AW: AW: AW: Creating a sign language ordered dictionary

Sun Dec 12 00:24:06 UTC 2010

Hi Charles, 

yes – I agree – especially your last comment about combining Spoken language
with Sign Language. 

I am so astonished that DEAF people still accept to read spoken language
vocabularies in order to describe their performance of an idea. I mean – we
do have a writing systems that allows to write and read Sign Langauge. I
would expect any Sign Language instructor and any Sign Language teacher to
offer vocabulary and grammar and documents in written Sign Language but not
in “glosses” as we call this mix up of spoken words ( or parts of spoken
words) in a sequence that goes along with the sign – sequence. I mean
reading SignWriting you get to know what and how to sign. Same is not true
with this loan of Spoken Language. 

Time will come that SL – students will get the chance to receive well
prepared documents in SignWriting in order to achieve a higher level in Sign
Language. 

Time will come that DEAF people will find themselves well supported that
their language – Sign Language – is taken as a language of its own – no need
to ask for loans from the spoken language -. Ha – well – may be except for
the “Mundbilder”. 

Stefan ;-)

  _____  

Von: SignWriting List: Read and Write Sign Languages
[mailto:SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU] Im Auftrag von Charles Butler
Gesendet: Sonntag, 12. Dezember 2010 01:06
An: SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU
Betreff: Re: AW: AW: Creating a sign language ordered dictionary

I understand your "search by word" for practical reasons, I guess what I am
looking to would be a future in which signed language dictionaries are just
that, signed language dictionaries, not bilingual dictionaries in a spoken
language with signs attached to them.

You wouldn't teach English grammar in French, nor French grammar in English
unless you intended that a person never be fluent in English alone or French
alone.  

So in teaching ASL, or LIBRAS, or Ethiopian Sign Language, I'm trying to
truly think in a signed language, in projection, so if I want to find a
sign, I want to look it up by handshape because I may see someone using the
sign and I have no idea, even in context, what it may mean.

I got so frustrated when I was taking ASL at Gallaudet University and the
question was asked "how many signs can you think of which use the "little
finger" handshape.  

The lists of signs included, spaghetti, innocent, idea, draw, etc, but every
one of the lists was in English words, in what I thought was a "total
immersion" sign language class.

I was the only one taking notes in sign language, so if I saw a sign I
didn't know, I tried not to ask in English, but in sign, and expected a
signed answer, not an English language answer, but the teacher, who was
native Deaf, kept on writing down English words, not what I wanted at all.

Charles

  _____  

From: Stefan Wöhrmann <stefanwoehrmann at GEBAERDENSCHRIFT.DE>
To: SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU
Sent: Sat, December 11, 2010 6:54:36 PM
Subject: AW: AW: Creating a sign language ordered dictionary

Hi Charles, 

thanks for your explanation.  

Well for practical reasons I am happy to look up a sign from „searching by
word“. 

Sometimes I feel lucky to look for signs by symbol – especially if I get a
message in ASL and have to look for the meaning of a sign. 

I see that you would love to have a dictionary in sign order. – This is
interesting. 

I do not know what categories would be first, second third – if I would go
to sort all the signs.

Thanks for your answer. 

Stefan 

  _____  

Von: SignWriting List: Read and Write Sign Languages
[mailto:SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU] Im Auftrag von Charles Butler
Gesendet: Sonntag, 12. Dezember 2010 00:14
An: SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU
Betreff: Re: AW: Creating a sign language ordered dictionary

Okay, when Valerie first came out with Sign Writing for Everyday Use, we had
an order to the signs within each group, following in a logical order from
straight to bent to curled.  With the growth of the system, handshapes have
been added without a logical progression so that missing ones may be
inferred but there is no order to them.  

For a complete dictionary, in sign order, then pushing "Sign Frequency" will
print them by group and in order of the numbers of the codes, but that
coding is not consistent across the board.

When I teach the system, I teach it in an order, Group 1, then Group 2, then
Group 3, then Group 4, but i also attempt to put the actual handshapes in a
logical order, and at the moment that varies from sign language to sign
language depending on which handshapes are actually used in the language. 

I published, some time ago, a proposed system to put 

1) handshape

2) orientation starting from facing the reader, half left or right, back of
hand, face up, forward half left or right, face down

3) rotation from vertical rotating clockwise.

4) --- second handshape would fit here if more than one hand is in the sign,
orientation, rotation

4A - I put location here, Valerie puts it at the end, from her experiments
with Deaf looking up signs. 

