived negatively and positively within chronotopes also
function cohesively to bind the entire narrative theniatieally. Phineas structures his life
story topically in terms of oppositions. He uses eyegaze to signal the spatial opposition
[constituting eaeh topic] which he sets up contrastively on the left and right of the signing
space. Spatial contrasts operate on both the shape and meaning of the text to delineate a
central system of sub-texts or topics organized around oppositions in this lifestory.
The setting up of oppositions spatially is a requirement of the language but the
use of space to create new oppositions and resolve them is an example of idiosyncratic spatial
patterning which gives us insight into the way this Dca f individual constructs oppositional and
narrative meaning for himself.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 57 4. Hemitopes are the largest textual units in which botli physical and textual time and space
interact. There are two hemitopes, composed of groups of chronotopes according to their
occurrence in both physical and textual time (cyclical vs linear) and spaee (home vs exile).
The first hemitope consists of the introductory orientation and cyclical Namibian
chronotope. The second hemitope consists of the linear chronotopes of exile (Angola and
USA).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 58
Chronotopic boundary %%%%%%%% Hemitopic boundary Hemitope one Part one: BECOMING DEAF AS A CHILD (Orientation) epitope 1 2a
Part two: GROWING UP WITH FAMILY IN RURAL NAMIBIA (Namibian Chronotope) epitope 2b WAIT FUTURE+ + 3 4 5 6 7 WAIT TOMORROW-}- -I--}--}--H -}--l--}--}--}--)--}--}--}--}--}--}--}--}--}--}--}--}--}--}--l--}--}- + + -}--l--l--}--l--}--}--}-- %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Hemitope Two Part three: LIFE IN EXILE WITH DEAF PEOPLE IN ANGOLA (Angolan Chronotope) epitope 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
Part four: ARRIVING IN USA FOR MORE DEAF EDUCATION (USA ehronotopc) epitope 15 WAIT-}- -I- + WITH Part five: NOTHING-TO-DO EXCEPT WAIT epitope 15 WAIT UNTIL WAIT (deaf i)oss instructions) WAIT UNTIL WAIT (through weekend, start mon) WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Figure 8: Hemitopic Boundaries
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 59 The hemitopic boundary falls in the middle of the narrative at the end of epitope
seven in line 26 (out of a total of 51 lines). It is signalled by a reversal in the direction of
movement of spatial discourse contours. The spatial discourse contours of epitopes one to
six generally move in a leftward direction throughout the first hemitope. The direction of
movement at the beginning of epitopes is therefore patterned and the reversal of this pattern
midway through the narrative functions to delineate a major transition in his lifestory which
divides his life into two distinct hemitopes: life in Namibia (parts one and two in Figure 7)
vs. life in exile (parts three, four and five in Figure 7 above).
Hemitopes are also tied together thematically, by internal lexical repetition which
does not cross hemitopic boundaries. There is not much evidence of Phineas’ agentivity as
a separate individual in the first hemitope where he functions in the context of his family
members who are emphasized (MOTHER, FATH HR. BROTH ER-SISTER) rather than the
self (ME) (APPENDIX 6: Repetition Of Actors Across Epitopes). In this hemitope he
succumbs to the authoritative discourse of his hearing mother who does not allow him to go
to school. This hemitope ends with him initially succumbing to his mother’s authority after
her refusal to allow him to attend the Deaf school in Namibia. This is what Bakhtin refers
to as pre-individuation, the power of the authoritative voice which meets no resistance.
However in the second hemitope, Phineas' internal dialogue begins when he
questions this authority and decides to leave his family secretly and go into exile. There is
a marked inerease in the frequency of occurrence of ME. signalling the narrator’s increased
agency which extends to the end of the narrative. Further evidence of this agency is the
repetition of verbs such as THINK, WANT, LEARN. There is no mention of his family in
the second hemitope.
In the first hemitope the dialogue is straightforward - between his hearing rural
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 60 Owambo family with whom he identifies and the South African authorities who control the
hospital and the Deaf school. However this situation changes at the beginning of the last
part of the first hemitope when he has his first conflict with his mother and rejects her
authority. This marks the emergence of his Deaf identity, which he navigates through the
second hemitope in relation to different voices.
The entire second hemitope is dialogic in terms of Phineas’ experiences with the
hearing authorities at the school in exile who offer a different authoritative discourse to that
of his Deaf peers who had left the camp and relocated to the city of Luanda. There are also
the seductive voices of the hearing women at the camp who ultimately reject him. There is
his own emerging internally persuasive voice in relation to these other voices and a new set
of authoritative Deaf voices at Gallaudet in the U.S.A where he ends his narrative at the
time of narration.
The above structural analysis provides us insight into Phineas’ intricate use of
spatial and temporal linguistic markers to organize his life story in terms of cohesive textual
units which give the narrative a hierarchical organizjition.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 61
Key: epitope
sub-epitope contratope, orientation, chronotope, coda - F 4 - 4 - - F + hemitope %%%%%
epitope line contratope chronotope orientation coda 1 1 1. hospital-home orientation 2 3 4 5
2a 6 7 8
***************** 2. inedible waste-food Namibian Chronotope 2b WAIT FUTURE-1-+
3a 10 11
3b 12
3c 13
3d 14
3e 15
16 17
18 19
6a 20
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6b 21 . 22 .
6c 23 7
***************** 2. Deaf school-Mothcr 7 24 . 25 . 26 .
***************** ^ no school-Angola + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Angolan Chronotope %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% 8 27 . 28 . 29 . 30 .
31 .
***************** 5. younger-older students 10a 32 . 33 . 34 .
***************** 6. grade 2-grade 4 10b 35 . 36 . 37 .
***************** 7. refugee camp-Luanda 11a 38 . 39 .
11b 40 .
lie 41 . 42 . 43 .
***************** 8. women- rejected
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 63 12 44 .
***************** g _ 13 45 .
14 46 .
***************** 10 leave Angola- arrive USA USA Chronotope 15 47 . 48 . 49 . 50 . Coda 51 . %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Figure 9: Structuring Of Text According To Orientation, Epitopes, Contratopes, Chronotopes, Ileinitopes And Coda
Summarv of Textual Units
Epitopes are the smallest epitopic units and are temporally signalled at their final
boundary by repetition of two handed FINISH. Contratopes are oppositional structured
spatial topical frames consisting of one or more epitopes. They are finally signalled by
repetition of one or two handed FINISH. Chronotopes consist of a series of contratopes
and are temporally signalled initially by repetition of WAIT, and are terminated by repetition
of FINISH. In addition they are spatially patterned.
Hemitopes consist of one or more chronotopes and form each half of the narrative.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 64 The following section, the analysis of lexical repetition, provides the linguistic
argumentation for lexical repetition as a structuring device in this life story text. I have used
this structuring device in the text to divide the text up into textual units for analysis as
detailed above.
ANALYSIS OF TEMPORAL PARTICLES
Linguistic Anaivsis Of Lexical Repetition
I will examine two aspects of repetition. This section addresses lexical repetition
of temporal particles, actors, events and actions whereas the next section addresses repetition
involving spatial aspects of discourse structure.
My analysis of lexical repetition demonstrates that the repetition of lexical items
functions to segment the text into units of different sizes by means of which the narrator
organizes and presents his narrative.
In the following linguistic analysis 1 examine Phineas* life story in terms of lexical
repetition in order to first determine how the narrator uses different kinds of lexical
repetition to give the text a shape or structure. Temporal lexical items are repeated in order
to chunk the text into units of different sizes.
I also determine how lexical repetition contributes to the construction of meaning
or sense-making in the life story by identifying the themes that emerge from repetition within
and across major topic boundaries. Phineas uses lexical repetition to mark topic boundaries
that convey significant information about his construction of cultural identity. Lexical
repetition thus functions cohesively to bind parts of the text together within and across topic
boundaries (Hymes 1981, Tannen 1989, Zimmer (In Press), Winston 1994).
Hymes (1981) delineated his verse structure using recurring elements to show the
underlying organization of the text. In addition to emphasizing the time-space interaction
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 65
in these units, I call these units epitopes rather than verses or stanzas to avoid the imposition
of terminology from a western literary tradition onto a non-western oral literary form. The
formulaic recurrence of FINISH (a one and two handed lexical item which conveys aspect)
seems to be functioning to chunk the narrative into major life segments or epitopes.
Research on FINISH in ASL has revealed that aspectual FINISH can function
as a discourse marker to mark the end of one topic and the transition to a new topic (Roy
1989). The following analysis establishes that FINISH is indeed functioning as a temporal
discourse marker. The epitopic structure of the narrative can be seen in table two where I
have given each of these epitopes a title. Note that each epitope is a self-contained entity:
subsequently there is no leakage of content across two handed FINISH boundaries.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 66
TABLE 2
OVERVIEW OF MAJOR LIFE EPITOPES
epitope line title number number 1 1-5 Who I am in terms of my origins (Namibian) and Deaf as a result of early childhood illness 2 6-9 Back home with my family 3 10-15 Growing and Harvesting the crops
4 16-17 After the harvest the animals graze on the remaining stalks while mother and children pound the millet 5 18-19 The windy season - separating edible grain from waste particles 6 20-23 Family prepares millet for storage
7 24-26 Giving in to mother who refuses to let me go to the Deaf School 8 27-30 Thinking about alternative Deaf Schools, leaving for Angola 9 31 Gaining independence 10 32-37 Founding our Deaf school
11 38-43 Moving between two Deaf communities: the refugee camp at Kwanza and the capital city Luanda
12 44 Meeting young women at Kwanza - no luck 13 45 Resigned to working at Kwanza 14 46 Malaria and Recovery 15 47-51 Leaving Angola, arriving in the USA in search of more education II------
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 67 Repetition of FINISH as an involvement strategy
The division of the text into epitopes bounded finally by the formulaic use of the
time marker FINISH provides a starting point for this analysis. Tannen (1989) explored the
use of repetition as an involvement strategy used in narrative. Her notion of "involvement"
is the achievement of a connection through conversation or narrative between the narrator
and the audience in which the narrator expresses the bond felt to other people, places,
things, memories and words. The listeners or watchers are active participants in the
construction of the narrative which is shaped by the idler in terms of Becker’s notion of an
aesthetic response which comes from an emergent sense of coherence (Tannen 1989:13).
This allows for audience participation in the construction of narrative as well as for the
comprehension of meaning. Thus involvement and coherence work together to create
meaning and elaborate on it by balancing formulacity and novelty. The two aspects of
involvement strategies function simultaneously. The lirst aspect is that of sound and rhythm
or the music of the text whereas the second involves sense-making, a response to scenes
containing images made up of detail.
Tannen argued that the fusion of music and scenes trigger emotions and in
Friedrich’s terminology gives language its poetic force. Repetition thus functions to give the
text its characteristic shape and sound which sustains listener involvement. I have shown that
the music of NSL is created by the same strategics that create the music of spoken languages
Le., by the use of lexical and spatial repetition which works on the visual shape of the
narrative.
The formulaic recurrent use of FINISH at the end of each epitope thus gives this
narrative its characteristic rhythm and shape. The occurrence of FINISH is always
accompanied by a headnod. Thus this lexical repetition operates as an involvement strategy
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 68 on the musical or rhythmical level. FINISH also functions as an involvement strategy on the
sense making level, to maintain watcher involvement by introducing an element of suspense
and anticipation about what will be narrated next.
The Shane Of The Text: Lexical Repetition Of Time Particles As A Chunking Device
I unpack the internal structure of this life story by examining the repetition of
time particles that function to segment or chunk the text. The following time particles are
repeated throughout this narrative and I discuss each of them in turn:
i. FINISH
ii. WITH
iii. UNTIL
iv. NOW
FINISH
The following analysis of FINISH as a discourse marker considers all three signs
that I have glossed as FINISH in this text:
FINISHl is a two-handed symmetrical sign, FINISH2a is a two-handed
asymmetrical sign, FINISH2b is a one-handed phonological variant of FINISH
2a above, in which only the dominant moving hand is used and the non
dominant stationary hand is omitted.
Claim 1: FINISH, in general segments this narrative and different variants of FINISH mark
different textual units
The repetition of two-handed FINISH (1 and 2a) functions to segment this
narrative into fifteen major epitopes, whereas the repetition of one-handed FINISH (2b)
within any epitope further segments certain epitopes into sub-epitopes.
The claim is that the repetition of diffcrent forms of FINISH mark different sized
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 69 discourse units in this life story. Two-handed FINISH marks the boundaries of the narrator’s
major life epitopes and one-handed FINISH marks the boundaries of sequential units within
major epitopes.
Analysis of two-handed vs one-handed FINISH markers
In order to test the validity of the above claim concerning FINISH, I first need
to justify why I consider FINISH 1 and FINISH 2a together as distinct from FINISH 2b
(which is phonologically related to FINISH2a).
Originally I hypothesized that all FINISH signs function similarly in this narrative
to divide it into equivalent units as my informants had told me that these signs all mean the
same thing, namely that what has just been said has been completed or dealt with adequately
and it is the end of that topic. I consequently divide the narrative into more epitopes
according to each instance of FINISHl, FINISH2a and FINISH 2b.
However after repeatedly viewing the videotape, 1 realized that the one handed
FINISH signs are executed differently from the two-handed FINISH signs. The one-handed
FINISH variant co-occur with fewer non-manual signals than arc used with the two-handed
FINISH markers (FINISHl and 2a).
I therefore rejected my initial hypothesis regarding the similarity in the
functioning of these three FINISH signs. After looking carefully at these different FINISH
signs on the videotape and transcript, I hypothesize instead that FINISHl and FINISH2a
which both co-occur with similar non-manual signals function together to divide the narrative
into major life epitopes and that FINISH2b has a different function, that of marking
sequential events within epitopes. As a result. I discuss one and two-handed FINISH signs
separately in the following analysis.
Discussion of two-handed FINISH; (FINISHl and FINISH2a)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 70
In order to test this new hypothesis regarding the functioning of FINISHl and
FINISH2a, I checked to see if any of the major life epitopes crossed a two handed FINISH
boundary. As illustrated below in my in-depth discussion of epitopes one to three the major
epitopes did not cross two-handed FINISHl and FINISH2a signs, thus confirming that
FINISHl and FINISH2a do in fact signal major epitopic boundaries. An examination of all
fifteen epitopes confirmed this finding regarding the functioning of FINISHl and FINISH2a.
I first illustrate how FINISHl and FlNISH2a segment this life story into fifteen
major life epitopes by providing an overview of the text in terms of the fifteen primaiy
epitopes. (APPENDIX 2 and APPENDIX 3 contain the full transcript with two handed
FINISH divisions). I have summarized the epitopic structure of the transcript in Figure 3
(above) according to lexical repetition. Note that each epitope is a self-contained entity,
subsequently there is no leakage of content across two-handed FINISH boundaries.
Discussion of FINISH I and FIN!SH2a:
There are four instances of FINISHl (line 5:22, line 44:379, line 45:398 and line
46:401) and ten instances of FINISH 2a (line 9:59. line 15:93, line 17:106, line 19:115, line
23:139, line 26:167, line 30:193, line 31:197. line 37:303. line 47:408). Thus fourteen FINISH
markers segment this life story into fifteen primary epitopes which I have indicated using a
double line in the transcript (see APPENDIX 3).
FINISHl occurs only once at the beginning of the narrative at the end of the
first epitope in line 5 and does not reappear until towards the end of the narrative where it
functions to mark the boundaries of the penultimate three epitopes, namely, epitopes eleven,
twelve and thirteen.
Although the form of FINISHl is different from that of FINISH2a both of these
two-handed FINISH signs function in the same way to mark the end of major epitopes and
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 71
according to native Namibian signers they can be interchanged without any resulting change
in meaning.
The narrator uses the repetition of two-handed FINISH to construct a sequential
epitopic time line in which events are related chronologically. FINISH occurs at the end of
each major epitope. I argue that it is this lexical repetition of two-handed FINISH (1 and
2a) that gives the narrative as a whole its epitopic form. It is this epitopic structure which
makes it easy for the audience to process the narrative in terms of discrete chunks which the
narrator presents chronologically.
Discussion of one-handed FINISH
I claim that one-handed FINISH divides major life epitopes into smaller parts
which are temporal sequential events within a major life event. To check this claim, I
examine the data to see whether any major life epitopes cross a one-handed FINISH2b
boundary. Life epitopes do in fact cross one-handed FINISH signs. Therefore one-handed
FINISH signs have a different function from the two-handed FINISH markers discussed
above.
In this narrative, FINISH2b does not mark a major epitopic boundary, instead
it indicates a sequence of two or more events that occur within a major epitope.
Five of the fifteen epitopes (see epitopes 2. 3, 6, 10 and 11 in TABLE 1) are
made up of sequential events which the narrator signals by means of the one-handed FINISH
marker. Epitopes two and ten consist of two sequential events . Epitopes six and eleven
are each comprised of three sequential events and epitope three is made up of five
sequential events.
The sequential events in each major epitope are linked temporally by the one-
handed FINISH marker which also indicates that there is not be a major epitope shift but
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 72 rather a shift to a consecutive time period within the same epitope. Below is a detailed
discussion of how both one-handed and two handed FINISH markers function in the first
three epitopes.
Analysis Of FINISH Markers In Epitopes One To Three
I illustrate the use of one-handed FINISH2b as a temporal marker within a
particular epitope by examining its use in epitopes two and three, as it does not occur in
epitope one.
In epitope two (lines six to nine) Phineas describes how his family arrive at the
hospital to take him home. He rejoins his family in this epitope after his separation from
them during his hospitalization. His family take him home to his traditional Owambo village
where he recovers and grows up with his siblings and his parents surrounded by cows and
goats.
Epitope 2: Back home with my family
line 6: FATHER MOTHER BROTHER-SISTER ME hesitation ME GO LOOK-FOR SHOP LOOK-FOR O-S-H-I-K-U-K-U line 7; ME LOOK-FOR HOSPITAL CL:TAKE-CARRY-PUT HOME- HLJT OWAMBO WITH line 8: HOSPITAL HEALTHY FINISH2bfRt
line 9: WAIT FUTURE+ + COW WITH GOAT WITH FARM MOTHER FATHER WITH CHILD BORN CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UP-F + + FINISH
A line by line explanation of Epitope two follows;
In line 6: he relates that as the hospital is far from his village which is near Oshikuku and as his family do not have transport, getting home is an arduous process involving going to the general trading store and looking for a way to get home.
In line 7: he tells us that after some effort expended in looking for a ride home, they succeed in getting from the hospital back to their village.
In line 8; he recovers at home after his stay in the hospital. In line nine he describes how
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 73 time passes while he grows up with his siblings, living in the country with their parents and their cows and goats.
The boundary between the first and second epitopes is marked by two-handed
FINISHl. The two epitopes deal with two distinct topics. The first epitope is an explanation
of how he became deaf as a result of a childhood illness for which he was hospitalized
whereas the second epitope deals with his recovery at home with his family.
In the second epitope "Back home with my family", Phineas uses a one-handed
FINISH marker at the end of line 8 (HOSPITAL HEALTHY FINISH2bfRll to signal that
he has finished discussing his discharge from the hospital and his return home. I argue that
he does not use a two handed FINISH marker here as this event is topically related to the
following event (line 9) where he continues signing about the major life event under
discussion focusing on the centrality of his family and his recovery at home on the farm
during this period of his life. In line 9 (WAIT FUTURE-!--»- COW WITH GOAT WITH
FARM MOTHER FATHER WITH CHILD BORN CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UP4- 4- -l-
FINISHl he elaborates on the topic of his family which he introduced in line 6. He
describes how after he returned home from the hospital, he grew up on the farm together
with his siblings and his parents. Thus Phineas divides this epitope into two parts: part 2a
(lines 6-8) and part 2b (line 9):
Sub-epitope 2a: My family took me home from the hospital to recover line 6: FATHER MOTHER BROTHER-SISTER ME hesitation ME GO LOOK-FOR SHOP LOOK-FOR O-S-H-I-K-U-K-U line 7: ME LOOK-FOR HOSPITAL CL:TAKE-CARRY-PUT HOME- HUT OWAMBO WITH line 8: HOSPITAL HEALTHY FINISHfRl
Sub-epitope 2b: Growing up on farm with goats, cows, parents and siblings line 9: WAIT FUTURE-!- 4-COW WITH GOAT WITH FARM MOTHER FATHER WITH CHILD BORN CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UP4- 4- 4- FINISH
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 74 Phineas uses the first part (lines 6-8) to locate himself firmly in his family who
are the central actors in his lifestory at this point. They arc the primary agents who take him
home firom the hospital. This sub-epitope deals with getting home from the hospital. He
uses the one-handed FINISH sign to link the first sub-epitope to the second sub-epitope in
which he describes growing up on the farm with the farm animals, his parents and his
siblings. His family thus remain the central actors in the second sub-epitope. The two
handed FINISH sign at the end of line nine indicates that he has completed his discussion
of his family’s centrality during this epitope [of his life] and marks the transition to the third
epitope which has a different central topic. The existence of these units functioning as
independent epitopes is substantiated in my discussion of claim three which argues for lexical
cohesion within epitopic boundaries.
One-handed FINISH functions similarly in the third epitope where it occurs four
times by determining whether the following is true:
If each occurrence of FINISH2b signals a discrete temporally related event, it follows that:
1. all five events will be part of the same major life event.
2. these events will be sequentially related to each other.
In order to verify my claim that one-handed FINISH signals discrete temporally
related events, I needed to answer the following questions.
Question 1: Are all five events part of the same major life epitope?
Question 2: Are these events sequentially related to each other?
Question 1: Are all five events in epitope three part of the same major life epitope?
All five events are indeed all part of the same major life epitope which is
concerned with the growing and harvesting of crops. Phineas begins the third epitope (lines
10-15) by describing the rainy season when it is time to plough the land and then plant the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 75 seeds. This epitope covers the agricultural activities (plowing and planting, hoeing and
harvesting, harvesting millet, harvesting sugar-cane) that he and his family perform from the
time of the first rains to the dry season.
Epitope Three: Growing and harvesting the crops line 10: IS RAIN FARM-LAND OX CL: YOKE CL:GUIDE-PLOUGH line 11: MOTHER CL:PLANT-SEED4- FINISH-FfRl
line 12: RAIN FARM LAND CL:HOE-H- CL:PLANT-GROW CL:PICK MILLET+ 4- 4- FINISHfRl
line 13: JULYHOT4-4- SUN STRONG-DRY FINISH(R)
line 14: PICK-MILLET4-4-BR0THER-SISTERCL:CARRY-BASKET-0N- mHEAD CL:CARRY-BASKET-0N-HEAD CL:P0UR-0UT FINISH line 15: GO SUGAR-CANE-f- CL:PICK-SUGAR-CANE CL:CUT-TOPS- OF-SUGAR-CANE-OFF-PLANT4- CL:FILL-BASKET4- CDCARRY-BASKET-OF-SUGAR-CANE CDPOUR-OUT FINISH FINALLY
In line 10: the epitope begins with the rainy season which is the time for plowing the soil using oxen.
In line 11: mother plants the seeds.
In line 12: there are more rains after which the land is hoed so that the crops grow abundantly until they are ready for the harvest.
In line 13: he describes another seasonal change to the hot-dry season (July).
In line 14: he tells us how the children arc responsible for picking the millet which they carry away from the fields in baskets on their heads.
In line 15: he tells us how the children then pick the sugar cane which they carry away from the fields in baskets on their heads which they empty somewhere else.
Question 2: Are these events in epitope three sequentially related to each other?
This epitope is also broken down into five sequential component events which
are marked by one-handed FINISH markers. These sub-epitopes deal with the sequence of
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 76 specific agricultural tasks in a seasonal round which he and his siblings and his mother carry
out. He also describes each family member’s role during each season for each stage of
producing and harvesting the crops.
Sub-epitope 3a: line 10: IS RAIN FARM-LAND OX CL:YOKE CL:GUIDE-PLOUGH- FWD line 11: MOTHER CL:PLANT-SEED4- FINISH2b-t-(R)
Sub-epitope 3b: line 12: RAIN FARM-LAND CL:HOE4-4- CL:PLANTS-GROW CL:PICK- MILLET4-4-4- FINISH2b (R)
Sub-epitope 3c: line 13: JULY HOT4-4- SUN STRONG-DRY FINISH2b (R)
Sub-epitope 3d: line 14: PICK-MILLET-H-BROTHER-SlSTERCL:CARRY-BASKET-ON- HEAD CL:POUR-OUT FINISH2b (R)
Sub-epitope 3e: line 15: GO SUGAR-CANE4- CL: PI CK-SUGAR CANE CL:CÜT-TOPS- OFF-SUGAR-CANE CL:FILL BASKET-1- CL:CARRY-BASKET- OF-SUGAR-CANE CL: POUR-OUT FINISH2a (two handed) FINAL
The use of one-handed FINISH to segment the third epitope into sub-epitopes
corresponds to a shift in seasons, or a shift in actors, or a shift in agricultural activity. Each
sub-epitope deals with one or more of the following:
establishing the seasonal time for each consecutive agricultural activity,
describing which actors are present (family members)
describing the agricultural activities which deal with each stage of growing and harvesting the crops.
In the following discussion, each sub-cpitope is organized, for the purpose of this
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 77 analysis, in terms of seasonal time, who the actors arc and the agricultural activity that they
are engaged in. Each sub-epitope is discussed in turn so as to make explicit how one-handed
FINISH functions to link these sub-epitopes together to form a major "growing and
harvesting" epitope. Each sub-epitope deals with cither setting up the seasonal time and/or
describing the actors and/or describing the agricultural activity.
Sub-epitope 3a: Season Actors Activity line 10: rain oxen plough the fields line 11: mother plants seeds FINISH (one handed)
In the first sub-epitope, it is the rainy season and someone (probably the father)
yokes the oxen and ploughs the fields so that mother can plant the seeds. The one-handed
FINISH marker at the end of this epitope signals to the audience that the next sub-epitope
will now follow. Indeed the next sub-epitope starts with an almost verbatim repetition of line
10. This lexical collocation is a further cohesive device which binds sub-epitope 3a to sub
epitope 3b.
sub-epitope 3a line 10: IS RAIN FARM-LAND sub-epitope 3b line 12: RAIN FARM-LAND
The narrator is still discussing the rainy season but is focusing on the subsequent
activity which follows planting, namely hoeing the ground in preparation for the plants
growing until they are ready for the harvest.
Sub-epitope 3b: Season Actors Activities line 12: rain mothcr(cont) hoe - plants grow pick millet FINISH (one handed)
The use of one-handed FINISH at the end of line 12 indicates that the narrator
is about to move onto the next sub-epitope which will he linked in some way to the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 78 discussion of crops growing and ready for harvesting.
Sub-epitope 3c: Season Actors Activities line 13: July hot ------Sun strong/dry ------FINISH (one-handed) In line 13, he moves onto the next sub-epitope (3c) which takes place in the dry
hot season. The narrator does not tell us about the activities which will occur now and
closes this sub-epitope with a one-handed FINISH marker.
Sub-epitope 3d: Season Actors Activities line 14:Sun strong/dry(cont) siblings pick millet carry basket on head pour-out FINISH (one handed)
He only gives us the information we are waiting for about the specific agricultural
activities and who carries them out in line 14 where he describes his siblings' role in the
harvesting of the millet.
Sub-epitope 3e: Season Actors Activities line 15:Sun strong/diy(cont) sibiings(cont) harvest sugar cane, carry basket on head pour out FINISH (two-handed) FINAL
In sub-epitope 3e, he indicates the transition to the harvesting of the sugar-cane
(see line 15) at the end of line 14 by a one-handed FINISH marker. Phineas indicates that
he has completed the planting to harvesting epitope at the end of line 15 by using a two
handed FINISH marker followed by the FINAL sign. The sign FINAL indicates that the
harvesting of both the millet and sugar-cane has been completed.
In order to provide an overview of how the narrator makes sense of his life story
by presenting it in terms of fifteen major life epitopes some of which are further sub-divided
into sequentially related events, I list both the major epitopes and sequential events within
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 79
epitopes in TABLE 1 in which I have also labeled each sequential event according to the
narrator’s use of the one handed FINISH sign (FINISH2b).
Discussion Of Other Time Particles
In the preceding analysis of the functioning of the time particle FINISH, I have
shown that FINISH functions in two ways to shape this narrative. Firstly, it functions as a
discourse marker which operates across the entire life story, dividing it into significant life
epitopes and secondly, it functions as a discourse marker that operates within epitopes,
breaking them down further into sequences of events, (see Figure 1)
I have demonstrated that the narrator uses different forms of the sign FINISH
to mark both major life epitopes and discrete sequential events. I now investigate the
contribution of the repetition of other temporal lexical items to the structuring of the shape
of the text. I determine whether and how the recurrence of other time particles (WAIT,
WITH and UNTIL) contribute to the emerging temporal shape of this text.
Question 5a: In this life story do other repeated time particles function to organize the
temporal shape of this narrative?
Question 5b: If so, how?
I examine the data to see how the narrator signals a change in narrative time
during his telling of his life story. I identify the following recurring time particles: WAIT,
WITH, UNTIL, YEAR/RAINY SEASON and the following non-recurring time particles -
NOW, FUTURE, TOMORROW. I do not include YEAR/RAINY SEASON in this
discussion, as, despite its recurrence within epitope three, it does not function in the same
way as the time particles. YEAR/RAINY SEASON marks a specific time or season of the
year and will therefore not be discussed here.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 80 Discussion of: WAIT, UNTIL, WITH
This discussion focuses on the recurring time markers WAIT, UNTIL, WITH,
together with the non-recurring time particles FUTURE AND TOMORROW which co
occur with WAIT. NOW will not be included in this discussion as it only occurs once in the
narrative and I do not have enough data to provide evidence for any claim about NOW.
Claim 2: The recurrence of WITH, UNTIL and WAIT functions to signal to the audience the
relative time between a new event and the preceding event.
I discuss each time particle in turn:
a. WITH
b. UNTIL
c. WAIT
WITH
WITH is the most frequently recurring lexical item in this narrative. It occurs
a total of twenty two times and although it has one form I claim that it has two meanings
(WITHl and WITH2) and two distributions. WITHl only functions as a time particle that
which at the same time as in three instances that are important to this analysis (see
discussion below). The rest of the time WITH has a different meaning, WITH2 meaning
together with and also has a different distribution from WITHl. WITH2 does not occur
utterance initially but can occur and recur within an utterance as well as in utterance final
position. A list of all the occurrences of WITH2 follows:
Instances of WITH2:
line 7, sign #42
line 9, sign #49, 51, 55
line 21 sign #121,123
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 81 line 33 sign #209
line 35 sign #253, 257, 273
line 37 sign #285, 300
line 39 sign #320, 324
line 40 sign #333, 335, 337
line 48 sign #422, 425
Claim 2a: WITH2 functions as a locative rather than as a time particle, WITH2 means
"together with"
The above claim is supported by an analysis/interpretation of the occurrence of WITH2 in
line 7. The following meaning and functioning of WITH2 holds for the other eighteen
examples listed above but due to constraints of space I do not include them all here.
WITH2 occurs at the end of line 7, (ME LOOK FOR HOSPITAL CL:TAKE-CARRY-PUT
HOME-HUT OWAMBO WITH). In this instance WITH2 is not telling us anything about
time. Instead it behaves like a locative linking the narrator’s traditional home and his
Owambo people who live in his village. He is explaining that his family took him home from
the hospital where they put him in his hut where he could be together with his Owambo
people.
Due to the difference in functioning of locative WITH2 as opposed to temporal
WITHl, I exclude the former in ray analysis of WITH as a time particle which I summarize
below.
Claim 2b: WITHl functions as a temporal particle which signals relative time between
epitopes and sub-epitopes.
Instances of time particle WITHl
line 32, sign # 198
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 82 line 38, sign # 304
line 47, sign #411
Distribution of WITHl
In two of the above three instances (line 32 and 38), WITH occurs immediately
after a major FINISH life epitope boundary. In line 47 it occurs after another time particle
WAIT which follows a major FINISH epitope boundary, thus, it appears always to occur
epitope initially and therefore sentence initially.
Elaboration of claim 2b:
After major epitope boundaries WITHl functions to keep the listener cued to relative time.
