Siegmund Prillwitz, Alexander von Meyenn, Wolfgang Schmidt, Regina Leven
{"title":"Memories from the First Researchers of German Sign Language","authors":"Siegmund Prillwitz, Alexander von Meyenn, Wolfgang Schmidt, Regina Leven","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920119","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920119","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> Memories from the First Researchers of German Sign Language <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Siegmund Prillwitz (bio), Alexander von Meyenn (bio), Wolfgang Schmidt (bio), and Regina Leven (bio) </li> </ul> <h2>Introduction</h2> <p>This contribution is made up of separate memoirs from the first team that Siegmund Prillwitz pulled together around 1982 to begin research on German Sign Language (DGS) at the University of Hamburg. The \"Three Musketeers\" in this text refers to the first deaf researchers who worked with him: Alexander von Meyenn, Wolfgang Schmidt, and Heiko Zienert (who died in 2019). Regina Leven was also in this first research team and, at the same time, was one of the first DGS interpreters. In 1997, Prillwitz, von Meyenn, Zienert, Schmidt, Leven, and Bernd Rehling all received the Cultural Award <strong>[End Page 406]</strong></p> <br/> Click for larger view<br/> View full resolution Figure 1. <p>Siegmund Prillwitz in 1989. Photo courtesy of Thorsten Herbig.</p> <p></p> <p>of the German Federation of the Deaf, which is awarded every four years, for their pioneering work. DGS was officially recognized in Germany in 2002. Prillwitz retired in 2005.</p> <p>The contributions from Prillwitz, von Meyenn, and Zienert are English translations of interviews from television broadcasts, as well as from interviews published on the University of Hamburg website.<sup>1</sup></p> <h2>Siegmund Prillwitz</h2> <p>In 1979, I was an assistant at the University of Hamburg for the German language and was asked by Professor Kröhnert, professor of deaf education at the university at that time, to create seminars for teachers of the deaf so that they could better teach the deaf German <strong>[End Page 407]</strong> grammar. When I took a look at how this was done in schools, I was suddenly quite fascinated that during breaks in the instruction, the deaf students, even though signing was forbidden in class, still signed. And as a linguist, I wanted to know more about this, so I went to a kindergarten, early education classes, and a deaf club, and from then on, I became more and more interested in sign language.</p> <p>Then I was very lucky to meet Wolfgang Schmidt, social pedagogue at the Hamburg School for the Deaf, then Heiko Zienert, and Alexander von Meyenn. Beginning in 1982, every Monday, before going to my string quartet with my violin, we met at my home: Heiko, Alexander, and Wolfgang—three deaf intellectuals—and Regina Leven.</p> <p>Actually, I had come across the topic before through the literature. Before that, I had no contact with deaf people or sign language, neither through my relatives nor as a linguist. I had also largely succumbed to the common prejudice against sign language: \"Yes, that's probably a makeshift means to somehow communicate something visually.\"</p> <p>Our group started an investigation in which we looked a","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139977895","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Reflections on the Early Days of Sign Language Research","authors":"Susan D. Fischer","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920103","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920103","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Abstract:</p><p>In the spirit of the theme of this special issue, I'm going to focus largely on my experiences prior to 1980.</p></p>","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139977653","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Accidental Sign Linguist","authors":"James Woodward","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920111","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920111","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Abstract:</p><p>My involvement in sign linguistics began in 1969 and is still ongoing, with affiliations and collegial relationships at a number of institutions. Interestingly, all of these affiliations began with chance meetings or serendipity. Along the way, my research focus and emphasis has shifted, depending on funding, institutional priorities, or my own choices.</p></p>","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139977660","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"From Signed Swedish to Swedish Sign Language in the 1970s","authors":"Brita Bergman","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920124","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920124","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> From Signed Swedish to Swedish Sign Language in the 1970s <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Brita Bergman (bio) </li> </ul> <p>A<small>s hearing people</small> with sign language skills, we are used to answering questions as to why we know sign language. We all have a story to tell, some with surprising coincidences. One of my favorite examples is the young woman who wanted to register for an evening course in guitar playing. The course was fully subscribed, and it was suggested that she take a course in sign language instead. It was the beginning of a professional career as a sign language interpreter. Here is the beginning of my story.</p> <p>It is not entirely clear when it began. It probably happened back in my hometown, when I was a high school student and spent many afternoons at a café where three deaf, signing men used to meet.