Wrist versus Arm Movement

[Valerie Sutton]

SignWriting List
April 23, 2004

Charles Butler wrote:
> Valerie, I would differ with you on argue.  When I sign it, the wrists 
> wobble up and down, the hands rotate (facing the reader) from a 45 
> degree angle to a pointing in straight angle with the arms not moving 
> up and down in space at all.  It's just the hands that move.  So how 
> do you right the bending of the wrists for this?  It's not a flip, and 
> it's not a bending of the wrists up and down, like "YES" but a 
> rotation on the hand axis to the side but not carrying the arm with 
> it.

Hello Everyone, and Charles!
There are many ways to sign the sign for ARGUE ...If you are in a 
heated argument, it could be signed using the whole body, with an angry 
face, raised shoulders, and the movement up and down from the elbow...I 
guess it depends on how extreme the arguing is - ha! That spelling was 
taken from the dictionary written by three Deaf native ASL 
signers...they had two versions and both were not from the 
wrist...maybe they wanted it from the wrist (smile) but they didn't 
write it from the wrist...

So, I am just talking about the writing of that sign, and what the 
writing shows us...This writing, is not showing wrist 
movement...without any special wrist notation, it is assumed that it is 
the forearm movement, not wrist movement...So if you do not see any 
special notation for the wrist, then it assumed that the movement is 
from the arm...

please see attached...more soon...

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