WITHl signals that there is an overlap in the time at which the current major epitope and
the preceding epitope occurred. I have translated WITHl into English as "at the same time
as". Thus WITHl indicates that at the same time as the preceding epitope occurred, the
epitope that is about to be told also occurred.
I illustrate how WITHl links epitope 9 and sub-epitope 10a together as occurring
at the same time. Similarly WITHl links sub-epitope 10b and sub-epitope 11a together.
Illustration: epitooe 9 and Sub-epitope 10a
WITHl occurs in line 32, the first line of sub-epitope 10a (founding a Deaf
School) in which Phineas details selecting and identifying the original students. In this
instance WITHl signals to the audience that the founding of the Deaf school was happening
at the same time as the narrator’s independent arrival in Angola which he has just
proclaimed in epitope 9 (Gaining Independence).
Illustration: sub-epitope 10b and sub-epitope 11a
WITHl occurs in line 38 at the beginning of sub-epitope 11a (moving between
two Deaf communities from the Kwanza Deaf School to the Community of working Deaf
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 83
adults in Luanda after finishing school). In this instance WITHl signals to the audience that
the sub-epitope he is about to tell us concerning his decision to move to the city to look for
work happened at the same time as the preceding sub-epitope in which he and his peers
finally graduated from school after passing the sixth grade. At the same time as he had
completed his studies, he decided to move to the city (Luanda) to look for work.
Illustration: linking two simultaneouslv occurring actions in epitope 15
WITHl is functioning in line 47 to link the initial two activities of waiting and
thinking together within epitope fifteen. It is not functioning to link epitope 15 to epitope
14. Epitope 15 (Leaving Angola, arriving in the USA in search of more education) clearly
follows epitope 14 (Malaria and Recovery) sequentially. In this instance WITHl does not
occur immediately following a major epitope boundary. Instead WAIT is the initial sign in
line 47 (WAIT-*- -f -*- WITH THINK ME WANT SCHOOL LOOK-LIKE-SAME WHERE).
I claim again that the narrator is using WITH to mean at the same time as within one
epitope and not across a major epitope boundary. Thus following his recovery from malaria
(in epitope 14) he spends some time simultaneously waiting and thinking about what to do
next.
Summarv of WITH
I have demonstrated above that the time marker WITHl functions to cue the
audience that the time at which the current epitope or event is occurring, is the same as the
time at which the preceding epitope or event occurred.
UNTIL
Claim 2c: The recurrence of UNTIL functions to signal relative time.
I test whether and how the recurring particle UNTIL functions to signal relative time.
UNTIL recurs a total of seven times throughout this life story. [In order to test the claim
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 84
that UNTIL is functioning as a time marker, I asked the following question: Does every
instance of UNTIL function as a time marker?]
Instances of time particle UNTIL:
epitope 4, line 16, sign #95
epitope 5, line 18, sign #107
epitope 6a, line 20, sign #116
epitope 11b, line 40, sign #344
epitope 14, line 46, sign #402
epitope 15, line 51, sign #439, #445
Each of the above instances of UNTIL functions as a time marker to indicate the
next thing that happened to the narrator.
Distribution
UNTIL occurs in two positions:
1. At the beginning of the first line of a new epitope, after a major FINISH
epitopic boundary (epitopes 4, line 16; epitope 5, line 18, epitope 6, line 20;
epitope 14, line 46)
I claim that in this position UNTIL signals the beginning of the next major life
epitope.
2. Embedded within a line towards the end of a sub-epitope or epitope (sub-
epitope 11b, line 40; epitope 15, line 51 (X2)
I claim that in this position UNTIL signals the beginning of the next event that
happened.
UNTIL thus moves the narrative forward to the next major life epitope when it occurs
immediately after a major life epitope FINISH boundary in epitopes 4, 5, 6 and 14.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 85
However in sub-epitope 11b and in epitope 15 it occurs embedded in a line towards the end
of the event he is discussing. In these two epitopes it still functions to signal the next thing
that happened in relation to the event he has just finished discussing.
Illustration: UNTIL indicating relative epitopic time in epitopes 4.5.6
There is a sequence of UNTIL markers at the be^nning of epitopes 4, 5 and 6
which I use to support my claim that UNTIL functions as a time marker indicating the
relative time between adjacent epitopes.
UNTIL Epitope 4: Animals graze left over stalks, mother and children pound millet
UNTIL Epitope 5: Windy season: grain sorting begins
UNTIL Epitope 6: Sorting and Preparing millet for storage
In epitopes 4 through 6, UNTIL moves the narrative forward in time to the next
major life-epitope which I translate as and then. The narrator is relating that they harvested
the crops and then they let the animals graze on the remaining stalks in the fields while the
mother and children pounded the millet and then it was the windy season so they could
separate the good grain from the waste particles using the wind and then they prepared the
millet for storage by taking the kernels off the cobs.
In epitope 14, UNTIL functions in the same way described above to move the
narrative to the next important life epitope.
Illustration: UNTIL functioning to signal sequential time within epitopes
When UNTIL occurs within an epitope as it does in 11 and 15,1 claimed that
UNTIL also functions to move the narrative forward to the next event that he wants to
discuss. As we saw with FINISH, there are ways to segment epitopes sequentially. When
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 86 UNTIL occurs within an epitope it functions to indicate the next important event within that
epitope. I illustrate this by analyzing epitope 15 in depth as UNTIL occurs twice in the last
line of this epitope.
Epitope 15: line 47: WAIT+++ WITH THINK ME WANT SCHOOL LOOK-LIKE- SAME WHERE line 48: ME GO FLY AMERICA WITH DEAF ALL WITH FLY LAND START
line 49: HERE HOUSE WHAT ALL KNOW ME KNOW line 50: NEVER SEEN-BEFORE NOTHING-TO-DO > line 51: WAIT UNTIL WAIT BOSS DEAF TITUS WAIT UNTIL WAIT TOMORROW SUNDAY MONDAY TEACH NOTHING-TO-DO WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Epitope 15 brings the narrator into the present time as he deals with leaving
Angola and arriving in the USA in search of education. He tells the audience about his
experience in the USA during his first week here. At the end of this final epitope in the
narrative, the narrator uses UNTIL in conjunction with the time marker WAIT to segment
the previous few days into sequential periods of waiting which are significant in terms of his
construction of cultural identity (see Chapter Four).
> line 51: - WAIT UNTIL WAIT BOSS DEAF TITUS WAIT UNTIL WAIT TOMORROW SUNDAY MONDAY TEACH NOTHING-TO-DO WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Each occurrence of UNTIL sandwiched between two WAITs (WAIT UNTIL
WAIT) signals to the audience that he will introduce the next thing that happened after they
had waited and waited. He uses UNTIL to introduce the next event which happened after
the waiting. First they waited for the Deaf boss and then they waited for the weekend to
pass. Thus this line could be segmented into three parts each of which starts with WAIT.
I give the translation below:
- we waited and then we waited for our Deaf boss Titus who told us that we
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 87
must - wait and then we waited for the weekend to pass so we could start school on Monday. We had nothing to do.... - We waited and had nothing to do....
Thus I have shown that UNTIL functions within a line within an epitope to signal
the next event that he is going to relate within that epitope.
Summarv of UNTIL
I have argued above that UNTIL functions both across epitopes and within
epitopes to signal "the next thing that happened". When UNTIL occurs immediately after
a major life epitope boundary it functions to move the life story forward to the next major
epitope. However when UNTIL is embedded within a line, it fiinctions to move the
narrative forward in time to the next important event in relation to the previous event but
within the same epitope. I now discuss the final recurring time particle in this narrative;
WAIT.
WAIT
I investigate (a) whether the recurring particle WAIT functions to signal relative
time and (b) how the recurring particle WAIT functions to signal relative time.
WAIT recurs a total of eight times in three epitopes (2,7 & 15) of this life story.
In order to test whether WAIT is functioning as a time marker, I examine whether every
instance of WAIT functions temporally.
Instances of time particle WAIT:
epitope 2b, line 9, sign #46
epitope 7, line 26, sign #165
epitope 15, line 47, sign #409
epitope 15, line 51, sign #437, #439, #443, #445, #451
Each of the above instances of WAIT functions as a time marker to indicate the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 88 passing of an unstipulated amount of time which the narrator patiently waited out. In all of
the above instances except for its last occurrence in line 51, sign #451 (WAIT NOTHING-
TO-DO) WAIT co-occurs with another time particle:
epitope 2b, line 9, sign #46: WAIT FUTURE4-+ epitope 7, line 26, sign #165: WAIT TOMORROW4--F-H-4- epitope 15, line 47, sign #409: WAIT4-+4- WITH epitope 15, line 51, sign #437, #439: WAIT UNTIL WAIT #443, #445: WAIT UNTIL WAIT #451: WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Claim 2d: WAIT functions to signal duration
The co-occurring future marker is repeated to mark durative aspect in epitopes
2 and 7. At the beginning of epitope 15, WAIT itself is repeated to signal durative aspect.
There is no aspectual marking on WAIT or following WAIT in line 51, although the
recurrence of WAIT in line 51 functions similarly to signal duration in the present.
Distribution of WAIT
WAIT can occur at the beginning or end of an epitope or sub-epitope. The
position of WAIT within an epitope is not in itself significant as WAIT does not function on
the epitopic level. I offer the following claim concerning the functioning of WAIT in terms
of segmenting the lifestory into five larger parts above the level of the epitope. I term these
parts the orientation, the Namibian chronotope, the Angolan chronotope, the USA
chronotope and the coda.
Elaboration of Claim 2d
WAIT functions to signal a transition period between the five major periods of
his life. It means T waited while time passed."
WAIT signals the transition between major periods of his life when it co-occurs
with a future time particle. In the first two instances (epitope 2b, line 9 and epitope 7, line
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 89
26) WAIT co-occurs with a future time particle inflected for the durative aspect. This signals
the passage of a long period of waiting between significant parts of his life. The first
example of WAIT segments the initial introductory orientation (see initial overview) from
the Namibian chronotope where he describes his growing up within his family context and
the corresponding rural agricultural subsistence activities.
Illustration: WAIT segments part one (becoming Deafl from part two (growing up with familv. subsistence farming!
Part one: BECOMING DEAF AS A CHILD Orientation epitope 1 2a Part two: GROWING UP WITH FAMILY IN RURAL NAMIBIA Namibian Chronotope epitope 2b WAIT FUTURE-f- + 3 4 5 6 7 WAIT TOMORROW-f- -H-4-4-
Discussion of transition, line 9. epitope 2b:
> line 9: WAIT FUTURE-F + COW WITH GOAT WITH FARM MOTHER FATHER WITH CHILD BORN CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UP FINISH
In epitope 2, line 9, WAIT occurs in conjunction with FUTURE-t-4- at the
beginning of sub-epitope 2b to indicate the passing of time between the first two parts of his
life. After he returns home Aom the hospital to recover, a long period of time passes, after
which he relates how he grew up on the farm with his siblings and his parents surrounded
by cows and goats. He goes onto describe in part two the seasonal cyclical time and the
corresponding agricultural activities of his rural childhood.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 90 Illustration: WAIT segments part two (growing up with familv. subsistence farming) from part three Hife in exile with Deaf people in Angola).
Part two: GROWING UP WITH FAMILY IN RURAL NAMIBIA epitope 2b WAIT FUTURE+ + 3 4 5 6 7 WAIT TOMORROW-1-4-4-4-4- Part three: LIFE IN EXILE WITH DEAF PEOPLE IN ANGOLA epitope 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
In line 26, WAIT occurs in conjunction with TOMORROW4- 4- 4- 4- at the end
of epitope 7 to indicate the passage of a long period of time between two major life epitopes
and also between two major series of episodes or parts of his lifestory. In epitope 7 at the
end of the second part of his life story, he focuses on his mother’s denial of permission to
go to the residential deaf school in Namibia. He ends epitope 7 with his being suspended
in time (an endless succession of tomorrows) waiting and bored without the schooling he
desires as time goes on. Thus WAIT TOMORROW 4- 4- 4- 4- 4- signals to the audience that
he is in a transition period during which he succumbs to parental authority before he takes
action in the next and third part of his life in which he relates how he leaves his family and
goes into exile in search of schooling. I emphasize that WAIT TOMORROW 4-4-4-4-4-
marks the transition to the second major chronotope of this life story in which he substitutes
his biological hearing family with the Deaf community he meets in exile. Another interesting
observation is that WAIT TOMORROW 4- 4- 4-4-4- occurs almost exactly halfway in this life
story, in line 26 (there are a total of 51 lines in this narrative).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 91 Epitope 7; GIVING IN TO MOTHER’S REFUSAL TO LET ME GO TO DEAF SCHOOL line 24: line 25: > line 26: ME STAY GIVE-IN BORED DO NOTHING WAIT TOMORROW+++++ FINISH Epitope 8: THINKING ABOUT ALTERNATIVE DEAF SCHOOLS LEAVING FOR ANGOLA
Conclusion: In both of these instances WAIT occurs with a future time particle to signal a
transition period preceding the next major chronotope or time period containing a set of
events that occurs in the subsequent part of the narrative (seasonal agricultural familial
activities and leaving his family in search of Deaf education).
Illustration: WAIT divides part three from part four
Part three: LIFE IN EXILE WITH DEAF PEOPLE IN ANGOLA epitope 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
Part four: ARRIVING IN USA FOR MORE DEAF EDUCATION epitope 15 WAIT+++ WITH
In epitope 15, line 47 (WAIT+ + -I- WITH THINK ME WANT SCHOOL
LOOK-LIKE-SAME WHERE ME GO FLY AMERICA WITH DEAF ALL WITH FLY
LAND START HERE), WAIT does not co-occur with a future time particle. However
WAIT is repeated successively four times. This repetition signalling durative aspect
functions similarly to that of the future time particles following WAIT discussed above.
There is again a period of waiting that marks the transition between his life in Angola and
his leaving for the USA. WAIT in this final epitope functions similarly to its occurrence at
the beginning of the second and third parts of his life story. It precedes the beginning of the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 92 fourth part of this life story which brings him into the recent past (leaving Angola for the
USA in search of more Deaf education).
Illustration: WAIT divides part four from part five
Part four: ARRIVING IN USA FOR MORE DEAF EDUCATION 15 47 . WAIT+ + +W ITH LEAVING ANGOLA, ARRIVAL USA, IN SEARCH OF EDUCATION 48 49 50
Part five: NOTHING-TO-DO EXCEPT WAIT 15 51 . WAIT UNTIL WAIT (deaf boss instructions) WAIT UNTIL WAIT (through weekend, start mon) WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
In line 51 (WAIT UNTIL WAIT BOSS DEAF TITUS WAIT UNTIL WAIT
TOMORROW SUNDAY MONDAY TEACH NOTHING-TO-DO WAIT NOTHING-TO-
DO) WAIT again signals the final part or coda of his life story. Here, he uses WAIT to
bring us to part five, the coda or ending of his lifestory in which he reinserts himself in
timeless, spaceless reality. He relates how there has been nothing to do besides WAIT since
he arrived at Gallaudet three days before I made this videotape. This is the only instance
in this narrative that WAIT begins a major part of his life story without any aspectual
iteration. I explain this in terms of the fact that he is using WAIT to situate the life story
in the unfinalized present. The time period stipulated at the end of his life story parallels
the time period he used to begin his lifestory in the orientation - the time of his birth signals
his entry into the world out of the timeless primordial ooze. The time period in the coda,
again brings him into a timeless formless present. What he is relating has just happened
and is as yet unresolved. He is in the process of waiting for the next thing to happen to him
and therefore repeats WAIT four times in line 51 in conjunction with UNTIL and
NOTHING-TO-DO. The refrain WAIT UNTIL WAIT emphasizes the durative aspect
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 93 although there is no iteration of WAIT or UNTIL. The repetition of the phrase WAIT
UNTIL WAIT indicates to the audience that he has been sitting around and waiting without
any structure for what seems like a long time. The repetition of NOTHING-TO-DO.
Summarv of WAIT:
Each instance of WAIT indicates a transition period in his life story. WAIT
signals that one part of his life story is over and the next part is about to begin. These
components are larger units than epitopes and form the temporal framework for the
organization of his lifestory into five major parts. Part one functions as the orientation to
the narrative (Labov and Waletsky 1967, Labov 1972), parts two and three constitute two of
the three chronotopes, namely the Namibian and Angolan chronotopes. Part four constitutes
the USA unfinished USA chronotope. Part five signals the end of the narrative, Labov’s
coda, in the present where Phineas awaits the next major event. I have summarized the five
major parts as signalled by WAIT below:
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 94 Part one: BECOMING DEAF AS A CHILD Orientation timeless, emerging out of a spaceless reality epitope 1 2a Part two: GROWING UP WITH FAMILY IN RURAL NAMIBIA Namibian Chronotope epitope 2b WAIT FUTURE++ 3 4 5 6 7 WAIT TOMORROW+ ++++ Part three: LIFE IN EXILE WITH DEAF PEOPLE IN ANGOLA Angolan Chronotope epitope 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Part four: ARRIVING IN USA FOR MORE DEAF EDUCATION USA chronotope epitope 15 WAIT+ + + WITH
Part five: NOTHING-TO-DO EXCEPT WAIT * f codai Coda reinserting himself into a timeless, spaceless reality epitope 15 WAIT UNTIL WAIT (deaf boss instructions) WAIT UNTIL WAIT (through weekend) WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Seasonal Time and Linear Time
As there are other ways besides the repetition of time particles in which this
narrator signals changes in time that contribute to the temporal shape of this narrative, I
identify other lexical items that indicate a change in time (future markers such as FUTURE,
TOMORROW; seasonal signs such as RAINY, DRY and WINDY SEASON and dates
1960, 1980, 1987). I include a brief discussion of these lexical time markers as they
contribute to segmenting the two major sections of the text which are differentiated spatially
by eye-gaze patterns.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 95 Each major part of the text deals with two different kinds of time, seasonal,
cyclical time and linear time, which are conveyed by different kinds of lexical time markers.
The seasonal signs segment the first hemitope of the text into seasonal rounds and the dates
form part of a linear time line in the second hemitope.
The next section of the analysis of lexical repetition focuses on the lexical
repetition of actors, events and actions which function to substantiate the epitopic and
hemitopic textual units further.
ANALYSIS OF ACTORS AND EVENTS
Lexical Repetition Within Epitopes
The available research on the role of repetition in creating meaning and in
sustaining involvement in a text has been reviewed by Johnstone (1987). The cohesive
function of repetition has been investigated by Halliday and Hasan (1976). In addition
Labov (1972) has looked at the use of repetition as an evaluative device to highlight the
point of a story and its relevance to preceding discourse. Johnstone also discusses the use
of repetition as a device people use to create rhetorical presence. The repetition of an idea
makes it persuasive without logical support as the repetition functions to force ideas into the
listener’s consciousness and keep them there.
In order to determine the significance of the meaning or sense-making level of
these fifteen primary epitopes I analyze the lexical repetition within epitopes. (APPENDIX
4) Within each epitope there is a great deal of lexical repetition. As lexical repetition has
been found to reveal what is most significant to the narrator and furthermore is used to
persuade the audience of its importance (Labov 1972, Johnstone 1987, Tannen 1989) then
an analysis of the lexical repetition within each epitope should reveal what this narrator
considers to be most significant within each epitope. Furthermore the dominant lexical
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 96 content of each epitope should not leak across epitopic boundaries if these are indeed true
epitopic units.
Claim 3: Lexical repetition of signs within each epitope is an independent means of verifying
the epitopic structure determined by the repetition of two handed FINISH.
I show that lexical cohesion within epitopes is further evidence for the
psychological reality of these epitopes as independent units of this narrative. Epitopes
contain topics that do not leak across FINISH boundaries. Each epitope thus depicts a
discrete segment of Phineas’ life which he terminates with a two handed FINISH sign. I
identify the lexical repetition within each primary FINISH epitope. This is summarized in
APPENDIX 4.
Lexical repetition within epitopes to confirm epitopic boundaries
I will use the lexical repetition within each epitope in order to support the
following claim.
Claim 4: Lexical repetition of signs within epitopes is an independent means of verifying the
epitopic structure determined by the repetition of two-handed FINISH.
There is no leakage of important epitopic content (as determined by lexical
repetition) across major FINISH boundaries. In Figure 4, I listed the titles I have
constructed out of lexical repetition to demonstrate the significant content material of each
epitope. Each title contains only the repeated lexical items for that epitope and thus reflects
what is significant in each epitope. There is no leakage of significant content across epitopic
boundaries.
Having completed the discussion on lexical repetition within epitopes, the next
two sections will deal with lexical repetition of actors, events and actions across epitopic
boundaries as a means of further determining textual units that occur beyond the epitopic
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 97 level (delineating chronotopes and hemitopes) that are bound together lexically. It is
interesting to determine whether the division of this narrative into five sections based on the
repetition of the time particle WAIT triangulates with the lexical repetition of actors or
events.
Lexical Repetition Across Epitopes:
I analyze the repetition of actors/agents across epitopes (APPENDIX 5) and then
other recurring events or activities (APPENDICES SIX and SEVEN), all of which involve
repetition across FINISH epitopic boundaries as opposed to the lexical repetition within
epitopes described above.
Analysis Of Repetition Of Actors:
Two questions that I will answer in the following analysis of the actors in this narrative are:
1. Who are the important actors in this narrative?
I identify the important actors in the narrative by tracking repeated references to individuals.
(APPENDIX 5) The important actors that emerge are as follows:
a. self (referred to consistently as me)
b. family members referred to by kinship title (brother-sister, mother, father)
c. animals (COW, GOAT)
d. Deaf people (identified by the lexical item Deaf or by sign name)
e. hearing teachers (identified by sign name)
2. How is the narrative organized according to the actors involved?
I tabulated the repetition of actors (see APPENDIX 5) so as to provide evidence
for my next claim.
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Claim 5: lexical repetition that occurs across epitopic boundaries functions as a cohesive
device to bind together sections of the narrative into hemitopes so as to structure the shape
of the narrative and further re-enforce other chunking devices such as chronotopic
segmented by WAIT.
The tables of the repetition of MOTHER, FATHER, BROTHER-SISTER,
DEAF, CHOOSE and sign names in APPENDIX 5 illustrate the organization of the
narrative into two major halves which I term hemitopes. The first hemitope concerns the
narrator and his biological hearing kin as family members’ titles are repeated. This
Namibian hemitope focuses particularly on Phineas’ mother (who has the most repetitions)
and other kin (brother-sister and father) as the main protagonists until the end of this section
where mother switches roles and becomes the antagonist. He refers to himself in the context
of his biological family and does not differentiate himself from the rest of the family, except
for his initial and final reminder that he is deaf in the Namibian chronotope which makes
up most of the first hemitope.
The second hemitope has a different set of actors: Deaf people and their hearing
teachers. Deaf individuals are referred to repeatedly, since the focus is Phineas’ participation
in his newfound Deaf community that replaces his hearing biological family members. The
Deaf people are the major protagonists of the second half of this narrative, which is also
characterized by an increase in Phineas’ agency.
Repetition Of References To Self As Actor CMEl
In the first line the narrator identifies himself by finger spelling his name,
thereafter he refers to himself with the first person subject pronoun ME. The table of the
repetition of ME (APPENDIX 5) also serves as evidence to support the claim that this
narrative is organized, in terms of actors, into two distinct hemitopes. Although ME emerges
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at the beginning of the narrative and recurs throughout this life story, the frequency of
occurrences of ME drops sharply in the middle of the first half (there is no evidence of ME
in epitopes 3, 5 and 6 and only one instance of ME in epitope 4) until the end of the first
half where ME re-emerges in epitope 7 (repeated three times). In the second half of the
narrative ME recurs frequently (more than three times) in six of the nine epitopes.
The recurrence of the first person pronoun ME throughout the narrative is not surprising
as this is after all a life story. However what is interesting about the use of the subject
pronoun ME is that although it is syntactically optional in the surface structure of NSL, the
narrator increases his frequency of the use of ME in the second half of the lifestory. I argue
that this can be interpreted as signalling the increasing agency of the narrator in directing
the course of his life. The use of ME therefore signals a significant choice on the narrator’s
part to assert his own identity as distinct from that of his collective family identity. The
following discussion of the use of the first person pronoun in each epitope illustrates that its
use in epitope seven indicates the beginning of this individuation process. In epitope seven
he emerges for the first time in conflict with his mother. This conflict signifies his
construction of himself as a Deaf individual breaking away from his hearing family in search
of a Deaf community and education in sign language.
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Frequency of occurrence of ME in first hemitope (parts 1 & 21 and second hemitope (parts
3 & 41 of life story:
epi- line sign lex. epN line sign lex. sode nmbr nmbr itm sode nmbr nmbr itm 1 2 7 ME F I R S T 10 32 199 ME HEMITOPE 10 33 214 ME 1 3 11 ME 10 instances 10 35 264 ME of ME 10 37 280 ME 1 4 14 ME 10 37 285 ME
2 6 26 ME .11 38 307 ME 2 6 28 ME .11 39 310 ME 2 7 34 ME 11 39 314 ME 11 40 330 ME 11 41 m ME 11 43 375 ME 17 103 ME 14 46 402 ME 7 24 140 ME 7 25 U5 ME 7 26 160 ME 15 47 412 ME %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% .1.5 48 417 ME 8 27 168 ME SECOND 15 49 433 ME HEMITOPE 8 27 170 ME 20 instances of ME 8 28 174 ME 8 29 179 ME 8 29 181 ME
Figure 10: Frequency of Occurrence of ME in First Hemitope And Seconde Hemitope of Life Story
Repetition of ME in the first hemitope - "The hearing world in Namibia"
ME is repeated a total of ten times in the first half of the narrative which is located in
Namibia while the narrator is with his family. ME occurs three times in epitopes one and
two respectively (childhood illness resulting in loss of hearing, hospitalization, return home
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and recovery) and does not appear again until epitope seven. It is interesting that he does
not repeat ME in epitopes three, four, five and six which deal with agricultural activities
performed by his family.
ME emerges again in epitope seven where it occurs three times (replicating the
pattern in epitopes one and two) where he is negotiating with his mother to go to school.
This is the last epitope in which ME occurs three times and marks the end of the first half
of the narrative (corresponding to parts 1 and 2 which are signalled by WAIT). At this point
in the narrative he is waiting for tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow and
tomorrow. His future seems to be locked into cyclical seasonal time.
Increase of repetition of ME in the second hemitope - "The Deaf community in exile"
In epitope eight the shift in agency is indicated by an increase in the incidence
of ME from 3 to 5 occurrences in one epitope as Phineas takes control over his own destiny
after he breaks away from his mother’s authority and decides to go alone into exile in
Angola.
In epitopes 8,10 and 11 particularly Phineas’ agency is prevalent as indicated by
the increase in his use of ME. He uses ME 16 times in these three epitopes which deal with
his active agency in decision-making at critical periods in his life: leaving for Angola in
search of a deaf school to learn English; forming a deaf school and progressing through
school; leaving Kwanza after finishing school to look for work.
It is interesting that in the second hemitope of this narrative which corresponds
to parts 3 (Angola) and 4 (USA) of his lifestory as indicated by WAIT, ME recurs at least
5 times in those epitopes in which his agency is recapitulated. Part five (the current time at
which he ends this life story) reveals no agency as he waits to see what future events he will
have to deal with and use his agency to resolve. Agency is thus connected to successful
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 102 resolution of circumstances beyond his control which happen after he makes a decision to
change his life. He ends the narrative in the present during an unresolved period of his life,
characterized by waiting, in which he has no active control yet. The worldview that he is
constructing in this narrative can be seen as a combination of his own agency (signalled by
ME) which interacts with the greater forces of the unknown over which he has no control.
The narrator therefore waits and thinks before he can act in his best interests. Thus he is
in no hurry to find immediate solutions to the obstacles he confronts in each stage of his life.
His strategy is to rather wait and think before acting.
Familv Members As Actors. Referred To By Kinship Titles: MOTHER. FATHER. CHILD. SISTER-BROTHER
From the frequency of occurrence of MOTHER (8), FATHER (3), CHILD (2), SISTER-
BROTHER (3) that all recur a total of 16 instances throughout the first half of his narrative,
I argue that Phineas’ mother, whose name occurs the most frequently compared with the rest
of the family members, is the most important actor.
In the second epitope, Phineas’ entire family (FATHER MOTHER BROTHER-
SISTER) come to get him from the hospital to bring him back home. All family members
are present and active in getting him back to his village where they all grow up. From the
third to the sixth epitopes the importance of his mother and siblings as significant actors
becomes more apparent. MOTHER occurs in isolation in line 11 as responsible for planting
the seeds without FATHER or BROTHER-SISTER. Presumably it is MOTHER who is
hoeing the ground in line 12, as no other actor is mentioned. In line 14 the siblings are
responsible for harvesting first the millet, and in line 15, since no other actors are mentioned,
it is probably the siblings who harvest the sugar cane too.
Father is noticeably absent from any of these activities.
This corresponds to the mother-focused structure of the traditional Owambo family where
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women also do the bulk of the agricultural labor, the topic of the first half of his life story.
His father is mentioned the least number of times in this section and does not have a major
role in the agricultural activities although he is definitely present. I discuss below how I see
FATHER as functioning more on the discourse level together with MOTHER and
BROTHER-SISTER or CHILD to bind this first half together.
The siblings are mentioned a total of five times (three times as SISTER-
BROTHER and twice as CHILD). Four of these instances are in conjunction with either
FATHER or MOTHER or both parents. With reference to the chart below, I discuss how
the recurrence of the sequence: FATHER and MOTHER, followed by BROTHER-SISTER
or CHILD functions cohesively to tie the first half together.
FATHER-MOTHER BROTHER-SISTER are first introduced at the beginning
of epitope two when Phineas describes how they came to fetch him from the hospital to find
transport to take him back home to his rural Owambo village. This same sequence does not
recur. The next mention of his family is at the end of epitope 2, where he describes how he
is growing up on the farm with his parents and siblings (line 9:. ...MOTHER FATHER WITH
CHILD BORN CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UP FINISH). Thus MOTHER-FATHER plus
children occur at the beginning and end of this epitope which focuses on his family’s agency
[as a whole] at this point in his life.
At the beginning of the final epitope (sbc) of the agricultural period of his life
where he discusses the preparation of the millet for storage the sequence FATHER
MOTHER WITH CHILD recurs in line 21. I argue that the occurrence of MOTHER
FATHER WITH CHILD at the beginning and end of part 2 (the Namibian chronotope)
which deals with farming in Namibia functions to further reinforce the WAIT boundaries of
part two to signal that this is a cohesive and contained part of his life. MOTHER FATHER
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 104 functions to tell us that this is the beginning and end of this unit that deals with his family
life. He uses FATHER in conjunction with MOTHER to signal that FATEGER has
important status in his family although he is not the primary parent that Phineas relates to.
Interestingly, it is his mother with her role of ultimate authority in his family that
Phineas turns to for help midway through his life story in epitope 7, when he wants to attend
the Deaf school in Namibia. MOTHER is referred to three times in this epitope signalling
her critical role at this juncture of his life. At this turning point in his life, she asserts her
authority and refuses to allow him to go. He rejects her authority in all fairness to her, she
has his best interests at heart which he does not mention. The school is situated in the war
zone in Northern Namibia and she is afraid for his life. Instead he describes their clash of
wills, and his rejection of her authority.
After he describes leaving his family in Namibia in epitope eight, Phineas does
not refer to any of them again. FATHER and his siblings are not mentioned after epitope
six. MOTHER is the leading antagonist in epitope seven where the narrator describes their
conflict. In epitope eight the narrator leaves for Angola where mother, father and his
siblings will be replaced by the Deaf community, the main actors in a more egalitarian
community in the second half of the narrative.
Farm Animals As Actors ICOW. GO ATI
Cows and goats also emerge as actors in this narrative when the narrator includes
them in epitope two, line 9, with a list of his family members to whom he returns after his
hospitalization.
line 9: WAIT FUTURE+ + COW WITH GOAT WITH FARM MOTHER FATHER WITH CHILD BORN CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UP FINISH
Phineas refers again to the cows and goats in epitope four, line 16, in his
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description of the end of the harvest which is marked by the cows and goats being herded
into the fields to graze on the remaining stalks of millet and sugar-cane plants. Again, the
mention of the cows and goats occurs in proximity to that of his family members who he
refers to in the next line:
line 16: UNTIL COW GOAT WITH CL:HERD-ANIMALS-INTO-GARDEN ANIMAL-EAT GO-AWAY). line 17: MOTHER ME BROTHER-SISTER CL:POUND-MILLET-WITH-STICK FINISH
Lexical Repetition Of Actors As A Cohesive Device In The First Hemitope
In my discussion of MOTHER, I demonstrate how the lexical repetition of
MOTHER functions to bind the first half of the narrative together into one cohesive unit.
