A SignWriting-Bad Approach to
Sign Language Processing
Antˆo nio Carlos da Rocha Costa and Gra¸c aliz Pereira Dimuro
Escola de Inform´a tica,Universidade Cat´o lica de Pelotas
96.010-000Pelotas,RS,Brazil
{rocha,liz}@he.br
he.br
Abstract.The SignWriting system is a practical writing system for
deaf sign languages,compod of a t of intuitive graphical-schematic
symbols and simple rules for combining them to reprent signs.The
SignWriting Markup Language(SWML)is an XML-bad language for en-
coding sign language texts,written in SignWriting,in an application and
computer platform independent way.Thus,sign language texts,written
in SignWriting and encoded in SWML,can be entered as input to-and
赛维干洗店加盟24小时打一成语also got as output from-any kind of computer program performing
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any kind of language and document processing(storage and retrieval,
analysis and generation,translation,spell-checking,arch,animation,
dictionary automation,etc.).This opens the whole area of text-bad
natural language processing and computational linguistics to the deaf
sign languages.The paper explains such approach to sign language pro-
cessing,giving its elements and general guidelines1.
Keywords:Sign language processing,writing systems for sign languages,
SignWriting,SWML.
1Introduction
The SignWriting system2is a practical writing system for deaf sign languages. It is compod of a t of intuitive grahical-schematic symbols and of simple rules for combining such symbols to reprent signs.
Oppod to notation systems like the HamNoSys system3,SignWriting is not a system specially meant to be ud by linguists in their analytical reprentation of signs and sign phras,although it can surely be ud in such task.It is esntially a system conceived to be ud by deaf people in their daily lives,for the same purpos hearing people commonly u written oral languages(taking notes,reading books and newspapers,learning at school,making contracts,etc.) 1This work and the SignNet Project(UCPel/PUCRS/ULBRA)are developed with financial support from CNPq/ProTeM and FAPERGS.云南茶文化
2
3www.sign-lang.uni-hamburg.de/Projects/HamNoSys.html
2 A.C.Rocha Costa and G.P.Dimuro
This places the SignWriting system in a privileged position to be taken as the preferred writing system for sign language and sign document processing systems,as such systems can thus be put into real practical u by common (deaf)people.
Given the graphical-schematic nature of the SignWriting system,an ap-propriate encoding of its symbols is necessary,in order to allow the computer storage and processing of sign language documentfiles,as well as the u of written sign languages in interactive control components of computer program interfaces.
That is the purpo of SWML(SignWriting Markup Language4),an XML-bad language that is being developed to allow the computer-platform inde-pendent reprentation of sign language texts written in SignWriting and to allow,thus,the interoperability of SignWriting-bad sign language processing systems.
This paper explains our approach to text-bad sign language processing, which takes the SignWriting system as its main foundation and SWML as its main computational tool.
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Section2gives an overview of the SignWriting system.Section3firstly reviews XML and its role as a meta-language providing for computer systems interoperability.Then,it briefly explains the current version of SWML,the role SWML can play for future sign language processing systems,and the relation it has to the SignWriter editor(thefirst and-currently-major computer program ud to create and process SignWriting texts and dictionaries[2]).
Section4pictures the overall scenario of SignWriting-bad sign language processing,as envisioned by the approach propod here,and hints on software developments being carried on within the SignNet Project5.
2The SignWriting System
2.1Conceptual foundations
Valerie Sutton,the inventor of the SignWriting system,took the stance that, from a practical and intuitive point of view,sign language notation should be visually driven and graphically displayed.Such stance came from her previous experience with the development of a writing system for choreographic move-ments,the DanceWriting system[4]6.
Sign language notation was,thus,conceived as just another ca of movement writing,so that the same principles of DanceWriting could be applied,and the SignWriting system[1]came up as a visual language for writing sign languages.
Sure,the system was construed to tackle the various phonetic and phonolog-ical aspects of sign languages,as they are usually identified by the mainstream of sign language linguistics[5]:hand configurations,hand andfinger movements, 4he.br
5he.br
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Lecture Notes in Computer Science3 locations,face expressions,contacts,gmentation,etc.[1].That was necessary becau the visual aspects of sign languages are precily what is specific to their linguistic features at the phonetic and phonological levels.
