"English" signs? I'm confused.

CoffeeFiend

CoffeeFiend

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I’m having problems differentiating “English” signs from ones that are “Pure ASL”. As a student, I’m not seeing much difference between the two and my linguistics professor is confusing on the issue. (He’s Deaf.)
According to him, “Juice” signed with a “j” twisting at the mouth is “English” but the signs “duty”, “doctor”( with a d, not an m), “chocolate”, “wine”, “tan”, “church”, and “toilet” aren’t.
From my perspective, all of the above are initialized. All of these signs incorporate the first letter of the word they represent into the sign itself. I have signed all of the above in class, except juice. He chewed a girl out for signing that and firmly told her to fingerspell the word or get out of class.

Is there any way to tell what makes a sign “English” by watching/looking it up or is it purely based on the origin of the sign itself?
 
English sign and ASL sign is different-- English signs have more signs, ASL has fewer. Hope that helps.

For example, one might say, " I finished my homework", while in ASL it's signed as "homework finished".
 
Yup yup. But what makes an individual SIGN English?
I mean, how is the sign for "tan"(or any of those other ones with letter shapes) ASL but "Juice" with a j at the mouth is English? That's the part that isn't making any sense to me. O_o

Maybe my professor is just odd...
 
CoffeeFiend said:
Yup yup. But what makes an individual SIGN English?
I mean, how is the sign for "tan"(or any of those other ones with letter shapes) ASL but "Juice" with a j at the mouth is English? That's the part that isn't making any sense to me. O_o

Maybe my professor is just odd...
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Each teacher who teaches ASL have their own ways, but signing Juice with the letter J at the mouth is the ASL sign, while spelling it is English.
 
Egad, he told me it was the other way around, that proper ASL was to fingerspell juice while the j sign was English. Hahah!

*lets head drop to desk and lets out a heavy sigh*

Thanks for the info. Now I know! (Still not signing juice in class... I don't want to get yelled at...)
 
It's possible he's one of those who taught ASL from way back when it was legally allowed in the 1970's? Back before 1972, ASL wasn't allowed, but now it is.
 
That J by the mouth corner is the English sign.

ASL sign is like hand tips a drinking glass to the mouth, then the "J"
 
Hi CoffeeFiend,

It can seem strange at first, but some initialized signs have been accepted into ASL and others haven't. You really have to learn them as you go along. You sign "team" with a t, but (at least in certain environments around here) signing "try" with a t will get you sternly corrected. I don't even mean in a class.

It can also seem confusing that they want you to fingerspell but not do things they label as English. It can seem like spelling is *more* English-y. But I think the idea is that ASL is a real language that exists, with signs that are part of it and signs that aren't. If you get to a word that doesn't have an ASL sign, you can try to describe the thing, act it out, or maybe fingerspell, and you're sort of acknowledging that ASL doesn't have a sign for that. But if you use a sign from another system (like English based signing) then a boundary starts to blur, and it's a boundary that's very important to some.
 
CoffeeFiend said:
I’m having problems differentiating “English” signs from ones that are “Pure ASL”. As a student, I’m not seeing much difference between the two and my linguistics professor is confusing on the issue. (He’s Deaf.)
According to him, “Juice” signed with a “j” twisting at the mouth is “English” but the signs “duty”, “doctor”( with a d, not an m), “chocolate”, “wine”, “tan”, “church”, and “toilet” aren’t.
From my perspective, all of the above are initialized. All of these signs incorporate the first letter of the word they represent into the sign itself. I have signed all of the above in class, except juice. He chewed a girl out for signing that and firmly told her to fingerspell the word or get out of class.

Is there any way to tell what makes a sign “English” by watching/looking it up or is it purely based on the origin of the sign itself?
Click to expand...


You did not mention where you come from. Are you in USA, Canada or other country? "English" might indicated that it is in SEE (Sign Exact English) which they sign the whole sentences. Before ASL, I learned how to sign Ameslan which is similar to ASL many years ago. I am an old woman, 68 years old.

If you don't know the sign word for "Juice". Then you just sign in fingerspell so that it would be easy to explain what you were talking about.

I don't know the sign for "Juice" so I fingerspell it. In the corner of the mouth with the sign "j" meant jealous. I have never use much of English sign language which is different than ASL.

At the beginning of the ASL class, it is always better to practice fingerspell the alphabets so that we can have letters to go with ASL signs. Without the letters (fingerspelling), it is hard to make up a sign word for us to understand. So fingerspell the word is better so that we can understand more easier. That is the way we do as we are Deaf users like myself.

Do you understand what I am talking about???? :hmm:
 
Hey CoffeeFiend,

One other thing. I agree with Bebonang that in a beginning ASL class it's good to practice your fingerspelling. I think this is especially true because hearing people (or anyone learning ASL as an adult) often seem to have a hard time reading others' fingerspelling, so it's good to get lots of practice spelling and reading each others' from the start.

At the same time, I try not to *rely* on spelling if I can think of another way to get my concept across. This is because I know some people who really only sign. They don't know English much at all, including how many English words are spelled. So if I spell, they just look at me like "ok, that's nice, no idea what you're talking about, but nice for you." So it's good to think about how you would use the ASL you know to express ideas that you don't know a sign for. Maybe not at this early stage, but something to keep in the back of your mind for later.

You're not going to meet people like that here, because everyone's communicating by typing, so everyone has some spelling/reading/writing skill. But in real life you might come across people who communicate differently.
 
amylynne said:
Hey CoffeeFiend,

One other thing. I agree with Bebonang that in a beginning ASL class it's good to practice your fingerspelling. I think this is especially true because hearing people (or anyone learning ASL as an adult) often seem to have a hard time reading others' fingerspelling, so it's good to get lots of practice spelling and reading each others' from the start.