The repetition of COW and GOAT can also be seen to function cohesively, although it only
occurs at the boundaries of a smaller unit within the first half of this narrative: the growing
season. The repetition of COW and GOAT in the line sixteen also functions to ft-ame this
period of Phineas’ life. The first occurrence of cows and goats precedes his discussion of the
growing season and their recurrence in line 16 occurs at the end of the growing season after
the harvest.
Lexical Repetition Of Actors Across Epitopes In The Second Hemitope
The repetition of Deaf actors in the second hemitope of the life stoiy extends
throughout the second hemitope from epitopes 8 - 15. There is no further mention of
Phineas’ biological hearing Namibian family after epitope seven in the first hemitope of the
narrative. In this discussion, I do not include repetition of actors within a single epitope e.g.,
the name signs of the hearing teachers EVER, RAUNA, THABITHA and GIRL-t- which
is repeated in epitope 13.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 106 Repetition Of Lexical Items Referring To The Narrator’s Construction Of A Deaf Community
I claim that all the instances of DEAF in this life story except for the first two
(lines 3, 24) are references to people who the narrator identifies as culturally deaf (see
APPENDIX 6). However, in the first two instances, in lines 3 and 24, DEAF does not refer
to actors but to the condition or state of deafiiess or loss-of-hearing.
I have not included the first two instances of DEAF (lines three and 24) in the
tabulation of the DEAF repetitions as they do not refer to Deaf actors. In epitope one, the
narrator’s use of DEAF does not refer to an actor but refers specifically to his loss of
hearing. This usage occurs only once in this life story in this first epitope, line three (ME
DEAF HEARING-GONE). The narrator refers to himself here in terms of his loss of
hearing rather than to his identity as a culturally Deaf individual.
Support for this claim that DEAF first refers to loss of hearing as opposed to
Deaf actors comes firom the context as it precedes his description of how he lost his hearing
as a result of a childhood illness. At that stage he saw his deafness in terms of the
pathological medical model, as something connected to a serious illness for which he received
treatment. Thus deafness in line three is not used in the context of identifying himself as a
deaf actor in relation to other deaf actors.
In epitope seven DEAF again does not refer to a Deaf actor. Instead DEAF
occurs in line 24 (ME MAKE THINK SAY THAT MOTHER HELP SCHOOL DEAF
OSHAKATT ...). DEAF occurs here in the context of the deaf school which he is asking his
mother for permission to attend. DEAF refers in this case to a specific kind of school for
deaf individuals.
DEAF occurs twice in each of the following epitopes: ten, eleven and fifteen
respectively. These instances of DEAF always refer specifically to Deaf actors.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 107 In epitope ten there are two instances of DEAF, in lines 32 and 33, in which the
narrator starts immediately to people his world in exile with other Deaf individuals. He
begins to actively seek out other DEAF actors in line 32 [as he wonders where he can find
other Deaf people] immediately after he has successfully arrived in Angola,
line 32: WITH ME THINK DEAF LOOK-LIKE-SAME WHERE
He immediately follows this line with a description of how the solution of finding
other Deaf people presented itself in the form of the director or boss of the school they were
forming, who was called Ever. Ever grouped the Deaf students together and started
teaching them the finger-spelled signs for the written alphabet.
line 33: HELP EVER BOSS CHOOSE PUT WITH DEAF TEACH ALPHABET
CHOOSE-FIRST.....
The beginning of epitope ten is marked by the use of DEAF which recurs in the
second line of this epitope. DEAF functions in line 33 to signal the importance of the Deaf
community he finds at the Deaf school that he helps to form in exile. The Deaf school
community forms the content of epitope ten and the importance of each actor is elaborated
on by his use of all thirteen name-signs (see discussion of CHOOSE+NAME-SIGN below).
DEAF occurs twice more in epitope eleven which deals with the movements of
Deaf actors between the two Deaf communities that now exist: the Deaf community in the
city of Luanda and that at the refugee camp at Kwanza. In line 41, the narrator describes
how Peter and Daniel remained in Luanda while he moved to Kwanza where he lived with
other Deaf people there.
line 41: PETER STAY THERE (R) HOME LUANDA (R) STAY THERE (R) ME DEAF STAY-THERE (L) STAY-THERE (R) DANIEL CLSTAY- THERE (R) FINAL
In line 42, DEAF recurs when he describes how Kalile and Kaupa moved in the opposite
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 108 direction and left Kwanza to join the Deaf community in Luanda, line 42: ...KALILE THINK MOVE-TO-ANOTHER-PLACE WORK LUANDA JOB WORK+ + LUANDA-THERE(R) KAUPA DEAF CL:LUANDA-THERE(R) ME KWANZA THERE (L) FINISH
Thus DEAF functions cohesively again in epitope eleven to emphasize that there
are two locations in exile and two corresponding Deaf communities comprised of Deaf actors
who he refers to by name sign. The repetition of DEAF signals that these actors are moving
between their two communities in the city and in the refugee camp respectively.
DEAF also occurs twice more in the final epitope where the topic still involves
the narrator’s search for opportunities for Deaf individuals. He now decides to leave
Kwanza and fly to the USA with the other Deaf students who have been selected to leave
for more training and education. In the final instance in line 51, DEAF refers to the Deaf
individual who is the coordinator of the Deaf Namibians in the USA. The recurrence of
DEAF in epitope fifteen functions thematically and cohesively to tie the beginning and end
of this epitope together.
Phineas often uses specific name-signs to refer to Deaf individuals. This is a
common practice in ASL where each signer is given a name-sign by other Deaf people by
which they are identified in the community. Henock and Sackeus’ name-signs only recur
within epitope ten and will not be discussed. Daniel and Peter’s name-signs are the only
ones that recur across epitope boundaries in epitopes ten and eleven.
Line 33. epitope 10a: > CHOOSE FOURTH SACKEUS > CHOOSE FIFTH DANIEL > CHOOSE SIXTH HENOCK CHOOSE SEVENTH MARIUS BEFORE YOUNG > CHOOSE EIGHTH HENOCK BEFORE CL:OLDER(L)-YOUNGER(R) 233 CHOOSE NINTH TTMONY YOUNGER (L)
> 269 CHOOSE FOURTEENTH PETER
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 109 PETER and DANIEL (who were named in the initial list fourteenth and fifth
respectively) recur in epitope 11c, line 41 as representatives of the Deaf community who
moved to Luanda from Kwanza after finishing school and who stayed there when the
narrator left to return to Kwanza.
Line 41. epitope 11c:
...PETER STAY THERE (R) HOME LUANDA (R) STAY THERE (R) ME DEAF STAY THERE (L) STAY THERE (R) DANIEL STAY THERE (R) FINAL
The recurrence of PETER and DANIEL in epitope eleven also fiinctions
cohesively to tie epitope eleven (which deals with two adult Deaf communities in Luanda and
Kwanza) to epitope ten which deals with the original deaf community at Kwanza.
Analvsis Of The Recurring Events
This final section focuses on the recurrence of events in the narrator’s life story
denoted by the repetition of lexical items across epitopes. I identify the recurring signs that
are not actors or time particles and categorize these signs as denoting events in this life story
(see APPENDIX?). I then analyze the patterning of each recurring event in relation to the
time particle divisions (epitopes and chronotopes) and in relation to the "hearing" and "deaf
hemitopes.
All of the signs that are repeated across epitopes are lexically fixed, or non
productive, except for the sign for BASKET which is a poly-synthetic classifier construction.
The lexical items that I select for discussion are all repeated across life epitope boundaries
and function cohesively to structure the shape of the narrative by binding or tying different
sections together.
The repetition of recurring lexical events contributes to the existing structural
shape of the narrative as delineated by the recurring time particles and actors discussed in
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the first two sections of this chapter. The following lexical events all of which recur across
epitopes:
HOSPITAL, BACKSIDE-INJECT, SICK, HEALTHY, PUT, FARM, CARRY- BASKET, THINK, WANT, HELP, TEACH/SCHOOL, ENGLISH, LEARN-A- LOT, WORK, KWANZA, NOTHING-TO-DO.
I claim that the repetition of these lexical events contributes to the structural
shape of the narrative in three different ways:
Claim 6: Repetition of primary lexical events binds the entire second hemitope (parts three
and four) of the life story together into a cohesive unit.
Claim 7: Repetition of secondary lexical events delineate smaller units or sub-texts within
either hemitope of the life story.
Claim 8: Repetition of lexical events signals key transitional events throughout the second
hemitope of the life story (parts three, four and five).
Lexical Cohesion In The First Hemitope
Claim 6: Lexical repetition signals primary lexical items which bind the entire second
hemitope of the life story together into a cohesive unit.
The entire first hemitope of the life story is bound together primarily by the
lexical repetition of actors, specifically that of MOTHER which recurs throughout epitopes
one to seven (see discussion of actors). However there is no parallel repetition of lexical
events which ties parts one and two together into a cohesive whole.
Claim 7: Lexical repetition signals secondary lexical items which delineate smaller units,
contratopes or sub-texts within either hemitope of the life story.
The first hemitope of this life story is made up of three consecutive sub-texts
each delineated by lexical repetition of the events surrounding HOSPITAL, FARM and
BASKET. The repetition of HOSPITAL links epitopes one and two into the first sub-text.
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which is a spatially defined contratope. The repetition of FARM links epitopes two and
three into the second sub-text. The repetition of the handshape morpheme for -BASKET-
combined with different movement morpheme paths ties epitopes three to six together.
These constitute the second spatially defined contratope and the bulk of the remainder of
the first hemitope of the narrative.
I illustrate the structure of the narrative in terms of sub-texts by examining the
recurrence of HOSPITAL which binds epitopes one and two together into one sub-text. This
constitutes the first contratope of the life stoiy. The shape of the narrative begins to take
form as the first two epitopes are linked by the lexical repetition of HOSPITAL.
Although both epitopes focus on the common broad topic of the narrator’s
hospitalization, on closer examination the narrator can be seen to be using the repetition of
HOSPITAL in epitope two to focus on his removal from the hospital and return home to
the farm. He contrasts his hospitalization experience in epitope one, in which he was
separated from his family, to his experience of his family successfully reclaiming him in
epitope two and bringing him home from the hospital to their traditional Owambo farm (see
discussion of repetition of FARM below).
At the end of epitope two HOSPITAL recurs again. In this instance HOSPITAL
is juxtaposed with HEALTHY again reinforcing the opposition between HOSPITAL and
HOME. HEALTHY is positively associated with HOME and OWAMBO in contrast to
HOSPITAL which is negatively paired and associated with SICK and BACKSIDE-INJECT
in epitope one.
The repetition of FARM in epitopes two and three signals the beginning of the
second sub-text (corresponding to the first chronotope) which extends from epitope 2b to
epitope 7, until he decides to leave for Angola. The FARM is the center of his and his
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 112 family’s subsistence agricultural existence.
BASKET functions to tie epitopes 3,5 and 6 into a sub-text or contratope that
extends over much of the Namibian chronotope. Although BASKET is not a fixed lexical
item but rather is part of a productive poly-synthetic classifier construction, I discuss the
repetition of the BASKET handshape morpheme as it consistently occurs with different
movement paths: -CARRY, -PICK-UP, -HOLD and -SHAKE. -BASKET ties epitopes three
, five and six together all of which form the bulk of the second contratope concerning the
harvest and storage of grain.
Lexical Cohesion In The Second Hemitope (parts 3. 4 & 51:
Claim 6: The lexical repetition of primary or key lexical events, namely, THINK, WANT,
TEACH/SCHOOL functions in two ways: a) to signal a separation between the first and
second hemitopes of this life story and b) to bind the entire second hemitope of the
narrative together into a cohesive unit (epitopes 7-15)
I show that THINK, WANT TEACH/SCHOOL and DO-NOTHING
(APPENDICES SIX and SEVEN) are the key lexical items in the second hemitope of the
narrative. My evidence for their identification as key lexical items is that:
1. They recur the most frequently throughout the narrative and that they also
occur in the highest number of different epitopes as opposed to occurring within
a single epitope.
2. They do not only recur in consecutive epitopes but are spread across the second
hemitope of the narrative. They all occur at the beginning of epitope 8 and
again in epitope 15.
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CS VOCO 00 O n
I CO i i
a. 0I
1
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TEACH/SCHOOL, THINK, WANT, all appear for the first time mid-way
through this narrative (in epitopes 7 and 8 at the hemitopic boundary) and recur throughout
the narrative in different permutations before their final recurrence at the end of the life
story in epitope fifteen. With the exception of DO-NOTHING these lexical items occur
most firequently throughout the narrative as well as in the highest number of epitopes (see
APPENDIX 6). They are therefore primary lexical events.
The lexical items THINK, WANT, TEACH/SCHOOL do not occur at all in the
first hemitope of the narrative. All except WANT appear in epitope seven, a transition
epitope in the life story, at which time he is in conflict with his mother who will not allow
him to attend the Deaf school. In epitope eight WANT emerges for the first time when he
goes against her wishes and leaves for Angola signalling his individuation and rejection of
parental control. These three lexical events tie together epitopes 7-15 together with
secondary lexical events. THINK, WANT, TEACH/SCHOOL all appear again in epitope
15.
I demonstrate in turn the primacy of each of these recurring lexical events which
function cohesively to bind the second hemitope of the narrative (parts 3,4 and 5) into a
distinct unit:
THINK recurs from epitopes 7-15 linking the second hemitope of the life story together (see
APPENDIX 6). This corresponds to Phineas’ individuation and breaking away from his
mother’s authority. WANT functions similarly as a cohesive device within the second
hemitope, indicating the decisions of the narrator to relocate based on his assessments of his
needs. He decides what he wants, which is usually not obtainable wherever he is,
consequently he relocates to find it.
TEACH/SCHOOL occurs 17 times within the second hemitope of his life story
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 115 from epitopes 7-15 (see APPENDIX 6). I treat this as one lexical item, which, although it
first appeared to denote the English verb "to teach", functions as a noun denoting "the place
where teaching occurs" or "school". This lexical item binds together the second hemitope
into a cohesive section of Phineas’ life in which he focuses on his search for and attainment
of appropriate education in exile. The appearance of TEACH/SCHOOL in epitope seven
is the reason for his conflict with his mother and his departure from Namibia. He chooses
to search actively for a Deaf school in exile as there are no appropriate deaf schools in
Namibia. The recurrence of TEACH in epitopes 8-15 indicates the importance of his search
for education as a Deaf individual, as central to his life choice^ and decision to relocate first
to Angola and then to the USA.
Claim 7: Lexical repetition within a major hemitope of the narrative indicates secondary
lexical events and sub-texts.
Different combinations of these key lexical items recur with other secondary
lexical items throughout the second hemitope of the life stoiy (LEARN-A-LOT, HELP,
WORK, ENGLISH and KWANZA) which I claim function to delineate sub-texts. The
narrator repeats these secondary lexical items in association with the key lexical items
identified above in the following epitopes:
epitope 7 (HELP. THINK, T1EACH/SCHQOL, DO-NOTHING) epitope 8 fHELP. THINK, WANT, TEACH/SCHOOL, LEARN-A-LOT. ENGLISH. DO-NOTHING) epitope 10 (HELP. TEACH/SCHOOL) epitope 11 (TEACH/SCHOOL, ENGLISH. LEARN-A-LOT. WORK. KWANZAl epitope 12 fWORK. WANT, KWANZA) epitope 13 (WORK. DO-NOTHING) epitope 14 () epitope 15 (THINK, WANT, TEACH/SCHOOL, DO-NOTHING)
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Claim 7; ENGLISH, LEARN-A-LOT, HELP, WORK, and KWANZA have secondary
structural status as they do not bind the entire second hemitope of the narrative together.
Instead they function to delineate sub-texts vyithin the second hemitope of the life story.
I demonstrate that each of these lexical items in turn delineates a sub-text within
the second hemitope of the life story (parts 3 and 4): ENGLISH, LEARN-A-LOT, WORK,
KWANZA and HELP
English signals the sub-text from epitope 8-11 which functions together with
LEARN-A-LOT to delineate the time he spent at school. Primarily his goal was to learn
English at school (see APPENDIX 6).
ENGLISH first occurs in line 30 to set up the topic of this line which is to find
a school in Angola that teaches English to Deaf students. Thereafter ENGLISH recurs
together with LEARN-A-LOT in lines 30 and 38 (see discussion of LEARN-A-LOT below).
LEARN-A-LOT signals the beginning and end of the Kwanza-as-site-of-deaf-
school-and-leaming sub-text which extends from epitopes 8-12. LEARN-A-LOT co-occurs
with ENGLISH in lines 30 and 38. LEARN-A-LOT first occurs at the end of epitope eight
and marks Phineas’ decision to leave Namibia and go to Angola in 1980 expressly to learn
a lot of English. He achieves this goal in line 38 at the beginning of epitope 11. At this time
he decides to move to Luanda to work. The combination of ENGLISH, LEARN-A-LOT
and FREE/INDEPENDENT thus frames the first sub-text of his Angolan chronotope which
starts with his arrival at Kwanza (end of epitope 8, beginning of epitopes 9) and his school
experience there (epitope 10) and terminates his school experience prior to his decision to
depart for Luanda.
However in line 40 Phineas returns to Kwanza, to the place where he had
learned a lot or maybe in order to learn some more. LEARN-A-LOT recurs at the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 117 beginning of epitope 11a, and at the end of epitope 11b. It provides a second frame for his
explanation for leaving the place where he had learned a lot of English to look for work in
Luanda, and then for his return to this place.
FRAME ONE > line 30: TEACH+ ENGLISH+ LEARN-A-LOT FINISH > line 31: INDEPENDENT/FREE COME4-4- FINISH line 32 line 33 line 34 line 35 line 36 line 37 > line 38: WITH THINK TEACH ME ENGLISH LEARN-A-LOT FREE
FRAME TWO > line 38 WITH THINK TEACH ME ENGLISH LEARN-A-LOT FREE line 39 ME THINK WANT LUANDA... > line 40 ...TRUCK-GO DROP OFF KWANZA-SUL DROP-OFF-f UNTIL TEACH LEARN-A-LOT FINISH
WORK signals the post-school-phase-adult-deaf-communities sub-text which
follows the graduation from the deaf school at Kwanza. The WORK sub-text extends from
epitopes 12-14 (see APPENDIX 6). The recurrence of WORK in conjunction with
LUANDA in 11a and lid frames epitope eleven in which the narrator sets up another Deaf
community, associated with Deaf Namibians who leave the refugee camp to find work in
Luanda in 1980. In epitopes 12 and 13 WORK recurs, associated with the refugee camp.
Kwanza, indicating that there is also a working Deaf community there. Thus epitopes 11,12
and 13 deal with the working Deaf communities in two locations: Luanda and Kwanza and
the repetition of WORK functions to bind these three epitopes into a larger unit dealing
with the topic of work.
KWANZA extends from epitopes 11-13 to signal the sub-text in which Phineas
relocates and returns to Kwanza after working in Luanda (See APPENDIX 6). KWANZA
is repeated throughout epitopes 11 and 12 which binds these two epitopes together. In
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 118 epitope 11 the narrator describes his return to Kwanza and he links this to epitope 12 in
which he describes his attempts at relating to hearing women there who rejeet him.
HELP recurs when Phineas is discussing education and the hearing people who
he depends on for assistance with education; his mother whom he asks for help to attend
school; and his teachers who help him learn English. HELP signals the sub-text which runs
from epitope 7-10 in which he appeals to figures of authority for help (his mother and his
teachers) within the kwanza epitope (see APPENDIX 6).
PUT signals the sub-text in which the narrator deals with the role of authority
in his life story. In epitope one authority intervenes in the form of his family who take him
home fi'om the hospital. However, in epitope ten in the third part of the life story, after the
narrator has rejected parental authority, this is replaced by the authority of the school
director. He decides which students and which teaching assistants belong together in specific
groups according to ability levels. The transition to internalizing authority and acting on his
own occurs in epitope eleven where PUT functions to signal that the narrator himself
determines that he wants to leave the school community and go find work in Luanda. PUT
in epitope eleven thus signals the beginning of greater autonomy and action on the part of
the narrator and differentiates the post-school era of personal autonomy from the school era
in which he was under the control of teachers.
Claim 8: Repetition of lexical events signals key transitional events.
I will discuss two event structures:
1. The sequence SICK, INJECT, HEALTHY is treated as one event composed of
the sequence of illness followed by treatment and recovery. I argue that this
sequence signals two major transition points in the life story.
2. DO-NOTHING forms the second event which I argue also signals transition
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 119 points prior to part three (epitope 7) and four (epitope 13) and at the beginning
of part five (epitope 15) of this life story.
The repetitions of SICK, INJECT, HEALTHY at the beginning of the narrative
and at the end of part three (APPENDIX 7) function to signal important textual boundaries
as the narrator uses this sequence of events (illness, treatment, recovery) to indicate two
major turning points in his life. The first significant event is at the beginning of the narrative
when he describes how he lost his hearing as a child, was hospitalized for the illness, and
then recovers with the help of his family. Similarly at the end of the narrative he becomes
ill again following his first failed romance entailing his rejection by a woman. He again
becomes ill the recovers and this time his adult agency [allows him to] chooses to move to
the USA.
The event structure SICK, INJECT, HEALTHY signals the end of the first
epitope (or orientation) and precedes the final epitope (which contains the coda), producing
an overall symmetrical structure to the narrative. The first orientation epitope includes the
first illness, its treatment and recovery, whereas the final epitope, containing the coda in the
final line, follows the second illness, treatment and recovery bringing the narrative to a close.
Repetition of BACKSIDE-INJECT, SICK and HEALTHY ties the first and
second epitopes (which function together as they are tied together by HOSPITAL) to the
penultimate epitope of this life story. (APPENDIX 7) I discuss how BACKSIDE-INJECT
operates in conjunction with SICK and HEALTHY to balance the narrative structure. The
narrator repeats the sequence of getting ill, receiving injections and recovering at the end of
the first part of his life story (see discussion of major parts) and again at the end of the third
part of the narrative.
Together with BACKSIDE-INJECT, SICK ties the first epitope to the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 120 penultimate epitope. The treatment of an illness using western medicine and injections at
these two points in his life story supports the segmentation of this narrative into four major
parts and the beginning of the current and fifth major part which are all bounded by the time
marker WAIT. SICK is followed in both instances by BACKSIDE-INJECT and precedes
HEALTHY in the second and fourteenth epitopes. Phineas’ subsequent recovery is
signalled by HEALTHY which marks a major transition to the second and fourth parts of
this life story. Epitopes two and fourteen are thus marked as transition epitopes which
precede the Namibian and USA chronotopes respectively.
Healthy functions in conjunction with SICK and BACKSIDE-INJECT to link
epitopes 2 and 14 in which his childhood experience of sickness, treatment by injections and
return to health recurs when he is an adult. The recurrence of this sequence of events
precedes and functions to create the Namibian chronotope of his life story in which he
describes his life as a child in rural Namibia. It also precedes and functions to create the
final chronotope of his life story in which he leaves Angola for the USA thus marking
another major transition in his life. The sequence of events beginning with sickness and
ending with his return to health mark epitopes two and fourteen as transition epitopes. They
also function to balance the shape of the narrative, since his first illness occurs in the fifth
line of this narrative, and his second illness occurs in line 46, five lines before the end of the
narrative. This balances the narrative both structurally, and in terms of meaning, by
providing a similar sequence of events near the beginning and near the end of the life story.
The recurrence of this sequence of events near the beginning and end of the
narrative also triangulates with the recurrence of the time particle WAIT which divides the
narrative into its five part and chronotopic structure. SICK-INJECT-HEALTHY occurs at
the end of part one and at the end of part three. Both occurrences of the sequence SICK -
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 121 INJECT...HEALTHY are followed by WAIT and signal chronotopic boundaries.
Chronotopic boundaries
Part one: BECOMING DEAF AS A CHILD (orientation) epitope > 1 SICK...INJECT > 2a HEALTHY Part two: GROWING UP WITH FAMILY IN RURAL NAMIBIA (Namibian chronotope) epitope * 2b WAIT FUTURE-l-i- 3 4 5 6 7 WAIT TOMORROW+++ + +
Part three: LIFE IN EXILE WITH DEAF PEOPLE IN ANGOLA (Angolan chronotope) epitope 8 9 10 11 12 13 > 14 SICK...INJECT...HEALTHY
Part four: ARRIVING IN USA FOR MORE DEAF EDUCATION (USA chronotope) epitope 15* WAIT+ + + WITH Part five: NOTHING-TO-DO EXCEPT WAIT epitope 15 WAIT UNTIL WAIT (deaf boss instructions) WAIT UNTIL WAIT (through weekend, start mon) WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Figure 11: Event Structures Signal Chronotopic Boundaries
Key transitions in this narrative are also marked by DO-NOTHING which
occurs: at the end of epitope seven preceding part three; at the end of epitope thirteen
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 122 preceding part four, and at the end of epitope 15 preceding part five, which is as yet
unfinished, and in transition at the time of telling, and therefore marked again by DO-
NOTHING (see APPENDIX 7). DO-NOTHING occurs at epitope boundaries to signal a
transition event, the lull before his next active step in the second hemitope of the life story.
Each instance of DO-NOTHING follows an obstacle:
1. Mother’s denial of permission to attend the Namibian Deaf School after which
he does nothing but wait while time passes before he decides to leave his family.
2. Rejection by young women after which he does nothing but work until he gets
malaria.
3. Unable to start course immediately after which he does nothing but wait for the
course to start.
Each instance of DO-NOTHING precedes a major event:
1. Relocating to Angola in search of Deaf people and education.
2. Moving to the USA in search of more Deaf education.
3. Facing the unknown future in the USA
The first three occurrences of NOTHING-TO-DO all follow a negative event.
NOTHING-TO-DO occurs for the first time at the end of epitope 7 after his mother tells
him that he cannot go to school.
Epitope 7; line 25: ME STAY GIVE-UP MOTHER NEVER > line 26: ME STAY GIVE-IN BORED NOTHING-TO-DO WAIT T O M O R R O W 4 - 4- 4- 4- -F F IN IS H
The second occurrence of NOTHING-TO-DO is in epitope 13 after his girl
friend rejects him in epitope 12.
Epitope 12: line 44: ...FRIEND BAD REJECT ME FINISH
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Epitope 13: > line 45: NOTHING-TO-DO WORK FINISH
The third occurrence of NOTHING-TO-DO is in epitope 15, line 50, after he
arrives in the USA where everything is unfamiliar and nobody knows him. The implication
is that he is feeling alienated again.
Epitope 15: > line 50: NEVER-SEEN BEFORE NOTHING-TO-DO
The last two recurrences of NOTHING-TO-DO are at the end of the narrative,
where the narrator is still waiting, without activity, for school to start and the next event to
happen. We can infer that the narrator ends the narrative in the present. He feels alienated
in yet another unfamiliar situation that he will have to resolve.
Epitope 15: > line 50: NEVER-SEEN BEFORE NOTHING-TO-DO line 51: ...WAIT UNTIL WAIT BOSS DEAF TITUS WAIT UNTIL WAIT > TOMORROW SUNDAY MONDAY TEACH NOTHING-TO-DO WAIT > NOTHING-TO-DO
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Epitope 7: line 25: ME STAY GIVE-UP MOTHER NEVER line 26: ME STAY GIVE-IN BORED NOTHING-TO-DO WAIT TOMORROWS -H- 4- 4- FINISH
Epitope 12: line 44: ...FRIEND BAD REJECT ME FINISH Epitope 13: > line 45: NOTHING-TO-DO WORK FINISH Epitope 15: > line 50: NEVER-SEEN BEFORE NOTHING-TO-DO line 51: ...WAIT UNTIL WAIT BOSS DEAF TITUS WAIT UNTIL WAIT > TOMORROW SUNDAY MONDAY TEACH NOTHING-TO-DO WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Figure 12: Nothing To Do Frames Negative Events Or Turning Points Which He Has To Resolve
Summary Of Recurring Lexical Events
Lexical repetition differentiates the first and second hemitopes of the life story
and sub-texts within each hemitope. In addition lexical repetition balances the narrative.
Interestingly there is a lack of lexical repetition in terms of events in the first hemitope of
the narrative. There are only two examples of non-productive lexical event repetition
(FARM and BASKET) across epitopes and one example of the repetition of a classifier
predicate including repetition of the handshape morpheme (BASKET). However, the fixed
lexical items FARM and HOSPITAL recur. The narrator uses lexical repetition here to set
up an opposition between the hospital and the farm to which he returns to recover.
However in the second hemitope of the narrative there are a total of four
recurring primary lexical events and five secondary recurring lexical events. The fact that
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there is such a difference in the number of fixed lexical items related to events that are
repeated in the first and second halves of the narrative is related to the narrator’s preference
for using classifier predicates rather than fixed lexical items in the first hemitope of the
narrative. His use of classifier predicates involves extensive repetition of hand movements
and handshapes. The recurring secondary lexical events in both part one and part two define
sub-texts in this narrative. Moreover the repetition of the SICK-INJECTION-RECOVER
sequence in the first and third parts of the narrative functions to balance the narrative
around two illnesses at the beginning and end of the narrative. The repetition of lexical
events in particular serves to reinforce chronotopic and hemitopic boundaries as indicated
in the chart below.
Key: part boundary @@@@@@ chronotope boundary 4-+4-4-+4- hemitopic boundary %%%%%
PART ONE ORIENTATION epitope one line 1 line 2 line 3 line 4 ...HOSPITAL line 5 CL:BACKSIDE-INJECT-(- + SICK-t- 4- + INJECT FINISH epitope two line 6 line 7 ...LOOKFOR HOSPITAL CL:TAKE-CARRY-PUTHOME-HUT OWAMBO WITH >line 8 HOSPITAL HEALTHY FINISH
NAMIBIAN CHRONOTOPE line 9 WAITFUTURE+4- COW WITH GOAT WITH FARM...CHILDRENGROW UP FINISH
PART TWO epitope three
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epitope four epitope five epitope six epitope seven line 24: line 25: >line 26: ME STAY GIVE-IN BORED DO-NOTHING WAIT TOMORROWS 4-4-4-4- FINISH
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% PART 3, ANGOLAN CHRONOTOPE epitope eight _neg line 27: ME THINK ME THINK SCHOOL WHERE.... epitope nine epitope ten epitope eleven epitope twelve epitope thirteen epitope fourteen >line 46: UNTIL ME SICK4-4- FEVER-MALARIA INJECTION-BACKSIDE4- HEALTHY FINISH FINAL @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
USA CHRONOTOPE PART FOUR epitope fifteen line 47: WAIT4-4-4- WITH THINK ME WANT SCHOOL LOOK-LIKE SAME WHERE... line 48 line 49 line 50 line 51: WAIT UNTIL WAIT TOMORROW....WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Figure 13: Event Structures, Part, Chronotopic And Hemitopic Boundaries
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 127 ANALYSIS OF SPATIAL REPETITION
Spatial Discourse Contours
The spatial-gestural modality offers different ways of structuring sign language
discourse in contrast to spoken languages that use the oral-aural modality. Space is not only
the medium for the articulation of ASL but contributes to the cohesive structuring of texts
through the use of spatial mapping (Liddell 1995, In Press, Winston 1993,1995). Winston
uses the term spatial mapping to refer to the process of associating a concept with an area
located in the signing space and the subsequent repeated referencing to spatially located
entities. Non-referential space is also used for paralinguistic functions (Van Hoek, Norman
and O’Gracfy 1989, cited in Winston 1993, Mather 1988, Friedman 1975). This is the use of
space for non-referential functions such as emphasis, stress, utterance and phrase boundaries
and audience involvement.
