Show Me What You’ve B/Seen: A Brief History of Depiction

Abstract

Already at a relatively early stage, modern sign language linguistics focused on the representation of (actions, locations, and motions of) referents (1) through the use of the body and its different articulators and (2) through the use of particular handshapes (in combination with an orientation, location, and/or movement). Early terminology for (1) includes role playing, role shifting, and role taking and for (2) classifier constructions/predicates and verbs of motion and location. More recently, however, new terms, including enactment and constructed action for (1) and depicting signs for (2) have been introduced. This article provides a brief overview of the history of enactment and depiction in the sign linguistic literature but mainly focuses on issues related to terminology (and terminology shifts). First, we consider the relation between role shifting and constructed action. We question the idea that these terms can be used interchangeably and rather suggest that they capture different, but related functions. Subsequently, we zoom in on the conceptualization of depicting signs, indicating verbs, pointing signs and fully lexical signs and the relation between these signs and the method of depicting. Where earlier research often associates depicting with the use of specific types of structures, we promote the idea that depicting is a semiotic diverse practice. In doing so, we show that the conceptualization of the different sign types and the terms that are used to refer to these phenomena do not accurately capture the way these signs are used in actual signed discourse and propose a reconceptualization of the different sign types in the lexico-grammar of Flemish Sign Language (VGT) as composite signs that can describe, depict and indicate meaning in various ways. In this way, this article illustrates (1) the risks that may come with the execution of terminology shifts and (2) the importance of making a clear distinction between form and function, i.e., we show that it is important to be careful with assuming a (too) exclusive relation between a certain function and one or more particular forms.

Mocking enactments: a case study of multimodal stance-stacking

“… Clark (2016 , p. 325) defines depictions as “physical scenes that people stage for others to use in imagining the scenes depicted”. Whereas depiction is a broader phenomenon of iconic meaning representation, during enactment, signers/speakers map a referent onto their body “on a real-world scale” ( Cormier et al, 2013 , p. 370), constructing this referent’s actions and/or dialogs (see Beukeleers and Vermeerbergen, 2022 for a historical overview of the terminology). Imagine the difference in options for depicting someone who is walking.…”

“…A body of work shows that enactment and depiction practices form a very common way of representing information ( Clark, 2016 ; Ferrara and Hodge, 2018 ; Hsu et al, 2021 ; Beukeleers and Vermeerbergen, 2022 ), both in signed and spoken languages. In narratives, for example, enactment is frequently used to show how something happened or what was said and how.…”

The Pragmatics of Gaze Patterns in a Local Family Sign Language from Guatemala

“…Enactments also often recruit not just the body but also the space in front and around the signers. The enacted character may be interacting with other referents, and these referents are often 'located' in the immediate space of the signer (Liddell 2003;Beukeleers and Vermeerbergen 2022). Additional examples of enactment from our data are provided in Section 4.1 below.…”

Stance in Flemish Sign Language

“…In our future research, we will further explore the role of the dialogical and interpersonal aspect of stance on the intensity or foregrounding.3.Early work on CA in signed languages was inspired byTannen's work (1989) on 'constructed dialogue' in spoken languages. SeeBeukeleers and Vermeerbergen (2022) for a historical overview of the analysis of 'enactment' and the changed terminology.…”