NORTHERN IRELAND Writing Dublin signs
Valerie Sutton
sutton at SIGNWRITING.ORG
Fri Aug 5 18:19:15 UTC 2005
SignWriting List
August 5, 2005
Hello Everyone and Shane!
Your messages are amazing, Shane. You know so much about these signed
language variations. Thank you for sharing this with us! I enjoyed
reading your message below...;-)
We need Deaf people to write these signs....Writing is power, because
it is read by generations to come...
I would like to ask a favor. Can you write some of these variants in
SignWriting, in the Northern Ireland SignPuddle, or the Ireland
SignPuddle, and then share them with us?...It would help us to
imagine the differences. Word descriptions are no good.
Maybe the NorthernIreland SignPuddle should have two entries of
everything...the Female and Male variants?...That is up to you...but
it is something to discuss with others...
I know you already entered a few signs before...there are 11 signs in
there right now. Go to:
http://www.SignBank.org/signpuddle/sgn-NorthernIreland
and click on SignMaker icon. Then create new signs...
To learn the SW symbols....
Click here for a short lessons document:
http://signwriting.org/archive/docs1/sw0008-About-SignWriting.pdf
Start on the second page and start going through the lessons...they
will give you immediate understanding of some of the symbols...
Hearing people need Deaf people to write their native signed
languages, so hearing people can learn them! The power will shift to
the Deaf Community, if written NISL becomes widespread in the Deaf
Community...
It is getting started that is the hardest...Maybe you can find a co-
worker from Northern Ireland to share the input of signs into
SignPuddle?
I am here to help anytime...so start asking questions...smile...
Val ;-)
---------------------------------
On Aug 5, 2005, at 5:45 AM, Shane Gilchrist Ó hEorpa wrote:
>
> When the Dominican Sisters started St Mary's School for Deaf Girls,
> they
> didn’t want to include boys - it was a very strange order (groups
> of nuns) -
> they had weird theories about sexuality and all that - but however
> they did
> start the school - and then I believe they brainwashed the
> Archbishop of
> Dublin to set up separate schools - one for girls one for boys...the
> Archbishop said "Oh, no mixing between deaf boys and deaf girls -
> it ll
> result in deaf babies!" but that was because of the Dominican
> Sisters and
> their propaganda-making.
>
> Remember, there were separate deaf clubs - one for deaf men, one
> for deaf
> women - in Dublin - they started to "integrate" in the 1950s or
> 1960s I
> think - maybe earlier - and until the 1950s, deaf people down South
> were
> told NOT to marry each other - just marrying outside the deaf
> community
> (which is really stupid)
>
> The most awful thing is that the female variant is very close to
> the LSF
> that was brought over from Caen, France - yet they went and changed
> the male
> variant - and took out or amended the breast-touching signs from
> the female
> variant - that way the girls won't touch their breasts when they
> sign (which
> is a bit stupid cos fluent signers hardly touch their breasts in
> any sign
> language) - and they tried to change the system - that way men
> won't mouth a
> lot - yet women will mouth a lot and rely heavily on lip-reading to
> understand each other. And even more, the Dominican Sisters and the
> Christian Brothers fought like mad against REAL ISL saying that
> it’s a bad
> language, that everyone MUST use GOOD ENGLISH - they promoted
> Signed English
> HEAVILY in the schools and OUTSIDE the schools (they also ran the deaf
> community - the deaf clubs, the deaf churches, the deaf retreats and
> everything - if youre from Cabra, don’t be surprised if a Christian
> Brother
> or a Dominican Sister turns up at your father's funeral and try and
> take
> over organising your father's funeral - that’s what theyre so used
> to!)
>
> Dr Lorraine Leeson and Carmel Grehan at Dublin's Centre for Deaf
> Studies are
> working hard on Women's Signs, recording the signs etc - despite
> the attacks
> from some male deaf leaders saying that womens signs are wrong,
> that they
> used the right signs at the boys' school etc - I do get attacked
> for using
> some womens' signs now and then - and theres a big language war in
> Dublin -
> Anglo-ISL (signed english) vs ISL etc.
>
> That's Dublin for you - we don’t have that complication up North in
> Belfast
> ;) despite the fact that our NISL consists of 3 different sign
> languages:
> ASL, ISL (male and female) and BSL!
>
> When I first learned ISL, it was of the female variant - but
> gradually I
> became "male" in my ISL - but with some female signs - I was told
> that I
> sign like a woman in me ISL - yet I sign like a man in my NISL (!)
>
> Rant over and done with!