The spatial analysis of this life story text builds on Winston’s research on the
spatial structure of an ASL text at the discourse level. She demonstrates how a signer uses
spatial mapping to build discourse frames which structure the text and provide the receiver
with salient cues for interpreting the text. She studies the use of spatial mapping to
"... highlight the topic by adding spatial dimensions to linear, sequential text. Such mapping allows the signer to provide powerful cues to guide the audience in their interpretation of the meaning of the signed message....As such spatial mapping is a powerful marker for ASL discourse structure....nor is it used only to reflect physical tangible entities. It is used to mark important topic shifts, salient asides, revealing comments about a given topic." (1993:226)
This is referred to by Levinson as "discourse deixis" which he defines as:
"... the use of expressions within some utterance to refer to some portion of the discourse that contains the utterance (including the utterance itself). It also includes a number of ways in which an utterance signals its relation to surrounding text (Fillmore 1975, Lyons 1977)." (Levinson 1983:85)
What is important here is the relationship between an utterance and prior
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discourse, e.g., in English, utterance initial usages of but, therefore, in conclusion, and after
all. They seem to indicate just how the utterance that contains them is a response to, or a
continuation of, some portion of the prior discourse. Another example is the Amerindian
language, Cubeo, which has morphemes which mark the main story line, or topic markers
in Japanese and Tagalog which relate the marked utterance to some specific topic raised in
the prior discourse. Le., to perform a discourse deictic function." (Levinson 1983:87-88)
In the spatial analysis, I demonstrate how the narrator uses eyegaze spatially to
structure the shape of the narrative. I refer to the direction in which the eyes are looking
(left, center and right) as an indication of the meaningful use of the left, center and right of
the signing space. I identify patterns in the use of space as indicated by the direction of his
eyegaze on the epitopic level (see Spatial Transcription, APPENDIX 8).
Analysis: The Epitopic Use Of Space
How is space used on the epitopic level? Is space used in any way to delineate
epitopes or their boundaries?
I argue that space as measured by eyegaze movement plays a crucial role in
structuring each epitope according to epitopic spatial discourse contours which I have
identified. I argue for the existence of esdc’s on the basis of four substantiating claims: nine,
ten, eleven and twelve.
Claim nine: The general pattern for initiating epitopes is the use of eyegaze directed at the
center of the signing space.
Claim ten: The general pattern for ending epitopes is the use of eyegaze directed at the
center of the signing space.
Claim eleven : There is a pattern in terms of the direction of movement between the first
two locations (initial and second) at the beginning of each epitope and the last two locations
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(penultimate and final) at the end of each epitope.
Claim twelve: The direction of movement at the end of epitopes is generally patterned in the
opposite direction to that at the beginning of epitopes.
I use claim thirteen to argue that these epitopic spatial contours do more than
operate on the epitopic level. I argue that the reversal of the direction of these contours in
epitope seven (midway through this life story narrative) both constitutes and supports the
division of this narrative into two major hemitopes, each of which is comprised of discrete
epitopes marked by epitopic spatial discourse contours. This supports the structure found
in the signer's use of lexical repetition to delineate epitopes. (FINISH was repeated at the
end of each epitope. There was also internal topical lexical repetition within each epitope).
Claim thirteen: The reversal pattern at both the beginning and ends of epitopes which starts
at epitope 7 results in a different overall contour which changes from a contour that moves
leftward from the center of the signing space and back to the center, to a contour that
moves rightward from the center of the signing space before moving back to the center. The
reversal in the direction of the contour functions to delineate a major transition in his
lifestory which divides the text hemitopically into his life growing up in Namibia (parts one
and two) from his life in exile (parts three, four and five).
Epitopic Spatial Discourse Contours fESDC’sI
The above five claims work together to produce what I term epitopic spatial discourse
contours. The direction of eyegaze movement at the beginning and end of epitopes is
significant on the discourse level as it functions to tie the first six epitopes together as the
first hemitope of the narrative and to distinguish it from the second hemitope: epitopes 7-15.
Within hemitopes, esdc’s remain constant, thereby tying together the epitopes that comprise
the hemitope. Between the hemitopes, there is a reversal of direction of esdc’s, thereby
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 130 marking this critical division between major narrative structures.
The spatial discourse contours of epitopes function to contribute to the overall
structure or shape of the narrative by tying together the first six epitopes and differentiating
them with a specific cyclical spatial discourse contour which moves from the center to the
left and terminates in the center. The spatial discourse contours of epitopes one to six
generally have this leftward movement from the center before terminating in central space
in the first hemitope of the narrative.
The spatial discourse contours of epitopes seven to fifteen generally have a
rightward movement at the beginning, and terminate with a leftward movement, thus giving
rise to a cyclic process moving from the center to the right before terminating in the center
in the second hemitope of the narrative. The direction of movement at the beginning of
epitopes is therefore patterned, and the reversal of this pattern midway through the narrative
functions to delineate a major transition in the life story which divides Phineas’ life in
Namibia into two hemitopes (see discussion of hemitopes).
The discourse use of space at the beginning and ends of epitopes thus signals
epitopic contours which function in two ways:
1. To structure the epitope spatially in terms of contours and thereby let the
receiver know where the narrator is relative to the begirming and end of the
epitope.
2. The reversal of the direction of the contour signals a division of the narrative
into two distinct halves denoting his life in Namibia and his life in exile.
I outline in some detail exactly how I identify the spatial discourse contours for
each epitope. First I identify the initial and final location of eyegaze for each epitope.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 131 TABLE 4
SHOWING INITIAL LOCATION AND SECOND LOCATION FOR EACH EPITOPE (SIGNALLING DIRECTION OF MOVEMENT AT THE BEGINNING OF EACH EPITOPE)
Epitope Initial location Second location 1 R C 2a CL 2b R C 3a C R 3b R C 3c C R 3d CL 3e RL 4 R C 5 CR 6a C 6b L-R C 6c R L 7 CR 8 C R 9 RC 10a C R 10b C R 11a C R 11b C R 11c R L 12 C L
13 C -
14 C -
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R
I use the previous table to determine the direction of movement from the first to the second
location of each epitope. I use the spatial transcript in APPENDIX 8 in which every change
in location is recorded for the entire transcript. The position of the first location in each
epitope is noted in column one and the next location for each epitope is noted in column
two.
TABLE 5
INDICATING THE DIRECTION OF MOVEMENT AT THE BEGINNING OF EACH EPITOPE * second item is the final item of epitope
epitope direction of movement 1 leftward 2a rightward 2b leftward 3a rightward *(FINISH marks end of sub-epitope) 3b leftward 3c rightward 3d leftward 3e leftward 4 leftward 5 rightward 6a no change 6b rightward 6c leftward 7 rightward 8 rightward
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 133
9 leftward 10a rightward 10b rightward 11a rightward 11b rightward 11c leftward 12 leftward 13 no change 14 no change 15 rightward
Epitope Initial Evegaze Patterns
Claim eight: The general pattern for initiating epitopes is the use of eyegaze directed at the
right or center of the signing space to initiate epitopes.
The narrator consistently starts major epitopes with his eyegaze directed forwards
and to the center of the signing space with the exceptions of epitopes 1,4 and 9 in which he
starts signing with his eyegaze directed to the fight. I claim that the pattern of eyegaze
pointing to the center signals the initiation of twelve of the fifteen major life epitopes.
Eyegaze to the center works together with other repeated lexical items which signal the
beginning of a new epitope.
In order to support this claim, I need to explain why three of the epitopes do not
conform to the central eyegaze rule. The three exceptions in epitopes 1, 4 and 9 in which
eyegaze is directed to the right can be explained in terms of these epitopes being marked.
I argue that epitope one is marked initially by eyegaze to the right as it is the
beginning of the entire narrative. Epitopes four and nine are marked by eyegaze to the right
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 134 as this is a continuation of the spatial use of eyegaze in the preceding epitopes to which they
are directly connected.
Exception #1 to claim nine, eyegaze to right: epitope one
I claim that the narrator uses eyegaze to the right to initiate his telling of his life story as this
is the begirming of the story/narrative and thus different from the other epitopes which he
starts off by using eyegaze to the center. Epitope one starts off with line one (NAME IS P-
H-I-N-E-A-S K-I-M-I-S) which is all signed with his eyegaze right except for IS which is
signed in the center. Interestingly the sign for IS is not a true NSL sign. Instead it is a
manually coded sign for the copula borrowed from the Paget-Gorman system. His use of
eyegaze to the right for the first line except for the sign IS indicates that he is using a
borrowed lexical item in contrast to the rest of the natural NSL signs which make up this
utterance.
Exception #2 to claim eight: eyegaze to right, epitope four
I claim that the narrator uses eyegaze to the right at the beginning of this epitope in order
to spatially tie the beginning of epitope four to the end of epitope three and thus provide
continuity fi’om one epitope to the next.
The narrator starts epitope four with line sixteen (FINALLY UNTIL COW
GOAT WITH CL:HERD-ANIMALS-INTO-GARDEN ANIMAL-EAT GO-AWAY) He
produces FINALLY with eyegaze towards the extreme right, UNTIL COW GOAT with
eyegaze directed to the center and WITH CL:HERD-ANIMALS-INTO-GARDEN moves
across the signing space from left to right with corresponding eye-gaze movement. The use
of space and the direction of eyegaze in epitope four can be understood in terms of the use
of space in epitope three to which it directly corresponds.
The end of epitope three is structured spatially with the millet and sugar-cane
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 135 fields located in the center and to the right of the signing space. In contrast the place where
they empty out the baskets of harvested crops is located on the left of the signing space.
Epitope three therefore ends on the left where the harvested crops have been carried in
baskets and poured out so that they can be sorted for storage.
Thus the beginning of epitope four starts with the narrator using eyegaze to the
right to indicate the location of the fields as the topic, which holds for the beginning of
epitope four. FINALLY in line sixteen refers to the fact that, at long last, the family have
completed the harvesting of first the millet and then the sugar-cane. Thus FINALLY is
located on the right in epitope four which is where the sugar-cane fields have been located
in epitope three. Thus the narrator uses eyegaze to tie epitope four to the preceding
epitope. FINALLY emphasizes the idea that at last the fields (on the right) have been
harvested and are ready for grazing.
The narrator thereafter shifts his eyegaze to the center for the establishment of
the new topic (UNTIL COW GOAT...). This is the beginning of what happens next in
epitope four and is correspondingly located centrally as are the beginnings of the topics in
most of the other epitopes. He then shifts his eyegaze to the left again for the initiation of
the classifier predicate which moves from left to right tracing the path that the animals take
as they are herded into the fields on the right to eat the left-over stalks.
Exception #3 to claim eight: eyegaze to right, epitope nine
Similarly, epitope nine starts off with eyegaze directed to the right in order to tie this epitope
spatially to the preceding epitope. Epitope eight utilizes the right side of the signing space
to set up Angola, and English, which is what he wanted to learn there. This is contrasted
with the lack of other schools for the Deaf in Namibia which he locates on the extreme left
earlier in epitope eight.
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The narrator starts off epitope nine on the extreme right in line 30
(INDEPENDENT...) thus locating his independence upon his arrival in Angola where he
could learn English. He does not use lexical items to tell the audience that independence
is associated with Angola and English. Instead the audience knows this by associating the
location of his eyegaze which is directed to the right with his prior location of Angola and
English in this same location. He then shifts his gaze to the center of the signing space to
continue this utterance and introduce a new topic, his arrival in Angola (COM E+++)
before shifting gaze to the extreme left again to sign (FINISH) which ends this epitope, (see
discussion of end of epitopes on right).
I use TABLE 4 to determine the direction of movement from the first to the
second location of each epitope. I use the spatial transcript (APPENDIX 8) in which every
change in location is recorded as a basis for compiling TABLE 4. The position of the first
location in each epitope is noted in column one and the next location for each epitope is
noted in column two.
Using TABLES 4 and 5 I provide evidence to support the existence of spatial
discourse contour patterning (claims eleven and twelve) in this life story and its role in
structuring the narrative into two major hemitopes (claim thirteen).
Claim eleven states that there is a pattern in terms of the direction of movement between
the first two locations (initial and second) at the beginning of each epitope and the last two
locations (penultimate and final) at the end of each epitope.
Claim twelve states that the direction of movement at the end of epitopes is generally
patterned in the opposite direction to that at the beginning of epitopes.
Claim thirteen states that the reversal pattern at both the beginning and ends of epitopes
which starts at epitope 7 results in a different overall contour which changes from a contour
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 137 which moves from the center to the left and back to the center to a contour that moves from
the center to the right and back to the center. The reversal in the direction of the contour
functions to delineate a major transition in the life story which divides his life in Namibia
(hemitope one) from his life in exile (hemitope two).
The direction of movement of eyegaze at the beginning of epitopes one to six:
The general direction of movement for the first six epitopes is leftward. The
following exceptions (2a, 3a, 3c, 5, 6a, 6b) do not fit the leftward rule in the first hemitope
(epitopes 1-6) due to competing processes such as:
The previous use of space to create a left-right opposition.
In epitopes 2a and 6b, (TABLES 4 and 5) the signs produced at the second
location are pulled to the right to tie the current event to a previous event which uses
location on the left and right contrastively to oppose whatever is on the left and whatever
is on the right.
In 2a (TABLES 4 and 5) the sign for BROTHER-SISTER is produced on the
right resulting in a rightward movement. This is consistent with the signer’s use of the
spatial opposition between HOME and OWAMBO which he signs on the right (line 7) in
contrast to HOSPITAL and INJECTION which he signs on the left (line 5). HOME and
OWAMBO on the right thus pull BROTHER-SISTER in 2a towards the right as his family
members are associated with his Owambo farmstead and home. These are associated with
health and recoveiy, in contrast to the western hospital where he went for the treatment of
his illness and where he was separated from his family.
The hospital is in a different location to his home and he uses this difference in
location as the basis for opposing sickness and health, traditional Owambo and western
medicine, family and strangers. The direction of movement thus pulls the contour from the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 138 center to the left and back to the center Instead of the cyclic process moving from the center
to the right and back to the center.
Lexically fixed items involving eyegaze to the right.
In sub-epitope 3c the rightward movement is caused by the use of the sign SUN
which is lexically fixed and is always produced on the right.
Finger spelling conventions involving eve-gaze to the right.
In epitope 5 the rightward movement results from the fact that W-I-N-D is finger
spelled and that all finger spelling occurs on the right by convention in NSL.
The beginning of an epitope functioning as the end of an epitope.
In sub-epitope 3a FINISH is produced on the right as it is the final sign in this
short sub-epitope which is produced in central or neutral space. This is consistent with the
pattern that endings in the first hemitope of the narrative move towards the right and thus
signals the termination of this sub-epitope.
Summary
The use of space as measured by eye-gaze within epitopes or sub-epitopes
generally moves in the first six epitopes to the left from the point at which eyegaze starts
before terminating in the center or to the right (1, 2b, 3b, 3d, 3e, 4, 6c). The rightward
moving exceptions are caused by the prior oppositional topical use of space on the right,
which contrasts with the use of space on the left; lexically fixed signs which occur on the
right: the conventional use of finger spelling on the right; and finally in those cases where
the beginning of an epitope functions in the same way as the end of an epitope, moving
rightward to terminate in the center or on the right.
The Reversal Of The Direction Of Eyegaze Movement To The Right At The Beginning Of Epitopes Seven To Fifteen:
In epitope seven the direction of the eyegaze epitope initially changes from the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 139 leftward movement discussed above for epitopes one to six to that of a rightward movement
which generally holds for the remainder of the narrative - epitopes seven to fifteen.
This rightward direction of eyegaze can be seen at the beginning of epitopes 7,
8 ,10a, 10b, 11a, 11b and 15. Interestingly, repetition of the lexical item THINK accounts
for four of these instances of a shift to the right in epitopes: 7, 8 ,10a and 11a. I argue that
THINK is not lexically fixed on the right but rather the second location of the epitope pulls
THINK to the right from epitope seven onwards, as it is produced in the center, in neutral
signing space in the middle of epitope 11c, line 42 (KALILE TEACH THINK TEACH....).
THINK is also produced in the center as the third location in epitope 15, line
47 (WAIT+ + + WITH THINK ME WANT SCHOOL...). WAIT is produced in the center
as it is in the initial position in this epitope. There is the characteristic movement to the
right for WITH and a shift to the center for THINK which is the third location in that
epitope. Thus THINK is now pulled towards the center to the left of WITH, following the
rightward pull of the epitopic contour which has moved beyond the rightward locus for
WITH and which is now continuing its path rightwards towards the center.
The narrator conforms to this pattern of eyegaze movement to the right in
epitope 11b line 40 [NOW (C) KWANZA-SUL(R) ME (L) GO-BACK (L)....] where
KWANZA is introduced on the right although it is never again produced in this location.
In the very next sign KWANZA is set up on the left of the signing space by the next
directional verb ME GO-BACK which is produced on the left of the signing space. Luanda
is set up in opposition to KWANZA on the right of the signing space in this epitope. All
subsequent references to KWANZA are produced on the left for the rest of epitope 11 in
contrast to all references to Luanda which are produced on the right in this epitope.
Exceptions to movement to the right in epitopes 7-15:
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 140 Similar reasons account for the disruption of the rightward movement contour pattern for
epitopes 7-15 to the accounted of the disruption of the leftward movement contour pattern
in epitopes 1-6. At the beginning of epitopes 9 , 11c, 12,13 and 14 the pattern of movement
to the right is broken for the following reasons:
The use of space to create a left-right opposition
In epitope 11b KWANZA was set up on the left, this location for KWANZA persists in 11c
thus pulling the direction of the contour to the left and not to the right in line 41 which is
the beginning of epitope 11c (PETER STAY-THERE (R) HOME LUANDA (R) STAY-
THERE (R) (L-H) ME DEAF CL: STAY THERE (L)....). Thus everything before ME
DEAF in line 41 is produced on the right in the Luanda location and ME DEAF CL:STAY
THERE is produced both with the left hand and with left eyegaze in the Kwanza location,
as the narrator is contrasting his move to Kwanza with Peter’s remaining in Luanda, on the
right.
Lexically fixed items involving evegaze
In epitope 9, COME is produced as it always is, in neutral or central space with the
corresponding direction of eyegaze.
No change in location in epitopes thirteen and fourteen
The absence of any change in location throughout epitopes thirteen and fourteen is
interesting as this does not happen elsewhere in the narrative except for in epitope 6a which
functions as the end of epitope five (see discussion above).
Alternatively, epitope six may precede epitope seven, the major key transitional event in this
lifestory. In which epitope seven the contour pattern is reversed to mark a major transition
in Phineas’ life. His conflict with his mother over his schooling causes him to reject her in
epitope eight and go into exile in Angola in search of Deaf education.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 141
Epitopes thirteen and fourteen also precede a critical transitional move in his life,
when he decides to leave Angola and go the USA in search of more opportunities for Deaf
education. Thus, this lack of any movement contour in epitopes 6a, 13 and 14 may signal
the stasis he feels before a major life move.
Summary
The above discussion of epitope initial eyegaze patterns provides evidence to
support claims eleven and thirteen substantiating a leftward movement pattern at the
beginning of the spatial discourse contours of epitopes 1-6. This then reverses to a rightward
movement pattern which holds for the remainder of the life story (epitopes 7-15). In order
to substantiate the existence of spatial discourse contours, I examine eyegaze patterns at the
ends of epitopes.
Epitope Final Evegaze Patterns
I examine whether epitopes are terminated with any consistent position of
eyegaze signalling the end of the epitope.
Claim ten: The general pattern for ending epitopes is the use of eyegaze directed
at the center of the signing space to terminate each epitope.
This pattern holds for 10 out of 15 epitopes, all except epitopes 3d, 3e, 6c
(contour conforms), 9 ,11b (contour conforms) in which the left or right side of the signing
space is used instead of the center in order to refer to a location or contrast in the epitope
concerned.
Exceptions: The use of spatial opposition causes the epitope to terminate on left or right
Epitope 3d ends on the left, as the location for pouring out baskets of harvested
millet is located on the left in opposition to the fields (which the narrator has already set up
on the right) where harvesting occurs.
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Following the procedure for examining initial eyegaze patterning I look at the
patterning involving the final location of each epitope in relation to the penultimate location
for each epitope, using TABLES 6 and 7 to show the direction of eyegaze movement.
TABLE 6
SHOWING PENULTIMATE AND FINAL LOCATION FOR EACH EPITOPE (SIGNALLING DIRECTION OF MOVEMENT AT THE TERMINATION OF EACH EPITOPE)
E pitope...... Penultimate ...... Ultimate 1 ...... L ...... C 2a ...... C ...... R 2b ...... R ...... C 3 a ...... C ...... R 3 b ...... C ...... R 3c ...... C ...... R 3 d ...... C ...... L 3 e ...... R ...... L 4 ...... R ...... C 5 ...... R-L ...... C 6a ...... C ...... C 6b ...... C ...... R 6c ...... C R 7 ...... R ...... C 8 ...... R ...... C 9 ...... C ...... R 10a ...... C ...... R 10b ...... R ...... C 11a ...... R ...... C 11b ...... C ...... L 11c ...... R ...... L 1 2 ...... R ...... C 13 ...... C ...... C 14 ...... C ...... C 15 ...... R ...... C
I use TABLE 6 to determine the direction of movement from the penultimate
to the final location of each epitope. In order to create TABLE 6 I use the table at the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 143 beginning of this chapter in which every change in location is recorded for the entire
transcript. The position of the penultimate location in each epitope is noted in column one
and the final location for each epitope is noted in column two.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 144 TABLE?
INDICATING THE DIRECTION OF MOVEMENT AT THE END OF EACH EPITOPE
epitope direction of movement 1 rightward 2a rightward 2b leftward 3a rightward 3b rightward 3c rightward 3d leftward 3e leftward 4 leftward 5 rightward 6a No change in location 6b rightward 6c rightward 7 leftward 8 leftward 9 rightward 10a rightward 10b leftward 11a leftward 11b leftward 11c leftward 12 leftward 13 no change in location 14 no change in location 15 leftward
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 145 The patterns epitope finally in relation to the patterns epitope initially in order
to determine the existence of spatial discourse contours in this narrative.
Claim eleven: There is a pattern in terms of the direction of movement between the first two
locations (initial and second) at the beginning of each epitope and the last two locations
(penultimate and final) at the end of each epitope.
The pattern of the direction of movement at the beginning of epitopes, namely,
leftwards from epitopes one to six and then rightwards from epitopes 7-15 has already been
determined. Using TABLES 6 and 7 ,1 determine the contour movement pattern at the end
of each epitope to see whether there is a corresponding reversal of the direction of
movement in epitope seven.
Direction of eyegaze movement at the ends of epitopes
I examine how the discourse use of space at the ends of epitopes works together
with the use of space at the beginning of epitopes in order to substantiate my claim that the
beginning and ends of epitopes work together to form spatial discourse contours that operate
on the epitopic level.
An examination of the direction of eyegaze at the ends of epitopes also provides
evidence to support claim eleven in which I state that the direction of movement at the end
of epitopes is generally patterned in the opposite direction to that at the beginning of
epitopes.
Direction of movement of eyegaze at the end of epitopes one to six:
TABLE 7 shows the direction of movement in eyegaze at the end of each epitope and sub
epitope. The general direction of movement for the first six epitopes is rightward. The
following exceptions (2b, 3d, 3e, 4, 6a do not fit the rightward pattern in the first hemitope
(epitopes 1-6) due to the competing and presumably "heavier" process in which space is being
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 146 used or has already been used to create a left-right opposition.
Exceptions: epitopes one to six: movement to left epitope finally:
There are four instances at the end of epitopes (2b, 3d, 3e, and 4) in which the
spatial use of location to set up a contrast between two places interferes with the rightward
pull epitope finally, resulting in a leftward movement instead of a rightward movement.
In epitope 2b the left-right contrast between HOSPITAL on the left and HOME
on the right, which has already been set up in epitope 2a, pulls the penultimate location of
HOME HEALTHY to the right. This creates a leftward movement towards the final
location.
In epitopes 3d and 3e there is a left-right contrast between the place where they
pour-out harvested crops from their baskets in contrast to the fields where the crops grow
and are harvested. These sub-epitopes terminate with the crops being taken from the fields
(penultimate location on right) to the pouring-out location (final location on left) creating
a leftward movement toward the final location.
Thus, the general rightward pattern for the ends of epitopes one through six,
coupled with the epitope initial leftward pattern for these epitopes, creates a cyclical process
which moves from center to left and back to center that corresponds to the first two parts
of Phineas’ life story, set in Namibia before he goes into exile.
Direction of movement of eyegaze at the end of epitopes seven to fifteen:
The general pattern of movement of eyegaze at the end of epitopes reverses in
epitope seven to a leftwards movement, with the exceptions of epitopes 9 & 10a, due to the
contrastive use of space, and epitopes 13 & 14, in which there is no change in movement.
In epitope 9, the final location of FINISH is pulled to the right by the contrast
in which ANGOLA and INDEPENDENT are already set up on the right.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 147 In epitope 10a, the final location of TABHITHA pulls the direction of movement
to the right as THABITHA’s group of students is contrasted with RAUNA’s group of
students who have been set up on the left.
Epitopes 13 and 14 do not involve any change in location throughout these
epitopes and therefore break the leftward contour pattern. These epitopes have been
discussed as transition epitopes before the final major life transition in epitope 15 at the
beginning of part four (when the narrator moves to the USA). They reflect the stasis in his
life before this major change.
Summary
Considered in conjunction with the rightward eyegaze movement pattern at the
beginning of epitopes in the latter hemitope of the life story (epitopes 7-15), the leftward
eyegaze movement pattern at the end of these epitopes produces a cyclic process moving
from the center to the right contour pattern that generally holds for the last two parts of this
life story, in opposition to the cyclic process moving from center to left and back to center
contour pattern of the first two parts of the narrative. The reversal in the direction of the
contour functions to delineate a major transition in this life story which divides Phineas’ life
into two hemitopes, his life in Namibia, and his life in exile (see discussion of hemitopes in
terms of lexical cohesion).
ANALYSIS OF SPATIAL OPPOSITIONS
Spatial Delineation of Topical Boundaries
In section one I demonstrate how spatial discourse contours provide one more
way for the narrator to delineate major epitopes in his life story. In this section I explore
how space is used to delineate larger units than the epitopic level. I claim firstly that this
narrator uses eyegaze repeatedly to reference spatial oppositions which he sets up
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 148 contrastively on the left and right of the signing space. My next claim is that his repeated
spatial references to the opposition concerned operate on the discourse level in NSL to
frame sub-texts which I term contratopes in this life story. Winston (1993) shows how space
operates in this way to frame comparative sub-texts in an ASL text. In the discussion below
I provide evidence to support the claim that spatial contrasts delineate a system of sub-texts
or topics organized around oppositions (contratopes) in this lifestory.
In the transcript each topical boundary is marked with a double line. I identify
each topic spatially in terms of each major opposition on the left and right sides of the
signing space. I circle each event on the right as well as each contrasting event on the left.
These oppositional contrasts pattern into nine major topics. There is only one topic in this
narrative which is not spatially organized.
Sub-Texts Or Topics As A Separate Spatial-Oppositional Svstem
The oppositional use of space which emerges does not always conform to the
formal discourse boundaries which I identify and discuss in the preceding sections, namely,
epitopes marked by temporal particles and lexical repetition across and within epitopes;
epitopic spatial discourse contours; parts marked by the lexical repetition of the temporal
particle WAIT and lexical repetition of events; and lastly, the hemitopic boundary marked
by the reversal of the epitopic spatial discourse contour and the lexical repetition of actors
and events.
I argue that the oppositional use of space marks topical frames or contratopes
which are larger than sub-epitopes and epitopes. I use the term contratope to refer to major
spatially organized contrastive topics or sub-texts in the narrative. Following Winston (1993)
who found that spatial cohesion delineated sub-texts in an ASL lecture, I discover that topics
are structured in terms of spatial oppositions in this NSL narrative. A contratope may
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 149 extend over a series of epitopic (two handed FINISH) and sub-epitopic (one handed
FINISH) boundaries. Thus contratopes may include one or more sub-epitopes or epitopes
(Figure 9). However the endings of these contratopes generally coincide with a major
FINISH discourse marker and are frequently initiated by a time marker. It is the
combination of the contrastive use of space with a new meaning and the use of lexical time
markers that signals the end of the topic and the beginning of a new topic.
I illustrate this by showing how topic one and two utilize the contrastive use of
space, with the time marker FINISH at the end of topic one, and the time marker WAIT
at the beginning of topic two (which also ends with a major FINISH marker). There is also
a shift in the meaning of right and left signing location after topic two is set up on the right
representing HOME. Topic one utilizes right and left space to represent HOME and
HOSPITAL respectively, whereas topic two starts off by utilizing the right to represent
HOME, and then shifts to create a new contrast within the home area, in which right and
left space represent FIELDS and WASTE respectively.
An in-depth explanation of how these contratopes utilize oppositional space and
time markers to delineate their borders follows. The first topic is characterized by the spatial
opposition HOSPITALxHOME. HOSPITAL is located on the left and HOME is located
on the right. This topic ends with a FINISH marker on the right hand side of the signing
space when the signer returns home to his family’s kraal (homestead) to recover. The
second topic GROWTH, HARVEST:: WASTE is initiated in line 9 by use of the lexical time
particle WAIT (after the FINISH marker in line 8) on the right at the location of the farm.
The central and right hand side of the signing space are used to represent the fields where
crops are harvested in lines 14 and 15, and where the animals go to graze on the leftover
stalks, in line 16. The left hand side of the signing space is used to represent the place
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 150
where the left-over waste is taken, in line 18, when the wind blows the waste particles to the
left, and in line 22, the bare cobs are placed on the left hand side of the signing space.
Contrastive And Poetic Use Of Spatial Oppositions
The major claim I put forward is that in this life story the signer uses left and
right signing space both contrastively and poetically in order to set up and elaborate each
topic. The oppositional use of space to set up contrasts on the discourse level is yet another
resource at the disposal of the narrator for the expression of his life story narrative. I argue
that he exploits the contrastive use of space as an involvement strategy on the sense-making
level. I call his usage of space beyond the dictates of the language poetic in the sense used
by Friedrich (1986). NSL provides a set of rules by which signers can set up a contrast on
the left and right sides of the signing space. Phineas stretches the spatial nature of NSL
beyond the spatial rules of the language.
The grammatical spatial rules of NSL are similar to those found in ASL on the
discourse level. If signers are contrasting two entities entity X and entity Y, they will set up
X on one side of the signing space, e.g., the right and Y on the other side of the signing
space, e.g., the left. Thereafter, if signers want to refer to X they can point to the right and
the watcher will know that signers are referring to X and when signers point to the left the
watcher will know they are referring to Y. Signers can thus refer back to either side of the
opposition using space.
I demonstrate how the narrator in this life story conventionally uses space
contrastively to either set up and/or elaborate on the oppositions around which nine of the
ten topics are structured. All the contratopes, excluding contratope eight, utilize a spatial
opposition. I show that the narrator adds another level of structure and meaning to this
narrative by further using this spatial patterning to build additional levels of personal
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 151
meaning. His use of spatial patterning reflects a pattern of assigning valences to the left
versus the right side of the signing space.
The Internal Oppositional Structure Of Nine Sub-Texts
I use in Figure 14, in order to analyze further the spatial oppositions which the
narrator uses to delineate or frame the nine sub-texts that structure this narrative. I label
each topic according to the spatial oppositions I have pulled out from the spatial transcript
in APPENDIX 8. I have not included the central use of space in my analysis as I consider
this to be neutral or unmarked signing space. A list of the ten contratopes follows. It is
clear that all except contratope eight include an opposition. I exclude topic eight from the
discussion and refer to the following nine contratopes, namely topics 1-7 and 9-10.
LEFT RIGHT 1. hospital; sic k ...... home; health 2. inedible w a ste ...... crops, harvest, grain 3. Deaf School in Namibia ...... mother 4. younger Deaf students older Deaf students 5. grade four at Deaf school ...... grade two at Deaf school 6 . refugee camp (Kwanza) ...... work in the city (Luanda) 7. hearing women friends ejected, alone 8...... sick 9. leave A ngola...... arrive USA 10. foreign Deaf B o ss...... Deaf Namibians
Figure 14: Internal Oppositional Structure Delineates Contratopes.
