4.4. Sociolinguistic variation
The anecdotal evidence from Deaf signers and CODAs indicate that there is no communication problem due to regional variation of TİD. Dikyuva, Makaroğlu, and Arık’s grammar book, which is based on a representative sample of the whole of Turkey [Socio-Historical Background - 4.1.], states that the regional variation is observed only in terms of lexical items between Eastern and Western regions (e.g. some signs for the days of the week), but not in grammatical structure.
Other than regional variation, there can be lexical variation in smaller scale regions, that is variation between Deaf schools, Deaf associations, and families. Moreover, there can be variation between younger and older generations. For example, hour is produced by pointing to the wrist, thus this sign is iconically related to wristwatch. Older generations articulate hour with a C-handshape on the chest, which is iconically related to pocket watches that lost their popularity gradually after World War I.
This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant Agreement No 693349.