How does ASL convey meaning?

Question

This question is quite complex but the short version of an answer goes something like this.

ASL is expressed using your hands, arms, face/eyes and body. There are four physical parts of your body that can contribute to "the meaning being expressed." When language (like English) is spoken it is more or less linear in presentation; that is, sounds follow one after the other in a string in a linear fashion. You can't easily articulate two sounds of a word at the same time. When you say a word like BUG. The b sound, u sound and g sound follow one after the other as you pronounce the word. There are elements of simultaneity in spoken language articulation but not to the same degree as ASL uses simultaneity.

Think about ASL as meaning units stacked on top of each other in one instance/moment of time so rather than meaningful units coming out one after the other think about ASL as "dense in meaning units" with the elements stacked one on top of the other. This means that at one moment in time each meaningful unit of expression is packed.

Take the expression, Are you coming? In English each word is expressed in linear fashion one word following the previous word. There is an element of vocal intonation that carries the meaning "a question is being asked." So that is a simultaneous element that is occurring but as you will see ASL expresses this whole expression of meaning with one sign. The one sign has a "stack of meaningful units" articulated together by the signers Face/Eyes, Hands, Arms and Body.

To express this in ASL the signer makes one sign COME. However, the signer's face will simultaneously have an expression with eyebrows raised, head tilted slightly forward. This facial expression is part of the Yes/No question expression. Also the signer's body will be leaning forward slightly. This is also part of the required Yes/no question expression. When making the sign COME the signers hands and arms will be held further out in space indicating he/she is talking about the addressee (you/second person) and the sign will move back toward the signer's body. Finally the signer's eyes will be directly looking at the addressee. So at one instance in time with one sign being made a complex set of meanings are expressed. The addressee understands that he/she is being asked the question "Are you coming?". But only one sign is used. The question element is expressed via eyes/face and body position. Who is coming "the you" is being expressed by where the hands start in space and where they end when making the sign movement.

If the signer started with his/her hands close to his body and the movement went outward/away from the signer's body and had the same expression. The meaning would be interpreted. "Am I going?"

This is a very basic example of how ASL expresses meaning. This is quite different in structure from the way most spoken languages work and it is one reason that learning to express meaning in ASL will be quite different for most learners and may be the most challenging aspect of learning ASL.

Answer 1

ASL is quite different from spoken language since the grammatical features of the language, all residing in facial expressions called non-manual markers, whereas with spoken language, it is more so in the tone of voice and structure of the sentence. One example of a non-manual marker is when expressing how cold one is. BRR is how you can write it out if you are glossing (written out using English, but following ASL sentence structure as practice for interpreting/translating/transliterating). BRR and other non-manual markers would go above the word they are used for when writing this way. "YOU FEEL OUTSIDE? COLD!!" The exclamation mark in that example marks the word with emphasis, the BRR would be on the lips as you sign that word and would mean that it is freeing cold outside, whereas using MMM (lips together) would mean that it is closer to a jacket weather cold instead of a blizzard. The facial expression and body language holds a vast amount of meaning, along with how a person is signing. One's palm orientation, movement, location, and handshape helps to give meaning to what one is attempting to sign.

I know that this does not answer the whole question, but it is a very deep question that has multiple parts. I would be more than willing to help more if you would like to break it into parts and discuss this more in-depth.