Wavs In Which The Narrator Marks Left And Right Space
The narrator’s discourse use of left and right space utilizes a range of ways that
differentiate the left from the right signing space. The use of eyegaze as a spatial indicator
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 152 predominates, working in conjunction with headtum and bodyshifting. In addition, he
relocates signs from neutral space to the left or right, and he manipulates spatially the
productive movement roots of classifier predicates. I assume that the narrator’s use of left
and right space is marked and contributes to the meaning he creates out of the structure of
this narrative. I claim that the narrator uses spatial reference consistently to set up and
signal contrastive meaning purposely.
Using Figure 14,1 demonstrate that eight of the nine discourse sub-texts provide
a means through which the narrator constructs his life story in terms of oppositional topical
units which he resolves in some way. I show that in some of the contratopes there is no
poetic use of space. These frames do not go beyond the linguistic requirements in that they
utilize left vs. right space to convey topographical spatial meanings rather than set up
conceptual contrasts. However in other contratopes, the narrator constructs new
idiosyncratic meanings around a spatial opposition which he has previously assigned to a
topographical contrast. These are more interesting to interpret as they indicate poetic
manipulation and mastery of the language.
Setting Up Oppositional Topics Spatially
I focus on the narrator’s discourse use of space to set up a topic. The signer
follows the convention of NSL to use the left and right sides of the signing space.
Subsequently in the discourse he refers anaphorically to the left and right sides of the space
using lexical pointing, eyegaze, body shift or headturns. Winston (1993) discusses this use
of space in her detailed analysis of topical framing in an ASL lecture. She describes the
process by which topics are set up and framed using spatial reference as a cohesive strategy
to make the discourse more coherent.
My analysis goes beyond the conventional discourse use of space as described by
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 153 Winston. I show how the narrator uses spatial referencing in NSL in order to set up an
opposition involving a contrast which is indicated by means of: relocating eyegaze, relocating
signs, bodyshifting, headturns and pointing. This may also involve the grammatical use of
space (I use grammatical in the broad sense to incorporate phonology, morphology and
syntax) to:
indicate different locations of things in the world using poly-synthetic classifier
predicates.
indicate grammatical relations to signal subject and object relations using
agreement verbs.
indicate deictic relations and contrasts, e.g., here vs there, using agreement
locatives or pronominal indexing.
Using Space Contrastively To Set Up Topographical Oppositions
The use of space, in the conventional sense, to set up contrasts occurs in all the
topics except in topic eight which does not have any spatial contrast (WITH in topic eight
is the only sign produced on the right and this is not contrastive, but refers to the
simultaneous actions of waiting and thinking). The ways in which the narrator uses space
contrastively are consistent throughout all nine contratopes. Therefore I illustrate how the
narrator uses space in this way in only one contratope. I unpack the spatial structure of
contratope six (lines 38-43) KWANZA vs. LUANDA in which he contrasts leaving the
school at Kwanza and going to look for work in Luanda. He then gives us details about
which of his peers stayed in Luanda, and who moved from Kwanza to Luanda.
Explication of contratope #6
In line 39 the narrator clearly sets up the location of Luanda on the right hand
side of the signing space after finger spelling L-U-A-N-D-A on the right hand side (which
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 154 is where all finger spelling occurs and so therefore does not in itself constitute setting up L-
U-A-N-D-A on the right). In order to establish that Luanda is on the right he relocates the
string ME GO PUT WORK to the extreme right as well as using eyegaze to the right
throughout this utterance. The rest of the utterances in this line all originate in neutral
signing space with eyegaze moving from the center to the right.
In contrast, he locates Kwanza on the left (line 40) in opposition to Luanda,
which he sets up first on the right. He does this by using eyegaze to the left and relocating
the signs ME GO-BACK on the left instead of producing them in neutral signing space. He
then signs a sequence of classifier predicates on the left (CL:LOAD-THINGS-ONTO-
TRUCK CL:DRIVE-AWAY CL:TRUCK-GO CL:DROP-OFF-J-)
The narrator elaborates that on the location of Kwanza is on the left by
relocating a string of fixed lexical items to the left. These are generally signed in neutral
space as they are not locatives or classifiers (UNTIL TEACH LEARN-A-LOT FINISH).
He signs these together with eyegaze to the left to indicate that Kwanza is located on the left
side of the signing space.
He then goes back to focusing on Luanda by using a string of locatives and nouns
relocated to the right (PETER STAY-THERE HOME LUANDA STAY-THERE4-) which
is where he located Luanda in line 39. He uses eyegaze and locatives to refer to Luanda on
the right.
The use of the left hand space to indicate Kwanza and the use of the right hand
space to indicate Luanda continues in line 41,42 and 43, the end of this topic. For this topic
the signer is contrasting the different locations of Kwanza and Luanda.
I have shown how he starts off by moving to Luanda at the beginning of the topic
which he sets up on the right and how he ends the topic by emphasizing his return to
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 155 Kwanza (on the left) and his decision to remain there, despite other friends remaining in
Luanda leaving for Luanda. In the next section I demonstrate how he uses space poetically
to go beyond the requirements of the language to set up and refer back to spatial contrasts.
There are similar conventional uses of topographic space to set up contrasts in each of the
other contratopes (excluding number eight).
Poeticallv Stretching And Resolving The Opposition
In order to analyze how the narrator exploits the spatial features of NSL to
express his narrative in terms of contrasts that are meaningful to his construction of identity
and culture, I look at the interplay between the requirements of the language which is
spatial-gestural by nature, and his manipulation of these spatial features to create and
express personal meaning. I argue that he is stretching the language at his disposal (which
is inherently spatial) beyond what is required by the grammatical constraints of space. He
is creating his own personal oppositions out of a variety of spatial discourse strategies, some
of which are not obligatory. It is these spatial discourse strategies that are not required by
the language itself that I claim are poetic. It is this poetic manipulation of space to create
oppositions that I examine.
The second part of the analysis demonstrates how the narrator further exploits
the discourse requirement to create new meanings and resolve oppositions. He does this by
exploiting signs that do not generally use space contrastively, e.g., relocating the eyegaze,
relocating the sign, body shifting, headturns, pointing. He combines these with the use of
classifier predicates, locatives, agreement verbs and pronominal indexing to pattern his
narrative in terms of meaningfril oppositions and their resolution.
I use topic one: HOSPITAL VS HOME (lines 1-8) to demonstrate how the
narrator uses space systematically to create new meanings and resolve oppositions. In this
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contratope he initiates the topic by locating his identity on the right. He tells the audience
his name and the fact that he is Deaf.
He further locates his identity on the right in lines 2 and 3 by using eyegaze to
the right while he signs the year in which he was born (1960) and the fact that he lost his
hearing (HEARING-GONE). The location of his identity on the right is not conventional.
He decides to assign a spatial location (right) to emphasize his identity as a Deaf Namibian
bom in 1960. We can predict that something will occur on the left as he has indicated that
he is using space poetically by starting off, uncustomarily, on the right.
As anticipated, he creates an opposition when he uses his left hand, on both
occasions, to sign BACKSIDE-INJECT in line 5. The narrator does not use his left hand
in the production of any other classifiers in this narrative as he is right handed. I claim that
he is using his left hand to relocate the hospital on the left in opposition to his identity and
his health which he locates on the right. Although he uses left eyegaze when he signs
HOSPITAL in line 4, this does not strongly locate HOSPITAL on the left as this sign is
phonologically located on the non-dominant shoulder (the left shoulder for most signers).
The narrator therefore uses his left hand to sign BACKSIDE-INJECT, purposefully locating
this medical intervention and early trauma in his life on the left. Interestingly HEARING-
GONE was signed on the right, indicating that it is a fact of his identity, in the same way
that he was born in 1960 in Namibia.
In lines 6 and 7 he continues referring to hospital on the left by using eyegaze
to the left when he signs LOOK-FOR (way to get home from hospital). OSHIKUKU is
finger spelled conventionally on the right, with eyegaze to the right. There is a clear
indication of the HOSPITAL-HOME opposition in line 7 when he uses a classifier verb
TAKE-CARRY-PUT which moves from left to right to signal how he was taken home from
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 157 the hospital to his village.
He uses this classifier predicate (line 7: CL:TAKE-CARRY-PUT) to indicate a
change of location in the real world from one place (HOSPITAL) to his traditional village
(HOME) which is a conventional usage in itself. TAKE is signed on the extreme left of the
signing space, CARRY moves from left to right in the central area of the signing space and
PUT is signed on the extreme right of the signing space. This movement from the left to the
right of the signing space is required by the grammar of NSL, as the movement paths of
classifier predicates trace a similar movement from one location (HOSPITAL) to a second
location (HOME) in the real world.
However, I argue that he uses this classifier to support an opposition of a
different order which he creatively constructs. This opposition goes beyond the meaning that
two locations in the real world are involved in this part of the narrative. He follows the
classifier verb sequence in lines 7 and 8 by a string of signs relocated to the right which are
usually signed in neutral space: HOME-HUT OWAMBO WITH (HOSPITAL) HEALTHY
FINISH. Again, in line 8, HOSPITAL is the only lexical item signed to the left
of...OWAMBO WITH HEALTHY FINISH, which are all signed on the right. I argue that
the narrator has located his health, his identity, his home and his family’s agencty on the
right, in opposition to the hospital, and his injections, and his lack of agency on the left.
This patterning is a poetic construction as the signer is using space to mean. He is creating
new meanings which are not customaiy. The narrator is using space beyond the linguistic
spatial grammar of NSL to create layers of meaning concerning agency as he constructs his
life story and his identity for us.
Following the demonstration of spatial oppositional discourse frames, I claim that
these oppositional discourse frames identify another layer of structure that contributes
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 158 simultaneously to the meaning of the narrative. The oppositions out of which the narrator
builds his life stoiy are themes that both construct and express his world view. I demonstrate
how he uses spatial oppositions to set up thematic oppositions which run through the entire
narrative.
These thematic oppositions can be discovered by analyzing the oppositions in
each contratope for meaning. All the different meanings for each set of oppositions in each
contratope (1-9) are listed.
TABLE 8
SHOWING OPPOSITIONAL THEMES EMERGING FROM CONTRATOPES
SIGNER’S RIGHT SIGNER’S LEFT Deaf Hearing Family Leave Family Home Not Home Self Agency Authority From Others Source of Actions Recipient of Control Internal Control External Control Self Benefit Self Detriment Inside-Group Outside-Group Resolved Unresolved Education - English No Education Men Women Work School / Unemployment
I assume that these oppositional themes are active in the narrator’s mind but do
not come up in every topic. They come up in different combinations in different topics.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 159 They interact with each other differently in each topic. By analyzing these thematic patterns
that emerge throughout this narrative we can understand how the narrator uses this spatial
narrative structure simultaneously to express and make sense of the events in his life that
occur in each of the nine spatially organized contratopes.
It is in this interaction of oppositional themes that the narrator achieves what
Friedrich calls the art of "languaging" (using language to weave together of strands of cultural
meaning into personal patterns). Out of the interaction of the above oppositional themes
the following patterns emerge:
1. Most of the time the themes on the right have positive meaning for him and
those on the left have negative meaning for him. However there are two
negative events that occur on the right. In contratope three, he signs on the
right that there is no available Deaf school for him in Namibia and, in
contratope eight, he signs on the right that he is alone and rejected by his
women friends. There are also two positive events that he refers to on the left
which is otherwise used for negative events. In contratope six he places Kwanza
on the left to which he returns after deciding to leave the city of Luanda. In
contratope ten, he locates the Deaf foreign coordinator of his program at
Gallaudet on the left.
2. He starts most spatial topics on the right, moves over to the left and ends on the
right. Thus, the right means resolution and the left means lack of resolution.
At the beginning of epitope fifteen, he leaves Angola (on the left) and flies with
his group to the USA (on the right) where the right signals progress and the
resolution of his former unresolved conflict. Epitope fifteen takes place for the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 160 remainder of line 48 on the right hand side, where there is the promise of more
education which he is waiting for impatiently. As this is out of his control, the
Deaf boss is positioned on the left in the position of authority and power, where
he withholds school until the end of the weekend. Thus this authority figure is
an obstacle to the narrator despite his Deafness and Africanness). The story
ends fittingly in central signing space, in the uncertainty of the present, with the
narrator and his group waiting passively in the center (the position of lack of
resolution). This epitope is in progress at the time of narration: narrative time
and real time are conflated in the time of waiting.
3. In-group identification is usually located on the right and he usually ends up with
his own cultural group (Deaf Heterosexual Male Namibians) and not alone. He
prefers being with his group but forgoes the group for education when he leaves
his peers in Luanda to return to Kwanza (on the left) for more educational
opportunities and for women. Although he lands up alone on the right after
being rejected by women, this is the position of strength of identity for him and
signals that not all is hopeless for him as he always makes a positive change for
himself from the right.
Conclusion
The existence of these nine contratopes validates my first claim that this narrator
structures his life story topically in terms of spatial oppositions. He uses eyegaze to signal
the spatial opposition constituting each contratope which he sets up contrastively on the left
and right of the signing space. The spatial structuring of topical oppositions discussed above
is evidence for the claim that spatial contrasts operate on both the shape and meaning of the
text to delineate a central system of sub-texts or topics organized around oppositions in this
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 161 lifestory. The setting up of oppositions spatially is a requirement of the language, but the
use of space to create new oppositions and resolve them is an example of poetic and
idiosyncratic spatial patterning which gives us insight into the way this Deaf individual
constructs oppositional and narrative meaning for himself.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER FOUR
NARRATIVE IDENTITY AND THE NEGOTIATION OF SPACE AND PLACE
The purpose of this chapter is to demonstrate how the narrator constructs and
presents his social-cultural identity as a Deaf Namibian in this rendition of his life story
through his patterned use of spatial and temporal repetition.^
I detail how he uses spatial and temporal linguistic markers to stretch his
narrative into a different realm of social-cultural meaning that goes beyond its elegant
structure. I claim that the narrator actively engages his audience by using spatial and
temporal repetition through which he creates and expresses the meaning of his life story, in
this case, his identity as a Namibian Deaf person.
^ A discussion of the terminology concerning the different %)es of spaces I refer to throughout this chapter is necessary. I show how the signer metaphorically constructs his identity by manipulating what I call the literal signing area in which the narrator signs his narrative. I call what is usually referred to as the "signing space" the "signing area” so as to distinguish it from metaphorical and physical spaces. When referring to a geographical or physical location in the real world, sign languages in general have a number of available options. Phineas refers to physical locations by using lexical items to refer to place names e.g. Namibia, Angola, USA, Oshikuku, Oshakati, Luanda, Kwanza. He uses this strategy to locate places within countries e.g. he refers to school in Namibia and in exile. Phineas can choose whether to assign geographical locations to different parts of the signing area or not. He does this using tokens (Liddell 1995), structures that exist in the signing area to make reference to the associated nominal to create relations between geographical locations and the rigning area. For example, he sets up the farm on the right and the hospital on the left. However, we have no evidence that his home was located in that spatial relation to the hospital in Namibia, as he is not at home in his village for this narrative performance, and therefore we know that in all likelihood he is not using the signing area to point at real things to represent real relative locations. However, when he repeatedly places a sign to his right, we know that he is referring to the farm. Finally, Phineas makes use of grammatical space, which does not make reference to tokens or located spaces e.g. a contrast is established on opposite sides of the signing area. % locating a sing on either side of the signing area, Phineas refers to the opposing sides of the contrast e.g. the students who passed versus the students who failed are referred to on the right and left respectively. I use de Certeau’s terminology concerning metaphorical spaces, namely, the use of "place" and "space" which the oppressor and oppressed respectively create. I use the term topographical or physical space to refer to the locations that the narrator refers to which correspond to a geographical location in the real world.
162
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 163 It is justifiable that a study of narrative discourse will yield insights into the social
relations inherent in any cultural group’s make-up, what Rosaldo (1993) calls the cultural
borderlands. Like any oppressed group. Deaf people form their identity in relation to the
dominant cultural group in power. The identity of Deaf people interfaces with that of the
hearing majority (Erting 1982, Lane 1992).
I interpret Phineas’ life story anthropologically in terms of the work of Bakhtin
(1981, 1986), Linde (1993), De Certeau (1984), Friedrich (1986), Low and Altman (1992),
and Moy (1989), all of whom emphasize the inseparability of language and culture in text.
I begin by defining and detailing the key concepts I draw on from each of these six theorists.
This provides a framework in which I examine how Phineas idiosyncratically manipulates the
spatial and temporal linguistic resource available in his sign language (Friedrich) to construct
his narrative identity (Linde) thus forging a social cultural space (De Certeau) in relation to
conflicting world views or voices (Bakhtin). I show how place attachment is literally (Low
and Altman 1992) and metaphorically (Moy 1989) communicated in this narrative. It is this
spatial metaphorical expression of place attachment that is the most interesting aspect of this
analysis.
My starting point for building this interpretive framework is Bakhtin’s view of
verbal discourse as a primarily complex multi-layered social phenomenon. From this
perspective, language is not defined as:
...a system of abstract grammatical categories, but rather language is conceived as ideologically saturated, language as a world view, even as a concrete opinion, insuring a maximum of understanding in all spheres of ideological life. (Bakhtin 1981:271)
Thus, language is intimately bound up with actual social life and cannot be separated from
the "multitude of concrete worlds, a multitude of bounded verbal-ideological and social belief
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 164
systems." (Bakhtin 1981:288)
Bakhtin emphasizes the internally dialogic nature of discourse. His notion of
heteroglossia involves the simultaneous co-existence of contradictory social voices within a
monologic text such as a narrative, e.g., between the present and the past, between different
social groups in the present (1981:291-292).
According to this dialogic view of language, the ideological conflicts between
social groups with different world views is embodied in their discourse. Narrative, and more
specifically, life stories, are the forms of discourse that I examine in this dissertation. In any
narrative or life stoiy there is more than one belief system operating. One of the tasks of
this chapter is to use the linguistic analysis discussed in the previous chapter to identify
exactly which linguistic resources Phineas uses to both construct and communicate these
ideological conflicts between deaf and hearing Namibians in his life story. I focus on the
spatial manifestation of Phineas’ ideological conflicts as a Deaf person in relation to the
authoritative hearing world. I examine how the narrative spatially reveals this dialogic
interrelationship. This is also the means by which he differentiates his individual ideological
consciousness as a Deaf Namibian who tries to move away from the hearing language of
authority.
Phineas uses the text with its multiple voices (Owambo hearing kin. Deaf
SWAPO exiles, and hearing SWAPO exiles) to construct a narrative grounded in both space
and time, out of which emerges his sense of self. This sense of self is not temporally fixed
but is grounded in the time of narration, it is a justification, if you will, of his arrival in the
here and now. He contrasts a different self at the beginning of the narrative to what he has
become in the present. This early self lacks a Deaf identity and corresponding sense of
agency, instead he is merged within a hearing Owambo family grounded in agricultural
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cyclical time. The later Deaf self breaks away from this hearing family who are replaced by
Deaf kin in a tale of origin grounded in linear time in a different country, Angola.
I have also used Bakhtin’s notion of chronotopes as the framework for this
interpretation of Phineas’ lifestory. Chronotope is the term Bakhtin uses to express "the
inseparability of time and space ... (in) literature." (1981:84) They are:
the organizing centers for the fundamental narrative events of the novel... it is precisely the chronotope that provides the ground essential for the showing forth, the representability of events. And this is so thanks precisely to the special increase in density and concreteness of time-markers - the time of human life, of historical time - that occurs within well delineated spatial areas. (Bakhtin 1981:250)
According to Bakhtin (1981), these are the "primary points" from which
important scenes unfold. It is the means by which time is materialized in space and is the
center for "concretizing representation." In Phineas’ life story I found that space, place and
time interact to form five major parts which are separated by WAIT. The first and last parts
form the orientation and coda situating the narrative as emerging out of a timeless space
with Phineas’ birth and resituating it in a timeless space of nothingness and waiting at the
end. The body of the narrative contains the action and events which make up his identity.
The bocfy consists of three major chronotopes corresponding to his residence in three
different countries (Namibia, Angola and the USA) giving rise to three distinct parts of the
narrative, each of which is linguistically bounded by the time particle WAIT, which indicates
that a new part of the life story is about to begin (See the linguistic analysis in Chapter
Three).
Phineas uses the chronotope structure of the narrative to move from one stage
of his life to another both literally (from one country to another) and figuratively from one
social-cultural ideology to another. These chronotopes are more than Bakhtin’s fixed
grounding structures against which the action of the lifestory is played out. The chronotopes
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 166 themselves are the means by which Phineas transforms a fixed border or limit, where there
are no more opportunities for him, into a bridge which enables him to create yet another
new frontier.
I argue that Phineas uses chronotopes to create cohesion and coherence and
meaning out of his life. The linguistic analysis reveals that the sign WAIT occurs at the end
of each chronotope. I interpret Phineas’ act of waiting as the De Certeauian tactic which
he uses in order to make-do whenever he faces what appear to him to be insurmountable
obstacles. Waiting is a way he can demonstrate his agency, he waits before he acts. He uses
the act of waiting to suspend time and activity. Waiting builds a bridge to the next phase of
his life in a different place (country) with positive sentiment, away from the country that has
become negative and stifling.
There are thus three main chronotopes that are each comprised of a number of
epitopes (see the linguistic analysis in Chapter Three). Each epitope consists of a significant
event. These events are discontinuous in reality, but are told sequentially and cohesively as
if they followed each other without any intervening events occurring. I claim that, in
addition to providing a scaffolding structure, these chronotopes are the means by which the
narrator constructs and creates his sense of identity.
Whereas Bakhtin’s notion of text as a social phenomenon focuses on
heteroglossia, the coexistence of conflicting world views and belief systems. De Certeau sees
narrative as action through which social actors construct culture by organizing the spatial
practices of everyday life. Narratives are "culturally creative acts" or "actions organizing more
or less extensive social/cultural areas." (1984:122) De Certeau uses the notion of "social-
cultural area" to argue for a fluid spatial concept of culture that operates in daily life, where
people live out their lives in relation to other social actors and everyday practices.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 167 Accordingly, everyday existence is primarily spatial and filled with daily practices, operations,
actions, and movements. De Certeau’s discussion of narrative as practice, focusing on
ordinary people who actively create and reconstruct culture in everyday life, supports a
ctynamic notion of culture, involving social agents who pro-actively, cleverly, and guilefully
resist passively succumbing to the powers of those that control them.
De Certeau’s notion of culture involves what ordinary people do in everyday life
in order to survive. He terms this "making do". His notion of "making do" involves his
idiosyncratic use of the words "space" and "place." People survive by creating meaningful
"spaces" within the oppressive "places" of the dominant culture. De Certeau sees "places" as
fixed and inert, in a sense they are dead as they are sites of control. He refers to them as
"being there." In contrast, "spaces" are full of life, they are where things happen, places of
resistance to the dominant culture, they are filled with activities. De Certeau sees everyday
life as spatial: the movement of people between places and spaces which are not statically
related to each other. He sees narratives as opportunities for people to construct their lives
as spatial trajectories.
This discussion of narrative as practice or action emphasizes social actors who
construct their culture by organizing spatial practices of everyday life. These disempowered
actors empower themselves or survive by creating spaces for themselves in relation to the
places (proper, stable, fixed) of the people who are in power and have authority and have
taken control of institutions. In these places, things are reduced and inert. In contrast,
spaces are fluid and practiced, unstable and changing.
I use De Certeau’s concepts of place and space interacting in narratives to
understand the spatial trajectory running throughout my transcription of Phineas’ NSL
lifestory. According to De Certeau, stories are culturally creative acts in which there is an
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 168 interesting intertextual interplay between "space" and "place". Narrators oppose "places" and
"spaces" as well as transform, transgress, invert, convert, and displace "places" with "spaces"
and vice versa.
I claim that it is this spatial elaboration of daily practices which constitutes the
construction of Phineas’ narrative identity in this life story performance. Specifically, it is
in the spatial aspects of performance that he achieves this narrative identity. For example,
after locating his home on the left, he uses the entire signing area (left and right) to
elaborate this space. He does this by using rich imagery, metaphors and details to transform
the left signing area into a space where children grow up secure with parents and livestock
which they work with in harmony with the seasons. He further elaborates on the details of
everyday farming activities by moving back and forth between the fields which he physically
locates on the left, with the location for processing the grain on the right. This mobility
within the farm area transforms it into a living place, a practiced place where crops grow and
people and animals live in harmonious relation to the seasons, which they use to their
advantage to harvest and process the grain.
The only time that Phineas uses spatial elaboration to discuss a place is after his
return to the refugee camp after working in Luanda. The interesting thing here is that he
has set up the city Luanda on the left as a space in contrast to the refugee camp which he
left to find work in the city in order to get material things. Luanda is a space at this point.
However, he then decides to return to the refugee camp. He needs to contrast the camp
with Luanda, but because it was formerly a place on the right which he had seen as
oppressive and now he chooses to go back there, he transforms it into a space by first setting
it up on the left side. Thus, he temporarily displaces the city with the refugee camp which
he reclaims as a space to which he chooses to return to. This is a renunciation of the so-
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called independence he has in the city for the refugee camp where his material needs are
met only on the most basic level and where hearing people dominate and run the school for
Deaf students.
However, he decides to return there as it is an ambiguous place which used to
have positive sentiment - it is where he received an education and learned things. He then
relocates the refugee camp on the right side due to the structural constraints of the spatial
language. He needs to contrast the camp spatially with the city which remains on the left
side. He needs to have two distinct locations for the city and the camp in order to show the
movements of social actors between the two locations. This is a conversion of a place (the
refugee camp where hearing people dominate the Deaf community) to a space where he can
continue learning and find a mate. He is exploiting the spatial constraints of NSL to show
us on a more profound poetic level that he is subverting the dominant paradigm by choosing
to go back to the camp on the right side which represents place with negative sentiment, in
order to subvert and transform it into a space for himself, where he attempts to form
relationships with women and gain more education.
There is a continual spatial shifting from the refugee camp to the city as he
details the Deaf people who leave the camp and go to Luanda after rejecting the dominance
of the hearing administration. It is interesting that he names the three Deaf people who left
Kwanza to establish a space for themselves in Luanda. This emphasizes his return which
goes against the trend of dissatisfied Deaf people leaving and emphasizes his individual
commitment to return, despite the discontent of his peers, who are creating space for a Deaf
community in Luanda. However, he locates himself consistently on the right, in the camp
to which he has decided to return, to create space in the interstices of the dominant hearing
refugees.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 170 Perhaps this passage back to what has become a repressive place for some of his
peers is an example of what De Certeau refers to as the interplay between the frontier
(refugee camp) and the bridge (he transgresses the limit by returning to the place he already
left once).
By analyzing the interplay between space and place in this life story, I gain access
to how Phineas, as a Deaf oppressed Namibian in exile, organizes his "cultural space" in
relation to others. He both constructs and expresses his identity in this narrative in terms
of significant life events occurring in spaces which he details in terms of his daily practices,
operations, actions, and movements which occur in different physical locations to which he
attaches positive and negative sentiment.
He constructs his narrative identity spatially in the signing area by exploiting the
spatial resources of NSL. He does this both conventionally, according to the grammar of
sign languages by mapping real world locations onto the left and right sides of the signing
area, and metaphorically, by assigning positive and negative sentiment to the left and right
sides of the signing area, respectively. The chart below provides a summary of his
conventional spatial mapping of physical locations onto the right and left sides of the signing
area.
Left Right
Hospital Home
Namibian Deaf School Home
Refugee Camp City
Angola USA
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 171 I use Low’s notions of place attachment to argue for Phineas’ construction of a
spatial identity to elaborate his narrative identity. Low views place attachment as a multi
dimensional concept involving an "interplay of affect and emotions, knowledge and beliefs,
and behaviors and actions in reference to a place" (Altman and Low 1992:4-5). Low sees
place attachment as a complex phenomenon in which people attach feelings, beliefs,
knowledge, and actions to places in which they have experienced significant life events.
Orientation to place is thus inseparable from the life experiences which shape identity
construction. Places can be infused with positive or negative sentiment depending on the
nature of the experiences which occurred there. Phineas attaches positive and negative
sentiment to the physical real world locations he inhabits and this is the basis of his identity
construction in this lifestory.
Using Moy’s work on metaphor in ASL, I argue that Phineas maps negative and
positive sentiment onto the right and left sides of the signing space respectively so that the
left is positive and the right is negative for him in this narrative.
In this sign language narrative Phineas exploits the use of the signing space
beyond the referential level of interpretation where the different places he inhabits are
grammatically mapped onto different sides of the signing area. He simultaneously constructs
another level of meaning in which the signing space becomes the means by which he
constructs his social-cultural identity, in terms of the interplay between his attachments to
physical places with positive and negative sentiment. As mentioned above, he sets up a
pattern (a spatial metaphor) in which the left side of the signing space is positive and the
right side is negative. He then manipulates this juxtaposition in interesting ways,
transforming and transposing places with negative and positive sentiment. (See Figure 15).
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KEY: Place - pi Space - sp +++++- Chronotope boundary * - exceptions
Left (generally Right (generally positive) negative)
1. pi- hospital; sick sp - home; health
2. pi - S.A. controlled sp - maternal home deaf school
3. sp - inedible waste sp - food production
4. * pi - no Deaf school here
5. sp - Angola
6. sp - younger sp - older students students
7. sp - grade four sp - grade two sp - all pass - graduate
8. * sp - Kwanza - sp - Luanda - work refugee camp
9. sp - women friends pi - rejected, alone
10. pi - leave sp - arrive USA * sp - Deaf boss sp - Deaf group
Figure 15: Metaphoric Spatial Mapping Of Negative And Positive Sentiment Onto Left And Right Sides Of Signing Area
Both De Certeau (1984) and Low (1992) discuss how people make meaning in
their everyday lives out of the physical places they inhabit, attach to, and transform and claim
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 173 that their narratives are full of movement between different physical places which have
meaning. I, however, in addition show that in a signed narrative, which is spatial-gestural
in essence, not only can this movement between physical places be expressed using the actual
signing area, but, more significantly, the narrator can use the spatial linguistic resources that
convey referential place to create another level of cultural meaning.
I take Low’s concept of place attachment a step further in my analysis of this
NSL life story narrative. I claim that by looking at the spatial structure of the narrative, I
can identify exactly how Phineas actively uses place symbolically as more than a repository
for his life experience. In fact, he actively incorporates his attachment to place, so as to
construct and convey his own shifting personal, group, and cultural identity. He uses space
idiosyncratically to transform oppressive places into personally satisfying spaces, all of which
contribute to his creation of a social-cultural arena in this performance of his life story.
In order to explore this construction of social-cultural narrative identity, I pay
attention to what Friedrich calls the "poetics" of his narrative, his specific acts of
"languaging." Friedrich uses the concept of "poetic indeterminacy" in his construction of a
framework in which he examines text from the standpoint that the true force of any
language, which he also refers to as the act of languaging, resides not in the grammar but
in the idiosyncratic use of the language by individuals who exploit the structural forms of the
language to construct unique meanings.
It is at the borderlands that places or frontiers become bridges, creating access
to new spaces. It is at the structural chronotopic boundaries that identities intersect and
conflict. It is here that the language is stretched to form new meanings - in what Friedrich
calls an "act of languaging."
Even though there is a tendency for events located on the right side of the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 174 signing area to have positive sentiment, they sometimes have negative sentiment and events
located on the left side of the signing area, which is generally the location of negative
sentiment, sometimes have positive sentiment (See anomalies in Figure 15). There are two
examples of negative sentiment attached to the right hand side (generally positive side) of
the signing area: *No Deaf school here and *Rejected by women. There are also examples
of positive sentiment attached to the left hand side (generally negative side) of the signing
area: *Kwanza - Refugee camp and *Deaf boss.
These irregularities form another pattern if viewed in De Certeauian terms as
examples where space becomes place and vice versa. Figure 15 reveals that many of the
physical locations on the left hand side are places as they belong to the dominant culture
whereas those on the right hand side are spaces where Phineas is making-do as an oppressed
Deaf person.
From Figure 15 it is clear that this narrative makes sense as a spatial trajectory
in which the narrator transforms spaces - personally meaningful, practiced locations with
positive sentiment - into places of control belonging to the dominant culture, and, therefore,
associated with negative sentiment and vice versa.
