New Insights Into Mouthings: Evidence From a Corpus-Based Study of Russian Sign Language

Abstract

While some aspects of mouthings have been previously investigated, many topics in the use of this cross-modal contact phenomenon in sign languages remain un(der)studied, and not much is known about mouthings in Russian Sign Language (RSL), in particular. This article examines various aspects of mouthings as these are used by native RSL signers and aims to contribute new insights into the use and origin of mouthings in this sign language. Based on novel data from the online RSL Corpus alongside additional elicited data, we describe the distribution, forms, functions and spreading patterns of mouthings. Our findings furthermore show that sign languages exhibit more extensive variation in the use of mouthings than has previously been thought. Moreover, we – thus far uniquely – describe mouthings also as a written-language-based contact phenomenon. This study has the potential to provide a better understanding of the nature of such contact-induced features as mouthings in sign languages in general and reveals a complex interplay of the modalities of signed, spoken and written languages.

The processing of facial actions in deaf children with autism who use British Sign Language (BSL)

“…A further consideration is that corpus studies which collect examples of natural SL production suggest facial actions marking negation and question type may vary to a greater extent within individuals and across sign languages than might be supposed from standard descriptions of the canonical, formal structures widely cited in sign language literature (Bauer & Kyuseva, 2021;de Vos, van der Kooij & Crasborn, 2009;Johnston, van Roekel & Schembri, 2016). Our essentially null findings concerning the impact of ASD in linguistic NMMs of negation and question type 5 should be viewed in this constrained context.…”

Intuitions of native Japanese Sign Language signers onmouthing words with multiple pronunciations

“…A recent paper (Bauer and Kyuseva 2022) brings up a case of mouthing in Russian Sign Language that suggests that mouthings may not be entirely influenced by spoken language, but also partly impacted by the orthography. Bauer and Kyuseva noted Russian Sign Language users typically mouth "voda" with a clear rounded mouthshape for "o" when signing their manual sign for "water," when Russian speakers actually pronounce it as "vada."…”

Naming in Two Modalities: Manual and Mouth Gestures in Hearing and Deaf Children

“…Research based on different kinds of data and on different sign languages (Boyes-Braem, Sutton-Spence, 2001;Bisnath, 2022), has shown that mouthings occur more frequently than mouth gestures and both of them co-occur with the manual sign. Nevertheless, whereas mouth gestures are typically considered a part of sign language, mouthings are viewed as a sociolinguistic phenomenon due to the oral education of most deaf children (Hohenberger and Happ, 2001) and to the situation of bilingualism of most deaf adults (Boyes Braem, 2001;Bogliotti and Isel, 2021) to the interplay of the modalities of signed, spoken and written languages (Bauer, Kyuseva, 2022). Although mouthings has been considered as remnants of an oralist education (Hohenberger and Happ, 2001), not only are they very persistent in signing, but they also seem to be considered part of the language by native signers (Fontana, 2015;Bisnath, 2022) that consider "unnatural" signing without mouthings.…”