sign languages without fingerspelling

[Nobukatsu Minoura]

Hi,

> From: "Mieke Van Herreweghe" <Mieke.VanHerreweghe at rug.ac.be>
> Organization: University of Gent
> Reply-To: mieke.vanherreweghe at rug.ac.be
> Date: Thu, 11 May 2000 16:51:18 +0000
> To: "SLLING-L, Discussion List" <SLLING-L at ADMIN.HUMBERC.ON.CA>
> Subject: sign languages without fingerspelling

<snip>

> 2. Is there fingerspelling in communities where the spoken language
> does not have a phonetic/phonological alphabet (e.g. Chinese,
> Japanese, since as far as I know these do not have
> phonetically/phonologically encoded writing systems)? And if there
> is, how is the fingerspelling encoded?

Written Japanese employs phonologically encoded writing systems called
syllabary in English or hiragana/katakana in Japanese.  And Japanese Sign
Language has fingerspelling corresponding to the syllabary, i.e. most of the
fingerspelling units represent a CV sequence in spoken Japanese.

BTW, I do not know anything about the situation in Chinese Sign Language.

Nobukatsu MINOURA
Tokyo University of Foreign Studies