How intricate/detailed is sign language, especially where inflection and sarcasm are concerned? Do those exist?
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When I was a kid, one of my neighbors had a deaf mother. You always knew when the parents were silently fighting (they did this a lot) because of how…aggressively they would sign at each other. I’m not even sure how else to describe it.
You bet they have such things.
You always here that 70% of communication is non-verbal, anyway (or some such numbers). That includes voice inflection of course, but posture, position, eye contact, speed and sharpness of movement, facial expression, etc. are so important, even to verbal languages.
Fluent in ASL here – can say pages of stuff in a few minutes easily. It’s very expressive.
If someone asked you to give a sarcastic thumbs-up, I suspect you’d manage it. It can often be as simple as the style of the physical gesture. People often develop an ‘accent’ too! Usually within smaller groups that they communicate with most often, copying the style of certain signs
It’s perhaps easier to see this in action:
Cardi B’s WAP translated to sign language: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YByHs6zoS90
They can also be regional differences, just like with spoken English. Imagine the difference between someone from Boston and someone from Texas saying “wash the car.” You would be able to tell the difference between them by their accents. Same with sign! The “words” are the same but the style and movements can vary by region. It’s really cool.
Which sign language? There are a lot of different sign languages. ASL (American Sign Language) has its own grammar, puns, “literary devices” (ABC stories and ASL poetry is a thing that is very different than English stories and poetry), rhyming, etc. Sarcasm and inflection definitely exist in ASL. Facial expression and body language is a grammatical marker that changes sentences’ meaning.
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