He thus goes beyond simply mapping physical places, or contrasting sentiments
onto the left and right sides of the signing area. Such simplistic reductionism does not give
us insight into the complexity and richness of this narrative which is about how a Deaf
Namibian makes-do in his own country, and then in exile, constructing his own personally
satisfying identify.
The place/space interpretation emphasizes that right-left, positive-negative
mappings are not fixed, but fluid values as they can be transformed, e.g.. Home is on the
right (positive side) and Hospital is on the left (negative side). However, school is on the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 175 left (negative side) although for Deaf people it is a space where sign language gives access
to education and a deaf family - which he perceives positively and wants to be part of. On
the other hand, his mother perceives this state run school negatively as being under the
control of the South African enemy and he locates it on the left. This results in the
contaminating of his perception of home on the right as positive and safe, instead it becomes
negative, and is moved into the central signing area. He displaces home which is now an
oppressive hearing place with his escape to a new space, Angola which he locates on his
right, as there is the opportunity to form a Deaf school there. It has positive sentiment, in
opposition to home, which has been transformed from a space into a place of hearing
oppression, denying him access to Deaf others.
The following pattern emerges from my examination of the intertextual
relatedness of temporal and spatial repetition in epitopes, contratopes, chronotopes, and
hemitopes. Chronotopes emerge as the most significant topes signalling critical life
transitions.
At the beginning of each chronotope in the initial epitope a space is set up on
the right, in opposition to a previously established place on the left. In each instance, there
is a prior hegemonic place in the preceding epitope which Phineas is resisting by creating a
safe space. I illustrate this with the following three examples;
1. Home is a refuge from the hearing western hospital which pathologizes Deafiiess.
2. Phineas chooses exile to Angola in order to resist the South African occupiers in Namibia and his hearing mother preventing him access to Deaf peers, sign language, and education.
3. He chooses to further his education in the USA after the hearing women at the refugee camp reject his romantic overtures.
In subsequent contratopes within that chronotope, a personally created space is
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elaborated by means of movement between new opposing contrasts within this space. In
contrast, places are never elaborated in this way that uses the entire signing area to create
new oppositions. This movement back and forth between places (right) and spaces (left)
shows Phineas dealing with the challenges and obstacles in everyday life. The spaces become
practiced, filled with images and movements of actors engaged in tasks, e.g., in the first
chronotope, his Namibian family’s village is filled with family members doing daily
agricultural seasonal activities, as they work according to the seasons to get the grain they
need. He locates the grain consistently on the right in relation to the waste on the left.
Additionally, in the second chronotope, the selection of pupils for the new classes at the
Deaf school and their progress through school creates a Deaf space in exile, a new family
of origin in which every member is named. Finally, in the third chronotope, he details his
arrival in a foreign land where he knows no-one except the Deaf boss, whom he opposes to
the group in a position of authority. The main activity is waiting - this is the unfinished
chronotope which is still to be peopled and practiced by actions.
At the end of the chronotopes, in the final epitope, a place on the left
contaminates a space on the right, ultimately transforming this space into its negative,
oppressive counterpart - a place. Inevitably hegemony prevails and a place on the left
intrudes and contaminates the space on the right he has created, transforming it into an
oppressive place he has to leave physically. He thus leaves, in turn, his maternal home in
Namibia, which the state school contaminates, the refugee camp in Angola, which the
hearing school administration and then the hearing women contaminate. A previous space
has now been transformed into a place. The pattern repeats as the next chronotope begins
with Phineas’ relocation to the next country/physical location.
This helps us to understand Phineas’ narrative as a spatial construction of his
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 177 identity - we can see which places he selects and then how he resists succumbing to the
control of these places by creating personally satisfying spaces. This signals to us the process
of his construction of cultural-social identity.
Juggling the Deaf and Hearing Worlds in Real Life and in the Text
Phineas’ life story is basically about the survival tactics he employs as a Deaf
Namibian to make-do in a hearing world in order to survive actively in a system that
overlooks Deaf people. His stoiy is one in which he necessarily has to interact with, and find
spaces in, the hearing world in Namibia before independence, and in Angola after
independence with its places and names and all that is proper and fixed.
His journey takes him on a long tour that we can literally see, as his life story
moves back and forth between the right and left signing areas, from his birth to the present.
His narrative is a trajectory between the inert places which belong to the establishment, the
places with negative sentiment and the places with positive sentiment which become the
living spaces which he inhabits.
The narrator is primarily engaged in building a coherent presentation of self in
relation to a specific audience. I have looked at the cultural and linguistic resources he uses
to construct this coherence in the telling of his life story within this specific cultural social
group of Deaf Namibian refugees. I have argued that in a life stoiy narrative to a group of
fellow Deaf Owambo males, Phineas formulates his narrative identity in terms of his spatial
organization of his social-cultural area.
He expresses this identity in terms of significant events in his life, which he
details in terms of his daily practices, operation, actions and movements that occur in
different physical places. Although this narrative identity is grounded in terms of actual
experiences occurring in different places, at different times of Phineas’ life, he is at liberty
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during this spontaneous narration to select the specific experiences he includes and
elaborates.
Thus, it is the combination of the audience, the point in his life and the situation
in which he narrates his life stoiy that influences the particular narrative identity that he
constructs out of particular events and experiences. (Linde 1993) He elaborates these
experiences using details - the practices of daily life - to create images that involve the peer
audience who are familiar with these events and share a common cultural-social area, in that
they too are Deaf Owambo Namibians who lived in exile in Angola together for ten years.
It is not only his own stoiy that he is telling, but the story of the emergence of their
collective politicized Deaf identity.
So far, I have discussed how Phineas creates a sense of self in his life story
through his use of eye-gaze spatial movements. I now focus on another dimension of his
construction of this sense of self through his use of time depth. His story starts with his
birth, the beginning of his existence in the physical world, before which he did not exist. His
narrative, like all life stories, is a journey through both time and place, chronologically
climbing from his birth and childhood to his adult life in exile and ending in the present time
of the narrative itself, at Galluadet University, in front of a video camera, in the fall of 1988.
It is his manipulation of the spatial and temporal linguistic resources at his disposal that I
now address.
He does this differently in each set of units which are hierarchically structured.
There are fifteen epitopes, which are the smallest units, and which are organized
chronologically and presented cohesively (see the linguistic analysis). However, as in all life
stoiy narratives, these are selected significant events chosen out of a multitude of events in
his life, and they are presented as if they occurred as a smooth chain of events without
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 179 intervening events. In Linde’s terms, Phineas is managing temporal discontinuity in his
presentation of these epitopes as continuous.
I have discussed how he uses these fifteen epitopic units to negotiate and
renegotiate his identity in relation to other people (Deaf and hearing) and to differentiate
places with sentiment from those without, to transform places with sentiment, into places
without sentiment, and to create meaningful spaces out of places with sentiment.
Phineas uses the three chronotopes to create bridges from one phase of his life
to another. He uses them to transpose a positive sentiment place onto a former negative
sentiment place. He uses them to communicate the ideology that guides his life choices -
when a place no longer facilitates learning and opportunities, when it becomes stifling, he
doesn’t jump to a quick conclusion or remedy. Instead, he first submits to the place, waits
for an unstipulated period of time, until he acts. He then leaves for a new place to create
new opportunities for himself with other Deaf people and, more importantly, opportunities
for furthering his education through sign language.
There are also two distinct hemitopes, which are signalled linguistically by the
reversal in spatial discourse contours, and an increase in the narrator’s agency. In terms of
time, these two hemitopes are distinct. The second part is signalled by linear time, as
opposed to the use of cyclical time in the first part. This emphasizes his shift away from a
hearing-family-oriented cyclical rural world to a Deaf-peer-centered linear world where
education is the driving force behind his movements from country to country in exile. Each
hemitope is balanced in terms of the number of epitopes and lines it contains. The second
hemitope is signalled by the reversal in spatial discourse contours, which occurs almost
exactly in the middle of the narrative. Each part shows his origin in a different world: his
birth as a hearing child who becomes deaf in the hearing world in the first part, and then his
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 180 rebirth as a Deaf person in a chosen family of Deaf people.
Thus, each type of structural unit in this narrative is the site of a different aspect
of the narrator’s construction or reconstruction of social-cultural identity. The cumulative
meaning of each type of unit is not only contained in the narrative itself, but resides in the
interpretation of the narrative by the Deaf audience, who intuitively grasp the meaning in
its entire richness without analyzing it. This meaning connects thé narrator to his peers,
whom he involves in his story although they know the content well. It exists in the minds
of the audience who co-construct this narrative by their presence as Deaf peers who know
this narrator intimately, as a result of their shared past with the narrator in exile over the
past twelve years.
This meaning is also influenced by the recording of his story on video, making
it an in exile official script, different from the stories they all sat and told under the tree in
the light of the full moon. The setting here is formal, a conference room in a university,
there are white people present who don’t understand the language. This is his opportunity
to make his story public by recording it. There is a willingness to cooperate and to tell it
right, thus the audience interrupt at times when they disagree with his rendition and contest
what he says.
However, to the anthropologist and the linguist who are also present it was
indecipherable. We do not know the language. All we can witness is the animation of the
telling, the obvious enjoyment of the narrator and the audience. We are left out, the "other,"
behind the camera. Only after spending six months, daily, with the group deciphering this
narrative did I become privy to the meaning of the narrative from their elaborations and
explanations. I still did not know how the narrative had a structure which conveyed this
meaning until I deconstructed it.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 181 Conclusion
I have argued in this chapter that Phineas creates his identity both spatially and
temporally. He creates a life story, which is hierarchically organized in terms of structural
units that function to create a sense of narrative temporal continuity. He uses the smallest
units of the narrative, epitopes, to create places with and without sentiment. These get
elaborated to form personally satisfying spaces. The chronotopes are bridges by means of
which Phineas transcends old borders and creates access to new frontiers. The two
hemitopes of the narrative are both spatially marked in terms of the reversal of spatial
discourse contours and temporally marked in terms of repetition of time particles at the end
of part one (WAIT TOMORROW + + + + +). Each hemitope constitutes a story of origin
(the first in his hearing rural family, and the second in the Deaf world in exile). However,
although he leaves his hearing family he has to contend with the world of the hearing in exile
and he learns that each world necessitates the other. Phineas’ identity, like that of other
Deaf people, involves the juxtaposition of these worlds and his creation of spaces in the
interstices of the hearing world.
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CONCLUSION
My aim in this dissertation has been to show how discourse analysis provides
access to the ways in which a Deaf Namibian used available linguistic and cultural resources
to construct an identity via narrative, what I have termed here, narrative identity. In order
to accomplish this goal, I have drawn on critical points of theory which I review below.
Theoretical Background Review
The first theoretical assumption involves notions of culture and agency in which
individuals actively reshape and recreate culture in relation to other ordinary people in
everyday life (Rosaldo 1993, de Certeau 1984, Bakhtin 1986). In chapter one, I discussed the
power of individual agency to creatively refashion, reshape and impact culture as opposed
to the traditional view of culture as the dominant force to which individuals passively
conform in which there are no individual actors.
The second theoretical assumption is related to the first, culture is equated to
practice - what ordinary people do everyday in order to survive. I discussed De Certeau’s
view of culture in chapter four. For him, culture constitutes the spatial enactment of daily
practices as people walk around the city, work and live their lives. He uses the words "space"
and "place" metaphorically. "Spaces" are these sites of daily activity - they are living,
changing, fluid and practiced sites of resistance to the dominant culture’s control of "places".
"Places" are in contrast stable, proper, fixed and inert, in a sense dead places of control. In
this view, culture is constructed by the movements of people between "places" and "spaces"
as they create their lives. De Certeau points out that we can see this in narratives where
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 183 people construct their lives as spatial trajectories in which hegemonic places and spaces of
personal resistance are linked together.
The third theoretical point consists of Bakhtin’s notions of "finalization" and
"unfinalizability". Both notions are also related to the notions of "individuals as agents" and
"culture as a practiced space" discussed above. These overlapping and intersecting notions
enable an understanding of the construction of identity and culture in this life story narrative,
in terms of broader issues regarding the interrelatedness of the individual as a separated self,
situated is space and time, and related to other selves within a cultural whole. I introduce
these briefly in Chapter One but unlike the first two theoretical notions I do not discuss
them in detail. I therefore elaborate on them in some detail here.
A major issue running through Bakhtin’s work is the inherent contradiction
between texts in which the author assumes the stance of "other" as "finalizing" and the
"unfinalizablility" of the inner self and the conglomerates of selves that constitute culture.
Without a finalizing other, "I" cannot achieve an image of myself, just as I cannot be aware of how my mind works when I am unselfconscious, and cannot know how I really appear to the world by looking in a mirror. An integral self, a tentative self-definition, requires an other. To know oneself, to know one’s image in the world, one needs another’s finalizing outsideness. (Morson and Emerson 1990:91)
Morson and Emerson (1990) point out that Bakhtin’s understanding of selves
begins with a sense of people as "free and morally responsible agents" who are unfinalizable
as they are always capable of unpredictable actions (1990:175). However when people create
"images of others and images of themselves ^ others...the creation of such finalized images
is the essence of aesthetic activity " (1990:180).
Bakhtin thus viewed culture as essentially "unfinalizable", an "open unity". He
conceptualize culture as being simultaneously singular and multiple and requiring for its self
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 184 realization and creative development an outside or other perspective.
In "Discourse in the Novel", Bakhtin views self-construction as a function of the
interaction of socialization constraints within which individuation occurs as a result of the
rejection of authoritative discourse. This sets the stage for the unfinalizability of the self
and the unfolding of all its potential. Without these constraints, individuals cannot be
creative (Bakhtin 1981).
In "Speech Genres", Bakhtin elaborates on the idea that language with its
constraints and finalizing nature enables the creation of the new through its "relatively stable
thematic, compositional and stylistic types of utterances" for everyday use (1986:64). In
artistic language, it is the systematic given and finalized patterns of grammar, which are the
resources for poetic language use, whereby individual agents manipulate the grammar to
create the unique unfinalized languaged self. However this self is co-constructed in artistic
language, as both the author and the audience retain the finaliâng outsider perspective
necessary for the emergence of the unfinalized self.
The final theoretical point I draw on is Friedrich’s notion of poetic language
which I discussed in Chapters One and Four. According to Friedrich individuals have the
capacity to manipulate the grammatical patterning at their disposal to "stretch" the language
into new shapes and idiosyncratic patterns. He calls this the "poetic indeterminacy" of
language. This is similar to Bakhtin’s view of creativity in language in which individuals take
what is given and finalized to create what is new and unfinalizable.
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Chapter by Chapter Summary
In chapter one, I discuss the theoretical assumptions concerning individual actors
use of narratives, particulaily life stories in the construction of complex social-cultural
identities. I emphasize the illusion of finalization in any given rendition of a life story, as life
stories change from telling to telling, depending on the context in which they are told (the
situation, the audience and the time of narration). The narrative identity that emerges in any
life story performance is thus fictive as it is only real for the performer and audience during
that particular performance. By analyzing the shape of the narrative, the shape of the
narrator’s identity for that telling emerges.
Although it is not fixed across other tellings, the narrative identity that emerges
in any telling conveys important information about the narrator’s identity in that setting, in
relation to that audience. The specific audience for Phineas’ life story is his group of Deaf
male Owambo peers, his two hearing (male and female) Owambo teachers, (all of whom
belong to SWAPO) and the white hearing female South African researcher and her white
hearing male American consultant. His life story is therefore co-constructed by his Deaf
peers to whom he presents for ratification his Deaf Namibian self striving for their common
cause as oppressed Namibians and as oppressed Deaf people. He thus presents a self in
which he rejects his hearing family and the hearing world, adopts the Deaf community in
exile as his chosen family, and embraces Namibian Sign Language which he I earns from his
peers. This is a story about Deaf Namibian identity in relation to Deaf peers.
Simultaneously, this is a story for the hearing white researchers in the room
whose job it was ultimately to understand this text, this language and train this group of Deaf
Namibians to record their signs in a dictionary. We represent the Linguistics Department at
Gallaudet University, where sign languages and the Deaf cultures they identify have the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 186 status of spoken languages and their corresponding hearing cultures. This lifestory was a
response to our direct request to record on videotape his natural sign language. He is thus
aware that he was preserving his life story and sign language on videotape for posterity, for
a potentially larger unknown audience whose respect and acceptance he wants as a Deaf
Namibian. Evidence that he is not only addressing his life story to his peers in the room is
his inclusion of shared information that his peers already know, his name and date of birth.
In chapter two, I describe the oppressive historical and political factors that
shape both social-cultural groups which Phineas identifies with: his biological family whom
he lived with to adulthood (hearing Owambo culture) and the cultural group he identifies
with as an adult (Owambo Deaf Namibian SWAPO refugees). I show that Phineas is doubly
oppressed, first as an Owambo living under the apartheid regime illegally occupying his
country, and, secondly, as a Deaf person who has no access to other Deaf people, sign
language or education in his rural Owambo home. I also show that his Owambo kin have a
history of resistance to oppression and provide the context for outsiders to understand
Phineas' life story in which he hints at, but does not state explicitly, the political and
historical forces that he had to contend with and which shaped his identity in both the
Owambo rural world of his youth and in the Deaf and Hearing Swapo world of his adult life
in exile.
In Chapter three I detail my method of text analysis. I employ a linguistic
structural analysis in which I demonstrate how both temporal and spatial linguistic repetition
work together to structure this life story in terms of hierarchically organized units, which I
term in ascending order: epitopes, contratopes, chronotopes and hemitopes. I show how
these units are inter-textually related and function to give Phineas’ narrative identity both
structure and meaning.
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Chapter four constitutes the anthropological interpretation of the spatial and
temporal text analysis in which I argue that Phineas creates his identity both spatially and
temporally. I show that the structural units discussed in chapter three function to create a
sense of temporal and spatial cohesion. Phineas uses the smallest units of the narrative,
epitopes, to create places with and without sentiment, which get elaborated to form
personally satisfying spaces. The chronotopes are bridges by means of which Phineas
transcends old borders and creates access to new frontiers. The hemitopes of the narrative
constitutes two distinct stories of origin in the hearing and Deaf worlds respectively. In the
end it is his movement between these two disparate worlds that constitute his identity
construction. Phineas’ identity involves the juxtaposition of the hearing and Deaf worlds and
the creation of Deaf spaces in the interstices of the hearing world.
Concluding Remarks
Phineas constructs a narrative identity out of the interaction between his finalized
textual self and the simultaneous existence of his contradictory unfinalizable internal self.
Phineas’ finalized self is evident in the compositional structure of the narrative,
the clearly delineated epitopes, contratopes, chronotopes and hemitopes which are detailed
in chapter three as being signalled by both temporal and spatial repetition. The
unfinalizability of the internal self is constituted in the style of narration, the idiosyncratic
metaphoric spatial component of this narrative in which "places" can be transformed into
"spaces" and vice versa (chapter four).
The structural analysis detailed in chapter three demonstrates an inseparability
of form and meaning. Meaning is created through the intertextual relatedness of the three
components of the text which emerge from the structural analysis, namely, lexical repetition
of temporal particles; actors and events which indicate the thematic structure as well as the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 188 compositional structure; and the use of spatial repetition which indicates a unique stylistic
structure (Bakhtin 1986).
This structural analysis also delineates the lifestory’s finalized compositional
structure as well as its unfinalized poetic component. Phineas uses patterning of temporal
and spatial repetition to chunk the text into hierarchical units, namely, epitopes, contratopes,
chronotopes and hemitopes. However this analysis simultaneously demonstrates the
unfinalizablility of the inner self, the power of the individual to resist the linguistic
constraints of NSL and the cultural constraints that both the hearing and Deaf worlds impose
on Deaf Namibians. This text thus defies the finalization of Phineas’ narrative identity as
conforming to the dictates of the hearing or Deaf worlds. The individual agencty is always
paramount. There are situations in which Phineas goes against the Deaf tide and returns to
the refugee camp when other dissatisfied Deaf peers are leaving for city. The text is oriented
towards an unpredictable future, to dealing with obstacles as they emerge and constructing
an individualized cultural identity which he expresses through spatial metaphor. Phineas
ends his life story in the present, a period of waiting and uncertainty. Interestingly there is
no FINISH marker at the end of the text to finalize it.
At the same time, Phineas makes this text unfinalizable by stretching the spatial
resources of the grammar of NSL to produce his own idiosyncratic patterning of headtums
and eyegaze movements which creates and expresses another level of individual and cultural
meaning. There is a surplus of linguistic signals at the significant life transition points to
signal salient cultural information, e.g., the transition from the Hearing to the Deaf world is
marked by a chronotopic boundary (WAIT TOM ORROW +++++), a contratopic
boundary (Deaf school vs Home), a hemitopic boundary (reversal of direction of movement
of spatial discourse contours) and the transformation of home from a safe de Certeauian
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 189 "space" into an oppressive "place". In addition, the repetition of lexical events and actors in
the second hemitope signals Phineas’ agency as opposed to the repetition of lexical events
and actors in the first hemitope, which signals his lack of individuation as he cooperates as
a member of his hearing family.
My conclusions confirm the presence in Phineas’ narrative of the inherent
contradiction between the self and the text which Bakhtin discusses. Texts are complete and
bounded entities which are necessarily finalized in their construction for another, in contrast
to the unfinalizability and unpredictability of the inner self. My structural analysis
demonstrates how this narrator uses a finalized text to create and express an unfinalized self.
This dissertation operationalizes Bakhtin’s views on the intertextual relations
between finalization of the text and unfinalizability of the self. I have demonstrated that the
details of the structural analysis are critical to a post-modern deconstruction of the text in
terms of narrative identity. However the structural analysis masks the dynamic, unfinalizable
elements of the text. I emphasize the fluidity and creative aspects of these elements in my
anthropological analysis.
The final question I ask about Phineas’ lifestoiy is whether it is similar or
different to the lifestory narratives of other Deaf Namibians. When comparing Phineas’ life
story with the other five life stories I collected from his peers, I find that his rendition of his
life story shares the same thematic structure with the others. Although the details of each
story differ, all six life stories from the Deaf Namibians contain the same recurring themes
concerning Deafness as a cultural identification and the dual struggle against white and
hearing oppression.
The narrators all position themselves in terms of their identification as Deaf
Namibians who during their childhood years had to contend with hearing Owambo families
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 190 and communities who did not comprehend or appreciate the cultural aspects of their
Deafiiess and regarded them as "dumb" objects of pity. They were all excluded from the
hearing world where no one signed. In all the narratives the hearing families did not know
sign language. They all emphasize that until they went to the deaf school, they were locked
into a world without sign. They all discuss childhood incidents involving hearing parents and
siblings in Namibia which vary from narrative to narrative. However each incident refers to
the ultimate authority of their hearing parents which they initially accepted and later
rejected.
Deaf schools are sites for connecting with Deaf peers and culture building. The
narratives all describe the excitement, the feeling of "coming home at last" when they
discovered a peer group who communicated through sign language at the deaf school in
Namibia. It is here that they experience for the first time the joy and power of true
communication. Through the multitude of daily activities, including story telling, sports,
drama, church and learning from each other the deaf students create a deaf culture for
themselves. However the state school for the deaf in Namibia also exemplifies oppression by
White South African occupying forces in Namibia. The narratives explicitly or implicitly
refer to the apartheid regime’s impact on their lives in Namibia, especially the lack of
educational opportunity under Bantu Education. The Deaf Namibians make do in the de
Certeauian sense by going into exile in search of meaningful education opportunities and to
fight for the freedom of their countiy. Going into exile and establishing a Deaf school in
Angola is a central theme in all the life stories. This event is a major turning point for this
group, an experience in which they take control over their own lives to fight for
independence as SWAPO members resisting apartheid and fighting for equality and
autonomy as Deaf people within their own community. As adults who joined SWAPO, they
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 191 receive recognition of their Deafiiess from the Women’s Council who facilitate their
establishment of the Deaf school, their "space". However, there are ongoing conflicts between
the Deaf students who are unhappy with the controlling hearing administration within this
school.
All the narratives end with their arrival in the USA, which they perceive as a
solution to the educational problems they had confronted in Angola where they had
exhausted the available resources.
Ethnographic findings confirm these themes which emerge in interviews with the
group (Maroney 1989) as well as during daily discussions in English that I conducted with
the group during the summer of 1989 on an interactive computer network (Morgan 1991).
Maroney conducted ethnographic interviews with the Namibian group in the spring of 1989.
My point here is that Phineas’ life story is not thematically unusual. His
construction of his identity as a Deaf Namibian refugee conforms to that of the others who
experienced oppression at the hands of white South Africa which limited their educational
opportunities and threatened their lives. To a lesser extent, they experienced oppression at
the hands of their own hearing Owambo community who did not know sign language or
understand Deaf culture.
However the way Phineas expresses these themes is unique in that his is the only
life story performance that employs spatial metaphor and spatial figures. After repeatedly
viewing the other life stories on videotape, I find no evidence that his peers are using
headtums and eyegaze to construct a layer of spatial meaning in the same way Phineas does.
Their use of temporal markers is similar to Phineas’ in that the FINISH marker is
consistently used as a chunking device. It is clear then that Phineas’ language use is thus
stylistically idiosyncratic and that together with the compositional and thematic structure, it
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 192 communicates his social-cultural identity. The essence of Phineas’ identity is contained in the
dialogic relationship between his finalized textual self and the contradictory unfinalizable
internal self.
This dissertation is only a starting point. I have used a bottom-up analytic
procedure to identify the linguistic or textual strategies whereby this narrator constructs his
cultural identity. In order to further determine the interrelated thematic, structural and
stylistic features of Deaf Namibian life stories it will be necessary to examine more lifestory
performances across different narrators. It will be of interest to specifically examine the role
of artistic language in the construction of narrative identity by analyzing the full range of the
variety of ways in which NSL can be stretched idiosyncratically to express social-cultural
identity.
General Anthropological Implications
I conclude this chapter and this dissertation by discussing the implications of this
project for anthropological studies of language and text making. What emerges most strongly
from this dissertation is the interplay between structure and creativity in one individual’s
narrative. I claim that these are the building blocks of social-cultural identity. This is evident
in the way the narrator manipulates the linguistic structural resources of Namibian Sign
Language to create a cultural-identity that is simultaneously shared and unique.
The method of discourse analysis that I employ is critical to the findings of the
analysis. The reduction of the narrative to its structural temporal and spatial composition
proves to be essential to understanding exactly how the narrator constructs a textual social-
cultural identity. What emerges from this structural analysis, is more than the elegant
structuring of the text itself. The structural analysis reveals that the text is in essence fluid
and dialogically constructed out of inseparable temporal and spatial linguistic resources. I
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 193 demonstrate how the creative and fluid aspects of the construction of the text rely on the
signer’s manipulation of the spatial and temporal conventional linguistic structures at his
disposal in the language. He thus exploits, and in Friedrich’s terminology "stretches" the
language to create and shape new personal meanings which expressed both what he shares
culturally with his Deaf peers and his own idiosyncratic de Certeauian "survival tactics". Thus
this dissertation provides a strong case for taking the time to do as detailed a structural
analysis as is possible, in order to understand how individuals create and shape their cultural
identities out of what is given and available in their language and culture.
The structural analysis of this sort of narrative is critical to operationalize
Bakhtin and De Certeau’s post-structural views of culture and language as practice, as open-
ended, as what regular people do in their daily practice of text and culture making. Thus, this
dissertation makes the case that it is through the deconstruction of specific texts such as
Phineas’ life story that the details concerning the construction of cultural identity can be
identified. Thus the construction of cultural identity emerges from the interaction of what
Leap (1993) terms "grammar" (syntax, semantics and pragmatics) and "discourse" (use of
grammatical knowledge).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX 1
SIGN BY SIGN TRANSCRIPTION OF NONMANUAL SIGNALS
The lexical sign is translated into English on the left. The nonmanual signals occuring with each sign are transcribed on the right. The narrative is divided into lines according to a native NSL users’ intuitions.
