A group of youth are chatting-you notice them smiling,nudging each other playfully but some thing’s different-this conversation is taking place in complete silence!Nothing can be heard but the sound of the jeepneys passing by and bystander’s chit-chat. How are they communicating?Take a closer look at their hands,making fast yet graceful movements accompanied with expressive faces conveying words.

Sign language is definitely an amazing,unique and beautiful means of communication, it is a language with punctuation and grammatical rules. Words have corresponding signs usually conceptual or derived from the meaning of the word combined with the emotion conveyed by the word. Take for example the word ‘happy’-

Notice the importance of facial expressions-even without the hands, no one would mistake the sign for sad would they? Just a twitch of your facial muscles would complete the message-one sign could be understood in a number of ways depending on the look on your face. Learning to utilize this ‘asset’ is one if not the most challenging aspects of learning sign. Imagine frequently frowning,smiling,raising your eyebrows, changing the shape of your lips during a conversation to convey the right message. Embarrassing? Well think of it like this: Would you enjoy talking to a person who speaks in a monotone?Never changes the pace,pitch or intonation of their voice throughout the whole conversation?Definitely not!We naturally add feeling to our speech-increase our pace when exited, raise our voices when angry, change our pitch when asking questions. In sign, your hands are your words and your face is your voice.

Unlike any spoken language where messages are conveyed through words, you don’t sign word-for-word but use ideas not following English grammar.What does this mean?Well, take for example the sentence:”where do you live”?A deaf would not sign that per word rather would sign “You live where?”Sign language follows the OSV (object,subject,verb) principle. More important than these ‘technicalities’ though is conceptualizing-if you don’t simply act out what you mean. This skill is especially useful when relating experiences or stories.In these cases, you would need to play the role of all the parties involved!This is where spatial referencing comes into play.Simply put,spatial referencing is assigning specific areas per party involved.For instance, if you were relating the story of Cinderella, you would establish the right side of your body as Cinderella,the Prince,fairy god mother and your left as the cruel stepmother,stepsisters and simply slightly turn your body to the direction of the party you’re addressing when signing.Traditionally,positive or good elements,attitudes or characters are assigned the right side whereas negative or bad the left side. Now imagine a story with various characters,how easy it would be to confuse your spatial referencing!

They really are many tips, suggestions,dos and don’t s regarding correct signing but the authority on that would be the owners of the language-the deaf community.Basically,once you get your hands to make the correct hand shapes, overcome your initial embarrassment,teach your hands and face to work hand-in-hand, increase your vocabulary,conceptualize and get a hang of spatial referencing, you’re good to go!Then the next time you see a unique conversation taking place in silence, take a deep breath, walk right into it and get yourself more tips!

Bookmark It