Spoken Language Rules Work In Signed Communication, Too

Language is language, regardless of the way you communicate. A new study by Psychology and Linguistics Professor Iris Berent at Northeastern University demonstrates that similar structures rule communication, and whether communication is via speech or sign is of secondary importance.

Basically, people adhere to certain patterns for what’s permissible in language and reject structures that “seem wrong.” By observing that research subjects with no knowledge of sign language mapped the rules of spoken language onto signs they were shown, researchers learned that ingrained rules play a bigger role than previously thought.

Sign language was already known to have its own grammar and rules for pronunciation, word order, and usage before this study. Beyond that, American Sign Language (ASL) has a very different vocabulary and set of rules from sign languages used in other countries, and there are different regional accents and dialects within one country, just like in spoken language.

Berent said that her research aimed “to reveal the complex structure of sign language, and in so doing, disabuse the public of this notion [that sign language is not really a language].”

How do you research language without taking the time to make people learn a whole new language?

Berent’s lab approached the problem by focusing on words and signs that had the same basic structure. Then, they extended that structure to meaningless sounds and signs. The researchers showed signs with similar patterns to participants with no knowledge of sign language and asked the participants to rate whether certain patterns seemed to make sense.

The main pattern was doubling: words and signs with a sound or sign that was repeated. Here are some examples:

• bagogo
• fatiti
• bizanzan
• slaflaf

If these words seem like they might be right at home in Dr. Seuss, you’re not far off the mark. These combinations are nonsensical, and participants in the study recognized that. The exciting thing for the researchers is that their participants recognized and reacted to this type of pattern in both speech and signs.

The subjects were asked to respond to signs the same way they would to words, judging whether they made sense in certain contexts. If a word was given as a name for a single object, people gave lower ratings to words with doubling than ones without doubling. For example, slaflaf got worse ratings than slafmak. Sure, they both sound like gibberish, but one sounds more likely to be a word. One exception: if subjects were given a word or sign with doubling and told that the doubling signaled plurality, they were more likely to give it a higher rating.

In short: people’s responses to specific forms change based on the linguistic context of those forms.

By finding that people with no knowledge of sign language reacted in the same way to both words and signs with similar patterns, Berent showed that the governing rules for spoken language and sign language aren’t as different as people may think.

Berent’s study shows that sign languages aren’t just based on things like the shapes of objects described in individual words: instead, they rely on abstract rules just like spoken languages do. The idea that the same mechanisms in the brain are at work for both spoken and sign languages is big news for neurologists, psychologists, and linguists alike. In the task of uncovering the mysteries of language, we’re just scratching the surface.

How would you like to learn grammar?

This poll is part of a series that Grammarly is running aimed at better understanding how the public feels about writing, language learning, and grammar.

Please take the poll and share your thoughts in the comments. We can’t wait to hear from you!

If you are interested in more, check out last week’s poll.

What to Write for Fathers’ Day

Like birthdays, Christmas, and Hanukkah, Father’s Day can be rough. Yes, it is a great opportunity to recognize our fathers (and father figures) for their profound impact in our lives, but it is also a time when many of us feel tongue-tied.

How can we tell dad exactly what he means to us in a simple card or letter? Here are five tips for writing the perfect note to dad in honor of Father’s Day:

Share important memories.

Father’s Day is more than just a reminder that you love your dad. It’s a time to recall the best memories you have with him, a day to really show him that he has made a difference in your life. A powerful way to do this is to recall great memories you have with your dad and write about them. Spend some time to paint a vivid picture of that one great day with dad that you will never forget.

Write from the heart.

Whatever you write, make sure it comes from your heart. That is to say, if you are not the sentimental type but you have a great sense of humor, there is no reason to force deep thoughts on to the page. Hit your dad with your best jokes, the ones that he will really appreciate. On the other hand, if you tend to write flowery prose but you aren’t great at stand-up comedy, don’t try to be overly witty.

When writing the perfect Father’s Day message, the old adage “write what you know” is key to success. Your dad knows your voice and style—he’s probably read your work before. And better yet, he knows and loves you. Stick with what you do, and who you are, and the message will be genuine.

Be honest.

Tell your dad exactly what you really want to say. Don’t be afraid that saying “I love you” is too cliché. Don’t worry that telling your dad, “You’ve always been there for me” is cheesy. Sometimes, keeping it simple and straightforward is the best way to approach a note to dad. If, “Thank you for always being there,” is what you want to say, then say it and say it just like that. You can always expand on this idea later.

Remember that mixed sentiments are not mixed messages.