>
> Shane
>
>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu [mailto:owner-sw-
>> l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu] On Behalf Of Ingvild Roald
>> Sent: 04 August 2005 22:54
>> To: sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
>> Subject: Re: AW: [sw-l] ESWS - European SW Symposium
>>
>> Yes,
>>
>> as far as I know they were separated as far from each other as
>> possible,
>> and
>> contact avoided, because some Hearies were afraid they might get
>> married
>> and
>> have deaf babies .... God forbid
>>
>> Ingvild
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> From: "Valerie Sutton" <sutton at signwriting.org>
>>> Reply-To: sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
>>> To: sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
>>> Subject: Re: AW: [sw-l] ESWS - European SW Symposium
>>> Date: Thu, 4 Aug 2005 12:50:21 -0700
>>>
>>> SignWriting List
>>> August 4th, 2005
>>>
>>> I believe it has to do with a girl's school for the Deaf, and a
>>> boy's
>>> school for the Deaf, in Ireland. They had different signed language
>>> variants, because they were isolated from each other enough, that it
>>> created almost another dialect of ISL...am I right, Shane? I
>>> also heard
>>> that they were isolated by religious schools as well?...no
>>> contact with
>>> each other will create new dialects and variations of the same
>>>
>> language...
>>
>>> Val ;-)
>>>
>>> -----------------------
>>>
>>>
>>> On Aug 4, 2005, at 12:34 PM, Stefan Wöhrmann wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Shane,
>>>
>>> what is this -- male and female variant of ISL ???????
>>>
>>> Stefan ;-)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
>>> Von: owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
>>> [mailto:owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu] Im Auftrag von Shane
>>> Gilchrist
>>> Ó hEorpa
>>> Gesendet: Donnerstag, 4. August 2005 11:47
>>> An: sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
>>> Betreff: RE: [sw-l] ESWS - European SW Symposium
>>>
>>> Chas,
>>>
>>> Sometimes knowing more than one national sign language does help
>>> a lot -
>>> and
>>> if one is a sign linguist in Europe, getting to know LSF (French
>>> Sign
>>> Language) would be VERY USEFUL because most national sign
>>> languages in
>>> Europe have started from LSF.
>>>
>>> With my native NISL, I had to learn BSL (British) and at least 5
>>> of its
>>> many
>>> dialects, ISL (Irish) and its male variant, female variant and north
>>> variant, ASL, fairly LSF and a bit of TID (Turkish), KSL (Kenyan)
>>> and a
>>> bit
>>> of DGS (German), a bit of VGT (Flemish), a bit of LSFB (Franco-
>>> Belgian)
>>> and
>>> a bit of NGT (Dutch) - I feel it is of some benefits to me as a Sign
>>> Linguist - and that is how I got to know that NISL is a separate
>>>
>> language
>>
>>> with a large amount of ASL, LSF, BSL and ISL inside it.
>>>
>>> Many fluent signers DO find it easy to pick up signs - it’s the
>>> question
>>> of
>>> keeping signs separate!!! :-o
>>>
>>> Shane
>>>
>>>
>>> ________________________________________
>>> From: owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
>>> [mailto:owner-sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu] On Behalf Of Charles
>>> Butler
>>> Sent: 03 August 2005 18:24
>>> To: sw-l at majordomo.valenciacc.edu
>>> Subject: Re: [sw-l] ESWS - European SW Symposium
>>>
>>> Hi Geoffrey,
>>>
>>> Charles Butler here.
>>>
>>> I know the feeling of being overwhelmed at the task of doing
>>> anything in
>>> an
>>> extra language, spoken or unspoken. I am fluent in English,
>>> passably
>>> fluent
>>> in ASL, can read Portuguese fairly well, and am beginning (at 52) to
>>>
>> learn
>>
>>> Libras enough to transcribe it and compare it to ASL.
>>>
>>> As a coordinator of Signed Language research, particularly a
>>> linguist, I
>>> would suggest that you focus on coordination more than day-to-day
>>> knowledge. Helping to coordinate the various groups (such as
>>> the ESWS)
>>> with
>>> other groups working in signed languages for Europe would be a
>>> doable
>>> task.
>>> Focusing on the linguistic need for documentation of the 63
>>> languages
>>>
>> will
>>
>>> be a task in itself. You don't have to do the work alone, yours
>>> should
>>>
>> be
>>
>>> a
>>> task of locating native users who would like to be involved in the
>>> linguistic research, much as you would with any other spoken
>>> language.
>>>
>>> Remember that Valerie Sutton (the inventor of our system) knows
>>> only one
>>> Signed Language and that word by word (ASL). She relies upon her
>>> Deaf
>>> friends to translate, communicate, and converse on linguistic
>>> issues.
