Belgium: Lessons in Spelling

[Valerie Sutton]

SignWriting List
October 28, 2005

> On Oct 28, 2005, at 2:28 AM, Kasterlinden Bilinguaal wrote:
> So you prefer the 5 handshape.. because the way we actually sign it  
> is not with the 5 handshape but the hand is a little more closed.  
> So sometimes you take different handshapes considering what you  
> think people will read easier? I'm not sure about the contact  
> symbol. The way I sign it, the right hand starts on top of the left  
> hand and closes into the C-shape. But the C-shape does not grasp  
> the right hand..

Hello Kathleen and Everyone!
That is fine about the 5 Hand being more closed, and the Inbetween  
symbol is Touch and not Grasp...I just re-did it in your SignPuddle  
to correct those two things...see attached...Thanks for telling me ;-)

But my real point, which I didn't explain well, is that we have a  
Spelling Rule:

Write the Position of Contact
http://signwriting.org/lessons/elessons/less063.html

And applying that rule, the end position, which shows the two hands  
contacting each other, would be written in this case, because the  
meaning of the sign is held in the way the two hands relate to each  
other. I was very fortunate to work with a team of 10 Deaf adults  
back in the 1990's, and we found over time, that people read signs  
better when they see the contacted position written as close to real  
life as possible...so I wanted to share this with you...From a  
foreigner's perspective, technically the dot alone, at the end of an  
arrow, does not assume that the fingers are coming together (although  
they probably are in European signed languages)...Technically, the  
dot just means any kind of closing, and you could be only partially  
closing...so there is more guessing, for the reader, when the  
Position of Contact is not written...Thank you for all your hard  
work...smile...



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