Watching language grow.
Watching language grow.
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看着语言成长。
DOI：
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发表时间：
2005
影响因子：
11.1
通讯作者：
S. Goldin‐Meadow
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
S. Goldin‐Meadow
因为手语是通过眼睛和手而非耳朵和嘴巴来处理的，我们可能会预期它们的结构与口语不同。然而，事实并非如此。手语具有相同的语言结构层次[句法（1）、形态（2）和音系（3）]，因此与口语一样依赖于人类相同的能力。此外，从出生就接触手语的儿童习得该语言就像听力正常的儿童习得他们所接触的口语一样自然，在大致相同的年龄达到主要的发展阶段（4，5）。
然而，手势模态至少在一个方面使手语具有独特性。相对容易使用手势模态创造出能被未受过训练的观察者立即理解的表征形式（例如，指示性的指手势或象形的模拟手势）。因此，可以当场在手势模态中创造出交流系统，这意味着手语系统有可能为语言创造过程提供一个窗口。事实上，聋人经常会遇到需要从头创造一种语言的情况。
桑德勒等人在本期《美国国家科学院院刊》中描述了这样一种情况（6）。一个社区，如今已到第七代，有3500名成员，200年前由阿尔 - 赛义德贝都因人在以色列建立。在过去的三代人中，这个社区出生了150名聋人，他们都来自两位创始人的五个儿子中的两个。阿尔 - 赛义德贝都因手语（ABSL）就这样诞生了。这种语言现在有三代手语使用者，因此不仅有机会瞥见一种处于婴儿期的语言，还能观察它的成长。
ABSL还不是一种成熟的语言，因此仍在变化。结果，三代手语使用者中的每一代可能在他们使用的手语系统上有所不同，而且是系统性的不同（7）。通过观察每一代手语使用者，我们因此可以很好地推测出某一特定语言特性首次进入该语言的时间。此外，由于社区中的各个家庭联系紧密，家庭内部联系紧密但家庭之间联系不紧密，我们可以根据社区的社会网络描绘语言的变化。我们可以确定特性何时在一个家庭内部保留，何时没有，从而追踪特定语言特性在社区中传播（或未能传播）的轨迹。这个小型且自给自足的社区因此为历史语言学中的一些经典问题提供了一个独特的视角（8，9）。
ABSL与年轻的口语[例如，洋泾浜语或克里奥尔语，当现有语言相互接触时出现的语言（10）]不同，因为ABSL是从头产生的，没有受到任何已确立的语言（无论是手语还是口语）的影响。此外，ABSL与其他年轻的手语[例如，目前在尼加拉瓜聋童群体中首次在学校聚集时出现的手语（11）]不同，因为它是在一个社会稳定的社区中发展的，儿童从父母那里学习这个系统。
ABSL在两种手语系统之间占据独特的位置：（i）家庭手语，一种由聋童发展出来的手语系统，其听力损失使其无法习得口语，且其听力正常的父母没有让孩子接触常规手语，也就是说，这是一种甚至不与家庭中的听力正常的家庭成员共享的个体手语系统（12）；（ii）完全形成的手语，由一群手语使用者使用并代代相传的系统。家庭手语告诉我们ABSL可能从哪里开始；完全形成的手语告诉我们它将走向何方。
桑德勒等人（6）证明，高度规则的词序在ABSL中在一代人的时间内已经进化出来以标记语法关系；该语言所显示的特定顺序是主 - 宾 - 动（SOV）。家庭手语使用者也会使用稳定的词序来标记语法关系，即使没有人向他们打手语表示那种词序。尽管每个家庭手语使用者都是独自发展其系统，但所有这些系统[即使是在不同文化中发展出来的（13）]往往都显示出相同的宾 - 动（OV）手语顺序——与ABSL中发现的SOV顺序相似（家庭手语使用者往往会省略主语S的手语）。事实上，即使让不懂手语的听力正常的说话者用手而不是嘴来交流，尽管他们的自然口语使用主 - 动 - 宾（SVO）顺序，也会出现相同的OV顺序（14）。因此，在没有常规语言输入的情况下发展出来的交流系统似乎在早期阶段容易呈现出OV顺序。
Because sign languages are processed by eye and hand rather than by ear and mouth, we might expect them to be structured differently from spoken languages. However, they are not. Sign languages are characterized by the same hierarchy of linguistic structures [syntax (1), morphology (2), and phonology (3)], and thus draw on the same human abilities as spoken languages. Moreover, children exposed to sign language from birth acquire that language as naturally as hearing children acquire the spoken language to which they are exposed, achieving major milestones at approximately the same ages (4, 5).
However, the manual modality makes sign languages unique in at least one respect. It is relatively easy to use the manual modality to invent representational forms that can be immediately understood by naive observers (e.g., indexical pointing gestures or iconic miming gestures). As a result, communication systems can be invented on the spot in the manual modality, which means that sign systems have the potential to provide a window onto the process of language creation. Indeed, deaf individuals have often found themselves in situations where they needed to create a language de novo.
One such situation is described by Sandler et al. in this issue of PNAS (6). A community, now in its seventh generation and containing 3,500 members, was founded 200 years ago in Israel by the Al-Sayyid Bedouins. Within the last three generations, 150 deaf individuals were born into this community, all descended from two of the founders' five sons. Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL) was thus born. The language now has three generations of signers and therefore offers the opportunity to not only glimpse a language in its infant stages but also watch it grow.
ABSL is not yet a mature language and thus is still undergoing change. As a result, signers from each of the three generations are likely to differ, and to differ systematically (7), in the system of signs they use. By observing signers from each generation, we can therefore make good guesses as to when a particular linguistic property first entered the language. Moreover, because the individual families in the community are tightly knit, with strong bonds within families but not across them, we can chart changes in the language in relation to the social network of the community. We can determine when properties remained within a single family and when they did not, and thus follow the trajectory that particular linguistic properties took as they spread (or failed to spread) throughout the community. This small and self-contained community consequently offers a unique perspective on some classic questions in historical linguistics (8, 9).
ABSL differs from young spoken languages [for example, Pidgin or Creole, languages that crop up when existing languages come into contact with one another (10)] in that ABSL has arisen de novo with no influence from any established language, either signed or spoken. Moreover, ABSL differs from other young sign languages [for example, the sign language that currently is emerging in cohorts of Nicaraguan deaf children brought together for the first time in schools (11)] in that it is developing in a socially stable community with children learning the system from their parents.
ABSL holds a unique position between two types of sign systems: (i) homesign, a sign system developed by a deaf child whose hearing losses prevent that child from acquiring spoken language and whose hearing parents have not exposed the child to a conventional sign language, that is, an individual sign system not shared even with the hearing family members within that home (12); and (ii) fully formed sign languages, systems used by a community of signers and transmitted from one generation to the next. Homesign tells us where ABSL may have started; fully formed sign languages tell us where it is going.
Sandler et al. (6) demonstrate that highly regular word order has evolved to mark grammatical relations in ABSL within a single generation; the particular order that the language displays is Subject Object Verb (SOV). Homesigners also turn out to use stable word order to mark grammatical relations, and to do so even though no one signs that word order to them. Despite the fact that each homesigner is developing his or her system alone, all of these systems [even those developed in different cultures (13)] tend to display the same Object Verb (OV) sign order—parallel to the SOV order found in ABSL (home-signers tend to omit signs for S, the Subject). Indeed, even when hearing speakers who know no sign language are asked to use their hands and not their mouths to communicate, the same OV order arises despite the fact that their natural spoken language uses the SVO order (14). Thus, communication systems that are developed without input from conventional language appear prone to exhibit OV order, at least in their early stages.