>>> She posted a recent article on Verb forms in ASL, but that was
>>> relying
>>> upon
>>> other linguists work to show the differentiation between
>>> inflected forms
>>> of
>>> a verb. Such a comparison between two signed languages, such as
>>> British
>>> Sign Language and Norwegian Sign Language (to name two) would be
>>> a task
>>>
>> to
>>
>>> involve linguists in two separated linguistic bases, as compared to
>>>
>> French
>>
>>> Sign Language and ASL (which incorporated major portions of it at
>>> its
>>> inception).
>>>
>>> Coordination is a way you could strongly help users of separate
>>>
>> linguistic
>>
>>> communities to realize that their own communication skills are
>>> important
>>> in
>>> preservation and history. Helping to start, and fund, a linguistic
>>> endeavor
>>> in the 63 currently used languages (and perhaps capturing the 7
>>>
>> moribund)
>>
>>> would be fascinating, I would think.
>>>
>>> Does that help?
>>>
>>> Charles Butler
>>>
>>> Geoffrey Hunt <geoffrey_hunt at sil.org> wrote:
>>> Stephan wrote and asked me to contribute my impressions of the
>>> European
>>> SignWriting Symposium. I'm a little reluctant to do this, because
>>> I am
>>> probably the least competent person to do it. Let me explain why...
>>>
>>> I am a member of SIL International, an organisation that in one
>>> way or
>>> another is associated with work in over 1,300 languages worldwide,
>>>
>> almost
>>
>>> all of them spoken languages. For twelve years I worked in Ghana
>>> as a
>>> linguist/translator and, since then, have mostly been involved
>>> with the
>>> use
>>> of computers for language work, but always for spoken languages.
>>> Then,
>>>
>> two
>>
>>> and a half years ago, my then boss asked me, as an additional
>>> task, to
>>>
>> be
>>
>>> involved with coordinating work in sign languages for the SIL
>>> Eurasia
>>>
>> Area
>>
>>> (the whole of Europe, the former Soviet Union and parts of Africa
>>> and
>>>
>> west
>>
>>> Asia). I decided I needed to find out what he was ! talking
>>> about, so
>>>
>> set
>>
>>> about gathering a list of all the sign languages for which I
>>> could find
>>> details. For the Eurasia Area I have a list of 70 SLs, of which 7
>>> are
>>> extinct or nearly so. So which one of these 63 SLs should I
>>> attempt to
>>> learn in my part-time role? At my late stage in life, it does not
>>> seem
>>> practical to start learning any of them, because I could not do
>>> it well.
>>> (Let me know what you think.) So you see why I feel particularly
>>> unqualified to contribute.
>>>
>>> One thing that does interest me is how computers could be used
>>> to serve
>>> the
>>> Deaf community, either for use by the Deaf or for use by those
>>> working
>>> with
>>> the Deaf. So I came to ESWS because I wanted to link up with those
>>>
>> already
>>
>>> involved in writing such software. We in SIL are starting such
>>> software
>>> development using the Python programming language, so it was
>>>
>> particularly
>>
>>> useful to meet Lars, whose own development work is using Python.
>>>
>>> The best thing about ESWS was meeting! the participants.
>>> Obviously, I
>>> could
>>> not communicate with everyone, but I appreciated the general
>>>
>> camaraderie.
>>
>>> I
>>> learnt a lot, particularly about SW and Deaf culture. And I made new
>>> friends and look forward to meeting you at future events. A few
>>> of us
>>> tried
>>> to decide on a sign for me, but it doesn't seem quite right, so
>>> perhaps
>>>
>> I
>>
>>> will have to wait for another time.
>>>
>>> Best wishes,
>>>
>>> Geoffrey (Hunt)
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Stefan Wöhrmann [mailto:stefanwoehrmann at gebaerdenschrift.de]
>>> Sent: 28 July 2005 22:38
>>> To: 'Geoffrey_Hunt'
>>> Subject: AW: [sw-l] ESWO
>>>
>>> Hello Geoffrey,
>>>
>>> I am so happy to know you on the list - very welcome!!!
>>> Of course - I will send some pictures -;-)
>>>
>>> Can you post your ideas , impressions, ?
>>> What happened in your group from your point of view?
>>>
>>> I am very interested in any comment - just as we concluded at the
>>> end of
>>> the
>>> meeting.
>>>
>>> Stefan ;-)
>>>
>>> Just btw what was you! r name sign ? I forgot my notes in the
>>>
>> restaurant.
>>
>>> I
>>> am sorry!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
>
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