R Rentelis

Lexical variation and change in British Sign Language

This paper presents results from a corpus-based study investigating lexical variation in BSL. An earlier study investigating variation in BSL numeral signs found that younger signers were using a decreasing variety of regionally distinct variants, suggesting that levelling may be taking place. Here, we report findings from a larger investigation looking at regional lexical variants for colours, countries, numbers and UK placenames elicited as part of the BSL Corpus Project. Age, school location and language background were significant predictors of lexical variation, with younger signers using a more levelled variety. This change appears to be happening faster in particular sub-groups of the deaf community (e.g., signers from hearing families). Also, we find that for the names of some UK cities, signers from outside the region use a different sign than those who live in the region.

Sociolinguistic Variation and Change in British Sign Language Number Signs: Evidence of Leveling?

This article presents findings from the first major study to investigate lexical variation and change in British Sign Language (BSL) number signs. As part of the BSL Corpus Project, number sign variants were elicited from 249 deaf signers from eight sites throughout the UK. Age, school location, and language background were found to be significant predictors for the use of regional number sign variants. The results suggest that leveling may be taking place in BSL number signs inasmuch as younger signers are using a decreasing variety of regionally distinct number sign variants. These results need to be understood in light of the sociolinguistic characteristics of the British deaf community, which differ from those of spoken language communities, with which linguists are more familiar.