Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!lll-crg!ucdavis!ucbvax!ingres!bradr From: bradr@ingres.ARPA (Brad Rubenstein) Newsgroups: net.motss Subject: Re: Signs for "Gay" Message-ID: <145@ingres.ARPA> Date: Wed, 6-Nov-85 17:54:40 EST Article-I.D.: ingres.145 Posted: Wed Nov 6 17:54:40 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 8-Nov-85 21:05:23 EST References: <105@emacs.UUCP> <10761@ucbvax.ARPA> <1750@gatech.CSNET> <131@ingres.ARPA> <586@osiris.UUCP> Sender: usenet@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: bradr@ingres.UUCP (Brad Rubenstein) Distribution: net Organization: University of California, Berkeley Lines: 31 In article <586@osiris.UUCP> jcp@osiris.UUCP (Jody Patilla) writes: >[...] > I asked a friend who works at Gallaudet, the college for the >deaf in Washington, about signs for "gay" and he showed me something >similar to the above. It's a "g" sign on the tip of the chin that (he >says - I wouldn't know) also looks like a "q" (for queer) and a limp >wrist. [...] Now that's interesting. For those that don't catch the reference, the handshapes for "g" and "q" are the same in the fingerspelling alphabet (they differ in the orientation of the hand), and a common way in which signs evolve is by alteration of the old handshape to the letter of the english-language word corresponding to the new sign. For example, a common sign for COMPUTER is the same as the sign for THINK, except that fingers form a "C" handshape. What strikes me is that I never associated the letter "q", hence QUEER, with the sign mentioned above. I wonder if the person who made that interpretation was gay-identified? I'm thinking that maybe the sign has different connotations to straight and gay signers, because of a coincidence in the correspondence between handshapes and letters (I mean, the "g" GAY/"q" QUEER confusion). Just a hypothesis. Ah, natural language. This could never have happened in LISP. Brad -- Brad Rubenstein Project INGRES/BARTOK Computer Science Division ARPA: bradr@ingres.berkeley.edu University of California UUCP: ...ucbvax!ucbingres!bradr Berkeley, CA 94720 PaBell: (415) 642-8149