Symmetry and dominance: A cross-linguistic study of signs and classifier constructions

Sign-spatiality in Kata Kolok

“…Simultaneous classifier constructions therefore possibly exhaust the sign-spatial affordances of the gestural modality. The cross-linguistic investigation of locative functions of the signing space has revealed striking resemblances among sign languages in the use of simultaneous classifier constructions (Emmorey 2003;Eccarius & Brentari 2007). Moreover, sign language users across a number of sign languages have been shown to perform the same mental rotation in interpreting simultaneous classifier constructions, namely, they rotate the scene as a whole to interpret the signed expression, which thus encodes the viewpoint (Emmorey, Klima, & Hickok 1998;Perniss 2007:157;Arik 2008).…”

Complexity in two-handed signs in Kenyan Sign Language

“…(1) ASL sign address (courtesy of Signing Savvy, LLC): Both hands with Å handshape touching the torso move upward, once morphological or syntactic constructions (Engberg-Pederson 1993: 295;Eccarius & Brentari 2007). For Battison, the limitation on handshapes in the Dominance Condition was significant evidence that complexity is the source of restricted combinations.…”

“…In a third approach, Eccarius and Brentari (2007) re-analyzed Type 3 signs using a measure of featural complexity that accounts for more two-handed signs than either Battison's Dominance Condition or the revised condition in (6) because sign languages tend to have a few relatively marked handshapes in this position. At the whole handshape level, ASL violates the handshape restriction of the Dominance Condition in 4.1% of cases (14 signs; e.g., skip-class, choose, then) and Hong Kong Sign Language (HKSL) violates it 13.0% of the time (54 signs).…”

“…However, not all possible permutations of the hands are attested, and not all attested combinations occur to the same degree within a lexicon (Battison 1978;Rozelle 2003;Eccarius & Brentari 2007;Crasborn 2011). These differences appear to be motivated by differing levels of formational complexity.…”

Guest Editors’ Preface

“…The authors use the Symmetry and Dominance Condition for 2-handed signs to analyze sign complexity, where H1=the dominant hand and H2=the non-dominant hand (first developed in Battison 1978; and revised in various ways by Rozelle 2003;Sandler & Lillo-Martin 2006;and Eccarius & Brentari 2007). Battison (1978) proposed 4 types of signs: 1-handed signs (Type ø), same handshape/same movement (Type 1), same handshape/H1 moves, but H2 does not (Type 2), different handshapes/ H1 moves, but H2 does not (Type 3), and different handshapes/ both hands move (Type 4).…”