Vacancy: PhD project, The role of the mouth

[Onno Crasborn]

PhD student for ‘The role of the mouth in Sign Language of the  
Netherlands’ (1.0 fte)

Faculty of Arts, Radboud University NIjmegen, The Netherlands

Vacancy number: 23.12.09

Closing date: April 4, 2009



Job description

Deaf people in the Netherlands are always bilingual to a certain  
extent: they have acquired sign language and spoken language, although  
not always from birth. This results in a continuum of communication  
modes in which spoken language and sign language are combined. This  
project focuses on the sign language end of the spectrum. The core  
questions are to what extent elements of spoken Dutch have become part  
of the lexicon of Sign Language of the Netherlands (NGT) and how and  
to what extent mouth actions are used flexibly in the communication  
between deaf signers, as instances of code-mixing between sign and  
speech. To answer these questions, the role of the mouth as an  
articulator in sign interactions will be analysed in the NGT Corpus, a  
72-hour corpus of spontaneous and semi-spontaneous signing of deaf  
people from the Netherlands using different registers. The corpus  
contains signers from different generations, for whom the role of  
Dutch in education in the past decades has changed from being the only  
mode of communication to being one of the two languages in a bilingual  
education programme. What is the impact of this changing role of  
spoken Dutch on the structure and use of Sign Language of the  
Netherlands? One of the hypotheses to be tested is that the youngest  
generation is most flexible and creative in the combination of mouth  
actions with signs.

Depending on the interests and background of the candidate, it will  
also be possible to look at child language data or use experimental  
methods to investigate the production or perception of mouth actions.  
Assistance from deaf colleagues in the research group is available for  
the coding and analysis of sign language data.

Requirements:

The successful candidate has:

	• a Master’s degree in Linguistics, Phonetics, Language & Speech  
Pathology, or a related discipline;
	• an interest in the statistical analysis of language corpora;
	• basic signing skills or is willing to take sign language courses as  
part of the project;
	• good writing and presentation skills;
	• a good knowledge of Dutch and English;
	• a good team player.

Organization

The Centre for Language Studies is one of the two research institutes  
at the Faculty of Arts, Radboud University Nijmegen. It has a staff of  
around 70 FTEs, including some 35 PhD students and postdoctoral  
researchers. About 45% of our research projects are externally funded,  
three of which have been granted prestigious EURYI/ERC awards. CLS  
received an outstanding research assessment in 2006. Focused on  
broadly theoretically based empirical research and affiliated with the  
on-campus Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics and Donders  
Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, it provides a  
stimulating research climate and excellent opportunities for graduate  
training.
This project will be carried out in the research group on Signed  
Languages within the Grammar & Cognition programme of the Centre for  
Language Studies, in close collaboration with the other (deaf and  
hearing) team members. The research will be conducted at the  
Department of Linguistics under the direct supervision of Dr O.A.  
Crasborn. The proposed research will result in a PhD thesis that may  
consist of scientific articles published in high-quality journals.


Conditions of employment

The total duration of the contract is 3.5 years. The PhD student will  
receive an initial contract for 18 months with the possibility of  
prolongation for another 2 years.

The starting gross salary is €2,000 per month based on full-time  
employment.


Additional Information:

Additional information and the text of the research proposal (in  
Dutch) can be obtained from

Dr O.A. Crasborn at o.crasborn at let.ru.nl


Application letters, including extensive CV and MA thesis or other  
publications,

(with vacancy number: 23.12.09, preferably by e-mail) can be sent to:


Radboud University Nijmegen, Faculty of Arts,

Department of Human Resources, attn. of Ms. A. Graat

P.O. Box 9103, 6500 HD Nijmegen, the Netherlands

E-mail: vacatures at let.ru.nl
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