finger movements spelling rules

[Charles Butler]

  or 
 
It's real hard to show hands on top of each other closing, and swirling clockwise while closing to an A handshape.
 
Which is clearer?


Valerie Sutton <sutton at signwriting.org> wrote:
SignWriting List
November 3, 2005

> Charles Butler wrote:
>> How does this look following those rules, the hands spin in a 
>> circle while trilling.

Hello Charles -
Thanks for this question. That is a beautiful sign from Brazil, isn't 
it? smile...

There are two different issues here...One is the symbols themselves, 
and the other is...What do we do, when we do not want to write both 
the beginning and ending positions?...

So far, with the rules that I just posted, I was writing both the 
beginning and ending positions of the sign. I am not saying you have 
to do that, it is just a question that keeps coming up over the 
years...what happens when we take one of those hand positions 
away?..and which one do we take away? We know, with the dot-by-dot 
symbols we have to have the open hand, or otherwise we don't know 
which finger is closing first, second or third, so I guess if you are 
going to take one away, you have to take the ending position away, 
which is what you did in this writing...

So we are assuming knowledge of the sign...and that is ok, if it can 
be read by the people who know the sign!

For me, as a foreigner, I would not really know how the sign 
finishes...what handshape does it close into? An S handshape, or an A 
handshape? And are those two ending handshapes relating to each other 
at the end? or are they separated by space? smile...

Would it hurt to write the ending position? Thanks for your 
question! Val ;-)



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