in this presentation we'' talk about the pragmatic features of ASL remember
pragmatics has to do with how the language itself is used in everyday life
so it's okay that we know the structure of the syntax and morphology and how the
signs are produced based on the the phonology but all those things come
together to actual language use one of the most important features of ASL when
compared to- especially english is the fact that ASL seems to present information
in a somwhat expanded form and so we refer to these differences as ASL as
expansion features we'll be speaking about seven of those after we first
clarify what exactly we mean by ASL pragmatics when compared to english
the first thing that you'll probably notice is that deaf people are more
direct than hearing people cultures vary in the degree of directness that they
prefer for instance in negotiations in large swathes in the Middle East
business people often find that people are very direct simply refusing deals
very aggressively making demands of their business partners
whereas American English speakers who go to Japan will often feel that the people
that they're negotiating with are very agreeable only to later find out that
the people were actually disagreeing they're actually saying that they were
not in favor of the deal because in the Middle East
there's a preference for for most of the cultures there for very direct
communication
whereas in Japan there's a preference for very indirect and very subtle
communication so hearing English American English speakers find ASL to be
more direct than English so they'll often sort of be taken aback by how clearly
deaf people state what they're thinking their needs their demands
sometimes comes across as a bit abrasive to people who are used to American
English which tends to be slightly more indirect
furthermore deaf people have a preference in for conveying
information in chronological order some languages are very free with the order
that information is conveyed english is one of those languages other
languages prefer information to be conveyed in the order it happened so in
storytelling for instance in ASL and again we don't really mean fairy tales
we can just talk about what happened yesterday at work
the preference is to give the information in a first second third
format and not to go back and forth in time
it's certainly possible to go back and forth in time but it's not preferable
related to the idea of directness is the idea of how explicit
ASL is English has many euphemisms and leaves a lot of messages implied
rather than overtly stated in ASL the preferences to overtly state whatever it
is that you're trying to convey
so if you're trying to convey that you don't really like a new coworker rather
than saying something like well you know we haven't really struck a groove
we haven't really been able to you know to find a lot of common ground or well
we're still getting to know each other
the preference in ASL would be to simply say I don't like that person
so far I don't like that person maybe later i will but I don't know
again this doesn't mean that deaf people are rude this simply means that
there are different rules of what constitutes polite and rude in ASL in
fact it's rude to be very indirect and to leave lots of information implied the
preferences to be very explicit and to not leave the message up for
interpretation
deaf people often also tend to give more information and then English speakers
prefer in English we tend to give only the point of a message and no
more
or at least that's the way we see ourselves as speaking there are other
languages that are even more succinct in English that prefer even fewer words
english is somewhere on the middle of the continuum as far as how much detail
we normally provide whenever we're giving information
ASL on the other hand is farther along on the extreme so ASL gives me
details so rather than just simply saying that you enjoy the meeting
why did you enjoy the meeting what happened in the meeting that you enjoyed
what specifically about the meeting was good
all these details would typically be given in American Sign Language
now one of the the ways that we can contrast languages as well as
by how much information they tend to leave implicit we've already said ASL is
more explicit more clear rather than implicit so that means when we're
comparing english and ASL
it seems that ASL tends to expand on certain ideas that English would
tend to leave in a sort of compact and implied form so we're going to take a
look at these expansion features and figure out what it is that makes these
up and what it is that english speakers need to learn and need to get used to
so that they can conform to the rules of ASL pragmatics the first feature we
notice in ASL is contrasting that is an ASL we typically first say what we think
the person we're talking to expects and then say it's not that
so if I said you know I really don't like my job
maybe I think you're going to expect that I don't like it because of the
money but in fact it's not that
so I'm i signed so in that case i said it is the money is it the money bad no
good money
such as a sign but then I tell you the reason so i say what you expect i say
it's not that and then I say it's something else
another example of that might be if i were to try to describe that all of the
cars I have ever owned have been black
well you might think I'm exaggerating or think i don't mean all of them are black
but i might say something like this to emphasize is there one red one blue and
no that's what you think but it's not true
they're all black fasting on the other hand is used when there is a concept
that requires more than one sign to get the concept across this might be a few
verbs to get the concept across or it might be a few adjectives to get the
concept across for instance if I said that the apartment that my friend was renting
