Sign Language Structure
Stokoe, Jr.
Though not the first to recognize the existence of a sign language among deaf-mutes--
Montaigne two centuries earlier had been struck by its precision and rapidity (Essays, 2:29)--
l’Épée was the first to attempt to learn it, use it, and make it the medium of instruction for teaching
French language and culture to the deaf-mutes of his country. This language of the deaf, he, like
writers for the next two centuries, called ‘the natural language of signs’, or le langage des signes
naturelles. But for teaching the intricacies of French grammar, and through it the art of abstract
thought, he devised what now would be called a meta-language. This was his system of signes
méthodiques.
‘The natural language of signs’ is a term with a long history; from 1776 to the early years
of this century its denotation has varied with the metaphysical and linguistic theory of the writer
who used it. Particularly interesting is the almost magical effect of the adjective natural. Some of
those who use it are confident that throughout time and terrestrial space there is a necessary and
unbreakable connection between a sign and its meaning. Here, for example, is Valade, who wrote
some penetrating studies of the sign language (1854): ‘Les signes sont naturels quand ils ont, avec
l’objet de la pénsée, un rapport de nature tel qu’il est impossible de se méprendre sur leur
signification. Ils ont une valeur qui leur est proper et qu’aucune convention ne peut changer.’
L’Épée in his use of the term is less the metaphysician and more the linguist, but even he concludes
his conspectus of 1776 with a ‘Projet d’une langue universelle par l’entremise des signes naturelles
assujétis à un methode.’
Actually ‘the natural language of signs’ is a false entity. A ‘natural’ sign language must be
very much what is described in the first paragraph of this section. Any extremely close, non-
arbitrary, relation of sign to referent will be in those few areas of activity where pantomime and
denoted action are nearly identical, for instance, eating. Or it will be in the cases where pointing
is as clear as language: you, me, up, down; etc. But most of the signs taken as natural, necessary,
and unmistakable in the past are, of course, those parts of the total communicative activity of a
culture which relate to a specific set of circumstances in that culture. This list of Arrowsmith’s, in
The art of instructing the deaf and dumb (London, 1819), contains some of all three kinds: ‘yes,
no, good, bad, rich, poor, go, come, right, wrong, up, down, white, black, walk, ride . . .’ but
whether a nod or some other sign was the ‘natural’ sign for yes in Arrowsmith’s England, that sign
is just as arbitrary, just as much culturally determined, as any syllable in a vocal system.
L’Épée realized that this natural language, indispensable as it was in the day to day
existence of uninstructed deaf-mutes, was insufficient as a medium for teaching them French
language and culture. When the language had a sign which could be used for a certain concept of
French grammar he adapted it. He found that the pupils he encountered signified that an action or
event was past by throwing the hand back beside the shoulder once or repeatedly. In his carefully
worked out set of lessons he shows how he teaches the past tenses of French verbs in connection
with the days of the week and institutes at the same time some of his signes méthodiques. He uses
one backward motion of the hand, over the shoulder, for the simple past, two coups de la main for
the perfect and three for the pluperfect tense. When the language of ‘natural’ signs lacked a sign,
as it did for the articles, he invented one out of hand. The definite article le was signed by a crooked
index finger at the brow, la at the cheek. For some of these signes méthodiques of l’Épée and his
successors the etymologies can be accepted as with any explicit coinages. The crooking of the
index finger, he says, was a reminder to the pupil that the definite article chose one of many
possible instances of the noun; the brow was to recall the male custom of tipping or touching the
SASLJ, Vol. 2, No. 2 – Fall/Winter 2018
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