You can combine different sentiments within the same message. For example, you can mention a touching idea alongside a humorous anecdote. Something like, “Dad, thank you so much for always being there for me…like that one time I ran over an orange cone and we had to use a crowbar to get it out of the wheel well!

For inspiration, here is a list of clever, witty, and touching Father’s Day sentiments.

Say thank you.

Regardless of what else you say in your piece, say thank you to your dad. After all, whether your sentiment is “you have always been there,” “you have given me wisdom,” or “you have always fought for me,” what you really are saying is “thanks for being there,” “thanks for your advice,” or “thanks for fighting for me.” Your father will appreciate being thanked.

Writing the perfect Father’s Day message is a lot harder than it seems. The basic ideas you want to convey, however, are pretty straightforward. And, if you speak from the heart, you’ll rarely go wrong.

What are some of your favorite Father’s Day messages? Share more tips and links in the comments below!

Grammar Basics: What Is Grammar Case?

Do you enjoy team sports? Some team positions carry special responsibilities. In hockey, the goalie’s job is to block the other team from scoring. In American football, the place holder steadies the football for the field goal kicker. If you imagine language as a team sport, you can think of grammatical cases as team positions. They tell you the special roles of pronouns. Only three cases are common in modern English—subjective, objective, and possessive.

The Subjective Case

When a pronoun is the subject of a clause or sentence, it is in the subjective case. Therefore, the pronouns I, you, he, she, it, we, they, and who are subjective case pronouns.

The Objective Case

Pronouns that serve as objects of verbs or prepositions are in the objective case: me, you, him, her, it, us, them, and whom.

The Possessive Case

With nouns, you usually indicate possession by adding an apostrophe and the letter S (or just an apostrophe, in the case of most plural nouns). Pronouns demonstrate possession by using possessive case forms. There are two types of possessive pronouns. Possessive determiners (my, your, his, her, its, our, their, whose) and absolute possessive pronouns (mine, yours, his, hers, ours, and theirs).

Did you notice that some of the pronouns appear in more than one case? Just as an athlete might enjoy more than one sport, pronouns can be versatile too. It’s interesting to learn about the different ways individual members contribute to the team, and it’s cool to know the grammatical cases!

Relax, Grammar Pedant. Everything You Know Is Wrong

Rules are rules, and they exist for a reason. They create order and minimize uncertainty. They are necessary because nothing would work without them. But some people don’t seem to understand that.

They don’t understand why it’s bad to split your infinitives, or why you shouldn’t start a sentence with a conjunction, or why you can’t end it with a preposition. Some people just don’t care. Some people just want to watch the world burn, fuelled by the misuse of “good” for “well,” and “while” for “though.” But if the world really depends on people adhering to those strict and sometimes obscure grammar rules, it might as well burn. Because all of the pedantic rules mentioned above are wrong. Forget everything you know, grammar pedant, because it’s all a lie.

Okay, so maybe the world won’t burn, and maybe not everything you know about grammar is a lie. A lot of it might be, though. Some grammar rules are simply myths with little to no basis in how the language is actually used. Other grammar rules aren’t applicable across the whole spectrum of English subtypes and dialects. And there are rules with so many exceptions that they probably shouldn’t be called rules.

Take the myth about ending sentences with a preposition, for example. We know exactly who to blame for this little superstition. John Dryden, a seventeenth-century British poet, was the person who came up with this “rule.” Robert Lowth, a bishop in the Church of England and a composer of prescriptive grammar textbooks, is often blamed for perpetuating the myth, but in fact he said quite clearly that avoiding a sentence-ending preposition is a matter of style, not grammar. Why did Dryden and Lowth do this? Well, they were men of their time, and in their time it was very popular to force English to follow the the rules of another language. That other language was, you guessed it, Latin. It’s true, you can’t end a sentence with a preposition in Latin. But it’s a common and correct construction in English.

The prohibition against splitting infinitives is another one that seems to have sprung from a fondness for applying Latin grammar rules to English. In English, splitting an infinitive means inserting an adverb between “to” and the uninflected form of a verb (e.g., “to boldly go”). Latin doesn’t have split infinitives because in Latin an infinitive is a single word. But in English, rigidly avoiding split infinitives can change the meaning of your sentence or make it more difficult to understand. So go ahead and split an infinitive when you need to, Latin be damned.

Another of these hobgoblins is the supposed rule that you can’t start a sentence with a conjunction. Starting too many sentences with conjunctions will make your writing awkward, for sure, but never doing it? It’s overkill. Conjunctions glue the elements of your writing together. These elements might be words or clauses. But they can also be sentences.