</p> <p>An important episode in my story occurred when I was a student in linguistics and took a course in psycholinguistics (spring 1971). The course coordinator, Inger Ahlgren, arranged a study visit to the school for deaf and hard of hearing children in Stockholm, the Manilla School. We were informed by the headmistress, Rut Madebrink, that sign language was not used in communication with the students. Since I knew that deaf people used sign language, it did not make sense. I could not understand why deaf children were denied access to the language used by deaf adult people. Instead of being approached with a language they had the ability to perceive, deaf children were left to look at the mouths of people whose speech sounds they could not <strong>[End Page 474]</strong> hear. I found it unbelievably cruel and felt like being thrown back to the Middle Ages.</p> <p>Later, I learned that The Swedish National Association of the Deaf (henceforth SDR) had since the early twentieth century advocated the use of sign language in deaf education. This work was intensified in the 1970s and began with a conference to which educational authorities and the parents' organization Döva barns målsmän (Guardians of Deaf Children) were invited. An important outcome of this meeting was that for the first time, the deaf organization managed to reach out to parents of deaf and hard of hearing children and that cooperation between the two organizations was initiated. This was a huge success for SDR, whose opposition to the oral policy of the National Board of Education, Skolöverstyrelsen (henceforth SÖ), was now shared with the parents' organization.</p> <p>The third semester of my studies in linguistics (autumn 1971) included writing a bachelor's thesis. At the first seminar, Professor Bengt Sigurd suggested possible topics, one of which was sign language. My hand flew up in the air. I knew right away it was my topic. I was prepared to fight for it, but no one else seemed to be interested.</p> <p>The fact that sign l","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139977897","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Research for a Reason","authors":"Charlotte Baker-Shenk","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920101","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920101","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> Research for a Reason <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Charlotte Baker-Shenk (bio) </li> </ul> <p>I<small>t took me</small> a long time, many years, before I stopped having dreams about the Linguistics Research Lab (LRL) at Gallaudet—of being part of something so much bigger than myself. Of good-hearted and bright-minded colleagues working tirelessly to discover and document the complex, brilliant structures of a denigrated language—and in doing so, to help alleviate the pain of an oppressed community that had been told it \"didn't have a language.\" The LRL had been a beehive of activity, fielding urgent requests for information and assistance from people all around the world, and a welcoming, resting place for Deaf<sup>1</sup> people working on the Gallaudet campus and elsewhere who would regularly show up to share their painful experiences.</p> <p>But I didn't start with an awareness of this struggle. Before ar riving at the LRL, I was simply a graduate student in linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley, in the mid-1970s with a background in psychology and an interest in the nonverbal behavior of hearing people while speaking. On a whim, I took an evening class in sign language with a Deaf instructor and fell in love with the language. That led me to help set up a fieldwork class at Berkeley with a Deaf instructor—and eventually to request a meeting with William C. Stokoe and ask for the opportunity to work with him at the LRL. At our first meeting, Dr. Stokoe (Bill) generously spent an entire day with me responding to my many questions and sharing LRL resources. However, because I couldn't muster the courage to ask about working at the LRL, I instead asked to return the next day, and Bill agreed. When I finally asked him the following day, Bill responded with his typical welcome and hearty support. My work there began in the summer of 1975. <strong>[End Page 203]</strong></p> <p>Bill and I ended up receiving a multiyear grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to study the linguistic functions of non-manual behaviors in American Sign Language (ASL), which became my area of research for many years. I was also fortunate, as a graduate student, to meet Drs. Paul Ekman and Wallace Friesen at their Human Interaction Lab at UC San Francisco, and to become part of their pioneering work in training a group of graduate students to reliably use their new Facial Action Coding System (FACS). FACS eventually became the primary tool I used for my dissertation research—meticulously coding all the facial movements, muscle by muscle, of native Deaf signers in conversations.</p> <p>It took hundreds of hours watching videotaped segments over and over again (noting changes in each video \"field,\" sixty fields per second) to numerically code and analyze a total of three conversational minutes! The results were astonishing—fac","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139977664","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Starting Sign Language Research from Scratch","authors":"Rachel I. Mayberry","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920106","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920106","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> Starting Sign Language Research from Scratch <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Rachel I. Mayberry (bio) </li> </ul> <p>P<small>erhaps the best way</small> to illustrate the environment of sign language research when I began my graduate studies at McGill University is to note the physical labor involved. There were no internet or digital archives, and I spent a lot of time in the library searching for books and journals after first figuring out which floor and shelf the item's Dewey Decimal number pointed to. Journals could not be checked out, so notes had to be taken by hand, or exact change was required for xeroxing, if you could locate a machine. Statistical data analysis by computer was possible, but only by mainframe because desktops hadn't been invented yet. Videotaping of sign language was possible using huge reel-to-reel and then cassette recorders on large carts with heavy TVs and only somewhat less-bulky cameras and recording equipment.