Research seminar: Dag Lindeberg

Title: Language variation in American Sign Language: The role of cross-linguistic influence

Language: American Sign Language, interpreted into Spoken English and Swedish Sign Language

Dag Lindeberg recently completed his PhD at the University of Texas at Austin. His research interests are mainly cross-linguistic influence within the signed modality and across modalities (spoken and signed) using quantitative methods. Dag Lindeberg is currently working at the Norwegian Support System for Special Education (Statped), documenting signs in Norwegian Sign Language and translating between Norwegian Sign Language and Norwegian. 

Dag Lindeberg. Private photo

Zoom

This will be a hybrid format seminar. If you wish to join via Zoom, please send us an email to get an invitation link: anna.sjoberg@ling.su.se

Abstract

A range of factors predicting variation in American Sign Language (ASL) have been suggested in the literature, including the age of acquisition of ASL, educational settings, hearing levels, adaption to interlock tors, and proficiency levels. Cross-linguistic influence between ASL and English is rarely mentioned despite extensive research on cross-linguistic influence in bilinguals of spoken languages. The absence of research on cross-linguistic influence in sign-spoken bilinguals could indicate that cross-linguistic influence is unique to the spoken modality. This research questions whether cross-linguistic influence and language control mechanisms depend on modality.

Known predictors of cross-linguistic influence, including language dominance, were compared with narratives in ASL produced by 100 deaf and hard-of-hearing participants who acquired ASL before age 8. Half of the participants had deaf parents. The results showed that ASL-English language dominance moderately predicted the measures of cross-linguistic influence (proportion of English mouthings and use of ASL classifiers per minute). Increased dominance in ASL was negatively associated with the proportions of English mouthings (moving the lips in accordance with producing an English word without voice) and positively with ASL classifiers produced per minute in ASL narratives. Other studies show that English mouthings positively correlate with the use of English prepositions and syntactic structures while signing ASL. The findings indicate that ASL dominant signers are less likely to employ English syntax in their ASL compared with English dominant signers. Cross-linguistic influence, in the form of syntactic choices, seems modulated by language dominance in sign-spoken bilinguals.

The gradual increase of English syntax in parallel with dominance levels suggests that signers commonly are in a bilingual language mode regardless of language dominance levels when using ASL. ASL and other signed and spoken languages may be better understood as communicative contexts than communication systems with distinctive sets of syntactic constructions. Signers may access syntactic structures common in ASL or English and assign signs to the selected structures in ASL discourses. The ease of access to syntactic structures may be regulated by language dominance.

If ASL is exclusively used in a bilingual language mode, linguists who are documenting the grammar of ASL may need to consider the appropriateness of using methods developed for languages that exist in monolingual language modes.

Contact

Welcome to contact us if you have questions about our seminars.
If you need a sign language interpreter, please let us know in advance.

Anna Sjöberg, PhD student
anna.sjoberg@ling.su.se

Carla Wikse Barrow, PhD student
carla.w.barrow@ling.su.se