German Sign Language
Encyclopedia
German Sign Language or Deutsche Gebärdensprache is the sign language
of the Deaf community in Germany
. It is often abbreviated as DGS. It is unclear how many use German Sign Language as their main language; Gallaudet University
estimated 50,000 in 1986.
The language has evolved through use in deaf communities over hundreds of years.
tradition and historically has seen a suppression of sign language. German Sign Language was first legally recognised in The Federal Disability Equality Act (2002) in May 2002. Since then, deaf people have a legal entitlement to Sign Language interpreters when communicating with federal authorities, free of charge.
Very few television programs include an interpreter; those that do are the news and a news "round-up". There is at least one programme conducted entirely in German Sign Language called "Sehen statt Hören" (Seeing Instead of Hearing), a documentary-style programme produced by the Bayerischer Rundfunk
(BR) and broadcast on Saturday mornings on Bayerischer Rundfunk and the other regional state broadcasters in Germany.
has been developed, which is known as "Signed German" (Lautsprachbegleitende Gebärden, Lautbegleitende Gebärden or LBG, meaning "sound-accompanying signs"). It is rarely used as a natural means of communication between deaf people. Another system of manually representing German is cued speech
, known as "Phonembestimmes Manualsystem" (Phonemic Manual System). Similar systems that represent the English language are known as Manually Coded English
.
German Sign Language uses a one-handed manual alphabet ('Fingeralphabet' in German) derived from the French manual alphabet of the 18th century; it is related to manual alphabets used across Europe and in North America.
is descendant from German Sign Language. Israeli Sign Language
may be as well, as it evolved from the sign language used by German Jewish teachers who opened a school for deaf children in Jerusalem in 1932, and still shows some resemblance to its German counterpart. It is not related to Austrian Sign Language
, which is used in parts of southern Germany, nor to Swiss Sign Language
, both of which are part of the French Sign Language family
, though they have had some influence from German Sign Language.
or HamNoSys. SignWriting
also has its adherents in Germany.
, morphology
, morphosyntax and syntax
.
s: handshape, hand orientation, location and movement. If one of these elements is changed, it can result in a sign with a completely different meaning. Two signs differing in only one element are deemed to be a minimal pair
. German Sign Language uses 32 handshapes, of which six are basic handshapes found in all sign languages.
Two-handed signs are signs which are necessarily performed with both hands. Their formation is in accordance with certain phonotactic
limitations, such as the rule of symmetry (when both hands move at the same time, they have the same handshape) and the rule of dominance (if the two hands have different handshapes, only the dominant hand is moved while the non-dominant hand remains passive).
Uninflected lexical signs in German Sign Language have at most two syllables. Syllable
s consist of two syllabic positions, described as Hold (H) and Movement (M). Holds consist of the handshape together with the hand orientation (together referred to as the hand configuration) at a specific location in signing space. Holds do not contain any change of location (movement from one location to another). Movements, on the other hand, involve a change of location and may involve secondary movements such as wiggling of the fingers. Syllables may then be grouped into the following types: M (the minimal syllable), HM, MH, HMH (the maximal syllable). In the case of HM syllables, for example, the hand configuration of the Movement moves away from the location of the Hold. A syllable of type M can consist of the following specifications: a path movement (from one location to another), a path movement with secondary movement (such as wiggling or twisting), or a secondary movement without path movement. The syllable type H (a segment without a Movement) is not allowed for phonotactical reasons.
An elementary component oflexical signs are non-manual lexical markings, such as movements of eyes (rolling, widening), mouth (puffing, rounding) and face, as well as the whole head (nodding, tilting) and upper body (leaning). These are obligatory accompaniments of a quarter of all lexical signs. Making visual syllables with the mouth is referred to as mouthing
.
Sign language
A sign language is a language which, instead of acoustically conveyed sound patterns, uses visually transmitted sign patterns to convey meaning—simultaneously combining hand shapes, orientation and movement of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions to fluidly express a speaker's...
of the Deaf community in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. It is often abbreviated as DGS. It is unclear how many use German Sign Language as their main language; Gallaudet University
Gallaudet University
Gallaudet University is a federally-chartered university for the education of the deaf and hard of hearing, located in the District of Columbia, U.S...
estimated 50,000 in 1986.
The language has evolved through use in deaf communities over hundreds of years.