The rules governing the use of “that” and “which” are also a bit shaky. The rule says that we should use “that” for restrictive relative clauses and save “which” for nonrestrictive relative clauses. This rule is sort of half-true, because using “that” for nonrestrictive relative clauses does sound a bit awkward. But the part of the rule that says you can’t use “which” for restrictive relative clauses is, well, not a good rule. You can do it, and there are situations when it’s the only choice you can make.

The point is that you shouldn’t blindly follow every prescriptive rule you come across without a second thought. Following these rules in formal writing and speaking might do you some good—people believe they’re true, remember—but in your everyday communication, you don’t have to worry about splitting infinitives or starting sentences with conjunctions. You can sometimes even let your modifiers dangle.

There are plenty of real rules to worry about, after all. Do you know the proper order of adjectives, for example? You probably wouldn’t be able to recite it off the top of your head, but if you use more than one adjective to describe something, you will intuitively arrange them in a way that just sounds good. You will say that something is big or small before you say which color it is. You will say that something is new or old before you say it’s French or British or Ugandan. There are plenty of rules you use you’re not even aware of. So relax, grammar pedant. Sit back, grab some marshmallows, and enjoy the fire if you think it’s there.

Monday Motivation Hack: Step Out of Your Comfort Zone

About three years ago, I decided to take a huge leap of faith. I sold almost everything I owned, packed my Toyota Sienna from floor to headliner with the stuff too precious to part with, and headed 2,000 miles west across rivers and mountains to an apartment I’d rented sight-unseen in a city I’d only ever driven past on vacation once. It’s the single scariest and best thing I’ve ever done.

Comfort zone annihilation level: expert.

There’s good news, though. You don’t have to make a cross-country move to experience the simultaneous terror and exhilaration of stepping outside your comfort zone. We’re talking about making your Mondays a little more enjoyable here, so baby steps will do.

What is a “comfort zone” and why should you challenge it?

Your comfort zone is the space you inhabit where behaviors, activities, and settings are all familiar and routine. That familiarity becomes a buffer to reduce anxiety and stress. You embrace the status quo because you feel secure there.

Here’s a tip: Status quo is Latin for the state in which. It’s been used since the early eighteenth century to mean “the current state of affairs.” The phrase usually serves as a noun, but it can also function as a phrasal adjective preceding a noun.

If comfort is a good thing (and anyone who’s spent a day in their pajamas working from home knows it is), then why are we encouraged to take risks? The idea of challenging our comfort zones dates back to a 1908 study. It showed that while being reliably comfortable produces steady performance, ramping up the anxiety level just a bit, to a place called “optimal anxiety”, maximizes it.

As tempting as it is to stick with our familiar routines, challenging yourself to push just past that state of relative ease by taking some risks is where you’ll achieve your best performance.

Four Simple Ideas for Breaking Out of Your Comfort Zone Today

If you’re ready to edge outside our comfort zone, here are a few ways to start shaking things up . . . just a little.

1 Take a different route to work.

We’re creatures of habit. Many of us follow the same, predictable path to the office each day. We don’t see much of anything new, but at least we know approximately how long the commute will take.

I make a point to take different routes whenever I go somewhere. Google Maps usually gives me a pretty solid estimate of how long the trip will take, and then I add five minutes or so to account for the unexpected. Changing my route keeps things interesting. Bonus: I know at least six different ways to get almost anywhere around my city.

via GIPHY

2 Take a risk-taker out for coffee.

Is there someone in your life—a family member, colleague, or friend—who’s adept at taking risks? Challenge yourself to take that person out for coffee with the goal of asking them about their gutsy lifestyle. Ask them what drives them to color outside the lines, and how they cope with their fears.

Change is unnerving. We all need a little encouragement from time to time. Most risk-takers will enjoy taking a neophyte under their wing and showing them how to stretch their boundaries. When you’re trying to challenge yourself, it’s good to have someone in your corner urging you on.

3 Sign up for a class and learn something creative.

Creativity equals risk-taking. Creative people fail, and the most creative people fail all the time. You don’t think Picasso always painted masterpieces, or that J.K. Rowling wrote the Harry Potter series without a single rewrite, do you?

Think of a creative pursuit that’s always fascinated you and take time on your lunch break to look around for classes. Maybe you’ve always wanted to learn how to use your expensive DSLR camera outside of auto mode. Or it could be you’d like to get your hands dirty throwing a ceramic pot. Your thespian side may long for an improv class. Face your fears and dive in!

