We describe a corpus-based study of one type of non-manual in signed languages (SLs) — mouth actions. Our ultimate aim is to examine the distribution and characteristics of mouth actions in Auslan (Australian Sign Language) to gauge the degree of language-specific conventionalization of these forms. We divide mouth gestures into categories broadly based on Crasborn et al. (2008), but modified to accommodate our experiences with the Auslan data. All signs and all mouth actions are examined and the state of the mouth in each sign is assigned to one of three broad categories: (i) mouthings, (ii) mouth gestures, and (iii) no mouth action. Mouth actions that invariably occur while communicating in SLs have posed a number of questions for linguists: which are ‘merely borrowings’ from the relevant ambient spoken language (SpL)? which are gestural and shared with all of the members of the wider community in which signers find themselves? and which are conventionalized aspects of the grammar of some or all SLs? We believe these schema captures all the relevant information about mouth forms and their use and meaning in context to enable us to describe their function and degree of conventionality.
@inproceedings{johnston:14003:sign-lang:lrec,
author = {Johnston, Trevor and van Roekel, Jane},
title = {Mouth-based non-manual coding schema used in the {Auslan} corpus: Explanation, application and preliminary results},
pages = {81--88},
editor = {Crasborn, Onno and Efthimiou, Eleni and Fotinea, Stavroula-Evita and Hanke, Thomas and Hochgesang, Julie A. and Kristoffersen, Jette and Mesch, Johanna},
booktitle = {Proceedings of the {LREC2014} 6th Workshop on the Representation and Processing of Sign Languages: Beyond the Manual Channel},
maintitle = {9th International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation ({LREC} 2014)},
publisher = {{European Language Resources Association (ELRA)}},
address = {Reykjavik, Iceland},
day = {31},
month = may,
year = {2014},
language = {english},
url = {https://www.sign-lang.uni-hamburg.de/lrec/pub/14003.pdf}
}
| van Roekel, Jane