PSY274H5 Chapter Notes - Chapter 5: Small Caps, Audiology, Iconicity
Document Summary
Deaf people use a communication system that involves moving their hands, heads and torsos known as sign language. People who never used sign language as their major means of communication are typically called deaf people (with a small d : these people are integrated into hearing society. Any sentence in english or any other spoken language can be conveyed in sign language. Sign languages can communicate information about people and objects that are not present, about specific times, and about very particular events. The kinds of words that would be open to a nonarbitrary correspondence between meaning and sound are those whose meaning has to do with sound. The whole idea of onomatopoeia is questionable: linguists often modify the notion in subtle and sensible ways in order to capture generalizations. In some languages certain classes of words identified by sound characteristics behave in predictable ways, and we need a way to recognize that grammatical fact.
