The Grammar of the Body and the ABCs of Language
Wendy Sandler, Sign Language Research Lab, University of Haifa
Tuesday, 30.06.2020
11:00 – 12:00
Room: [virtual Zoom talk]
Sign languages teach us that humans have the capacity to create language in two different physical modalities. What can we learn from this dual capacity? In this talk, I support the idea that the body-to-grammar correspondence of sign languages shows us the ABC’s of language form and emergence. Sign languages allow us to see directly the Analytic properties shared with spoken languages. By tracking the Body-grammar correspondence in young sign languages, we witness the emergence of linguistic form. Different types of communities show the effect of Culture on this emergence path. And finally, Culture, in the form of sign language theatre, spotlights the range of linguistic expression by stretching it to its limits and beyond.