Imagine that you have received a research grant to conduct a linguistic study of your target language and culture. How would you get started, and what would you investigate? How would different structural components presented in class appear in your work?
If I were given a research grant to conduct a linguistic study of ASL, I would investigate the regional variations in ASL. Having only spoken rigid spoken languages all my life, I was so surprised when I found out about all the variations in ASL across the US. For example: my language partner Ms. Reba Poole, who was born in Richmond, signs things a certain way. My language partner, Ms. Kaye Wise, who was born in Florida, signs things a different way. Moreover, the Barron’s textbook that we used throughout the semester had some completely different signs than what both our language partners were not familiar with. As a result, whenever we worked together, we often noticed the regional differences in signs and tried to make sense of which ones we should rather learn. Given the general understanding that ASL developed independently across different parts of the US, it is not surprising that these variations exist. However, it is still fascinating how majority of the ASL signs have been standardized over time, while a few signs continue to be different. Using my grant, I would study how speakers in different regions settled on a particular sign for a certain word. I would also study the consequence of such variation when it comes to people from different US regions interacting with each other or consuming media, academic materials etc. created by each other. Further, I would investigate whether such regional variation extends to syntax and morphology or if it is strictly limited to signs.
Next, I would study the trend of borrowing and existence of loan signs in ASL. As we discussed in our final cultural presentation, there is an increasing pressure on ASL speakers to change signs that are offensive in current socio-political climate. As a result, there is a lot more borrowing happening, especially when it comes to signs for different countries and ethnicities. For example: China was previously signed by making one’s eyes slanted with the index finger. That sign has been replaced by a loan sign from China, which uses an inverted L instead of the slanted eye motion. What I would be interested in studying is how this process of borrowing happens. ASL itself exists with so many regional variations. So, do the prominent Deaf organizations in different regions adopt the loan signs independently? Or is there a national network that makes an integrated effort to enforce new sign changes? In conclusion, I would study the pre-existing regional variations in ASL and the impact on those variations with increasing borrowing in current times.
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