Recognition of German Sign Language
Germany has a strong oralistOralism
Oralism is the education of deaf students through spoken language by using lip reading, speech, and mimicking the mouth shapes and breathing patterns of speech instead of using sign language within the classroom...
tradition and historically has seen a suppression of sign language. German Sign Language was first legally recognised in The Federal Disability Equality Act (2002) in May 2002. Since then, deaf people have a legal entitlement to Sign Language interpreters when communicating with federal authorities, free of charge.
Very few television programs include an interpreter; those that do are the news and a news "round-up". There is at least one programme conducted entirely in German Sign Language called "Sehen statt Hören" (Seeing Instead of Hearing), a documentary-style programme produced by the Bayerischer Rundfunk
Bayerischer Rundfunk
Bayerischer Rundfunk [Bavarian Broadcasting] is the public broadcasting authority for the German Freistaat of Bavaria, with its main offices located in Munich. BR is a member of ARD.- Legal foundation :...
(BR) and broadcast on Saturday mornings on Bayerischer Rundfunk and the other regional state broadcasters in Germany.
German and German Sign Language
German Sign Language is unrelated to spoken German. The two have very different grammars, though as the dominant language of the region, German has had some influence on German Sign Language. A signed system that represents the German languageManually Coded Language
Manually coded languages are representations of spoken languages in a gestural-visual form; that is, "sign language" versions of spoken languages...
has been developed, which is known as "Signed German" (Lautsprachbegleitende Gebärden, Lautbegleitende Gebärden or LBG, meaning "sound-accompanying signs"). It is rarely used as a natural means of communication between deaf people. Another system of manually representing German is cued speech
Cued speech
Cued Speech is a system of communication used with and among deaf or hard of hearing people. It is a phonemic-based system which makes traditionally spoken languages accessible by using a small number of handshapes in different locations near the mouth , as a supplement to lipreading...
, known as "Phonembestimmes Manualsystem" (Phonemic Manual System). Similar systems that represent the English language are known as Manually Coded English
Manually Coded English
Manually Coded English is a general term used to describe a variety of visual communication methods expressed through the hands which attempt to represent the English language...
.
Manual alphabet and fingerspelling
Dialects and related languages
Regional variants of German Sign Language include Hamburg, Berlin, and Munich sign. Sign languages of regions in the former East Germany have a greater divergence from sign languages of the western regions; some may be unrelated. Polish Sign LanguagePolish Sign Language
Polish Sign Language is the language of the Deaf community in Poland. Its lexicon and grammar are distinct from the Polish language, although there is a manually coded version of Polish known as System Językowo-Migowy , which is often used by interpreters on television and by teachers in...
is descendant from German Sign Language. Israeli Sign Language
Israeli Sign Language
Israeli Sign Language, or ISL, is the most commonly used sign language in the deaf community of Israel. Some other sign languages are also used in Israel, among them Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language....
may be as well, as it evolved from the sign language used by German Jewish teachers who opened a school for deaf children in Jerusalem in 1932, and still shows some resemblance to its German counterpart. It is not related to Austrian Sign Language
Austrian Sign Language
Austrian Sign Language, or Österreichische Gebärdensprache , is the sign language used by the Austrian Deaf community — approximately 10,000 people. -Classification:...
, which is used in parts of southern Germany, nor to Swiss Sign Language
Swiss Sign Language
Swiss Sign Language is a deaf sign language of Switzerland. There are lexical differences between the various schools, influence of the local oral language which divides the language into three dialects, and a marked influence of French Sign Language around Geneva...
, both of which are part of the French Sign Language family
French Sign Language family
The French Sign Language family is a proposed language family of sign languages which includes French Sign Language and American Sign Language, among others....
, though they have had some influence from German Sign Language.
Notation systems
Everyday users of German Sign Language use no written form of the language. In academic contexts, German Sign Language is usually described with the Hamburg notation systemHamburg Notation System
The Hamburg Sign Language Notation System, or HamNoSys, is a phonetic transcription system for sign languages, analogous to the IPA for spoken languages. First developed in 1985 at the University of Hamburg, Germany, it is currently in its third revision....
or HamNoSys. SignWriting
SignWriting
SignWriting is a system of writing sign languages. It is highly featural and visually iconic, both in the shapes of the characters, which are abstract pictures of the hands, face, and body, and in their spatial arrangement on the page, which does not follow a sequential order like the letters that...
also has its adherents in Germany.