5) --- contact (touch, strike, brush, rub)

6) --- finger movement

7) --- vertical movement

8) --- horizontal movement

9) --- curved vertical movement

10) --- curved horizontal movement

11) --- circles

12) --- speed

13) --- facial expressions

So, for example, the following are in Sign-Symbol-Sequence Order for me.
All two handed signs come after all one handed signs for the same
orientation. 

image.php.png  = Group 1, primary orientation, no movement

image.php.png = Group 1, primary orientation, movement vertical, 

image.php.png = Group 1, primary orientation, first hand, group one, primary
orientation second hand, movement horizontal, facial involvement (ALL TWO
HANDED SIGNS COME AFTER ONE HANDED SIGNS)

image.php.png = Group 1, primary orientation, first hand, group 5, back of
hand, second hand, movement horizontal (GROUP 5 comes after GROUP 1) 

image.php.png = Group 1, second orientation, 45 counter clockwise, circular
motion, facial involvement

image.php.png - Group 1, first hand, second orientation, 45 counter
clockwise, Group 1, crooked handshape, finger movement, finger movement.  Is
this before the one above from the finger movement?

(SKIPPING A FEW)

image.php.png = Group 5, first hand, forward, half, 45 counter clockwise,
Group 5, second hand, forward, half, 45 clockwise, held in between, forward
twice 

image.php.png  Group 5, side forward, half, 45 counter clockwise, Group 5
side forward, half, 45 clockwise, held in between, twice forward twice, slow

The Sign Symbol Sequence may order the signs if each of them has been
ordered, but I have not sufficiently experimented to see if one enters signs
and then orders them by one's chosen order whether the "symbol frequency"
will follow that order.  

From: Stefan Wöhrmann <stefanwoehrmann at GEBAERDENSCHRIFT.DE>
To: SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU
Sent: Sat, December 11, 2010 12:08:45 PM
Subject: AW: Creating a sign language ordered dictionary

Hi Charles, 

can you explain? I do not understand. 

Stefan ;-) 

  _____  

Von: SignWriting List: Read and Write Sign Languages
[mailto:SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU] Im Auftrag von Charles Butler
Gesendet: Samstag, 11. Dezember 2010 14:29
An: SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU
Betreff: Re: Creating a sign language ordered dictionary

But can you print a dictionary from Sign Puddle in one's chosen order
without constructing it yourself? I order my dictionary down to the
individual handshape and movement, and that is all by hand.

Charles

  _____  

From: Stefan Wöhrmann <stefanwoehrmann at GOOGLEMAIL.COM>
To: SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU
Sent: Sat, December 11, 2010 2:37:24 AM
Subject: AW: I need your help: DOS Box and SignWriter 4.4

Hi Meryeme, 

I am no software expert whatsoever and it took me a long time to understand
the tricks how to install the DOS-Box proberly to work together with the SW
4.4  Program (except for printing) . I wrote a short tutorial – 

http://www.gebaerdenschrift.de/documents/dos_winxp/dos_box_installation.htm

Perhaps this can support you in your efforts? 

In addition to that. It takes some time to become an expert with this DOS –
SignWriter 4.4  Program  - you have to download and install the dictionary
... 

As Valerie mentioned before – the SignPuddle software allows an easy way to
create entries, to create documents, to send emails written in SignWriting,
to look up terms word – to sign order and to look up signs – symbol –to sign
order, you can search for frequencies (what are the most often used symbols)
.... 

Good luck 

Stefan

  _____  

Von: SignWriting List : Read and Write Sign Languages
[mailto:SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU] Im Auftrag von Meryeme Ayache
Gesendet: Freitag, 10. Dezember 2010 22:04
An: SW-L at LISTSERV.VALENCIACC.EDU
Betreff: Re: I need your help

hey Valerie and Stefan :-)

   I hope that you all are doing well. I installed the DOSbox but I have
problem in some DOS commands like 'md \sw' in order to create f directory
but I will keep trying I think that is because I am using window 7 but I am
not sure. and by the way I used the ASL SignPuddle Dictionary and I really
like but I don't wanna use it in my project because I need to enter the sign
writing manually because I have to verify first if the entered character
belong to the list of sign-writing language or not and that is what we call
it (the lexical analyzer :-) and it is the first step to realize a compiler
I will let you updated of my researches 

-- 

Meryeme Ayache.
Elève ingénieur ( 2ème année )
Ecole Nationale Supérieure d'Informatique et d'Analyse des Systèmes ( Rabat
).

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