</p> <p>My first sign language experiment was for a course titled Language and Thought with Professor John Macnamara (1977). I compared concreteness ratings for English words with iconicity ratings for their ASL translations, which I gathered from sign-naïve undergraduate students. To create the experiment, I spliced reel-to-reel black-and-white videotape by hand with a razor blade and then used special tape to rearrange the segments for the experiment. I analyzed the data with paper, pencil, and a calculator. Manuscript preparation was tedious too, requiring typing everything out on paper, including tables, and making figures by hand with graph paper and either drawing them or using press-on symbols and letters. I have wondered how many <strong>[End Page 263]</strong> potential researchers might have gotten lost along this trail of work. But my father always said that I was stubborn, so I slogged through. More important than the labor, however, were the teachers and scholars who helped me along the way.</p> <p>Before attending McGill University, I had attended Washington University, where I came across the dictionary of signs with black-and-white photographs that Stokoe, Casterline, and Croneberg (1976/1965) had compiled using a coding system they had devised to represent sign structure. This was the only research I located in the library to help me explain sign language to the then-director of the Central Institute for the Deaf (CID), Richard Silverman (of Davis and Silverman 1978), who had asked me to teach him sign language once a week and made me promise not to tell a soul because sign language was forbidden. The institute included an oral school for deaf children, a speech and hearing clinic, graduate programs in deaf education, audiology, speech pathology, and research programs and faculty who primarily studied the sensory, perceptual, and motor mechanisms underlying speech and hea","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139977896","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Exploring Danish Sign Language in the Late 1970s","authors":"Elisabeth Engberg-Pedersen","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920115","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920115","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> Exploring Danish Sign Language in the Late 1970s <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Elisabeth Engberg-Pedersen (bio) </li> </ul> <h2>The Present</h2> <p>It's August 2022, and I am working on an analysis of the position of temporal adverbs and stance adverbs in declarative clauses in Danish Sign Language (DTS). My data are sentences from the DTS online dictionary (<em>Ordbog over Dansk Tegnsprog</em>), from which I have extracted all examples with adverbs like <small>i</small>-<small>går</small> \"yesterday,\" <small>ofte</small> \"often,\" <small>heldigvis</small> \"fortunately,\" and <small>bestemt</small> \"definitely.\" I check the examples for markers of clause boundaries, watching them at normal speed and in slow motion on my laptop. The examples are extractions from video-recorded diaries and discussions, rerecorded and provided with a rough annotation that makes it possible to search the dictionary for glosses of specific signs. I already have some idea about the structure of clauses in DTS (Engberg-Pedersen 2002) and can categorize the adverbs after their position relative to topicalized constituents, topics, and predicates.</p> <h2>The Late 1970s</h2> <p>All that is in stark contrast to the situation in the late 1970s. Many years earlier, I had seen the 1952 British film <em>Mandy</em> about a deaf girl who learns to say a few words by means of a balloon that makes her feel the vibrations of sound. Today, we would see this outcome of deaf education as very poor. But the film left a lasting imprint on me.</p> <p>In 1976, I met the Swedish linguist Inger Ahlgren, who told me about her work with deaf children and their deaf and hearing parents. In contrast to Mandy's situation in the 1950s, Inger described a <strong>[End Page 357]</strong></p> <br/> Click for larger view<br/> View full resolution Figure 1. <p>Elisabeth Engberg-Pedersen (left) with some of her Scandinavian colleagues: Brita Bergman and Lars Wallin (Sweden), Marit Vogt-Svendsen (Norway).</p> <p></p> <p>situation where the hearing parents and their deaf children acquired Swedish Sign Language by interacting with the deaf parents and their children.</p> <p>I was fascinated by the thought of a visual language, and in 1977, I wrote to Britta Hansen, who was head of the Center for Total Communication in Copenhagen. The center had been established in 1973 thanks to a bequest. Its aim was to improve communication between deaf and hearing people. At that time, it was not obvious to everyone that DTS was a language in its own right and the best language model for deaf children. But little by little, the authorities, the teachers of the deaf, parents of deaf children, and deaf people themselves realized the potential of DTS for giving deaf children the opportunity to develop cognitively, socially, and emotionally.</p> <p>Britta invited me to visit the center. The year before, ","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139977658","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Viva la Differenza!","authors":"Elena Radutzky","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920120","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920120","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> Viva la Differenza! <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Elena Radutzky (bio) </li> </ul> <p>T<small>hose who know me</small> well, know that I have two serious chronic diseases. The first is rheumatoid arthritis, which has had some serious consequences, not the least of which for my signing skills. I can no longer make a fist, nor can I raise individual fingers. As a result, my deaf colleagues teasingly tell me that when I sign now, I \"slur\" like a drunk. My second chronic disease is a mental obsession: I am constantly driven to guarantee access to communication to those who are denied it, and this affliction dates back to long before I entered the Deaf world.