A Grammar of Italian Sign Language (LIS)

The use of the signing space may be affected by register as well. In particular, variation in signing can be observed depending on the identity of the addressee and the extra-linguistic context. In this section, we discuss two register types: whispering and shouting. The whispering mode is usually adopted when the signer communicates in close contact to the addressee and wishes to make the message less noticeable to other people. Conversely, the shouting mode takes place when the message is directed to someone far away and signing is evident and clear on purpose.

            To illustrate register differences in LIS, we present the same content expressed in three different ways: spontaneously (a), in shouting mode (b), and in whispering mode (c), respectively.

 

 

 

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            a.         president arrive late       

            ‘The president, he is coming late.’ (spontaneous production)

 

 

 

                                                                                       re                bl-b

            b.         attention_getter today president arrive late

            ‘EXCUSE ME, THE PRESIDENT IS COMING LATE.’ (shouting mode)

 

 

 

                                                         eg-shift

            c.         president arrive late       

            ‘The president is coming late.’ (whispering mode)

 

Shouting and whispering differ in many respects. In both cases, discourse usually begins by capturing the addressee’s attention. Shouted signing directed to a general audience can be introduced by the following attention-getters: waving the hands from side to side, as in (a) below, or moving them quickly on the midsagittal plane back and forth, as in (b).

 

            

            a.         attention-getter signal (lateral plane)

 

            

            b.         attention-getter signal (midsagittal plane)

 

On the other hand, whispered discourse is directed to one addressee (or a few addressees) only. In order to hide the message from third parties, the addressee’s attention is captured simply by establishing eye contact.

 

            

            Establishment of eye contact (with someone on the left side)

 

While whispering, the signer does not necessarily have to maintain eye contact through the whole utterance. In fact, after the initial eye contact as attention-getter, the signer is likely to shift his/her gaze away from the addressee to make the message less noticeable.

            The most remarkable difference between shouting and whispering is the extension of the signing space: the former makes use of larger space, the latter of smaller space. The two screenshots below show the same sign (late) articulated in the two registers: in shouting (a), the dominant hand is completely extended in the signing space in front of the signer’s torso; while in whispering (b), the dominant hand articulates the sign in a small area in front of the signer’s lower torso.

 

            

            a.         late (shouting mode)

 

            

            b.         late (whispering mode)

 

Enlarging and shrinking the signing space can influence signing speed. Indeed, the articulation of larger signs generally takes more time than the articulation of smaller signs.

            The different use of space is often associated with variations of the amplitude of motion (PHONOLOGY 3.1.3). Typically, movements are proximalised in shouting and distalised in whispering. For example, let us consider the sign president, which is articulated with repeated wrist rotation in its citation form. In shouted discourse, this sign undergoes proximalisation, thus the movement is realised at the elbow joint (a), rather than wrist joint (b).

 

            

            a.         president (shouting mode)

 

            

            b.         president (whispering mode)

 

In shouted discourse, proximalisation is used to make the sign more evident and easily perceivable over distance.

            Another difference in the manual articulation of signs is the more frequent use of one-handed versions in whispered discourse, as opposed to two-handed versions in shouted discourse. For example, the sign arrive is a two-handed sign in LIS. This form is maintained in the shouting mode (a), while it is reduced by weak drop (PHONOLOGY 3.1.4) in the whispering mode (b).

 

            

            a.         arrive (shouting mode)

 

            

            b.         arrive (whispering mode)

 

The screenshots presented in this section show another important difference: typically, shouting involves vivid facial expressions, while whispering is associated with reduced non-manual behaviour. In some whispered productions, however, signers might decide to replace some manual signs with non-manual signals to reduce visibility. For instance, they might point toward a particular location with their eye-gaze or tip of the tongue, rather than using a manual pointing sign (PHONOLOGY 1.1.4).