Poetry in South African Sign Language: what is different?

Abstract

Poetry in a sign language can make use of literary devices just as poetry in a spoken language can. The study of literary expression in sign languages has increased over the last twenty years and for South African Sign Language (SASL) such literary texts have also become more available. This article gives a brief overview of the linguistic devices sign language poetry can make use of, in particular those specific to the visual-spatial modality. As an illustration of these devices an analysis is then presented of the SASL poem Soweto by Modiegi Moime. This poem illustrates well the multi-layered meaning that can be created in sign language poetry through the use of the two hands and the non-manual components.

Construction of deaf narrative identity in Creative South African Sign Language (SASL)

“…Most deaf children do not inherit a deaf identity from their parents. Deaf schools, instead of families, play an important role in establishing these children's sense of belonging and enabling these children to experience the shared values and interests of the South African and international deaf communities (Baker and Padden 1978, Bauman 2008, Morgan 2008, Baker 2017, Stander and McIlroy 2017. The storytelling tradition is at the centre of such identity development at schools -deaf teachers and older deaf children tell stories and jokes in sign language, which fosters young deaf children's linguistic development as well as cultivating their awareness of being a member of the deaf community (Ladd 2003).…”

“…Ladd (2003) discusses this in terms of the positive effects of oralism. Oralism resulted in the creation of an underground deaf culture of performance (Baker 2017;Kaneko 2017, 2018).…”