Mastering a new modality: the influence of/nphonological knowledge on the acquisition of sign/nparameters by hearing adults

Treball de fi de màster en Lingüística Teòrica i AplicadaTutor: Josep QuerWhile spoken and signed languages express linguistic meaning through distinct modalities – t he former makes use of the audiooral modality, whereas the second operates through the visualgestural modality– both build meaningful structures through phonological systems composed of meaningless substructure units. When the process of second language acquisition involves learning to communicate in the other modality, one must acquire a new phonological system. Some research has been conducted on the subject, but it has not yet been asked what role phonological knowledge might play in the acquisition process that takes place when hearing/nadults attempt to acquire a sign language. The present paper considers this issue, and through a pilot study attempts to examine the effects of the activation of phonological knowledge on perception and production accuracy of sign parameters. Additionally, a proposal for a future study is made, with the added goal of investigating the pedagogical methods of sign language as a second language