This article provides a cross-cultural study of language socialization through sign language in three indigenous Mesoamerican communities. We focus on what Goffman (1964) describes as ‘encounters’ or face engagements and how children learn the practices or rules of social exchange. As Goffman notes, many encounters have both ratified participants and excluded individuals, or those who are co-present but not explicitly implicated in the conversation. Cross-culturally, children may be more likely to occupy these side-participant roles and we explore whether this affects their ability to master visual practices in sign interactions. We analyse visual and tactile behaviours that have been documented in other signing communities in studies of turn-taking and social interaction (Horton & Singleton, 2022),including: visual-manual turn markers, establishing and maintaining eye gaze during signing, physically arranging participants to accommodate signing, and using eye gaze for joint attention and reference. Our analysis focuses on the relationship between visual/tactile communicative practice sand two characteristics of communities that have been linked to distinct socialization styles: participant frameworks and beliefs about language between adults and children.
Sign language socialization and participant frameworks in three indigenous Mesoamerican communities
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