OLAC Record oai:scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu:10125/24870

Metadata
Title:		Scoring sign language vitality: Adapting a spoken language survey to target the endangerment factors affecting sign languages
Bibliographic Citation:		Webster, Jenny, Safar, Josefina; 2019-08; Kaipuleohone University of Hawai'i Digital Language Archive;http://hdl.handle.net/10125/24870.
Creator:		Webster, Jenny
		Safar, Josefina
Date (W3CDTF):		2019-08
Description:		This article explores factors affecting the vitality/endangerment levels of sign languages, and how these levels were assessed through an international collaboration using a systematic scoring scheme. This included adapting UNESCO’s Linguistic Vitality and Diversity survey and developing a system for determining endangerment levels based on the responses. Other endangerment scales are briefly explored along with UNESCO’s, and the survey adaptation and systematic scoring processes are explained. The survey needed to be carefully adapted because even though many spoken language procedures can be also used for sign languages, there are additional challenges and characteristics that uniquely affect sign language communities. The article then presents the vitality scores for 15 languages, including both national and village sign languages, and the major factors threatening their vitality. The methodology of scoring based on averages is innovative, as is the workflow between the questionnaire respondents and scoring committee. Such innovations may also be useful for spoken languages. Future efforts might develop best practice models for promoting sign language vitality and compile diachronic data to monitor changes in endangerment status. The findings can also inform policy work to bring about legal recognition, greater communication access, and the protection of deaf signers’ linguistic and cultural identity.
		National Foreign Language Resource Center
Format:		38 pages
Identifier:		Webster, Jenny & Josefina Safar. 2019. Scoring sign language vitality: Adapting a spoken language survey to target the endangerment factors affecting sign languages. Language Documentation & Conservation 13: 346-383.
		1934-5275
Identifier (URI):		http://hdl.handle.net/10125/24870
Publisher:		University of Hawaii Press
Rights:		Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial 4.0 International
		Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 United States
		http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/us/
Subject:		sign languages
		language vitality
		language endangerment
		surveys
Table Of Contents:		webster_safar.pdf
Type:		Article
Type (DCMI):		Text
OLAC Info
Archive:		Language Documentation and Conservation
Description:		http://www.language-archives.org/archive/ldc.scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu
GetRecord:		OAI-PMH request for OLAC format
GetRecord:		Pre-generated XML file
OAI Info
OaiIdentifier:		oai:scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu:10125/24870
DateStamp:		2019-08-07
GetRecord:		OAI-PMH request for simple DC format
Search Info
Citation:		Webster, Jenny; Safar, Josefina. 2019. University of Hawaii Press.
Terms:		dcmi_Text