Grammar
The grammar of German Sign Language may be described in terms of the conventional linguistic categories phonologyPhonology
Phonology is, broadly speaking, the subdiscipline of linguistics concerned with the sounds of language. That is, it is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning in any spoken human language, or the field of linguistics studying this use...
, morphology
Morphology (linguistics)
In linguistics, morphology is the identification, analysis and description, in a language, of the structure of morphemes and other linguistic units, such as words, affixes, parts of speech, intonation/stress, or implied context...
, morphosyntax and syntax
Syntax
In linguistics, syntax is the study of the principles and rules for constructing phrases and sentences in natural languages....
.
Phonology
Signs are made up of a combination of different elements from each of the classes of distinctive featureDistinctive feature
In linguistics, a distinctive feature is the most basic unit of phonological structure that may be analyzed in phonological theory.Distinctive features are grouped into categories according to the natural classes of segments they describe: major class features, laryngeal features, manner features,...
s: handshape, hand orientation, location and movement. If one of these elements is changed, it can result in a sign with a completely different meaning. Two signs differing in only one element are deemed to be a minimal pair
Minimal pair
In phonology, minimal pairs are pairs of words or phrases in a particular language, which differ in only one phonological element, such as a phone, phoneme, toneme or chroneme and have distinct meanings...
. German Sign Language uses 32 handshapes, of which six are basic handshapes found in all sign languages.
Two-handed signs are signs which are necessarily performed with both hands. Their formation is in accordance with certain phonotactic
Phonotactics
Phonotactics is a branch of phonology that deals with restrictions in a language on the permissible combinations of phonemes...
limitations, such as the rule of symmetry (when both hands move at the same time, they have the same handshape) and the rule of dominance (if the two hands have different handshapes, only the dominant hand is moved while the non-dominant hand remains passive).
Uninflected lexical signs in German Sign Language have at most two syllables. Syllable
Syllable
A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds. For example, the word water is composed of two syllables: wa and ter. A syllable is typically made up of a syllable nucleus with optional initial and final margins .Syllables are often considered the phonological "building...
s consist of two syllabic positions, described as Hold (H) and Movement (M). Holds consist of the handshape together with the hand orientation (together referred to as the hand configuration) at a specific location in signing space. Holds do not contain any change of location (movement from one location to another). Movements, on the other hand, involve a change of location and may involve secondary movements such as wiggling of the fingers. Syllables may then be grouped into the following types: M (the minimal syllable), HM, MH, HMH (the maximal syllable). In the case of HM syllables, for example, the hand configuration of the Movement moves away from the location of the Hold. A syllable of type M can consist of the following specifications: a path movement (from one location to another), a path movement with secondary movement (such as wiggling or twisting), or a secondary movement without path movement. The syllable type H (a segment without a Movement) is not allowed for phonotactical reasons.
An elementary component oflexical signs are non-manual lexical markings, such as movements of eyes (rolling, widening), mouth (puffing, rounding) and face, as well as the whole head (nodding, tilting) and upper body (leaning). These are obligatory accompaniments of a quarter of all lexical signs. Making visual syllables with the mouth is referred to as mouthing
Mouthing
In sign language, mouthing is the production of visual syllables with the mouth while signing. Although not present in all sign languages, and sometimes not in signers at all levels of education, where it does occur it may be an essential element of a sign, distinguishing signs which would...
.
Further reading
- "German Sign Language Dictionary" - Maisch, Günther, and Fritz-H. Wisch (1987–89). Gebärden-Lexikon. Hamburg: Verlag hörgeschädigter Kinder.
- "German Sign Language" Rammel, Georg (1974). Die Gebärdensprache: Versuch einer Wesenanalyse. Berlin-Charlottenburg: Marhold.
- "Signed German" Hogger, Birgit (1991). Linguistische Überlegungen zur lautsprachbegleitenden Gebärdung. Hörgeschädigtenpädagogik, v.45 no.4, p. 234-237
External links
- Deaf and Sign Language Research Team Aachen - DESIRE (Aachen)
- Full list of online DGS dictionaries
- Institute of German Sign Language and Communication of the Deaf
- Rheinisch-Westfälischen Technischen Hochschule Aachen (RWTH Aachen University of Technology)
- Website of the German National Association of the Deaf