Saving dying languages: Plains Indian sign language

Jeffrey Davis, an associate professor [at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville] in sign language linguistics, has won National Science Foundation support to organize the first Plains Indian sign language workshop to be held in 80 years.

Davis rediscovered 1930s films of Native American signers that had been stored in government archives and is now leading a National Science Foundation project to locate and interview the few remaining users of Plains Indian hand sign.

Davis and co-investigator Melanie McKay-Cody from William Woods University, will hold the workshop August 12-15, 2010, at a site still to be determined on the Northern Plains. The NSF Documenting Endangered Languages program is funding the effort.

Davis’s efforts to preserve and document Plains Indian sign language are spotlighted on Science Nation, an online science magazine for the public supported by the National Science Foundation. View the NSF Science Nation video or visit the Hand Talk: American Indian Sign Language website.

For additional information, visit Jeffrey Davis’ website.

Recent Publications

Davis, J. (2010). Hand talk: Sign Language among Indian Nations of North America. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

McKee, R., & Davis, J. (Eds.) (2010). Sign Language Interpreting in Multilingual and Multicultural Contexts: Studies in Interpretation. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press.

Davis, J., & McKay-Cody, M. (2010). Signed languages and American Indian communities: Considerations for interpreting work and research. In R. McKee, & J. Davis (Eds.), Sign Language Interpreting in Multilingual and Multicultural Contexts. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press.

Davis, J. (2007). North American Indian signed language varieties: A comparative linguistic assessment. Sociolinguistics in Deaf Communities, 13, 85 – 122.

Davis, J. (2006). A historical linguistic account of Sign Language among North American Indians. In C. Lucas (Ed.), Multilingualism and Sign Languages: From the Great Plains to Australia (pp. 3 – 35). Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press.

Davis, J. (2005). Code choices and consequences: Implications for educational interpreting. In M. Marschark, R. Peterson, & E. Winston (Eds.), Educational Interpreting: From Research to Practice (pp. 112 – 141). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

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