Language Planning in Action: Depiction as a Driver of New Terminology in Irish Sign Language

Rachel Moiselle, Lorraine Leeson

Abstract
In this paper, we examine the linguistic phenomenon known as ‘depiction’, which relates to the ability to visually represent semantic components (Dudis, 2004). While some elements of this have been described for Irish Sign Language, with particular attention to the ‘productive lexicon’ (Leeson & Grehan, 2004; Leeson & Saeed, 2012; Matthews, 1996; O’Baoill & Matthews, 2000), here, we take the analysis further, drawing on what we have learned from cognitive linguistics over the past decade. Drawing on several recently developed domain-specific glossaries (e.g., STEM1, Covid-192, political domain, Sexual, Domestic and Gender Based Violence (SDGBV)-related vocabulary) we present ongoing analysis indicating that a deliberate focus on iconicity, in particular, elements of depiction, appears to be a primary driver. We also consider the potential implications of the insights we intend to gain from Deaf-led glossary glossary development work in the context of Machine Translation goals, for example, for work in progress on the Horizon 2020 funded SignON project.
Anthology ID:
2022.signlang-1.21
Volume:
Proceedings of the LREC2022 10th Workshop on the Representation and Processing of Sign Languages: Multilingual Sign Language Resources
Month:
June
Year:
2022
Address:
Marseille, France
Editors:
Eleni Efthimiou, Stavroula-Evita Fotinea, Thomas Hanke, Julie A. Hochgesang, Jette Kristoffersen, Johanna Mesch, Marc Schulder
Venue:
SignLang
SIG:
Publisher:
European Language Resources Association
Note:
Pages:
139–143
Language:
URL:
https://aclanthology.org/2022.signlang-1.21
DOI:
Bibkey:
Cite (ACL):
Rachel Moiselle and Lorraine Leeson. 2022. Language Planning in Action: Depiction as a Driver of New Terminology in Irish Sign Language. In Proceedings of the LREC2022 10th Workshop on the Representation and Processing of Sign Languages: Multilingual Sign Language Resources, pages 139–143, Marseille, France. European Language Resources Association.
Cite (Informal):
Language Planning in Action: Depiction as a Driver of New Terminology in Irish Sign Language (Moiselle & Leeson, SignLang 2022)
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