Text 3. Fingerspelling

The American manual alphabet consists of 26 distinct hand configurations that represent the letters of the alphabet.

Fingerspelling is the rapid execution of a series of these configurations to communicate words visually. As such, it is more a representation of written language than of spoken language because it excludes the phonological alterations and prosodic aspects of speech. Fingerspelling skills include the hand configurations, the characteristic positioning of the hand in a fixed central location, and the set of possible transition movements from one configuration to the next.

Dactylology (the study or use of the manual alphabet) has attributed the origin of fingerspelling to medieval monks who used it to communicate without breaking their vows of silence. A Spanish Benedictine monk, Pedro Ponce de Leon, is thought to have been the first person to use fingerspelling to instruct the deaf. His work was built on by another Spaniard, Juan Martin Pablo Bonet, who in 1620 published the first book on educating the deaf. This book included a diagram of a manual alphabet that is remarkably similar to the one used in the United States today. It is believed that this alphabet was later brought to France and used to improve the alphabet of Abbé Charles de l’Epée, founder of the first French public school for the deaf in the eighteenth century. It was de l’Epée’s methods and alphabet that were later imported to the United States by Laurent Clerc and Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet. This alphabet, further modified and evolved, has become the American manual alphabet.

There are numerous manual alphabets in use in different countries around the world. The American manual alphabet, however, with only two exceptions (t and d), was adopted by the Fourth Congress of the World Federation of the Deaf in 1963 as the international hand alphabet. This was in part because English and French (which uses a very similar system) are the official languages of the federation, and in part because the American alphabet was already in use in many countries.

Fingerspelling is generally used as an adjunct to sign language, especially to render proper nouns, technological terms for which no signs exist, and slang. To the uninitiated, fingerspelling seems an indistinguishable part of sign language.

There are, however, several differences between signing and fingerspelling. Signs usually use one or two distinct hand configurations, while in fingerspelling there are as many configurations as there are letters in the word. Fingerspelling is done in a much smaller space than signing, with the hand remaining in a nearly fixed position as only the configuration changes. Palm orientation in fingerspelling is restricted almost exclusively to a palm out position, in contrast to signing, in which there is no such restriction. Another important difference is that while signing evolved as a means of communication in the deaf community, fingerspelling originated as an instructional tool.

Although fingerspelling is used primarily as a supplement to sign language, a method of manual communication exists that relies exclusively on the use of fingerspelling.

This is known as the Rochester Method, after the Rochester School for the Deaf where the superintendent of the school, Zenas Westervelt, initiated its use in 1878. The method gradually fell into disuse after Westervelt’s death in 1912, and though proponents of it still exist, it is seldom used today, not even in the school for which it was named.

American deaf people are noted for more frequent use, and more rapid execution, of fingerspelling than other sign communities throughout the world. This may in part be responsible for the phenomenon known as loan signs. These are signs that originated as fingerspelled words, but in which the number of hand configurations has been reduced to two. In addition, other features such as palm orientation and movement have been added so that a phonologically well- formed sign is produced.

(Source: Encyclopedia of Special Education, THIRD EDITION Cecil R. Reynolds and Elaine Fletcher-Janzen, Editors, 2007)

1. Read the text.

2. Pick up the key words.

3. Divide the text into logical parts.

4. Make up an outline of the text.

5. Find the main idea in each part of the text.

6. Express the main idea of each part in one sentence.

7. Find supporting details in each part of the text.

8. Compress the text excluding the supporting details.

9. Express the main idea of the text in one sentence.

10. Write an annotation/a summary of the text using words and word combinations from your active vocabulary and sample summaries.