Why isn’t there a universal sign language? One that everyone around the world could learn so that they would be understood no matter where they lived, or travelled to? Who decided it was a better idea to have more than one?
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The American sign language sign for “bull shit” is crossing your arms with one hand making the bull horn symbol while the other hand clenches and releases a fist like it’s dropping something. This hand gesture is meant to literally symbolize a bull shitting.
In English, the phrase “bullshit” means something that is an outrageous and obvious lie. If you weren’t familiar with the phrase and you looked up the words, you would get the definition of a cow pooping. You wouldn’t understand why when I lie someone would say cow poop (maybe in context you would understand, but you see my point).
Each language has phrases that change over time and don’t well. So an American word translated into american sign language would not translate at all in another language and vice versa. Each language also has its own form of Grammer and word structure. Essentially, each language does need its own form of sign language.
However, there is a constructed language called Esperanto, which was created in the late 1800s with the intention of being an international language. It borrowed common words from different languages and had a simple Grammar structure without exceptions. The idea was that instead of everyone learning each others language, we should all learn Esperanto to talk to each other, since that would be easier. It never took off in the main stream but you can still learn it today, there are several million speakers. In the 1970, they developed Gestuno, which was like Esperanto but with hand symbols. Like the spoken language, it borrowed common gestures from other sign languages and constructed a simple second language with the intention of bridging the gap.
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