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British Sign Language Corpus Project: Documenting and describing variation in BSL Adam Schembri, Jordan Fenlon, Ramas Re

British Sign Language Corpus Project: Documenting and describing variation in BSL Adam Schembri, Jordan Fenlon, Ramas Rentelis & Rosemary Stamp. Overview. Background to the BSL Corpus Project Methodology What we are finding so far Handshape variation Vocabulary variation and change

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British Sign Language Corpus Project: Documenting and describing variation in BSL Adam Schembri, Jordan Fenlon, Ramas Re

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  1. British Sign Language Corpus Project:Documenting and describing variation in BSLAdam Schembri, Jordan Fenlon, Ramas Rentelis & Rosemary Stamp

  2. Overview • Background to the BSL Corpus Project • Methodology • What we are finding so far • Handshape variation • Vocabulary variation and change • Conclusion

  3. Why a corpus project of BSL? • Need for more work on BSL vocabulary, grammar, variation and change to increase our understanding of BSL linguistics (more work needed since Sutton-Spence & Woll, 1999) • One dictionary organized according to linguistic principles (Brien, 1992), but fewer than 2000 signs

  4. Why a corpus project of BSL? • Access to the data for researchers and the Deaf community: • Advances in technology make data-sharing possible, using new software such as ELAN • To provide evidence and material for sign language teaching and interpreter training • Language documentation & language change/endangerment • To address concerns in British Deaf community about BSL variation and change: heritage forms of BSL not being passed on to a younger generation?

  5. Background: Aims of the BSL Corpus Project • To create an on-line, open-access collection of BSL digital video data. • To research BSL variation, change and vocabulary frequency • Project timeline: January 2008-December 2010

  6. Linguistic structure • Grammar / syntax: rules for combining signs into sentences • Vocabulary / lexicon: the list of signs • Phonology: the structure of signs (i.e., handshape, movement, location, non-manuals)

  7. Background: Specific studies • (1) Sociolinguistic variation and change in • (a) phonology: signs made with the 1 handshape • (b) vocabulary: 101 signs from BSL vocabulary • (c) grammar: sentence structure and different groups of verb signs • (2) Sign frequency: in a collection of 100,000 signs, what are the most frequent signs? (see work on NZSL, McKee & Kennedy, 2006)

  8. Methodology: Sociolinguistic approach • Film ≥30 Deaf native and near-native signers (BSL exposure by 7 years of age) in 8 regions across the UK: • England (London, Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester, Newcastle) • Wales: Cardiff • Scotland: Glasgow • Northern Ireland: Belfast • Total sample of ≥240 individuals, balanced for age, gender, language background, possibly social class and ethnicity

  9. Deaf community fieldworkers (cf. ‘contact people’) recruited 249 Deaf people (minimum of 30 x 8 regions) that match project criteria Filmed over 2-4 visits No hearing people present during filming Pairs of signers from the same region and in the same age group Lived in the region for 10 years or more Methodology: Recruitment & data collection

  10. Methodology: Recruitment & data collection • Filming session: • blue background screen • two lights • plain colored clothing (back-up T-shirts) • chairs without arms • 1 high definition video-camera(s) focused on each participant, 1 on the pair

  11. Phase 1: 249 signers for 2 hours 2008-2010 Warm up activity: 5 minute personal experience stories (example 1) 30 minutes free conversation (example 2) 20 minute interview (example 3) 10 minute vocabulary task (example 4) Phase 2: 100 native signers for 2 hours (2010>?) More stories More interviews Language games, tasks etc Methodology: Content

  12. Data collection: 249 participants filmed Belfast 30 Birmingham 30 Bristol 32 Cardiff 30 Glasgow 30 London 37 Manchester 30 Newcastle 30 Why these locations? All are large cities, with 5 in England (South-east, South-west, Midlands, North-east and North-west) and 1 each in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland All have (or had in the past) a residential Deaf school Limited time and budget so not able to film Deaf people in more places Current status: March, 2010

  13. So what are finding out thus far? • (1) Sociolinguistic variation and change in • (a) phonology: handshape variation in signs made with the 1 handshape • preliminary results from 4 out of 8 cities • (b) vocabulary: number signs (i.e., 100 target lexical items) • results from all 8 cities for 20 number signs (signs for 1-20) out of 101 signs

  14. BSL 1 handshape variation • The 1 handshape can undergo • thumb extension • pinky extension • both thumb and pinky extension • full handshape change, for example, with all fingers and thumb extended

  15. Why is this important? • BSL students often do not develop BSL receptive/comprehensive skills very quickly: why is that? • One reason is that signs are not produced in conversation in their citation form (the way the sign is produced in the dictionary) • In the rapid signing of conversations between fluent signers, handshapes, locations and movements in signs can change from citation form

