[sw-l] left-handed or right-handed?

[Stephen Slevinski]

Hi Charles,

You may disagree with me, but you're not talking about lanes.  The head and
the hands are always in the same lane.  You can have the hands to the left,
right, extreme left or extreme right, but they are always in the same lane
as the head.  By definition, the whole body is always in the same lane.

View this online documents for the specifics.
http://www.signwriting.org/lessons/grammar/vertical/vert002.html

Talking pure mechanics, verticle writing centers the signs based on the
head.  Without lanes, the head is always centered in the middle.  When you
add lanes, you can put the head off center to the left or right.  Putting
the head to the left will move the entire sign.  (The hands move with the
head, because the sign is centered by the head).

Your example for Carmen Miranda is written horizontal.  See attached for
additional ways to write it vertically with lanes.  There are three columns,
each column has a head placement in the center lane for reference.  The
first column has all signs in the middle lane.  The second and third columns
use lanes.  Which column is the correct way to write Carmen Miranda
vertically?

-Stephen
  -----Original Message-----
  From: owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
[mailto:owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu]On Behalf Of Charles Butler
  Sent: Tuesday, December 07, 2004 9:19 AM
  To: sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
  Subject: RE: [sw-l] left-handed or right-handed?


  I would disagree with you Stephen.

  When I'm signing about people on opposite sides, my head goes one way and
my body shifts the other.  Sometimes the shoulders and the hips move in
different directions.  The eyes focus on something to the left but my body
has shifted to the right.  Here is the Brazilian sign for Carmen Miranda,
for example.



  There are two lanes here, the head and the hands.  I could have been more
extreme and shown the hips in a third lane to the opposite side of the
hands.

  If I were to try to show a long narrative, the head could stay in the
center, the body shifting to  one side or the other

  Stephen Slevinski <slevinski at signwriting.org> wrote:
    Writing in lanes is about body shifting. When the body shifts to the
left
    or right, the head shifts. Everything is centered around the head. The
    whole body shifts, so the whole signs is contained in one lane at a
time.

    Imaging a person sitting in a chair. If that person was discussing the
    functions of the right-brain versus the left-brain, they may use body
    shifting to identify what they are discussing. They could shift to the
left
    and sign: sequential, rules, logical. They could then shift to the right
    and sign: simultaneous, open-ended, intuitive. When transcribing this
    signed presentation, lanes would be used to illustrate that the signer's
    body shifted back and forth. This is a great aid to reading, because it
    becomes very obvious what the signer is talking about based on the lane.

    People have asked if it is possible to have more t! han one lane on each
side.
    It may be possible to have two lanes on each side, but any more than
that
    and the signer would loose their balance (and fall off their chair if
    sitting).

    -Stephen

    -----Original Message-----
    From: owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
    [mailto:owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu]On Behalf Of Sandy Fleming
    Sent: Tuesday, December 07, 2004 3:40 AM
    To: sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
    Subject: RE: [sw-l] left-handed or right-handed?


    Me again!

    > So meanwhile, there is this new program SignText which is the first in
    > history to create Sign-Lanes...so you can place a sign to the right or
    > left by saying which Sign-Lane it belongs in...This is a wonderful
step
    > forward...but...we will need both right and left handed signs for
    > writing in the Sign Lanes, because the right and left handed signs
    > interchange sometimes, because of grammer issues...
    >
    > Val ;-)

    I! had a niggling doubt about the lanes facility in SignText when it was
    origanlly explained. As you say, you can place a _sign_ to the right or
to
    the left, but this isn't enough, is it?

    Often the hands and the head are in different lanes - is this going to
be
    incorporated into the program? The origianl SWML that we saw just had
one
    element to say which lane the sign is in. At the very least we need two
lane
    elements, one to say which lane the head is in, and one to saw which
lane
    the hands are in.

    Sandy



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