</p> <p>I was born in Brooklyn in 1944 into a family of Eastern European immigrants from four countries. They arrived in New York Harbor, welcomed by the Statue of (so-called) Liberty! What a linguistic opportunity: I could have become multilingual and multicultural, effortlessly; each grandparent had only to speak to me exclusively in their language.</p> <p>Not a chance! They were all browbeaten into believing that to succeed, they must shed their language, culture, and accent and (heaven forbid) must never talk to the grandchildren in anything but English. My sister and I would enter the room while our grandparents were conversing in Ukrainian. Grandma would immediately whisper to Grandpa \"Onuki tut\" (\"The grandkids are here\"), and they would immediately switch to their broken English. Young as I was, I was furious!</p> <p>Lucky for me, my Uncle Pete married Maria, a beautiful Cuban woman who spoke a language my family could not understand—Spanish! That was it! I was determined to master it. (I'm a tad embarrassed to admit that my prime motivation was revenge.) I even <strong>[End Page 421]</strong></p> <br/> Click for larger view<br/> View full resolution Figure 1. <p>The American television comic Sid Caesar. Photo courtesy of the author.</p> <p></p> <p>changed my name from Ellen to Elena. I studied Spanish through junior and senior high and majored in it for my BA, then lived and studied for a year and a half in Spain to become fluent.</p> <p>Obviously, my language deprivation was nothing like what most Deaf children go through. Yes, I was deprived of being bilingual as a child, but I acquired my native English from my parents, which enabled full cognitive and linguistic development at the appropriate developmental moment in time. Furthermore, I was fully accepted by my parents as being similar to them. This is not the case with 95 percent of deaf children, who are born to hearing parents. But what drew me to the Deaf world and sign language? My father happened to be the best friend of the famous American television comic and mime, Sid Caesar (figure 1).</p> <p>From the age of ten, I spent many weekends at Sid's home. He had a Deaf gardener named Eddie, my first Deaf expe","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139977654","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Introducing the Contributors","authors":"","doi":"10.1353/sls.2024.a920100","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2024.a920100","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> Introducing the Contributors <!-- /html_title --></li> </ul> <p>Before you begin reading the detailed stories in the articles, you may appreciate the following overview—an alphabetical list of contributors with a few notes about how they got their start in this field.</p> <p><strong>Marie-Thérèse Abbou-L'Huillier</strong>, as a deaf daughter of deaf parents, first became aware of the linguistic and artistic aspects of her native <strong>French Sign Language</strong> through her experiences as a cofounder and very young participant in the International Visual Theater (IVT) in Paris. Her interest in the language was strengthened during an internship at Gallaudet in 1979, after which she collaborated with one of the first French Sign Language linguists, Christian Cuxac, and engaged in extensive didactic and artistic research related to French Sign Language.</p> <p><strong>Ben Bahan</strong> has been a storyteller in ASL since childhood. At Gallaudet University, he pursued a major in biology but remained involved in performance and storytelling. He heard about a job opening in Bill Stokoe's lab in 1977 and was hired to transcribe signs. He parlayed this experience into a research assistant job at the Salk Institute with Ursula Bellugi. He went on to graduate study in linguistics at Boston University but remained involved in storytelling and video production. After completing his doctorate in nonmanual marking in ASL sentences, he became faculty in Deaf studies at Gallaudet University in 1996.</p> <p><strong>Charlotte Baker-Shenk</strong>, while pursuing graduate degrees in linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley, was encouraged to take a sign language class because of her prior interest in nonverbal behavior. That led her to begin research on <strong>American Sign Language</strong> in 1975 at the Linguistics Research Lab (LRL) at Gallaudet University with William Stokoe. She wrote her dissertation on the linguistic functions of nonmanual behaviors in ASL questions.</p> <p><strong>Robbin Battison</strong> entered the field of sign language accidentally in 1970 as a student at the University of California, San Diego when he was offered a job as a research assistant in the Bellugi lab at the Salk Institute. His work for the next ten years focused on <strong>American Sign Language</strong> phonology, psycholinguistics, and neurolinguistics. He was lucky enough to work at two other hotbeds of sign language research: Gallaudet College (now University) and Northeastern University in Boston.</p> <p><strong>Brita Bergman</strong> was aware of sign language in her high school years, when she spent many afternoons in a café frequented by three signing deaf men. In 1971, as a linguistics student, she visited a school for deaf and hard of hearing children in Stockholm, where she thought it didn't make sense that signing wasn't u","PeriodicalId":21753,"journal":{"name":"Sign Language Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139981630","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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