In Quest of Influences of Polish Language Dictionaries on the Oldest Polish Sign Language Dictionary

Abstract

The paper examines whether the authors of the very first Polish Sign Language dictionary, Słownik mimiczny dla głuchoniemych i osób z nimi styczność mających ‘A gestural dictionary for deaf and dumb and persons who have contact with them’, published in 1879, may have been influenced by any of the spoken Polish monolingual dictionaries available at that time. As there is no historical documentation about the circumstances in which Słownik mimiczny was compiled, the inquiry necessarily relies exclusively on internal evidence: comparison of headword spelling, alphabetical ordering, direction of cross-references and the content of sample entries. The results indicate that such influence, if any, was only minor, and that the lexicographic strategies applied in Słownik mimiczny most likely resulted from the authors’ knowledge of Polish Sign Language and teaching practice.