View in EDS PDF Full Text

Australian Sign Language Lexicons in a Bilingual--Bicultural Program.

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Title: Australian Sign Language Lexicons in a Bilingual--Bicultural Program.
Authors: West, Erin1, Dettman, Shani1, Holt, Colleen1
Source: Journal of Speech, Language & Hearing Research. Jun2025, Vol. 68 Issue 6, p2851-2870. 20p.
Subject Terms: *Comparative grammar, *Communicative competence, *Phonological awareness, *Educational outcomes, *Learning, *Research, *Ability, *Vocabulary, *Sign language, *Cultural pluralism, *Language acquisition, *Training, *Children, Multilingualism in children, Evaluation of human services programs, Descriptive statistics
Geographic Terms: Australia
Abstract: Purpose: The aim of the study was to describe the expressive sign vocabularies of a group of children learning Australian Sign Language (Auslan). Method: The spontaneous signs of 44 children aged 3.0--6.8 years enrolled in one early-years bilingual--bicultural educational program were documented using a new approach, the Handshape Analysis Recording Tool, across a 2- year period. The resultant corpus was analyzed to determine the frequency of word classes including nouns, verbs, and adjectives. Results: There were 3,003 Auslan tokens and 806 different sign types. Nouns, adjectives, and verbs were highly represented in this exploratory study, comprising 54.1%, 21.0%, and 15.8% of the entire corpus, respectively. Preliminary analyses indicated differences in the composition of Auslan vocabularies when compared with existing spoken English and American Sign Language data. Conclusions: This exploratory study identified that the types of Auslan word classes used by this heterogeneous group of young learners included a high proportion of nouns and adjectives. While comparisons with past data are stated with caution as the composition of the child sample group was not controlled, there is preliminary support for earlier exposure and focused teaching of Auslan to facilitate the development of more varied expressive sign vocabularies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Copyright of Journal of Speech, Language & Hearing Research is the property of American Speech-Language-Hearing Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)
Database: Education Research Complete
Description
Abstract:Purpose: The aim of the study was to describe the expressive sign vocabularies of a group of children learning Australian Sign Language (Auslan). Method: The spontaneous signs of 44 children aged 3.0--6.8 years enrolled in one early-years bilingual--bicultural educational program were documented using a new approach, the Handshape Analysis Recording Tool, across a 2- year period. The resultant corpus was analyzed to determine the frequency of word classes including nouns, verbs, and adjectives. Results: There were 3,003 Auslan tokens and 806 different sign types. Nouns, adjectives, and verbs were highly represented in this exploratory study, comprising 54.1%, 21.0%, and 15.8% of the entire corpus, respectively. Preliminary analyses indicated differences in the composition of Auslan vocabularies when compared with existing spoken English and American Sign Language data. Conclusions: This exploratory study identified that the types of Auslan word classes used by this heterogeneous group of young learners included a high proportion of nouns and adjectives. While comparisons with past data are stated with caution as the composition of the child sample group was not controlled, there is preliminary support for earlier exposure and focused teaching of Auslan to facilitate the development of more varied expressive sign vocabularies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
ISSN:10924388
DOI:10.1044/2025_JSLHR-24-00651