Division of narrative into natural chunks H = a longer hold of final phonological segment of sign hn = headnod htilt = headtilt to left or right ht=headtum to L or R L = use of signing space on L R = use of signing space on R C = use of neutral central signing space L(gz) = eyegaze to L R(gz) = eyegaze to R P = pause, hands in neutral position
line 1 NAME ...... htR hn IS ...... hn F-I-N-E-A-(S-hld) ...... htR,eyegz fiw hnd,hn+++bighn K-I-M-I-(S-hld) ...... htR,eyegz fiw hnd,hn++(bighn)
line 2 IN ...... htR hd up, eyegzstrahd NAMIBIA...... htR bighn 4-bdytiltfwd M E hdup eyegzflwhnddown BORN...... hdup bdy Ins bk-hn IN ...... hd tilt fwd 196(0-hld) ...... hd tilt fwd,eyegz flwhnd(L-R),hn+bighn,htR
line 3 ME ...... Ceyegzflwhnd down DEAF ...... hn htiltL HEARING-GONE(Hld) ...... C htR+eyegzR+hn+h
194
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 195 line 4: ME ...... C eyegz flw hnd dwn CL:(L)CHILD-GROW-UP(R-H) ...... htL-C(eyegzflwL-Hdwn-up) HEARING+++ +++(L-H)...... C HEARING GONE(Hld) ...... C,bighn HOSPITAL...... C eyegzdwnflw hndLhtLeyegzstrahd
line 5: CL:BACKSIDEINJECT+-!-(LH)...... eyegzflwhndLhn+htRhn SICK++ + ...... Chn+4-4- (int) INJECT(LH)...... ChneyegzflwhndL FINISH ...... Chn
line 6: FATHER ...... ChneyegzflwhndR MOTHER...... ChneyegzflwhndL BROTHER-SISTER...... htRhneyegzR M E ...... Chniyrhzflwhnd hesitation ...... C ME ...... Chneyegzflwhnd GO ...... Ceyegzflwhndup LOOK-FOR...... C SHOP ...... C LOOK-FOR...... htL O-S-H-I-K-U-K-(Uhld) ...... htReyegzflwhnd+bighn
line 7: ME ...... Chn LOOK-FOR ...... ChtL HOSPITAL...... htLeyegzflwhnd CLzTAKE ( L ) ...... ChneyegzflwhndL- CLzCARRY (L-R) ...... htR CL:PUT(R) ...... htR (R)HOME-HUT...... htRhn (R)OWAMBO ...... htR WITH ...... htRhn
line 8: HOSPITAL...... Chddwn HEALTHY...... htReyegzR+up FINISH (R-H) ...... htRhn-Hdwn-Hld(P)
line 9: WAIT ...... htR,eyegzRstrahd,eyeblink FUTURE++ ...... htiltR-eyegzupup-eyegzflwhnd COW ...... htRC,eyegzstrahd,eyegzflwhnd WITH ...... htR-Chn,eyegzflwhnddwn GOAT...... htR-Chn,eyegzflwhnddwn
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 196 WITH ...... Chn,eyegzflwhnddwn FARM ...... hddn+bcfyfwd(bighn) MOTHER (L )...... ChntoR FATHER ( R ) ...... ChntoL WITH ...... Csraallhnhddwn CHILD ...... Chddwn BORN ...... Chddn CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UPfR)(L)(R)(L)...... CeyegzflwhndupR-L-R-dwn FINISH ...... Chn
line 10: IS ...... Ceyegzstrahd RAIN ...... ChdtiltReyegzupflwhnd-dwn FARM-LAND...... Chddwn(flw-hnd) OX (both-hnds) ...... Chddwn-up-hn CL:YOKE...... Chddwn CL:GUIDE-PLOUGH-FWD...... Chdstr-tiltR-L-R-L MOTHER...... Chneyegzdwn CL:PLANT-SEED+...... gz flw hnd dwn FINISH+ (R )...... hn+
line 12: RAIN ...... htRhdflwhndup-dwn ARM-LAND...... Chddwn-hn C L :H O E + + ...... Chddwneyegzflwhnd CL:PLANTS-GROW...... Cgz flw hnd up CLzPICK MILLET + + + Cgz flw hnd FINISH(R-hnd only) ...... hn, gzR-C
line 13: JULY ...... Cgz flw hnd up H O T+(L)+(R )+(L)...... , ...... htR-htL-htR SUN ...... htReyegzflwhndR STRONG-DRY...... htReyegzupR FINISH ...... htR,hn,eyeblink
line 14: PICK-MILLET...... C,htiltR,eyegzflwhnd M IL L E T + + htiltR-C,gz flw hnd BROTHER-SISTER *gz str ahd CL:CARRY-BASKET-ON-HEAD(C)...... gz flw hnd C-L CL:CARRY-BASKET-ON-HEAD(L)...... htL, gzL CL:POUR-OUT(extreme L ) ...... gzL,dwn FINISH(R-hnd only) (extreme L ) ...... hnL gzdwn
line 15: GO (L -R )...... ,...... htR, eyegz R SUGAR-CANE+ ...... htR-htL-htR(gz ahd)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 197 CL;PICK-SUGAR-CANE...... R (gz flw hnd) CL:CUT-TOPS-OF-SUGAR-CANE-OFF-PLANT+...... R gz up CL:HLL-BASKET+...... R*gzdwn CL:CARRY-BASKET-OF-SUGAR-CANE(R-L) ...... htL CL:POUR-OUT (L ) ...... htL FIN ISH ...... hnhtiltL FINALLY//C...... htRdwnhn+
line 16: UNTIL ...... hnC gz flw hnd COW ...... Chn,htiltR GOAT...... Chn,htiltR W IT H htLgz flw hnd CL:HERD-ANIMALS-INTO-GARDEN(L-R)...... *htR ANIMAL-EAT...... htR GO-AWAY//...... htR*C
line 17: M OTHER C hn eyegz dwn M E C eyegz dwn BROTHER-SISTER...... gz flw hnd L CL:POUND-MILLET-WITH-STICK-C(up-dn) ...... Chd dwn-up R+(up-dwn) ...... htR dwn-up C+(up-dwn) ...... htL dwn-up FINISH// Chn, P
line 18: UNTIL ...... hnC gz flw hnd WIND-BLOW (L -R -L)...... gz str-ht-R-L-C W-I-N-D ...... gzRflw hnd-hn WIND-BLOW (L -R -L)...... htR-C(dwn)-R(dwn)
line 19: CL:LIFT-BASKET(R)...... htL(dwn) CL;SHAKE-BASKET-FROM-SIDE-TO-SIDE...... htL(dwn) R-L-R-L-R-L-R...... htL(dwn) CL-R:cont-HOLD-BASKET ...... htL(dwn) CL-L:WASTE-BLOWS-AWAY-ON-WIND pf-pa-pf(R)-pa-pfR-(off screen?pa-pfR) htextrL(gzflwhnd-Lacr)pf-pa-pf(off screen++) ...... gzCdwn-gzflwhnd-Lacr pf-pa(off s c r) gzCdwn-gz flw hnd-Ldwn FINISH ...... C-hnP
line 20: UNTIL ...... C-htR-Cgz dwn + hn FINISH(R-hnd only) ...... Cgz dn + hn
line 21: ALL-GO (L-R)...... htR-gz dwn-str ahd
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 198 FATHER ...... C-gz dwn MOTHER...... C-gz dwn L WITH ...... C(hdwn) CHILD ...... C(hddwn) WITH ...... htR(hdup)hn CL-.COME-TO-ONE-PLACE...... C hd dwn+ln frvd
line 22: CL(R):SWEEP-KERNELS-TO-ONE-SIDE + + ...... ht R, dwn(gz fl hnd) CL:COB-MOVE(R) ht C + back CL:MILLET-COB...... Cgzflwhnds MANY ...... hn CL(R):SWEEP-MILLET-TO-SIDE++...... eye gz flws hnds R CL:COB-TRANSFER-TO-OTHER(L)-HAND-DROP(R)...... CL(R):SWEEP-MILLET-TO-SIDE++...... CL:COB-TRANSFER-TO-OTHER(L)-HAND-DROP(R)...... " " " " FINISH(R)...... C+bk(eye gz R)hn
line 23: CL:CARRY-BASKET(R-L) ...... htL, gz dwnL CL:PICK-UP-BASKET-ON-HEAD(L-C)...... C, hd dwn, gz dwn CL:CARRY-BASKET(C-R)...... htC-R STORAGE-HUT++(R) ht(R)(eye gz ahd-R) CL:POUR-MILLET(R)...... ht(extreme)R FINISH(R)//...... hnht(R)-C(P)
line 24: M E C hn eyegzdwn MAKE ...... hn(sim) THINK ...... hn (htR) SAY ...... C (eyegz dwn) T H A T hn (eyegz R) MOTHER...... eyegzR KELP ...... hn (dwnR) TEACH/SCHOOL ...... hn C DEAF ...... C OSHAKATI(L)...... eyegz up L, htL NEAR(L) ...... eyegz dwn L FAR-FROM-OUR-PLACE(L) eyegz L, htextr L YES(CNTR)...... Chn MOTHER...... C (str) NEVER++(hand:r-l-r-l-r-l, ...... hd:l-r-l-r-l-r
line 25: ME ...... C STAY ...... C-eyegz L to interruption GIVE-UP (PAUSE due to interruption, person on left touches signer and signs something, signer
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 199 pauses and attends) MOTHER...... C NEVER(hand: r-i-r-l-ctr head: 1-r-l-r-ctr
line 26: ME ...... Chn STAY ...... (1-tilt) GIVE-IN...... (r-tilt) BORED ...... (r-tiltcont) DO-NOTEDNG...... (1-tilt) WAIT ...... (ctr-hn) TOMORROW++ +++ ...... hdbkjgzahd smile repetition hand moves steeply up hn with each repeat and out from chest to eye gz to R above head FIN ISH Chn, no smile
line 27: ME ...... C eyegz R THINK (hold continues) ...... P,htR+hn,eyegz R, eyeblink ME ...... C eyegz dwn T H IN K htR+hn, eyegz L+dwn SCHOOL hn eyegz L+dwn neg______WHERE(R-C-R-C) Ceyegz L-R-L-R
line 28 neg ...... htR egR ME
neg__ THINK ...... htL egL-R-L-R-L
neg___ S IG N + + ...... htR-L-R-L
neg____ NOT-GOOD...... htR-L
ZERO/HAND//...... Chn
line 29 ME ...... C eyegz dwn THINK ...... htL-R dwn M E ...... C up WANT ...... hn sim CROSS-BORDER ...... C hn sim FENCE...... C hn A-N-G-O-L-A(H)//...... eyegz R flw hnd, htR, hnH(P)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 200
line 30: TEACH...... Chn ENGLISH+ + + ...... htR HELP ...... Chn 1980 ...... eyegz flws hnds hn hn hn hn T E A C H + ...... Chnhn ENGLISH+ ...... htR, LEARN-A-LOT ...... C eyegz dwn, hn FINISH ...... Chn
line 31: INDEPENDENT ...... htR eyegz R+smile C O M E + ...... hn (body leans fwd -bk) (interuption from L, turns to L)P (turns to L) COME ...... C hn, eyegz dwnR FINISH// htR, eyegz R, P
line 32: WITH ...... Chn ME ...... C THINK ...... htiltR+sl hn- eyegz ahd DEAF ...... Chn LOOK-LIKE-SAME...... Chn WHERE R-L, sm R -L ...... hn(htR)
line 33 HELP ...... Chn E V E R ...... htR+hn BOSS ...... C CHOOSE htRhn(eygz flw Rhnd) PUT (R) htR (more) +hn WITH ( R ) ...... htR+hn (hd dwn) D E A F C (hn) TEACH...... Chn, htR ALPHABET (N-A-M-N-A)...... htR, eyegz flw hnd CeyegzL CHOOSE-FIRST(pinky) ...... htR eyegz dwnR M E ...... htRextr-hn CHOOSE-SECOND...... htR+fwd bdy YOU (indexR) ...... htR+morefwd CHOOSE-THIRD...... htR(uprt)eyegzflwhnd NANGO ...... htRhn CHOOSE-FOURTH...... htReyegzflwhnd ZACK bkhtR +hn CHOOSE-FIFTH...... htReyegzflwhnd DANIEL C +hnhtL eyegzdwn CHOOSE-SIXTH htL hn eyegzL HENOCK...... htiltR+hn
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 201 CHOOSE-7TH ...... Ceyegzflwhnd MARIUS...... C+hn L-HBEFORE+...... mouth open+hn hn L-H,CL:YOUNG...... tng out,htL+hn+bdy fwd (eyegz flwLhnd) CHOOSE-EIGHTH+...... htL+hn eyegzL HENOCK...... htL+yeygzLhn+ BEFORE ...... htL, hn (mth open) CL:(L)OLDER-(R)YOUNGER...... htL+hn (tng out) CHOOSE-NINTH...... htL eyegzflwhnd HMONY C, hdbk(hn)(mth open) CL:(L) YOUNGER ...... htL+hn, tng out CHOOSE-TENTH ...... Chn (L)DAMON...... hn
line 34 CHOOSE-ELEVENTH...... Chn eyegzflwhnd ELIA ...... Chn CHOOSE-TWELTH...... Chn eyegzflwhnd THERESA ...... Chn eyegzflwhnd CHOOSE-THIRTEENTH+...... htR,eyegzRhn,C hn RAUNA ...... Chn RAUNA ...... htL+hn HELP ( L ) htL, eyegzL,hn RAUNA ...... htL, hn PUT ...... C TABITHA...... C-htR HELP ...... htR, eyegz R PUT ( R ) ...... htR, hn FINISH(R)//...... htR, hn
line 35: TEACH...... Chn WITH ...... Chn+bdy fwdR GRADE htR+bdyfwd+hn eyegzflwhnd sm TWO ...... htR+hn eyegzflwhnd WITH ...... Chn TEACH...... Chn SACKEUS ...... htR bdyR, smile, hddwn PASS (R)(Lup/Rdwn Rup/Ldwn) ...... htR hn+lips pursed LABAN ...... htL+bdy L PASS (L)(L up/Rdwn Rup/Ldwn) ...... htL hn HENOCK ...... C PASS (R) ...... htR+bdy R+hn PRO.l ...... C tongue out, hd dwn FAIL (C )...... C hd, shldrs dwn EVER (C )...... Chn CHOOSE 13th (mid fhgr) htL hnL DAMONA ...... C
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 202
CHOOSE 14th (ring fiigr)...... C hd dwn PETER ...... C CHOOSE 15th (index fhgr) ...... C hd dwn WITH ...... htR CLiCLASS-GROUP-TOGETHER (R ) ...... htR, bdy to R GRADE ( R ) ...... " TWO(R) ...... "
line 36 GRADE ...... C FOUR C ...... h tR h n CL:CLASS-GROUP-TOGETHER (L ) ...... htL bdy L TEACH+ ( L ) ...... htLhn
line 37 ME ...... htR GRADE-TWO (R) ...... htR, bdy R TEACH+ ( R ) ...... htR PASS (R) htR +lips pursed WITH (R )...... htR +bdy R ME ( R ) ...... bdy R htC STRUGGLE-WORK-HARD(C)...... C bdy +hd fwd WITH ...... Chn TEACH ...... C h tL GRADE ...... ChtL FOUR ...... Chn PASS ...... htL + bdy L GRADE ...... htL _neg n v E ...... c CLzSKIP-CLASS ( L ) ...... htL bdy L GRADE ...... htL SIX ...... C h t IL (slight) TEACH ...... Chn PUT WITH ...... Chn CL:ALL-PASS ...... C (slight htR) smile hd up FINAL ...... C hd dwn, bow + smile P FINISH ...... (ignores interrpt from L) ...... C bow (no smile)
line 38 WITH ...... Chn htiltR, hn TEACH...... THINK Chn hd dwn ME ...... C htR eyegzR ENGLISH ...... C LEARN-A-LOT ...... C htiltL FREE ...... leans bk to L htiltL
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 203 line 39 ME ...... C TEDNK ...... htiltR WANT ...... hn L-U-N-A-D-N-D-N-D-A...... C htL eyegz flw hnd hn M E ...... C Ins bk htR eyegz R GO ...... htR eyegz R, mvs fwd PUT ...... hn Ins fwd, htR eyegzR WORK++ (R-C) hdtumsR-L(precedes hnds) (R)M(up)M(dwn)M(up)M(dwn)M(up)M(dwn) GET-'IHINGS++(C-R)...... hdtumsR (R)M(out)M(in)M(out)M(in) ...... WITH ( R )...... htRhn VASELINE MM (C )...... Chddwn SOAP MM ...... Chddwn SHOP ...... C hn WITH ...... htR +up UNTIL ...... C hd dwn ...... eyegz up (P) hn 1987 ...... eyegz flw hnd L-R hn YEAR MMM C eyegzR+up FINISH (R)// ...... Chn
line 40 NOW ...... Chn KWANZA-SUL(Rh)(H) ...... tilt R hddwn ME (Lh) ...... tilt R eyegz Lup GO-BACK (Lhbk)...... hd dwn, incr tilt to R WITH ...... Chn PACK+ ...... C hn+ WITH ...... Chn TRUCK M(in)-M(out)-M(in) ...... ChtiltL-R-L WITH ...... Chddwn CLzLOAD-THINGS-ONTO-TRUCK...... eyegz up to L-dwn L CL:DRIVE-AWAY (C -L )...... htL+bdy si L eyegz L M(r)-M(l)-M(r)-M(l)-M(r) CL:TRUCK-GO (L) htL+bdy turn extr L M(dwn)-M(up)-M(dwn)-(up)(alt) ...... htL+bdy turn L DROP-OFF (L) ...... htL hd fwd+bdy turn L KWANZA-SUL ...... hn htL+bdy tm L DROP-OFF (L )+ ...... htL+bdyL hd mvs bk+ UNTIL ...... htL lean bk bdy to L, eyegz flw hnd TEACH + htL bdy to L hn LEARN-A-LOT ...... htL eyegz L hn FINISH// ...... htL
line 41 PETER ...... htR hdbk
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 204 STAY THERE (R) ...... htR (hd up+bk) HOME ...... htR (hd up+bk) LUANDA (R )...... htR (hd up+bk) STAY THERE +(ext) (R) ...... htR (hd up+bk) ME (Lhnd) ...... htL DEAF ...... htL hd+bdy mvs bk CL:STAY-THERE (L) htL htiltR+bk eyegz ahd STAY-THERE(R) ...... htR DANIEL...... htR CL:STAY-THERE ( R ) ...... htR (hd bk+up) hdftvd+bk FINAL// ...... htR (hd+bdy bk to fWd Chddwn)
line 42 KALILE...... htR bdy tm R, hd dwn TEACH+ ...... ChtLhn+ THINK ...... C htL TEACH ...... C htL hn TTRED-PROBLEM ...... htLhn KALILE...... htL THINK ...... htL hd tiltR MOVE-TO-ANOTHER-PLACE(L-R)...... htR eyegzR WORK++(R) ...... htR hnLUANDA htR hn JO B + + (R )...... htR hn WORK++(R) ...... htR hd dn-up CL:(LUANDA)THERE ( R ) ...... htR hn+ KAUPA ...... htRhn DEAF ...... htR CL:(LUANDA)THERE (R ) ...... htR hn bdy bk
line 44 PRO.l ...... htL KWANZA-SUL ...... htlextrL+bdy tmL CLzTHERE (L )...... htL +bdy bk htiltR+bk FINISH (hnck u p )// ...... htL to C-R, hd dwn-up Psmile
line 45 KWANZA-SUL ...... Chddwn GIRL+ ...... C hd dwn VISIT++ (C-L) ...... htC-L SEE (L-R ) C eyegzR-L VTSIT+ (L )...... htL KWANZA-SUL ...... C hddwn G IR L + ...... C VISIT (L )...... htL SEE (L) ...... htL FRIEND ...... C hn WANT ...... C-htL
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 205
WORK ...... htL GOOD ...... Chn STORY ...... htL GOOD ...... htL FRIEND (R )...... htR bdyR BAD ...... (R)htR, bcfytoR REJECT-ME++ (R) ...... htR, bdyto R FINISH C Ins bk hn NOTHING-TO-DO WORK + (C-L) ...... C FINISH...... C-htL
line 46 UNTIL ...... C hddwn ME ...... C lips spread grimace SICK++ C grimace FEVER-MALARIA...... C INJECHON-BACKSIDE +(L) ...... htL-C-hddwn HEALTHY ...... Chdup FINISH//...... C-P bdy mvs fwd bowtoR Ins bk
line 47 WAIT+ + + ...... C WITH ...... htRhn THINK ...... C htiltR hn H P ME ...... C htilt slight R WANT ...... Chn htiltR SCHOOL...... C htilt slight R eyegz flw hnd LOOK-LIKE-SAME C eyegz flw hnd WHERE ...... C hddwn (htiltR-L-Cup)
line 48 ME ...... C GO ...... C hd dwn eyegz flw hnd FLY ...... (R- L ) htL bdy turn L AMERICA...... C eyegz flw hnd WITH ...... htR DEAF ...... C ALL ...... htiltR WITH htR eyegz R FLY ...... (R)eyegz R(up-str ahd) LAND ( C ) ...... hd dwn eyegz flw hnd STA RT C hd dwn hn H ERE//...... C hd dwn hn
line 49 HOUSE ...... htL neg hdshk WHAT ...... htR-L neg hdshk
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 206 ALL ...... htRneghdshk
_neg KNOW ...... htLneghdshk
ME ...... htRneghdshk
_neg KNOW ...... : ...... htL
line 50 NEVER-SEEN-BEFORE...... htR NOTfflNG-TO-DO...... Chddwn hd bow htL ...... C htR+dwn C hd dwn +bow(dwn-up)
line 51 WAIT ...... C eyegz flw hnds dwn UNTIL ...... C hn+eyegz flw hnds htR-P W'AIT ...... C hn eyegz dwn BOSS ...... htL DEAF ...... C-L TITUS...... htR-L WAIT ...... C hn eyegzdwn UNTIL ...... C hn+ eyegzdwn W A IT htR str ahd-up TOMORROW ...... htRhn SUNDAY ...... htR hn eyegz dwn MONDAY ...... htR hn eyegzup TEACH ...... htiltR eyegzflwhnddwn NOTHING-TO-DO...... htiltRincr-hn-eyegzdwn WAIT ...... C eyegz ahd NOTHING-TO-DO...... htiltLincr-hn-eyegzdwn hnds clasped ...... htR eyegz R,hn,htRbow,CeyegzL ...... Chn+ ...... CeyegazeL htL hn+ ...... C hn str adh
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX 2
LINE BY LINE TRANSCRIPTION SHOWING EPITOPES
Epitope One: line 1: NAME IS F-I-N-E-A-S K-I-M-I-S line 2: IN NAMIBIA ME BORN IN 1-9-6-0 line 3: ME DEAF HEARING-GONE
line 4: ME CL(L):CHILD-GROW-UP CL(R):HEARING+ + + + + +-HEARING-GONE HOSPITAL
line 5: CL(L):BACKSIDE-INJECT+ + INJECT SICK+ + + FINISH
Epitope Two: line 6: FATHER MOTHER BROTHER-SISTER ME hesitation ME GO LOOK-FOR SHOP LOOK-FOR O-S-H-I-K-U-K-U line 7: ME LOOK-FOR HOSPITAL CLiTAKE-CARRY-PUT HOME-HUT OWAMBO WITH line 8: HOSPITAL HEALTHY FINISH(R) line 9: WAIT FUTURE++ COW WITH GOAT WITH FARM MOTHER FATHER WITH CHILD BORN CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UP+++ FiMSp;
Epitope Three: line 10: IS RAIN FARM LAND OX CL: YOKE CL:GUIDE-PLOUGH line 11: MOTHER CL:PLANT-SEED+ FINISH+(R) line 12: RAIN FARM-LAND CL:HOE++ CL:PLANT-GROW CL:PICK MILLET+ + + FINISH(R) line 13: JULY HOT++ SUN STRONG-DRY FINISH(R) line 14: PICK-MILLET++ BROTHER-SISTER CL:CARRY-BASKET-ON- HEAD CL:CARRY-BASKET-ON-HEAD CL:POUR-OUT FINISH (R) line 15: GO SUGAR-CANE+ CL:PICK-SUGAR-CANECL:CUT-TOPS-OF- SUGAR-CANE-OFF-PLANT+ CL:FILL-BASKET+ CL;CARRY- BASKET-OF-SUGAR-CANE CL:POUR-OUT FINISH FINALLY
Epitope Four: line 16: UNHL COW GOAT WITH CL:HERD-ANIMALS-INTO-GARDEN
207
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ANIMAL-EAT GO-AWAY line 17: MOTHER ME BROTHER-SISTER CL:POUND-MILLET-WITH STICK++ FINISH
Epitope Five: line 18: UNTIL WIND-BLOW W-I-N-D WIND-BLOW line 19: CL:LIFT-BASKETCL:SHAKE-BASKET-FROM-SIDE-TO-SIDE
CL(L):WASTE-BLOWS-AWAY-ON-WIND CL(R):cont-HOLD-BASKET FINISH
Epitope Six: line 20: UNTTL FINISH (R) line 21: ALL-GO FATHER MOTHER WITH CHILD WITH COME-TO-ONE- PLACE line 22: CL(R):SWEEP-KERNALS-TO-ONE-SIDE+ + CL:COB-MOVE CLrMILLET-COB MANY CL(R):SWEEP-KERNALS-TO-ONE- SIDE+ + CL:COB-TRANSFER-TO-OTHER(L_-HND-DROP CL(R):SWEEP-KERNALS-TO-ONE-SIDE+ + CL:COB-TRANSFER- TO-OTHER(L)-HAND-DROP FINISH(R) line 23: CL:CARRY-BASKET CL:PICK-UP-BASKET-ON-HEAD CL:CARRY- BASKET STORAGE HUT++ CL:POUR-MILLET FINISH
Epitope Seven: line 24: ME MAKE THINK SAY THAT MOTHER HELP SCHOOL DEAF OSHAKATÎ NEAR FAR-FROM-OUR-PLACE YES MOTHER NEVER++ line 25: ME STAY GIVE-UP...(interruption)... MOTHER NEVER line 26: ME STAY GIVE-IN BORED DO-NOTHING WAIT TOMORROW+++++ FINISH
Epitope Eight: line 27: ME THINK ME THINK SCHOOL neg__ WHERE line 28: neg__ neg_ ME THINK
neg neg__ SIGN++ NOT-GOOD ZERO/HAND line 29: ME THINK ME WANT CROSS-BORDER FENCE A-N-G-O-L-A line 30: TEACH ENGLISH+ + + HELP 1980 TEACH+ ENGLISH+ LEARN-A- LOT FINISH
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Epitope Nine: line 31: INDEPENDENT COME+ COME FINISH
Epitope Ten: line 32: WITH ME THINK DEAF LOOK-LIKE-SAME WHERE line 33: HELP EVER BOSS CHOOSE PUT WITH DEAF TEACH ALPHABET (N-A-M-N-A) CHOOSE-FIRST ME CHOOSE-SECOND YOU CHOOSE-THIRD NANGO CHOOSE-FOURTH ZACK CHOOSE- HFTH DANIEL CHOOSE-SIXTH HENOCK CHOOSE-SEVENTH MARIUS BEFORE+ CL: YOUNG CHOOSE-EIGHTH HENOCK BEFORE CL(L):OLDER CL:(R):YOUNGER CHOOSE-NINTH HMONY CL(L):YOUNGER CHOOSE-TENTH DAMON line 34: CHOOSE-ELEVENTH ELIA CHOOSE-TWELTH THERESA CHOOSE-THIRTEENTH+ RAUNA+ HELP RAUNA PUT THABITHA HELP PUT FINISH (R) line 35: TEACH WITH GRADE TWO WITH TEACH SACKEUS PASS LABAN PASS HENOCK PASS ME FAIL EVER CHOOSE- THIRTEENTH DAMONA CHOOSE-FOURTEENTH PETER CHOOSE-FIFTEENTH WITH CL:CLASS-ROUP-TOGETHER GRADE TWO GRADE FOUR CL:CLASS-GROUP-TOGETHER TEACH+ line 36: GRADE FOUR CL:CLASS-GROUP-TOGETHER TEACH+ line 37: ME GRADE-TWO TEACH+ PASS WITH ME STRUGGLE-WORK- HARD WITH _neg TEACH GRADE FOUR PASS GRADE FIVE SKIP-CLASS GRADE- SIX TEACH PUT WITH ALL-PASS FINAL FINISH
Epitope Eleven: line 38: WITH THINK TEACH ME ENGLISH LEARN-A-LOT FREE line 39: ME THINK WANT L-U-N-A-D-N-D-N-D-A ME GO PUT WORK+ + GET-THINGS++ WITH VASELINE SOAP SHOP WITH UNTIL 1-9-8- 7+ YEAR FINISH(R) line 40: NOW KWANZA-SUL ME GO-BACK WITH PACK+ WITH TRUCK WITH CL:LOAD-THINGS-ONTO-TRUCKCL:DRIVE- AWAY+ + + + + CL:TRUCK-GO+ + + + DROP-OFF KWANZA-SUL DROP-OFF+ UNTIL TEACH + LEARN-A-LOT FINISH line 41: PETER STAY-THERE HOME LUANDA STAY-THERE+ ME DEAF CL:STAY-THERE STAY-THERE DANIEL CL:STAY-THERE FINAL line 42: KALILE TEACH+ THINK TEACH TIRED-PROBLEM KALILE THINK MOVE-TO-ANOTHER-PLACE WORK++ LUANDA JOB++ WORK++ CL:(LUANDA)THERE KAUPA DEAF THERE(R) line 43: ME KWANZA-SUL CL:THERE(L) FINISH(*two handed symmetrical palms up)
Epitope twelve: line 44: KWANZA-SUL GIRL+ VISIT+ + SEE VISIT+ KWNAZA-SUL GIRL+ VISIT SEE FRIEND WANT WORK GOOD STORY GOOD FRIEND BAD REJECT-ME++ FINISH(*)
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Epitope thirteen: line 45: NOTfflNG-TO-DO WORK+ FINISH*
Epitope fourteen: line 46: UNTIL ME SICK+ + FEVER-MALARIA INJECUON-BACKSIDE+ HEALTHY FINISH
Epitope fifteen: line 47: WAIT+ + + WITH THINK ME WANT SCHOOL LOOK-LIKE-SAME WHERE line 48: ME GO FLY AMERICA WITH DEAF ALL WITH FLY LAND START HERE line 49: neg______HOUSE WHAT ALL KNOW ME KNOW line 50: NEVER-SEEN-BEFORE NOTHING-TO-DO line 51: WAIT UNTIL WAIT BOSS DEAF TITUS WAIT UNTIL WAIT TOMORROW SUNDAY MONDAY TEACH NOTHING-TO-DO WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX 3
TRANSCRIPTION SHOWING EPITOPIC AND SUB-EPITOPIC STRUCTURE
One English gloss represents each Namibian sign without the inclusion of any non- manual signals which the signer’s face and/or body may indicate. The repetition of each two-handed FINISH sign marks the termination of each epitope which I indicate by means of a double line. The repetition of each one-handed FINISH sign marks the sub- episodic boundaries within epitopes.