At the same time, I try not to *rely* on spelling if I can think of another way to get my concept across. This is because I know some people who really only sign. They don't know English much at all, including how many English words are spelled. So if I spell, they just look at me like "ok, that's nice, no idea what you're talking about, but nice for you." So it's good to think about how you would use the ASL you know to express ideas that you don't know a sign for. Maybe not at this early stage, but something to keep in the back of your mind for later.

You're not going to meet people like that here, because everyone's communicating by typing, so everyone has some spelling/reading/writing skill. But in real life you might come across people who communicate differently.
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Just to add that some Deaf people want to put on video or YouTube to discuss about what we want to say on the topic with ASL. We do that here, too. So far no one has post a YouTube to discuss what we want to say, yet.

Trainman does post videos or YouTube but there were only written sentences without ASL. Trainman like to do this to explain or teach us about those things. He had not discuss any of our discussion, only on his own threads in one OP thread which he started with introduction and then transfer it here on General Chat.
 
Bebonang said:
Just to add that some Deaf people want to put on video or YouTube to discuss about what we want to say on the topic with ASL. We do that here, too. So far no one has post a YouTube to discuss what we want to say, yet.
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That is such a great idea though. Hopefully some day more AllDeaf discussion threads in asl video:)

There was one person doing that - A young man named Ken (I think) from Jamaica? I liked watching his posts.
 
• ASL • American Sign Language

How do you sign "juice"? A co-worker of mine is trying to teach her hearing grandbaby.
Bren :)
​
DRINK or JUICE:
drink.gif


Bren,
If you are referring to "juice" in general--you sign a "J" right in front of the mouth using a double movement.
If you are referring to a certain type of juice you do a single movement of the "type" of juice and then the sign "drink" using a "C" handshape. For example, usually the sign "orange" is done using a double movement as you change from a tight "C" hand into an "S" hand, back to a "C" and back to an "S." When you do a compound sign however you will note that the movement of "ORANGE" is reduced to a single change from "C" to "S" and then continues on into the "DRINK" sign.

It is also permissible to sign "ORANGE" plus "JUICE" (using the "J" handshape for "juice.")
Grading notes: As an ASL instructor I would not mark a student wrong for using a "J" handshape. Nor would I mark the student wrong for using a double movement for the sign ORANGE as part of the compound sign "ORANGE-JUICE." But some instructors might, so it is always good to determine how strict your local instructor is regarding various signs. Additionally, if I were taking an ASL proficiency examination I would reduce the use of any unnecessary initialization of signs. Which is to say, I'd do the ORANGE-DRINK version rather than the ORANGE-JUICE version.

Which brings up an interesting cross-cultural / interpreting issue. Technically, an "orange drink" is nothing more than orange flavored sugar water. If it is important to distinguish between actual "juice" and a "flavored drink" I would clarify by adding the "real/true/actual/sure" sign to "ORANGE" or by signing "ORANGE PUNCH" (dominant hand fist striking left index finger). That leads to a completely different discussion of whether or not the sign "PUNCH" is appropriate to describe flavored sugar water. As a lexicographer I'm simply going to state that I often see "PUNCH" being used that way by a variety of signers and thus it is indeed part of ASL lexicon.

-- Dr. Bill
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IMO:

In a classroom situation where you're being graded/tested, use whatever sign the instructor shows you.

In the real world, use the signs that are common within your local community.

If you sign with people outside your community, by on-line video, be flexible.
 
Reba said:
In a classroom situation where you're being graded/tested, use whatever sign the instructor shows you.

In the real world, use the signs that are common within your local community.
Click to expand...

THIS ^

My daughter's ASL teacher was also a stickler for ASL signs only, no "English" signs. But the local Deaf community here freely uses initialized signs, probably even more than the "ASL" ones.

Keep in mind that are most likely going to be regional variations that have nothing to do with ASL vs "English".

"What" is a perfect example. All the teachers in our area are using "palms up circling" (similar to "here"), but all the locals use "pointer finger sweeping down the opposite '5' hand".
 
I've been taking classes and learning from Deaf friends variously as I'm able; my hubby just started taking some a class with me. He has a lot of questions and gets VERY detailed and technical and wants to know the "why" and the background of everything. So I was telling him also - in class or formal, use what is taught.
In the community, do what people use. I learned that 5/"pointing finger" handshape HERE in my first sign language class but have not seen it taught in classes <all since that first one taught by Deaf> here for some years. The times I've seen that sign in the community in my experience locally is by elderly people. The folks here under 50 or so that I've seen all use the open double handshape WHAT that is similar to HERE.

Things vary greatly and I tend to follow the example set by Deaf people locally.
 
dogmom said:
I've been taking classes and learning from Deaf friends variously as I'm able; my hubby just started taking some a class with me. He has a lot of questions and gets VERY detailed and technical and wants to know the "why" and the background of everything. So I was telling him also - in class or formal, use what is taught.
In the community, do what people use. I learned that 5/"pointing finger" handshape HERE in my first sign language class but have not seen it taught in classes <all since that first one taught by Deaf> here for some years. The times I've seen that sign in the community in my experience locally is by elderly people. The folks here under 50 or so that I've seen all use the open double handshape WHAT that is similar to HERE.

Things vary greatly and I tend to follow the example set by Deaf people locally.
Click to expand...
Deaf people locally don't always sign the same. For example, some of them came from other states.
 
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