4 Learn a language.

Learning a new language can be fun, and the process has many cognitive advantages. With apps like Duolingo and Babbel in your corner, it’s also easy. Sure, trying to learn something new can be a little scary, and trying to speak a new language when you’re still struggling to wrap your tongue around foreign sounds is unnerving, but the benefits are clear.

Comfort is overrated.

Looking back on our lives, we rarely regret the risks we’ve taken; we only regret the ones we didn’t. Comfort kills. It leads to apathy and boredom. It strips away our motivation.

Getting outside your comfort zone is not a means to an end, but rather a goal in itself. As soon as you choose to leave your comfort zone, you form a direct friction with life, go towards the pursuit of your dreams, and in short, really start living.

—Ran Zilca for Psychology Today

So, this Monday, go ahead and shake things up a little. There’s no reward without the risk.

How Grammar Influences Legal Interpretations

Grammar is important, but it’s not a matter of life or death. Or is it? How does grammar influence the legal system? Researchers decided to find out by conducting an experiment. Does the wording of the description of a murder affect whether jurors classify a crime as first- or second-degree murder? According to their findings, “legal judgments can be affected by grammatical aspect but [most significantly] limited to temporal dynamics… In addition, findings demonstrate that the influence of grammatical aspect on situation model construction and evaluation is dependent upon the larger linguistic and semantic context.” In other words, grammar plays a part, but the study participants also paid attention to context when making their decisions. Is grammar as significant in real-life legal cases?

For Avondale Lockhart, whether or not he would spend the next ten years of his life in prison came down to a question of grammar. Federal law requires a minimum ten-year sentence for repeat sexual offenders convicted of “aggravated sexual abuse, sexual abuse, or abusive sexual conduct involving a minor or ward.” How would you interpret the phrase? Does “involving a minor or ward” apply only to the part of the sentence immediately preceding it (abusive sexual conduct) or does it apply to all the crimes listed? Lockhart, previously convicted of attempted rape, contended that because his previous crime wasn’t against a minor, the minimum 10-year sentence did not apply to him.

In Canada, a cable television provider and a telecommunications company disputed the import of a single comma in their contract. Bell Aliant, the telephone company, wanted to cancel their contract with Rogers Communication. This is the sentence in question:”This agreement shall be effective from the date it is made and shall continue in force for a period of five (5) years from the date it is made, and thereafter for successive five (5) year terms, unless and until terminated by one year prior notice in writing by either party.” How do you understand the sentence? Does Bell Aliant have the right to cancel the contract at any time, provided they give one-year notice? Or does the one-year notice apply to cancellations enacted after the first five-year term? The difference amounts to about $900,000 US dollars.

How well can you explain the passive voice and the subjunctive mood? In an article published by the Loyola University Chicago Law Journal, law professor Robert C. Farrell observes that “there is widespread unfamiliarity among lawyers and law students with the terminology that describes verb forms.” In most contexts, this doesn’t matter. Native speakers use and understand grammar constructs instinctively, even if they cannot explain why saying something in a certain way is correct. However, in “a small percentage of cases, including some important ones, courts explicitly rely on grammatical terminology to explain their decisions.” If law students aren’t familiar with the classifications of grammar, how will they respond to arguments based on grammatical interpretation? The article highlights one case where grammar played a life-or-death role. In 1995, a jury convicted Michael Kelly Roberts of aggravated premeditated first-degree murder and first-degree felony murder. He received a death sentence for the crimes. Did the jury really have the authority to issue a capital punishment? Notice the passive voice in this phrase from their instructions that defines aggravated first-degree murder: “[when the] murder was committed in the course of, in furtherance of, or in immediate flight from, a robbery … or a kidnapping.” According to Robert’s defense, the use of passive voice mistakenly conveyed the impression that a death penalty could be applied to the accused even if he was not an active or major participant in the illegal events. Because there was another man involved, no one could say who had actually committed the murder.

Are you wondering about the verdicts of the cases mentioned? In the case of Avondale Lockhart, the Court applied the “rule of the last antecedent,” which states that “a limiting clause or phrase . . . should ordinarily be read as modifying only the noun or phrase that it immediately follows.” While the rule can be overruled by other “indica of meaning,” the Court found nothing to indicate that it should be reversed in this case. Lockhart received the minimum ten-year sentence. The Canadian telephone pole contract dilemma reached a resolution when Rogers Communications presented the French version of the same contract. The wording in the French contract was clear enough that the court reversed an earlier decision allowing Bell Aliant to terminate the contract before the end of the five-year term. As for Michael Kelly Roberts, the courts vacated his death sentence and reversed his conviction of first-degree murder. His first-degree felony murder conviction was upheld. How did the rulings match your interpretations of the legal language?