FINISH DIVISIONS
key: 1. major epitopes (FINISHl and FTNISH2a)
2. subepitopes (FINISH 2b)
line 1 1. NAME 2. IS 3. , F-I-N-E-A-(S-hld) 4. K-I-M-I-(S-hld)
line 2: 5. IN 6. NAMIBIA 7. ME 8. BORN 9. IN 10. 196(0-hld)
line 3: 11. ME 12. DEAF 13. HEARING-GONE(HId)
line 4: 14. ME 15. CL:CHILD-GROW-UP(L-H) 16. HEARING+ + ++++(R-H) 17. HEARING GONE(R-H,Hld)
211
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 212 18. HOSPITAL
lines 19. CL:BACKSIDEINJECT++(LH) 20. SICK++ + 21. INJECT(LH) 22. FINISH *(*two handed symmetrical palms up)
line 6 23. FATHER 24. MOTHER 25. BROTHER-SISTER 26. ME 27. hesitation 28. ME 29. GO 30. LOOK-FOR 31. SHOP 32. LOOK-FOR 33. O-S-H-I-K-U-K-(Uhld)
line 7: 34. ME 35. LOOK-FOR 36. HOSPITAL 37. CL:TAKE (L) 38. CL:CARRY (L-R) 39. CLrPUT (R) 40. (R)HOME-HUT 41. (R)OWAMBO 42. WITH
line 8: 43. HOSPITAL 44. HEALTHY 45. FINISH (R-H)
line 9: 46. WAIT 47. FUTURE+-F 48. COW 49. WITH 50. GOAT 51. WITH 52. FARM 53. MOTHER 54. FATHER 55. WITH 56. CHILD 57. BORN 58. CL:CHILDREN-GROW-UP(R)(L)(R)(L)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 213 59. FINISH
line 10: 60. IS 61. RAIN 62. FARM-LAND 63. OX (both-hnds) 64. CL:YOKE 65. CL:GUIDE-PLOUGH-FWD
line 11: 66. MOTHER 67. CL:PLANT-SEED+ 68. FINISH+(R)
line 12: 69. RAIN 70. FARMLAND 71. CL:HOE4-4- 72. CL:PLANTS-GROW 73. CL:PICK MÎLLET+ + + 74. FINISH(R)(L-handH(pick millet)
line 13: 75. JULY 76. HOT+(L)+(R)+(L) 77. SUN 78. STRONG-DRY 79. FINISH (R)
line 14: 80. PICK-MILLET-H- 81. BROTHER-SISTER 82. CL:CARRY-BASKET-ON-HEAD(C) 83. CL:CARRY-BASKET-ON-HEAD(L) 84. CL:POUR-OUT(extreme L) 85. FINISH(R-hnd only) (extreme L)
line 15: 86. GO (L-R) 87. SUGAR-CANE-F 88. CL:PICK-SUGAR-CANE 89. CL:CUT-TOPS-OF-SUGAR-CANE-OFF-PLANT4- 90. CL:FILL-BASKET+ 91. CL:CARRY-BASKET-OF-SUGAR-CANE(R-L) 92. CL:POUR-OUT (L) 93. FINISH
94. FINALLY
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 214 line 16: 95. UNTIL 96. COW 97. GOAT 98. WITH 99. CL:HERD-ANIMALS-INTO-GARDEN(L-R) 100. ANIMAL-EAT 101. GO-AWAY
line 17: 102. MOTHER 103. ME 104. BROTHER-SISTER 105. CL:POUND-MILLET-WITH-STICK (C-R-C) 106. FINISH
line 18: 107. UNTIL 108. WIND-BLOW (L-R-L) 109. W-I-N-D 110. WIND-BLOW (L-R-L)
line 19: 111. CL:LIFT-BASKET (R) 112. CL:SHAKE-BASKET-FROM-SIDE-TO-SIDE (R-L-R-L-R-L-R) 113. CL-R:cont-HOLD-BASKET 114. CL-L-.WASTE-BLOWS-AWAY-ON-WIND 115. FINISH
line 20: 116. UNTIL 117. FINISH(R)
line 21: 118. ALL-GO (L-R) 119. FATHER 120. MOTHER 121. WITH 122. CHILD 123. WITH 124. CL:COME-TO-ONE-PLACE
line 22: 125. CL(R):SWEEP-KERNELS-TO-ONE-SIDE + + 126. CL:COB-MOVE(R) 127. CL:MILLET-COB 128. MANY 129. CL(R):SWEEP-MILLET-T0-SIDE-F + 130. CL:COB-TRANSFER-TO-OTHER(L)-HAND-DROP(R) 131. CL(R):SWEEP-MILLET-TO-SIDE4- 4- 132. CL:COB-TRANSFER-TO-OTHER(L)-HAND-DROP(R) 133. nNISH(R)
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line 23: 134. CL:CARRY-BASKET(R-L) 135. CL:PICK-UP-BASKET-ON-HEAD(L-C) 136. CL:CARRY-BASKET(C-R) 137. STORAGE-HUT++(R) 138. CL:POUR-MILLET(R) 139. FINISH
line 24: 140. ME 141. MAKE 142. THINK 143. SAY 144. THAT 145. MOTHER 146. HELP 147. TEACH/SCHOOL 148. DEAF 149. OSHAKATI(L) 150. NEAR(L) 151. FAR-FROM-OUR-PLACE(L) 152. YES(CNTR) 153. MOTHER 154. NEVER-f-t-(hand:r-l-r-l-r-],
line 25: 155. ME 156. STAY 157. GIVE-UP (PAUSE due to interruption) 158. MOTHER 159. NEVER(hand: r-l-r-l-ctr
line 26: 160. ME 161. STAY 162. GIVE-IN 163. BORED 164. DO-NOTHING 165. WAIT 166. TOMORROW4-4--H- 167. FINISH
line 27: 168. ME 169. THINK (hold continues) 170. ME 171. THINK 172. SCHOOL
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neg______173. WHERE(R-C-R-C)
line 28: neg_ 174. ME peg 175. THINK peg___ 176.SIGN+ + neg_ 177. NOT-GOOD 178. ZERO/HAND
line 29: 179. ME 180. THINK 181. ME 182. WANT 183. CROSS-BORDER 184. FENCE 185. A-N-G-O-L-A(H)
line 30: 186. TEACH 187. ENGLISH-F+-F 188. HELP 189.1980 190. TEACH-F 191. ENGLISH-F 192. LEARN-A-LOT 193. FINISH
line 31: 194. INDEPENDENT 195. COME-F 196. COME 197. HNISH
line 32: 198. WITH 199. ME 200. THINK 201. DEAF 202. LOOK-LIKE-SAME 203. WHERE
line 33: 204. HELP 205. EVER 206. BOSS
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207. CHOOSE 208. PUT (R) 209. WITH (R) 210. DEAF 211. TEACH 212. ALPHABET(N-A-M-N-A) 213. CHOOSE-FIRST(pinky) 214. ME 215. CHOOSE-SECOND 216. YOU (indexR) 217. CHOOSE-THIRD 218. NANGO 219. CHOOSE-FOURTH 220. ZACK 221. CHOOSE-FIFTH 222. DANIEL 223. CHOOSE-SIXTH 224. HENOCK 225. CHOOSE-7TH 226. MARIUS 227. BEFORE+(L-H) 228. CL:YOUNG(L-H) 229. CHOOSE-EIGHTH+ 230. HENOCK 231. BEFORE 232. CL;OLDER(L-H)YOUNGER(R-H) 233. CHOOSE-NINTH 234. TIMONY 235. CL:YOUNGER(L) 236. CHOOSE-TENTH 237. DAMON(L)
line 34: 238. CHOOSE-ELEVENTH 239. ELIA 240. CHOOSE-TWELTH 241. THERESA 242. CHOOSE THIRTEENTH+ 243. RAUNA 244. RAUNA 245. HELP (L) 246. RAUNA 247. PUT 248. TABITHA 249. HELP 250. PUT (R) 251. FINISH(R)
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line 35: 252. TEACH 253. WITH 254. GRADE 255. TWO 256. WITH 257. TEACH 258. SACKEUS 259. PASS (R)(Lup/Rdwn Rup/Ldwn) 260. LABAN 261. PASS (L)(L up/Rdwn Rup/Ldwn) 262. HENOCK 263. PASS (R) 264. ME 265. FAIL (C) 266. EVER (C) 267. CHOOSE 13th (mid fhgr) 268. DAMONA 269. CHOOSE 14th (ring fhgr) 270. PETER 271. CHOOSE 15th (index fiigr) 272. WITH 273. CL:CLASS-GROUP-TOGETHER (R) 274. GRADE (R) 275. TWO (R)
line 36: 276. GRADE 277. FOUR C 278. CL:CLASS-GROUP-TOGETHER (L) 279. TEACH+ (L)
line 37: 280. ME 281. GRADE-TWO (R) 282. TEACH+ (R) 283. PASS (R) 284. WITH (R) 285. ME (R) 286. STRUGGLE-WORK-HARD(C) 287. WITH 288. TEACH 289. GRADE 290. FOUR 291. PASS 292. GRADE _neg 293. FIVE 294. CL:SKIP-CLASS (L) 295. GRADE 296. SIX
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 219 297. TEACH 298. PUT 299. WITH 300. CL:ALL-PASS 301. FINAL 302. FINISH
line 38: 303. WITH 304. THINK 305. TEACH 306. ME 307. ENGLISH 308. LEARN-A-LOT 309. FREE
line 39: 310. ME 311. THINK 312. WANT 313. L-U-N-A-D-N-D-N-D-A 314. ME 315. GO 316. PUT 317. WORK-F-t- (R-C) 318. GET-THINGS-F-F(C-R) 319. WITH (R) 320. VASELINE (C) 321. SOAP 322. SHOP 323. WITH 324. UNTIL 325. 198(7+) 326. YEAR 327. HNISH (R)
line 40: 328. NOW 329. KWANZA-SUL(Rh)(H) 330. ME fLh) 331. GO-BACK (Lhbk) 332. WITH 333. PACK+ 334. WITH 335. TRUCK 336. WITH 337. CL:LOAD-THINGS-ONTO-TRUCK 338. CL:DRIVE-AWAY++ + + + (C-L) 339. CL:TRUCK-GO+ + + + (L)
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340. DROP-OFF (L) 341. KWANZA-SUL 342. DROP-OFF (L)+ 343. UNTIL 344. TEACH+ 345. LEARN-A-LOT 346. FINISH
line 41: 347. PETER 348. STAY-THERE (R) 349. HOME 350. LUANDA (R) 351. STAY-THERE +(ext) (R) 352. ME (Lhnd) 353. DEAF 354. CL:STAY-THERE (L) 355. STAY-THERE(R) 356. DANIEL 357. CL:STAY-THERE (R) 358. FINAL
line 42: 359. KAI.ILE 360. TEACH+ 361. THINK 362. TEACH 363. TIRED-PROBLEM 364. KALILE 365. THINK 366. MOVE-TO-ANOTHER-PLACE (L-R) 367. WORK++(R) 368. LUANDA 369. JOB++(R) 370. WORK++(R) 371. CL:(LUANDA)THERE (R) 372. KAUPA 373. DEAF 374. CL:(LUANDA)THERE (R)
line 43: 375. ME 376. KWANZA-SUL 377. CL:THERE (L) 378. FINISH*(*two handed symmetrical palms up)
line 44: 379. KWANZA-SUL 380. GIRL+ 381. VISIT++ (C-L)
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382. SEE (L-R) 383. VISÎT+ (L) 384. KWANZA-SUL 385. GIRL+ 386. VISIT (L) 387. SEE (L) 388. FRIEND 389. WANT 390. WORK 391. GOOD 392. STORY 393. GOOD 394. FRIEND (R) 395. BAD (R) 396. REJECT-ME++ (R) 397. FINISH*(*two handed symmettrical pams up)
line 45: 398. NOTHING-TO-DO 399. WORK + (C-L) 400. FINISH*(*two handed symmetrical palms up)
line 46: 401. UNTIL 402. ME 403. SICK++ 404. FEVER-MALARIA 405. INJECHON-BACKSIDE +(L) 406. HEALTHY 407. FINISH
408. FINAL
line 47: 409.W AIT+++ 410. WITH 411. THINK 412. ME 413. WANT 414. SCHOOL 415. LOOK-LIKE-SAME 416. WHERE
line 48: 417. ME 418. GO 419. FLY (R-L) 420. AMERICA
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421. WITH 422. DEAF 423. ALL 424. WITH 425. FLY (R) 426. LAND (C) 427. START 428. HERE _neg_
line 49: 429. HOUSE _neg_ 430. WHAT _neg 431. ALL _neg 432. KNOW 433. ME _neg 434. KNOW
line 50: 435. NEVER-SEEN-BEFORE 436. NOTHING-TO-DO
line 51: 437. WAIT 438. UNTIL 439. WAIT 440. BOSS 441. DEAF 442. TITUS 443. WAIT 444. UNTIL 445. WAIT 446. TOMORROW 447. SUNDAY 448. MONDAY 449. TEACH 450. NOTHING-TO-DO 451. WAIT 452. NOTHING-TO-DO (hands clasped)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX 4
LEXICAL REPETITION WITHIN EPITOPES
epitope line sign lexical repetition number number number 1 3 13 HEARING-GONE 4 17 HEARING-GONE 5 19 CL:BACKSIDE-INJECT 5 21 CLzBACKSIDE-INJECT 2 7 ME 2 6 23 FATHER 6 24 MOTHER 6 26 ME 6 28 ME 7 34 ME 6 30 LOOK-FOR 6 32 LOOK-FOR 7 35 LOOK-FOR 7 36 HOSPITAL 8 43 HOSPITAL 7 42 WITH 9 49 WITH 9 51 WITH 9 55 WITH 3 10 61 RAIN 12 69 RAIN 10 62 FARMLAND 12 70 FARM-LAND 12 73 CL:PICK-MILLET+ + + 14 80 CL:PICK-MILLET+ + 14 82-83 CLzCARRY-BASKET-ON-HEAD 15 91 CL:CARRY-BASKET-ON-HEAD 11 68 FINISH2b 12 74 FINISH2b 13 79 FINTSH2b 14 85 FINISH2b
223
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 224
4 NO LEX REPETITION 5 18 108 WIND-BLOW 18 110 WIND-BLOW 6 21 121 WITH 21 123 WITH 22 125 CL:SWEEP-MILLET-KERNALS-TO-ONE- SIDE 22 129 CL:SWEEP-MILLET-KERNALS-TO-ONE- SIDE 22 131 CL:SWEEP-MILLET-KERNALS-TO-ONE- SIDE 22 130 CL:COB-TRANSFER-TO- OTHER(L)HAND-DROP(R) 22 132 CL:COB-TRANSFER-TO- OTHER(L)HAND-DROP(R) 23 134 CL:CARRY-BASKET(R-L) 23 136 CL:CARRY-BASKET(C-R) 7 24 140 ME 25 155 ME 26 160 ME 24 145 MOTHER 24 153 MOTHER 25 158 MOTHER 24 154 NEVER 25 159 NEVER 25 156 STAY 26 161 STAY 26 165 STAY/WAIT
8 27 169 THINK 27 171 THINK 28 175 THINK 29 180 THINK 27 168 ME 27 170 ME 28 174 ME 29 179 ME 29 181 ME 27 172 TEACH/SCHOOL 30 186 TEACH/SCHOOL 30 190 TEACH/SCHOOL 30 187 ENGLISH 30 191 ENGLISH
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 225
9 31 195 COME+ 31 196 COME
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 226
10 32 198 WITH 33 209 WITH 35 253 WITH 35 256 WITH 35 272 WITH 37 284 WITH 37 287 WITH 37 299 WITH 32 199 ME 33 214 ME 35 264 ME 37 280 ME 37 285 ME 32 201 DEAF 33 210 DEAF 33 204 HELP 34 245 HELP 34 249 HELP 33 205 EVER 35 266 EVER 33 207 CHOOSE 33 213 CHOOSE-FIRST 33 215 CHOOSE-SECOND 33 217 CHOOSE-THIRD 33 219 CHOOSE-FOURTH 33 221 CHOOSE-FIFTH 33 223 CHOOSE-SIXTH 33 225 CHOOSE-SEVENTH 33 229 CHOOSE-EIGHTH 33 233 CHOOSE-NINTH 33 236 CHOOSE-TENTH 34 238 CHOOSE-ELEVENTH 34 249 CHOOSE-TWELFTH 34 242 CHOOSE-THIRTEENTH 35 267 CHOOSE-THIRTEENTH 35 269 CHOOSE-FOURTEENTH 35 271 CHOOSE-FIFTEENTH 33 208 PUT 34 247 PUT 34 250 PUT 37 298 PUT 33 220 SACKY 35 258 SACKY 33 224 HENOCK 33 230 HENOCK 35 262 HENOCK 33 228 YOUNG
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 227
33 211 TEACH 35 252 TEACH 35 257 TEACH 36 279 TEACH 37 282 TEACH 37 288 TEACH 37 297 TEACH 35 254 GRADE 35 274 GRADE (TWO) 36 276 GRADE (FOUR) 37 281 (GRADE)-TWO 37 289 GRADE (FOUR) 37 292 GRADE (FIVE) 37 295 GRADE (SIX) 35 259 CLzPASS 35 261 CLzPASS 35 263 CLrPASS 37 283 CLrPASS 37 291 CLrPASS 37 300 CL:ALL-PASS 35 273 CLrCLASS-GROUP-TOGETHER 36 278 CLrCLASS-GROUP-TOGETHER
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 228
11 38 303 WITH 39 319 WITH 39 323 WITH 40 332 WITH 40 334 WITH 40 336 WITH 38 304 THINK 39 311 THINK 42 361 THINK 42 365 THINK 38 306 ME 39 310 ME 39 314 ME 40 330 ME 41 352 ME 43 375 ME 39 317 WORK 42 367 WORK 42 370 WORK 39 313 L-U-A-N-D-A 41 350 LUANDA 42 368 LUANDA 40 329 KWANZA-SUL 40 341 KWANZA-SUL 43 376 KWANZA-SUL 40 340 CL:DROP-OFF 40 342 CL:DROP-OFF 41 353 DEAF 42 373 DEAF 38 308 LEARN-A-LOT 40 345 LEARN-A-LOT 38 305 TEACH 40 344 TEACH 42 360 TEACH 42 362 TEACH 39 324 UNTIL 40 343 UNTIL 41 348 CL:STAY-THERE 41 351 CLrSTAY-THERE 41 354 CL:STAY-THERE 41 355 CLrSTAY-THERE 41 357 CLrSTAY-THERE 42 371 CLrLUANDA-THERE-R 42 374 CLrLUANDA-THERE-R 43 377 CLr(KWANZA)-THERE-L
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12 44 380 GIRL+ 44 385 GIRL+ 44 379 KWANZA-SUL 44 384 KWANZA-SUL 44 381 VISIT++ 44 383 VISIT+ 44 386 VISIT 44 382 SEE 44 387 SEE 44 388 FRIEND 44 394 FRIEND 44 391 GOOD 44 393 GOOD 13 NO LEX REPETITION 14 NO LEX REPETITION 15 47 410 WITH 48 421 WITH 48 424 WITH 47 412 ME 48 417 ME 49 433 ME 48 419 FLY 48 425 FLY _neg 49 432 KNOW _neg 49 434 KNOW 47 409 WAIT+ + + 51 437 WAIT 51 439 WAIT 51 443 WAIT 51 445 WAIT 51 451 WAIT 48 422 DEAF 51 441 DEAF 51 438 UNTIL 51 444 UNTIL 50 436 NOTHING-TO-DO 51 450 NOTHING-TO-DO 51 452 NOTHING-TO-DO
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX 5
LEXICAL REPETITION OF ACTORS ACROSS EPITOPES
MOTHER epitope line sign lexical item number number 2 6 25 MOTHER 2 9 53 MOTHER 3 10 66 MOTHER 4 17 102 MOTHER 6 21 120 MOTHER 7 24 145 MOTHER 7 24 153 MOTHER 7 25 158 MOTHER
FATHER
epitope line sign lexical item number number 2 6 23 FATHER 2 9 54 FATHER 6 21 118 FATHER
CHILD line sign number lexical item epitope number 2 9 56 CHILD
230
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 231
6 21 122 CHILD
BROTHER-SISTER epitope line sign lexical item number number 2 6 25 BROTHER-SISTER 3 14 81 BROTHER-SISTER 4 17 104 BROTHER SISTER
ME epitope line sign lexical item number number 1 2 7 ME 3 11 ME 4 14 ME 2 6 26 ME 2 6 28 ME 2 7 34 ME 4 17 103 ME 7 24 140 ME 7 25 155 ME 7 26 160 ME 8 27 168 ME 8 27 170 ME 8 28 174 ME 8 29 179 ME 8 29 181 ME 10 32 199 ME 10 33 214 ME 10 35 264 ME
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 232
10 37 280 ME 10 37 285 ME 11 38 307 ME 11 39 310 ME 11 39 314 ME 11 40 330 ME 11 41 352 ME 11 43 375 ME 14 46 402 ME 15 47 412 ME 5 48 417 ME 15 49 433 ME
FARM ANIMALS epitope line number sign number lexical item 2 9 48 COW 4 16 96 COW
epitope line number sign number lexical item 2 9 50 GOAT 4 16 97 GOAT
CHOOSE+NUMBER (followed by Name-Sign)
episode line number sign number CHOOSE+NUMBE R 10 33 213 CHOOSE-FIRST 10 33 215 CHOOSE-SECOND 10 33 217 CHOOSE-THIRD 10 33 219 CHOOSE- FOURTH
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 233
10 33 221 CHOOSE-FIFTH 10 33 223 CHOOSE-SIXTH 10 33 225 CHOOSE- SEVENTH 10 33 229 CHOOSE-EIGHTH 10 33 233 CHOOSE-NINTH 10 33 236 CHOOSE-TENTH 10 34 238 CHOOSE- ELEVENTH 10 34 249 CHOOSE- TWELFTH 10 34 252 CHOOSE- THIRTEENTH 10 34 267 CHOOSE- THIRTEENTH 10 34 269 CHOOSE- FOURTEENTH 10 34 271 CHOOSE- FIFTEENTH
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 234 Deaf people (identified by the lexical item DEAF. CHOOSE+NAME-SIGN or by NAME-SIGN alonel DEAF epitope line sign number lexical item number 1 3 12 DEAF (hearing -gone) 7 24 148 DEAF (school) 10 32 201 DEAF (people) 10 33 210 DEAF (students) 11 41 353 DEAF (peers at Kwanza) 42 373 DEAF (peers in Luanda) 15 48 422 DEAF (boss in USA) 151 441 DEAF
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX 6
RECURRING LEXICAL EVENTS ACROSS EPITOPES FREQUENCY OF OCCURRENCE OF LEXICAL EVENTS THROUGHOUT THE NARRATIVE.
lexical item instances of lexical number of epitopes recurrence throughout containing each lexical item narrative TEACH/SCHOOL 17 5 THINK 9 4 WANT 4 4 WAIT/STAY 8 3 DO-NOTHING 5 3 WORK 5 3 HELP 5 3 PUT 4 3 LEARN-A-LOT 3 2 HEALTHY 2 2 SICK 2 2 INJECT 3 2 FARM 3 2 ENGLISH 3 2 KWANZA 5 3 HOSPITAL 3 2
235
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 236 FARM epitope line number sign number lexical item 2 9 52 FARM 3a 10 62 FARM 12 70 FARM 3b
BASKET epitope line number sign number lexical item 3d 14 82 CARRY-BASKER- ON-HEAD 3d 14 83 CARRY-BASKET- ON-HEAD 3e 15 91 CARRY-BASKET- 6c 23 134 CARRY-BASKET- 6c 23 135 PICK-UP-BASKET- ON-HEAD 6c 23 136 CARRY-BASKET 5 19 111 LIFT-BASKET SHAKE BASKET FROM SIDE TO SIDE 5 19 113 HOLD BASKET
HOSPITAL epitope line number sign number lexical item
1 4 18 HOSPITAL 2 7 36 HOSPITAL 2 8 43 HOSPITAL
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 237 TtîINK epitope line number sign number lexical item 7 24 142 THINK 8 27 189 THINK 8 27 171 THINK 8 29 180 THINK 11 38 304 . THINK 11 39 311 THINK 11 42 361 KALILE THINK 11 42 365 KALILE THINK 15 47 411 THINK
WANT epitope line number sign number lexical item 8 29 182 WANT CROSS- BORDER FENCE ANGOLA 11 39 312 WANT LUANDA 12 44 389 WANT WORK 15 47 413 WANT SCHOOL...USA
TEACH/SCHOOL
epitope line number sign number lexical item 7 24 147 TEACH/SCHOOL 8 27 172 SCHOOL 8 30 186 TEACH 8 30 190 TEACH 10 33 211 TEACH 10 35 252 TEACH 10 35 257 TEACH 10 36 279 TEACH
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 238
10 37 282 TEACH 11 37 288 TEACH 11 37 297 TEACH 11 38 305 TEACH 11 40 344 TEACH 11 42 360 TEACH 11 42 362 TEACH 15 47 414 SCHOOL 15 51 449 TEACH/SCHOOL
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 239
ENGLISH epitope line number sign number lexical item 8 30 187 ENGLISH 8 30 191 ENGLISH 11 38 307 ENGLISH
LEARN-A-LOT epitope line number sign number lexical item 8 30 192 LEARN-A-LOT 11 38 308 11 40 345
WORK epitope line number sign number lexical item 11 39 318 WORK 11 42 367 WORK 11 42 370 WORK 12 44 390 WORK 13 45 399 WORK
LUANDA
epitope line number sign number lexical item 11c 41 350 LUANDA 11c 42 368 LUANDA
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 240
KWANZA epitope line number sign number lexical item 11b 40 329 KWANZA 11b 40 341 KWANZA 11c 43 376 KWANZA 12 44 379 KWANZA 12 44 384 KWANZA
HELP epitope line number sign number lexical item 7 24 146 MOTHER HELP TEACH 8 30 188 TEACH ENGLISH HELP 10 33 204 HELP EVER 10 34 245 RAUNA HELP 10 34 249 THABITHA HELP
PUT epitope line number sign number lexical item 2 7 39 PUT 10 33 208 PUT 10 34 247 PUT 10 34 250 PUT 11 39 316 PUT
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX 7
KEY TRANSITIONAL EVENTS SIGNALLED BY REPETITION OF: SICK-HEALTHY AND DO-NOTHING
Part one *SICK* Epitope One: me hearing-gone backside-inject *HEALTHY* Epitope Two a: father mother me look-for-(way home from) hospital Part two Epitope Two b: recovery on farm with family Epitope Three: rain farm-land pick-millet carry-basket-on-head Epitope Four: no lex repetition (herding animals into harvested fields to graze, mother, me and siblings pound millet) Epitope Five: wind-blow Epitope Six: sweep-millet-kemals-to-one-side, transfer-cob-to- other-hand-drop, carry-basket-(to-storage-hut) Epitope Seven: me, mother (told me that she would) never (allow me to go to deaf school so I had to) stay Part three Epitope Eight: me think (no other deaf school here so I went to Angola to search for a deaf) school (where I could learn) English Epitope Nine: come (arrival in Angola) Epitope Ten: Ever (our teacher) help(ed us by) teach(ing at the) school (we set up). He put (us) in groups together and chose thirteen deaf students (for) grades two and four. He taught us (until) we pass(ed). Epitope Eleven: me think me (go to) Luanda (for) work (after that the truck) dropped-(me)-off (at) Kwanza Epitope Twelve: Visit(ing) and see(ing) girls (at) Kwanza, (becoming) friends, good. Epitope Thirteen: No lexical repetition -after rejection by girls nothing to do but work *SICK* Epitope Fourteen: No lexical repetition -sick with malaria, recovery after injections *HEALTHY*
Part Four
241
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 242 Epitope Fifteen: me fly (to USA) with deaf, don't know (these houses or people), Part Five nothing-to-do until (our deaf boss tells us that school starts Monday except) wait....
Structure of narrative according to repetition of SICK. INJECT and HEALTHY:
Part One: Becoming deaf as a child
> SICK INJECT...HEALTHY
Part Two: Growing up with familv in rural Namibia
Part Three: Life in exile with Deaf people in Angola
> SICK..INJECT...HEALTHY
Part Four: Arriving in USA for more Deaf Education
Part Five: Nothing-to-do except wait ......
BACKSIDE-INJECT epitope line number sign number lexical item 1 5 19 BACKSIDE- INJECT 1 5 21 BACKSIDE- INJECT 14 46 405 BACKSIDE- INJECT
SICK
epitope line number sign number lexical item 1 5 20 SICK 14 46 403 SICK
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 243 HEALTHY epitope line number sign number lexical item 2 8 44 HEALTHY 14 46 406 HEALTHY
DO NOTHING epitope line number sign number lexical item 7 26 164 DO-NOTHING 13 46 398 NOTHING-TO-DO 15 50 436 NOTHING-TO-DO 15 51 450 NOTHING-TO-DO 15 51 452 NOTHING-TO-DO
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX 8
TRANSCRIPT DIVIDED INTO CONTRATOPES ACCORDING TO CONTRASTIVE USE OF SPATIAL OPPOSITIONS
lines LEFT CENTER RIGHT 1 NAME IS P-H-I-N-E-A-S K-I-M-I-S 2 IN NAMIBIA MEBORN IN 1960 3 ME DEAF HEARING-GONE 4 ME CL(L-H)CfflLD- CL(R- GROW-UP H)HEARING+++++ + HEARING-GONE HOSPITAL 5 CL(L-H)BACKSIDE- INJECT SICK (L-H)INJECT FINISH
6 FATHER MOTHER BROTHER-SISTER ME ME GO LOOK-FOR SHOP LOOK-FOR(-way-to- O-S-H-I-K-U-K-U get-firom-hospital)
244
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 245
7 ME LOOK-FOR CLzCARRY CL:PUTHOME-HUT HOSPITAL OWAMBO WITH CL:TAKE 8 HOSPITAL HEALTHY FINISH (R)
9 WAIT FUTURE-F-F COW WITH GOAT WITH FARM MOTHER FATHER WITH CHILD BORN CLzCHILDREN- GROW-UP(R-L-R-L) HNISH 10 IS RAIN FARM LAND OX CL: YOKE CLGUIDE-PLOUGH- FORWARD 11 MOTHER CL:PLANT- HNISH(R) SEED-F 12 RAIN FARM-LAND FINISH(R) CL:HOE4-4- CL:PLANTS-GROW CL:PICK-MILLET+ + + 13 JULY HOT SUN STRONG-DRY FINISH (R) 14 PICKMILLET4-4- BROTHER-SISTER CARRY-BASKET-ON- HEAD
CARRY-BASKET- ON-HEAD CL:POUR-OUT FINISH (R)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 246
15 GO SUGAR-CANE CLzPICK-SUGAR- CANE CLzCUT-TOPS- OFF-SUGAR-CANE CL:FILLBASKET4- CL:CARRY-BASKET
CLtCARRY- BASKET CL-.POUR- OUT FINISH FINALLY 16 UNTIL COW GOAT WITH CL:HERD- ANIMALS-INTO- GARDEN (L-R) ANIMAL-EATGO- AWAY 17 MOTHER ME BROTHER-SISTER CL;POUND-MILLET- WITH- STTCK+4-4-FINISH 18 UNHL WIND-BLOW W-I-N-D (L-R-L) WIND-BLOW(L-R-L) (htR-C-R) 19 CL(R):LIFT-BASKET CLtSHAKE- BASKET-FROM-SIDE- TO-SIDE CL;(R)CONT-TO- HOLD-BASKET CL:(L)WASTE- BLOWS-(to left) -AWAY-ON-WIND HNISH 20 UNTTL FINISH(R) 21 ALL...... GO FATHER MOTHER WITH WITH CHILD COME-TO-ONE-PLACE
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 247
22 CL(R);SWEEP- KERNELS-TO-ONE- SIDE-F-F CL(R):COB-MOVE CL(R):SWEEP- CL:MILLET-COB MANY KERNELS-TO-ONE- SIDE CLrCOB-TRANSFER- TO-LH-DROP CL(R):SWEEP- MILLET-TO-ONE- SIDE CL:COB-TRANSFER- TO-LH-DROP(R) HNISH (R) 23 CLzCARRY- BASKET...... CL:CARRY- BASKET(cont to left) CLzCARRY-BASKET CL:PICK- UP- BASKET-ON-HEAD STORAGE-HUT-F -F(R) CLzPOUR-MILLET HNISH
24 ME MAKE THINK SAY THAT MOTHER HELP SCHOOL DEAF OSHAKATINEAR FAR-FROM-OUR- YES PLACE MOTHER NEVER-FH-
25 • ME STAY GIVE-UP MOTHER NEVER-F-F 26 ME STAY GIVE-IN BORED DO-NOTHING WAIT TOMORROW -F-F-F-F-F HNISH 27 METHINK METHINK SCHOOL neg WHERE
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 248
28 neg____ ME______
neg__ neg ZERO/HAND THINK SIGN NOT-GOOD
29 ME THINK (left right)...... ME WANT CROSS- BORDER FENCE A-N-G-O-L-A 30 TEACH ENGLISH-H-4- HELP 1980
TEACH-f ENGLISH-F LEARN-A-LOT FINISH 31 INDEPENDENT COME-F COME HNISH
32 WITH ME THINK DEAF LOOK-LIKE- SAME
'V\HERE 33 HELPEVER BOSS CHOOSE PUT(R) WITH(R) DEAF TEACH ALPHABET CHOOSE-HRSTME CHOOSE-SECOND YOU CHOOSE- THIRD NANGO CHOOSE-FOURTH ZACK CHOOSE- FIFTH DANIEL CHOOSE- CHOOSE-SEVENTH SIXTH HENOCK MARIUS (L)BEFORE
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 249
(L)YOUNG CHOOSE- EIGHTH-F HENOCK BEFORE CL(L):OLD- (R)YOUNG CHOOSE-NINTH HMONY CHOOSE-TENTH CL(L)YOUNG (L)DAMON 34 CHOOSE-ELEVENTH ELIACHOOSE- TWELFTH THERESA CHOOSE- THIRTEENTH RAUNA RAUNA HELP(L) RAUNA PUT THABITHA(C-R) HELP PUT(R) FINISH
35 TEACH WITH GRADE TWO WITH TEACH SACKEUS PASS(R) LABAN PASS(L) HENOCK PASS(R) ME FAIL EVER CHOOSE THIRTEENTH DAMONA CHOOSE- FOURTEENTH PETER CHOOSE-FIFTEENTH WITH CLzCLASS- GROUP-TOGETHER (R) GRADE (R) TWO(R) 36 GRADE FOUR CL:CLASS-GROUP- TOGETHER(L) TEACH+(L) 37 ME GRADE-TWO TEACH 4- PASS WITH ME STRUGGLE-WORK- HARD WITH TEACH GRADE FOUR
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 250
PASS GRADE _neg __ FIVE CL:SKIP-CLASS(L) GRADE SIX TEACH PUT WITH CL;ALL PASS FINAL FINISH
38 WITH THINK TEACH ME ENGLISH LEARN-A- LOT FREE 39 ME THINK WANTL-U-A-N-D-A ME GO PUT WORK (R-C) GET-THINGS-F-F(c-r) WITH VASELINE SOAP SHOP WITH UNTIL 1 ...... 9...... 8 ...... 7 YEAR FINISH (R) 40 NOW KWANZA-SUL (R) ME(L) GO-BACK(L) WITH PACK-t- WITH TRUCK WITH CL;LOAD-THINGS- ONTO-TRUCK CLrDRIVE- AWAY(C-L) CL:TRUCK-GO(L) DROP-OFF (L) KWANZA-SUL DROP-OFF(L)4- UNTIL TEACH-1- LEARN-A-LOT FINISH(R)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 251
41 PETER STAY- THERE(R) HOME LUANDA(R) STAY- THERE-f-(R) (L-H):MEDEAF CLrSTAY- CL:STAY-THERE(R) THERE(L) DANIEL CLzSTAY- THERE(R) FINAL
42 KALILE TEACH4-(htI) THINK(htl) TEACH(htl) TIRED-PROBLEM KALILE THINK MOVE-TO ..ANOTHER-PLACE WORK-F-F(R) LUANDA JOB-F-F(R) WORK+4-(R) CL:(LUANDA)THERE (R) KAUPA DEAF CLz(LUANDA) THERE (R)
43 ME KWANZA-SUL CL:THERE(L) FINISH
44 KWANZA-SUL GIRL-F VISIT(C-L) SEE...... (L-R) VISIT-F(L) KWANZA-SUL GIRL+ VISIT (L) SEE (L) FRIEND WANT WORK GOOD STORY GOOD FRIEND BAD REJECT-ME+ + HNISH
45 NOTHING-TO-DO WORK-F(C-L) FINISH (C-htL)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 252
46 UNTIL ME SICK++ FEVER-MALARIA INJECnON- BACKSIDE-t-(L) HEALTHY FINISH 47 WAIT++ + WITH THINK ME WANT SCHOOL LOOK-LIKE- SAME WHERE
48 ME GO FLY (L-R).
AMERICAWITH DEAF ALL WITH FLY LAND START HERE 49 _ne^ _neg_ HOUSE WHAT ALL KNOW ME KNOW
50 NEVER-SEEN- BEFORE
NOTHING-TO-DO(c- htR) 51 WAIT UNTIL WAIT BOSS DEAF (C-L) TITUS(R-L) WAIT UNTIL WAIT TOMORROW SUNDAY MONDAY TEACH NOTHING- TO-DO WAIT NOTHING-TO-DO
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 253
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