Words in Hand

Well perhaps you recognize some of the signs that were in Gerry's story? George also uses the same range of signs; one-handed signs and two-handed signs. Perhaps you recognize examples like WHAT, MUST, FIND, SCHOOL, SAY, HARD, BEAUTIFUL, TWO OF US? Those one-handed signs were made just in front of the body in this area, or on the face. Did you notice the sign that George used for 'telephone' wasn't our sign that you've seen before as telephone, but it was related to the old sign. That was the old sign for 'telephone' but you can see it in different ways as a two-handed sign or as a one-handed sign TELEPHONE. Let's look at some other two-handed signs MUST. We had a single-handed sign MUST we've seen before but this one was MUST, CHILDREN, HOUSE. Perhaps you'll know other signs for 'house'. Also using two hands for example HOUSE or HOUSE sign EDUCATE. Other signs, the sign SIGN itself. I wonder if you caught the means of transport that he used when he was in Thailand? He told us it wasn't a car and it wasn't a taxi, what was it? Well let's have a look at the signs he used. He showed us people sitting and something that was in front, what was that? It's the same as our sign for 'Cycle' so what was it? If you think abroad in Thailand, maybe you've seen on television, or something like that, you'll know that people sit behind and there's a man cycling at the front and they're called 'Trishaws'.

So all of those signs that we've looked at have used two hands. Remember what we said before, both hands are active and they're both doing the same thing. The same handshapes, and moving at the same time. But there's another group, where the left hand just stays stationery. We had examples like ARRIVE, IN, LIFE, TOP or HEADMASTER and several signs connected with money. MONEY with the one hand, but MONEY with the two hands, PAY and CHARGE. George also used to sign for 'job' that's a universal sign. It shows our way of saying 'Where's your work?' or 'What do you work at?' But universally we say 'What's your job?' So we're beginning to get some idea that signs of BSL have a definite structure and it is different from the structure of English words because English words have sounds which are arranged one after the other in the sequence. But in BSL words we've got to try and do everything at the same time.

So let's clarify again what the important parts of a sign are. First of all there's the position. it can be on the body or in front of the body. if we look at the head area or the face, we can see a number of different significant important positions. I might sign NAME and then exactly the same hand shape, moved in the same way but put at the chin, you can see NAME (and then) but it has a different meaning NAME and AFTERNOON. So we would say that the brow and the chin are significantly different in BSL. A similar example is EASY and SENSIBLE. Let's have a look at the range of different positions on the face that are significant in BSL.

In the same way we have separate parts, significant parts of the face, we have separate significant parts of the body/ There's the chest, the upper part of the arm, the lower part of the arm and there are also some signs produced on the lower part of the body from the waist down. We've even found that there's a distinction between the upper part of the chest and the lower part of the chest in signs like SORRY and DELICIOUS. So let's look at these different parts of the body.

Another part of the sign that we've already seen is the actual handshape. We can have a sign like CONSIDER and a sign like SUSPICIOUS, and the only difference between the two signs is the handshape. The handshape changes for CONSIDER and SUSPICIOUS, everything else is the same. BSL has a whole range of different handshapes. Here's some of them.

When we use gesture we obviously move our arms around. Movement is one of the main aspects of sign structure and again slight differences in the way that we sign and move and the direction, can make a tremendous difference in the meaning. We have examples like JUST IN CASE and ARTIFICIAL. Both signs use the same hand shape and are made at the nose, but the movement is different: JUST IN CASE, ARTIFICIAL.

Another example is CABBAGE and the sign NEVER. The only difference between those two is that the action is repeated in CABBAGE, but not in NEVER (which has) just the one movement; just a slight difference, but look at the change in meaning; it's such an important difference. Another aspect of sign structure that we now realise is very important, is what we call 'Orientation'. That means the direction of the palm and the fingers.

Let's look at it in some examples. We have SWIM and WHERE. As you can see the only difference in WHERE is the palm is pointing up and then SWIM the palms are pointing down, otherwise the signs are exactly the same, but again look at the difference in meaning.

The main difference between the two signs BROTHER and ENGINE is in the direction of the palms and the fingers. Here's BROTHER, with the palm that way and the fingers that way and ENGINE (with) the palm that way and the fingers that way. The two meanings have nothing in common and the signs are completely different in meaning, but they're made in a very similar way.

Why is it so important to be aware of the structure of BSL signs? Let's think of it in relation to learning a foreign language. If we learn a foreign language, like French or German, we have to learn the vocabulary, the words and the grammar of that language. We have to learn how to pronounce that language as well as we can, so our French sounds as much... and we try to get it as close as possible to what French people say. In the same way, we have to try and produce signs and make those BSL signs as close as possible to what deaf people produce. We also we have to realise that the handshapes and the positions and the movements can be very precise, and if we make slight differences in that, in the way we sign, it may seem strange and looks strange to a deaf person. It might change the meaning completely and we find ourselves in a very embarrassing situation, because we signed in the wrong way.

So let's have a look again at George's story and this time we'll look at it with sound. That might help you to notice some of the points that we've been talking about.