Department of General Linguistics

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Browsing Department of General Linguistics by browse.metadata.advisor "Baker, Anne"

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    Developing a sentence repetition test for the evaluation of deaf children’s use of South African sign language
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2020-03) Palmer, Amy; Huddlestone, Kate; Baker, Anne; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study creates the first sentence repetition test (SRT) for South African Sign Language (SASL). The test can be used to measure the proficiency of a participant and track their progress over time. The test is easy to administer and score but needs to be adapted to the context within which it will be used. The aim of the test is to provide deaf schools with a language testing instrument, as there is currently no such instrument readily available. The test provides an opportunity to begin creating an image of what deaf children’s SASL language acquisition looks like, of which there is currently very little information. The main research questions of this study were concerned with establishing the most important features necessary for this test and the relationships between the participants’ scores and other variables, such as age and exposure to SASL. An SRT was created with 20 sentences, which were organised into three categories: Simple, Moderate, and Complex. These categories reflected the grammatical complexity of the sentences, as an SRT tests the grammatical knowledge of the participants. This study used data from 40 deaf children between the ages of seven- and nine-years-old. These children had had a minimum of one year of exposure to SASL and were from two schools for the deaf in the Western Cape. The results showed that lexical variation is vital feature influencing language testing. Appropriate grammatical features needed to be used, keeping the age groups of the participants in mind. It was concluded that the age of the children and their lengths of exposure had significant effects on their test results. The older the child and the longer their length of exposure, the higher they scored on the test. The results also found that participants from different schools scored differently on the test, which is possibly a result of the familiarity of language testing and the participant’s familiarity with the administrators of the test. Sentence length had an effect on the results, and the categorisation of the sentences was found to be relatively accurate, with some adjustments necessary for future use of the SRT.
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    Exploring the factors that influence SRT performance in young adults using South African sign language
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2024-03) Du Toit, Simone; Huddlestone, Kate; Baker, Anne; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study aimed to explore the proficiency of young adult users of South African Sign Language (SASL), using a sentence repetition test (SRT) as an assessment tool. SRTs are argued to be valid and reliable for sign language testing, and can be used to establish proficiency, as well as to determine which factors influence performance (Hauser, Paludnevičienė, Supalla and Bavelier 2006:166). As such, an SASL SRT displays the potential to be an efficient and cost-effective measurement of SASL proficiency. The study examined what general SASL performance on an SRT looks like in young deaf adults, and how their age of acquisition (AoA) affects their performance. The SASL-SRT consisted of 20 sentences, video recorded by native deaf signers, ranging in complexity and length. Sentences were between three and seven signs in length and included different grammatical constructions, such as questions, imperatives, negation, and verb agreement. The participants were 15 young adults recruited with the help of the National Institute for the Deaf (NID) and the NID Training College in Worcester, Western Cape and their ages ranged from 19 to 36 years, with AoA ranging from birth to 20 years of age. The mean age of the participant group was 29.3 and they had a mean AoA of 7.3 years. The participants were divided into groups of four, and presented with the video recorded SRT sentences displayed on a screen. After viewing each sentence, participants were prompted to repeat it, and their repetitions were video recorded. These recordings were then transcribed and scored according to the closeness of the match that the participant’s sentence was to the model sentence. The three categories for scoring were as follows: (i) whether the sentence was an exact repetition, referred to as overall score; (ii) whether the repetition of the manual items was a match to the model sentence, i.e., excluding all non-manual markers (NMMs); and (iii) whether the sign order was identical to the model sentence. Omissions, additions, phonological and lexical variants, lexical substitutions, and repetitions/self-corrections were also counted, along with the total number of target signs produced in each sentence. Statistical analyses showed that AoA is a strong predictor of the performance of the young adults on the SASL-SRT and that an extended length of exposure does not compensate for a late AoA. Overall scores ranged from 0% to 74%, with a mean overall score of 30%. Scores increased when NMMs were excluded from the analysis, with a maximum score of 84% achieved by one participant, and a mean score of 52%. This indicates that further research into the functions and optionality of discourse and grammatical NMMs is required. The number of target signs produced amounted to a mean of 87%, which indicated that participants largely understood the meaning of sentences, and that they could reproduce most of the signs seen in the model sentences. Sign order largely matched the model sentences, providing evidence that SASL has a verb-final basic sign order. This thesis shows evidence of the importance of an early AoA and that it plays a significant role in the performance of young adults. The study revealed that, while several areas require further research, the current state of the SASL-SRT shows robustness as a sign language assessment tool.
