Current Issues in ASL Phonology. Phonetics and Phonology

A book for academics and advanced students in linguistics and cognitive science, particularly those with an interest in phonology, sign language, and psycholinguistics and more specifically those with an interest in the nature of abstract articulatory representations in human language. "Current Issues in ASL Phonology" is a carefully-choses collection of essays which address theoretical issues in the phronology of the American Signed Language (ASL) of the deaf. While the papers deal directly with the internal study of ASL, the also address more general topics regarding the phonological structure of human language. It describes the abstract patterning of formational units in sign language with an inventory of features and discussions of how such features and segments are put together. Furthermore it answers such questions as: what units function as basic level segments in ASL?; how are these units grouped into norae and/or syllables in ASL?; what is the nature of ASL phonological tiers?