was luxurious
well there's no one sign that gives that idea but there might be several
different signs together that would give that idea maybe i could say all the
apartment comfortable
this sign which means formal are all expensive so together those signs
comfortable formal expensive would together get the idea of luxurious
similarly if I said that I wanted to convey this home was embezzling money
there's no one verb for embezzling so instead i might need to sign
several maybe stealing maybe sneaking maybe taking advantage and together
those signs maybe together
those signs would mean embezzle reiteration is exactly what it sounds
like it's saying the same sign
more than once and this is done as a way of emphasis in English we emphasize
sometimes with the tone of voice or sometimes by using words like very and
really in ASL rather than doing that oftentimes the word is simply repeated
so if i wanted to say that my friend bought a car that's that's very fast
that i might simply repeat the sign fast in two different places in the sentence
like this and you see I've said it was a fast car and then again said it was fast
this is reiteration the utilization of 3d space requires the person who's
signing to visualize where in space the ideas would be and to show
them now
sometimes this requires using your imagination to sort of imagine how
these ideas could be laid out in space for instance if I'm trying to say that
there are two concepts that both relate to one I might imagine the concept of a
chart where you have the vendiagram we have one here and then you
have two that go off to here as a way of showing that there is this one concept but
it could be divided into two
let's see there's nothing about concepts that really go on charts but I could
visualize a chart as a way of showing you
similarly if I talk about a trip I could tell you that i'm going to travel from
Florida to Georgia to North Carolina and then over to Tennessee and I don't need
to show you where those things are but it's more typical for a signer
to visualize what a map would look like and show the trip
so I've shown the journey Florida Georgia North Carolina i skip South
Carolina and then over to Tennessee in ASL often there's a word that's
missing from the the lexicon which means there's some category that ASL just
doesn't have a sign for english has this happen as well there's a category of
things that we have no particular word for and so instead of of sort of
describing the category we just give you examples and let you figure out what the
categories we're talking about
for instance there's no sign in ASL for weapon
however I could sign something like you know gun knife axe etc as a way of
showing weapon
there's no sign in ASL for office supplies but I could tell you the paper
stapler paper clips etc and by doing that you infer that I don't just mean
papers paper clips are staples and office and paper clips but instead I
mean office supplies as a whole other things might be included in that sticky
notes it you know whatever else you might need for an office
so when you use explaining by example you're just getting a few examples of
the the type of things that are in that category and letting the person you're
talking to know that you don't just mean those three things
notice I'm not listing you know if i were to say i'm going to go to the store
to buy office supplies
I would not say I go to the store why I need to buy paper stapler paper clips
that would look like i'm going to buy those three things but I need to sign
that i'm going to buy those three things and maybe do something to indicate
things like that
that's one of you know a sign like this or like this to show that I mean the whole
category of office type supplies not simply just those three things
finally we have the category of of couching or sometimes it's called
scaffolding and what this is is it's a way of preparing the person you're
talking to for the subject you want to talk about ASL doesn't typically just
start abruptly with information but it sort of prepares the person by giving
some background information we've already seen the structure of ASL
sentences which tend to move from known information to new information
well the structure of of discourse of not just a sentence but a whole story
tends to come about in this way as well
so rather than simply saying you know something like I'm going to see the
Washington Monument
i might say you know washington DC that area as a way of setting that
up and then saying you know that there's this one
pointy thing i'm going to see it so rather than saying Abraham Lincoln was a
great president
i might say you know a long time ago the North and the South war that president
named Abraham Lincoln was great
so I set it up by giving you some information and then once I see that the
person i'm talking to
gives back channeling they acknowledge that they understand
then I feel free to move on to say what I want to say
finally we see this tendency in ASL pragmatics to first describe something
and then to show it
so if i wanted to describe to you what it's like to be a new parent for
instance i might sign something like like this
I first say the first time a baby is born and that is awkward and then I show
the parents sort of holding the baby and not knowing what to do if i wanted to
say that it's really hot outside right now
then i might sign something like I don't want exaggerate it too much this isn't often
this isn't pantomime but it sort of involves one element of surrogacy one
element of saying okay this is the way things are
let me show you what that might look like very briefly oftentimes it's only
one or two signs where decided takes on the role of the surrogate and shows
with something about what that would look like this is sometimes referred to
as that described then do