Overview

The culmination of a seven-year project, this volume provides a complete description of American Sign Language (ASL) variation. For four decades, linguists have studied how people from varying regions and backgrounds have different ways of saying the same thing. Noted scholars Ceil Lucas, Robert Bayley, and Clayton Valli led a team of exceptional researchers in applying techniques for analyzing spoken language variation to ASL. Their observations at the phonological, lexical, morphological, and syntactic levels demonstrate that ASL variation correlates with many of the same driving social factors of spoken languages, including age, socioeconomic class, gender, ethnic background, region, and sexual orientation. Internal constraints that mandate variant choices for spoken languages have been compared to ASL as well, with intriguing results. Sociolinguistic Variation in American Sign Language stands alone as the new standard for students and scholars committed to this discipline.

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9781563681134

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A major contribution to the growing literature on the linguistics and sociolinguistics of ASL, an incredibly valuable first word on variation in ASL.

Author Information

Ceil Lucas is Professor of Linguistics in the Department of ASL, Linguistics, and Interpretation at Gallaudet University. Robert Bayley is Professor of Sociolinguistics in the Division of Bicultural-Bilingual Studies at the University of Texas at San Antonio. T. X. Clayton Valli, was Assistant Professor in the Masters Interpreting Program at Gallaudet University.

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