2013 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

Linguistic research on Japanese Sign Language and Japanese Intermediary Sign Language

Research Project

Project/Area Number	23520530
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
Allocation Type	Multi-year Fund
Section	一般
Research Field	Linguistics
Research Institution	Toyota Technological Institute
Principal Investigator	HARA Daisuke 豊田工業大学, 工学部, 教授 (00329822)
Project Period (FY)	2011 – 2013
Keywords	日本手話 / 中間型手話 / 媒介手話 / 混合言語
Research Abstract	The grammar or system of rules of Japanese Intermediary Sign Language (JISL) has been reported to be a mixture of the ones of Japanese Sign Language and Signed Japanese. But according to the results of our research, we cannot find a grammatical mixture or blending. It has been found that JISL words expressed by the hearing users tend to follow the rhythm of the Japanese bimoraic foot. The time length of the JISL word is 30% longer than that of JSL. This is partly because the JISL users tend to use proximal joints more, which are larger joints and take more time to move. The selection of CLs is also different in JISL. The ratio of the instrumental CL to the handling CL in JISL is 1 to 2.6 while the ratio in JSL 1 to 1.5. The ratio in JISL is also different from the one in gestures done by the Japanese speakers, which is 1 to 6.1. We have also examined JISL expressed by the deaf, which is simplified but follows the grammar of JSL.