More than hands can say: The use of nonmanual linguistic features in Flemish Sign Language

During the production of manual signs, signers move their head and body, blink their eyes, imitate the articulation of spoken words, gaze in certain directions, raise and lower their eyebrows and show other sorts of facial expressions. Some of these behaviours have no communicative function, others clearly have: without a correct interpretation of their function and meaning, the message cannot be fully understood. Reported in this paper are part of the preliminary results from the first in-depth study of communicative nonmanual behaviours in Flemish Sign Language. The findings presented here clearly show that at least part of the eye, face, head and body activities should be considered an integral part of the language system itself.status: publishe