  16. BSL 1 handshape variation • Aim to try to understand what variation can happen in one group of signs: signs made with the 1 handshape • Examples include signs like THINK, PEOPLE, HEARING, QUICK, THERE, WHAT, BUT, ME, YOU etc • So far, we have coded 1200 examples from 120 participants in Glasgow, Bristol, Manchester and Birmingham • 64% +citation form, 36% –citation form

  17. Distribution: Handshape variation

  18. BSL 1 handshape variation: Factors Linguistic factors: • Sign type • pointing signs (e.g., THERE, ME, YOU etc) • other signs (e.g., THINK, PEOPLE, HEARING, QUICK, WHAT, BUT) • Handshape in the sign before and in the sign after the 1 handshape sign: • 1 handshape • some other handshape • no handshape due to pause in the signing

  19. BSL 1 handshape variation: Factors Social factors: • Gender (male versus female) • Age (18-50 years old versus 51-94 years old) • Language background (parents Deaf or hearing) • Region: Glasgow, Manchester, Bristol & Birmingham • BSL teaching experience (20/120 participants)

  20. BSL pointing signs versus non-pointing signs

  21. Influence from signs before and signs after the 1 handshape sign

  22. Handshape assimilation • ME THINK YOU-ARE-RIGHT • ME THINK I-AM-WRONG • ME THINK YOU HEARING • Our research shows that THINK more likely to have thumb extension in (1), pinky extension in (2) and neither in (3)

  23. Women produced less variation than men

  24. BSL 1 handshape study • Pointing signs show more variation in handshape than non-pointing signs • The handshape in the signs before and after the 1 handshape signs influence the handshape variation • Women signers slightly prefer citation forms of these signs when compared to men • Age, region, language background, teaching experience not significant

  25. BSL sign variation and change • Lexical variation research questions • Is there evidence of traditional regional signs disappearing in BSL? • Which groups in the Deaf community are using fewer traditional regional signs? • Kyle & Allsop (1982) found around 50% in Bristol had difficulty understanding BSL varieties from other parts of the UK • Deaf community observations suggest sign variation in BSL appears to be diminishing • This change is perhaps the result of the more national and more international Deaf identity in the UK, due to increased mobility, inter-regional and international contact, and external influences, such as sign language interpreting on television and Deaf programmes, such as BBC ‘See Hear’

  26. BSL sign variation: Number signs All participants asked to produce their signs for 1 to 20 in a fixed random order, which are coded for: • Each specific sign used • Whether each sign is a traditional regional number sign or a non-traditional sign • Whether each sign was two-handed or one-handed (6,7,8,9,16,17,18,19 only) • Gender (male vs. female) • Age (18-35, 36-50, 51-65, 66+) • Language background (parents Deaf or hearing) • School education: local or non-local school Results from 4,233 examples (i.e., number signs 1-20 –except 1,2 and 5– from all 249 participants)

  27. Number sign task

  28. Results: Number sign variation

  29. Number signs: age differences

  30. SIXTEEN & SEVENTEEN in Manchester

  31. Results: Number sign variation-1 handed versus 2 handed forms

  32. BSL Number sign variation and change study • Number sign use is changing: younger people are using fewer traditional regional number signs • Some Deaf people with hearing parents and those educated in schools outside of the region where they live also use fewer traditional regional number signs • Older people, people from Deaf families and men tend to use more two-handed number signs

  33. BSL Corpus Project: Acknowledgements • Thanks to the following researchers whose work influenced our research design: Trevor Johnston (Australia), Onno Crasborn (The Netherlands), Ceil Lucas (USA), David McKee & Graeme Kennedy (New Zealand) • Thanks to the project co-investigators (Kearsy Cormier, Margaret Deuchar, Frances Elton, Donall O’Baoill, Rachel Sutton-Spence, Graham Turner, Bencie Woll) & Deaf Community Advisory Group members (Linda Day, Clark Denmark, Helen Foulkes, Melinda Napier, Tessa Padden, Gary Quinn, Kate Rowley & Lorna Allsop) • Thanks to Sally Reynolds, Avril Hepner, Carolyn Nabarro, Dawn Marshall, Evelyn McFarland, Jackie Parker, Jeff Brattan-Wilson, Jenny Wilkins, Mark Nelson, Melinda Napier, Mischa Cooke & Sarah Lawrence

  34. Contacts & websites • Adam Schembri a.schembri@ucl.ac.uk • Ramas Rentelis r.rentelis@ucl.ac.uk • Jordan Fenlon j.fenlon@ucl.ac.uk • Rose Stamp r.stamp@ucl.ac.uk • DCAL Research Centre, UCL • www.dcal.ucl.ac.uk • Project website • www.bslcorpusproject.org

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