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    A lexical comparison of South African sign language and potential lexifier languages
    (2020-03) Van Niekerk, Andries; Huddlestone, Kate; Baker, Anne; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: South Africa’s history of segregation was a large contributing factor for lexical variation in South African Sign Language (SASL) to come about. Foreign sign languages certainly had a presence in the history of deaf education; however, the degree of influence foreign sign languages has on SASL today is what this study has aimed to determine. There have been very limited studies on the presence of loan signs in SASL and none have included extensive variation. This study investigates signs from 20 different schools for the deaf and compares them with signs from six other sign languages and the Paget Gorman Sign System (PGSS). A list of lemmas was created that included the commonly used list of lemmas from Woodward (2003). The signs were elicited from informants and documented based on their phonological properties: handshape, movement, location, and orientation. SASL lexical variety was documented. Sign types were identified by comparing the different signs for a lemma with each other; signs that differed in more than one phonological parameter were classified as different sign types. These sign types were then compared with counterparts in six potential lexifier sign languages, American Sign Language (ASL), British Sign Language (BSL), Irish Sign Language (ISL), German Sign Language (DGS), Flemish Sign Language (VGT), and Dutch Sign Language (NGT) and PGSS. Signs that are heavily influenced by iconic devices were removed from the final comparison. Loan signs were identified on the basis of phonological similarity. The results showed the highest percentage of borrowings from BSL at 15.9%, followed by ASL with 12.6% and VGT at 11.7%. The results indicated that 65.4% of the sign types were influenced to some degree by foreign sign languages or PGSS. There is a substratum of signs that did not match with any of the potential lexifier languages or PGSS and their origins are uncertain; they possibly emerged naturally or were borrowed from a language that was not included in this study.
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    Lexical variation and change in SASL : a case study of a Western Cape school-lect
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2022-03) Njeyiyana, Susan; Huddlestone, Kate; Baker, Anne; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Lexical variation is common in most sign languages and is often related to regional identity specifically connected to a specific school for the Deaf. This study examined lexical variation and change in South African Sign Language (SASL) within a particular Western Cape “school-lect”. The latter refers to the transmission of particular varieties of sign language in schools for Deaf children and to the extent of their retention by adult native signers in the community. In this study, a picture-based elicitation task, incorporating some English/Afrikaans words, was used to elicit signs for 65 lemmas, extracted from Woodward’s (1993) modified Swadesh list, from four age groups of signers, ranging from 8 to 68 years. The elicited signs for each lemma were described in terms of handshape, palm orientation, location and movement, and were compared with each other. Signs that did not differ were classified as identical, signs that differed in only one parameter were classified as similar, while signs that differed in more than one parameter were classified as different – such signs could in turn have similar variants. Considerable variation occurred within and across groups: The group with the most intra-variation was the 16- to 18-year-olds, while the most inter-group variation was found between the youngest group, 8- to 10- year-olds, and the two adult groups (signers older than 18 years). Focus group interviews were held with the two adult groups (23- to 29-year-olds and 42- to 68-year-olds) to identify participants’ attitudes towards lexical variation in general, and possible reasons for lexical variation within the Deaf community from their school. During the interviews, the adults gave examples of signs that had changed, and compared the new and old signs, speculating about the reasons for the new variants. Some observed that signs are influenced by the other five schools for the Deaf in the Western Cape and by the environment outside the school, from which variants are brought to the current school. Older adults felt strongly that their (older) sign variants were appropriate, and that they communicated more easily with each other. However, some signs have developed new meanings, leaving them confused. According to the older adults, children currently at the school appear to have completely different signs that look strange and/or inappropriate to the older adults. Some observed that young Deaf children and older Deaf adults do not connect with each other and that older adults do not want to learn new variants. In contrast, young adults were willing to learn other new variants from different regions to broaden their SASL and to enable them to communicate with each other better. Young adults are able to switch variants depending on the signing community. The reason for adapting their sign lexicon was that it is important to expand one’s knowledge of all the signs and varieties used in the different South African provinces. The present study is relevant, for understanding lexical variation in SASL and for the documentation of regional varieties that are under pressure to standardize.