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Documenting Inuit Sign Language

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Documenting Inuit Sign Language Aims of project Documenting 1. Description and documentation of Inuit Inuit Sign Language: Sign Language. focus on agreement and classifiers 2. Contribution to sign language typology. Inuit Sign Language (IUR) is endangered: Joke Schuit ASL is used in many situations, Sign Language Colloquium Nijmegen especially at schools, and replaces IUR. March 22, 2010 1 2 Sign language typology Overview Sign language typology Sign language typology Extension of data pool may result in development of the field of SL typology. Background Inuit Sign Language (IUR) Classifiers in sign languages Background Inuit Sign Language Verb agreement in sign languages Background Zeshan (2008:675) Urban sign Inuit Sign Language languages Conclusion 3 4 Background IUR Background IUR 5 6 Background IUR Background IUR The Inuit Inuit Sign Language (IUR) • Traditionally hunter-gatherers, nomadic. • 1/3 of deaf Inuit uses only IUR. • Today: settled, employment. • IUR: Inuit Uukturausingit – Less face to face contact with other tribes. Inuit Uuktu- rausi- ngit • Estimated 155 are deaf (MacDougall 2000). Inuit measure- established_practice-PL.POSS – 0.6% of total population of Nunavut. ‘the established practice for measuring of the – Live spread acroos most Nunavut communities. Inuit’ – Socialise with own family clan, not often with OR: ‘Inuit Sign Language other deaf Inuit. 7 8 Background IUR Background IUR Other sign languages Spoken languages of Nunavut • 2/3 of deaf Inuit use mainly American Sign • Inuktitut: Language (ASL) / Manually Coded English – Language associated with cultural identity of (MCE) (MacDougall 2000). hearing Inuit. – Older (30-50) deaf were sent to schools in – Many dialects. southern Canada: communication problems in home community. A few use some IUR signs – Highly polysynthetic. additionally. – Written in syllabics: ‘Nunavut’ – Nowadays deaf children go to school in their • English: community with ASL interpreter. • Offers perspective, but separates them from their – Language of the colonisers. Language most heritage (culturally and linguistically). used in work and school environments. 9 10 Background IUR Social characteristics of IUR setting Example clip IUR • Large area, but only a few people who use PRO1 THINK ONE TWO WEEK WEEK the language. PRO 1 ICE-FISHING GOlocA GOlocB THINK • Extremely cold climate. ICE-FISHING FISH • High proportion of hearing L2 signers. N • The deaf are integrated in the community. ‘I think in one or two weeks, I’ll go ice • Not much deaf-deaf contact. fishing, either going there [A] or there [B], • Language endangerment. I’ll go ice fishing for fish.’ • Language contact situation. – ASL/MCE, Inuktitut and English. 11 12 Background morphosyntax Classifiers: background SL morphosyntax Classifiers in sign languages • Inflectional categories mostly realised by • Handshapes that depict specific semantic stem internal changes. properties of nominal referents (Supalla 1986) • Phonological parameters of a sign are • Analysis: incorporation (Meir 2001), agreement modified: (Glück & Pfau 1997), gender agr. (Zwitserlood 2003) – Verb agreement: location(s) and/or orientation • Some village sign languages (eg. Kata of a verb change (analysis Meir 2002) Kolok) have many entity classifiers (Marsaja – Classification: handshape of a verb changes 2008), others (eg. Adamorobe SL) only a few (Nyst 2007). – Possible explanation: use of character/ observer perspective (Nyst 2007). 13 14 Classifiers: background IUR Classifiers Classifier types Classifiers in IUR • Handle classifiers: • Entity classifiers: – refer to the manipulation of an object – Vehicle-CL: for skidoo, car, dog sled – classify the object in transitive sentences – Animal-CL: for caribou, wolf, musk ox – Birds-CL: for flying birds • Entity classifiers: –Person-CL – refer to form characteristics of a referent – refer to general semantic classes • Handle classifiers: – classify the subject in intransitive sentences – Used in many situations. – Degree of grammaticalization is not yet clear. 15 16 IUR Classifiers IUR Classifiers Glossing IUR Clips Classifiers IUR classifiers vs. other SLs HAMMER CC:LONG-THING POLE TWO-POLES • Classification basically similar. ROPES-ON-TWO-SIDES TURN CC:PERSON-SWING – Form might differ. TURN CC:PERSON-SWING ‘They sat up a horizontal bar, and then they turned around • Handle classifiers: it.’ – Form depends on the object that is manipulated, as in all SLs. SODA BOX SODA BOX MANY MOVE-BOX loc:up • Entity classifiers: SHELFS MOVE-BOXloc:up MOVE-BOXloc:up ‘I put boxes on shelves.’ – Person classifier: same form as many SLs. – Vehicle classifier: differs, as it does in many SLs. 17 18 IUR Classifiers Verb agreement: background Entity classifiers: IUR & other SLs SL verb agreement (1) Person classifier: IUR • Distinction of verb classes: (Padden 1988) same handshape as in – Plain verbs do not agree. ASL and NGT (and – Agreement V inflect for person and number . many others). – Spatial V agree with location = locative verbs. Vehicle classifiers: IUR same handshape as in • Agreement is rare in village sign languages NGT, different from (Nyst 2007, Marsaja 2008). ASL. – Though possibly existing in different forms. NGT, IUR ASL Jordan SL Palm down. Palm sidewards 19 20 Verb agreement: background Verb agreement: background SL verb agreement (2) SL verb agreement (3) • Referents are localised in signing space. • 1VERB2 • Citation form ‘I verb you’ usually moves away from the signer; does not signer agree. signer 21 22 Verb agreement: background Verb agreement: background SL verb agreement (4) SL verb agreement (5) • 2VERB1 • 3aVERB2 ‘You verb me’ ‘S/he verb you’ signer signer 23 24 IUR Verb agreement IUR Verb agreement Verb agreement in IUR Glossing IUR Clips Agreement • Plain verbs PRO3a BULLY3a PRO3a LONG-AGO PRO3b – THINK, TALK DON’T-KNOW PRO3a. PRO1 BULLY1 NEG • Agreement verbs ‘They bullied him, long ago back at school. Don’t know why. I wasn’t bullied.’ – BULLY1 ‘they bully me’ (clip 1) • Locative verbs THINK NEXT-MONTH PRO1 QALLUNAAQ –GO BIG-NOSE INDEX ‘I am going to Big a a SKIDOO TWO PRO1 INUK ONE THREE GO-BY- Nose Mountain’ (clip 2) SKIDOO GOloc BIG-NOSE PROloc TWO ‘I think, next month, two Qallunaat and me, that we go by skidoo to Big Nose Mountain.’ 25 26 IUR Verb agreement IUR Verb agreement ‘bully him’ ‘bully me’ IUR agreement vs. other SL • Agreement verbs: form similar to urban SLs (locations/orientation change). • Spatial verbs: similar to village SLs (absolute frame of reference). • No plural forms found (yet). • In general, fewer verbs. 27 28 Conclusion Conclusion Conclusion (1) Conclusion (2) • IUR verb agreement similar to that in • A sign language with a micro-community urban sign languages, but fewer verbs. thus does not necessarily lack verb morphology. • IUR seems to make more frequent use of • IUR does not fit into the existing verb agreement than village sign typological division of urban and village languages. sign languages. • Need for typological classification based • IUR classifiers follow same underlying on grammatical aspects. rules as in other sign languages. 29 30 Conclusion Conclusion Division in sign languages? Suggestion SL typology V il lag lan e s gu ign ag es + Agr -Agr + Classifiers - Urban ? sign languages 31 32 References Contact info Glück, S. and R. Pfau (1998). On classifying classification as a class of inflection in German Sign Language. In: T. Cambier-Langeveld, A. Lipták and M. Redford (eds.), Joke Schuit Proceedings of ConSOLE 6, Leiden: Sole, 59-74 MacDougall, J. (2000). Access to justice for deaf persons in Nunavut: Focus on signed languages. Report Research and Statistics Division, Dept. of Justice, Canada Marsaja, I G. (2008). Desa Kolok – A deaf village and its sign language in Bali, Indonesia, Nijmegen: Ishara Press Meir, I. (2001). Verb classifiers as noun incorporation in Israeli Sign Language. In: G. Universiteit van Amsterdam, ACLC Booij and J. Van Marle (eds.) Yearbook of Morphology 1999, Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 299-319 Meir, I. (2002). A cross-modality perspective on verb agreement. Natural language and linguistic theory, 20, 413-450 Nyst, V. (2007). A descriptive analysis of Adamorobe Sign Language (Ghana). PhD [email protected] Dissertation, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Utrecht: LOT Dissertation Series Padden, C. (1988). Interaction of morphology and syntax in American Sign Language. PhD Dissertation, University of California San Diego Supalla, T. (1986). The classifier system in American Sign Language. In: C. Graig (ed.), Noun classes and categorization, Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 181-214 http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/j.m.schuit Zwitserlood, I. (2003). Classifying hand configurations in Nederlandse Gebarentaal. PhD Dissertation, Universiteit Utrecht, Utrecht: LOT Dissertation Series 33 34.
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