However,in its conceptual foundation,the system was kept as a movement writing system,and that is exactly what makes it intuitive and usable for com-mon people,not specially trained in linguistics.Also,that is what makes the SignWriting system neutral with respect to the alternative linguistic frame-works,and thus compatible with otherwi linguistically incompatible theories.
For instance,the SignWriting system is neutral with respect to the vari-ous ways to analyze timing aspects(quentiality,simultaneity)in sign language phonology[5],and thus is neutral with respect to the movement-hold gmenta-tion versus single gmentation debate[6].
In fact,the SignWriting ems to be highly compatible with the visual phonological approach introduced by Linda Uyechi in[6],which was developed well after SignWriting was invented.
2.2The Graphical Symbols
There are various groups of graphical symbols in the SignWriting system,each corresponding to some important(phonetic/phonological)aspect of sign lan-guages.
Thefigures below(available from the website version of Amy Ronberg’s thesis[12],who collected them from various sources)illustrate the symbols of the SignWriting system.
Figure1shows the way the system reprents basic handshapes.Figure2 shows the modifications the basic handshape symbols may be submitted to,in order to reprent different hand orientations.It also gives examples of American Sign Language signs written in SignWriting.Figure3is an extract of an ASL text about ASL grammar,written by Karen van Hoek[13]
3SignWriting Markup Language
3.1XML and the Interoperability of Computer Systems
The development of the Internet furthered the need for the interoperability of on-line systems,and the eXtensible Markup Language(XML)is the solution propod by the World Wide Web Consortium(W3C)to such problem7.
XML is a meta-language allowing the definition of platform-and application-independent languages,dedicated to the storage and processing of information on the Web.
Theflexible t of rules incorporated in XML,and the wide availability of both free and commercial software(parrs,checkers,validators,etc.)supporting it,as well as the strong commitment to the language by the main computer 7/XML
4 A.C.Rocha Costa and G.P.Dimuro
Fig.1.The ten basic handshapes.
褐色英语怎么读manufacturers and software vendors,turned XML into the favorite interoperability tool in every software development initiative concerned with that matter.
团结议论文As it is easily envisioned that the applicability of SignWriting is of a wide spectrum in the Internet(texts,databas,websites,textual conversations,etc.), the need of an XML-bad format to reprent SignWritingfiles can also be easily understood.The SWML format explained below attempts tofill such need.
3.2SWML
The SignWriting Markup Language(SWML)is an XML-bad language created to allow the interoperability of SignWriting-bad sign language processing systems.
The current version of SWML is version1.0-draft2,defined by the DTD available at he.br/dtd-version1.0-draft2.htm.
Its main features are the following:
Lecture Notes in Computer Science5
Fig.2.The various modifications of the Index handshape.
SWML can reprent both SignWriting texts and dictionaries,as they are generated by the SignWriter program.
For every sign in the text or dictionary,there is a<sign box>comprising the t of<symbol>s that together reprent the sign.
For every<symbol>in a<sign box>,a"number"attribute identifies the <shape>of the symbol,and attributes"x"and"y"identify the coordinates of the symbol within the<sign box>.
Besides,for every symbol,a t of attributes("variation","fill"and "rotation")identify the<transformation>s to which the symbol was sub-jected when included in the sign.
Thefinal result is that the various features of any sign can be extracted from its reprentation in an SWML-encodedfile,and its image reconstructed, if necessary.
6 A.C.Rocha Costa and G.P.Dimuro
Fig.3.An extract of the ASL Grammar Lessons,by Karen van Hoek,written in ASL.
Figure4shows the sign for BRAZIL in the Brazilian Sign Language(LI-BRAS).Figure5shows the SWM
Lfile corresponding to that sign,as it is stored in a SignWriting textfile generated by the SignWriter editor.Comments were added afterwards,to ea the reading of thefile.
4SignWriting and Sign Language Processing
白云造句4.1The Propod Approach
We u the term sign language processing to denote the attempt to apply meth-ods and techniques of natural language processing and computational linguistics to deaf sign languages.
Such methods were originally developed to process oral languages and were, since the beginning,strongly connected to-and even dependent on-methods and techniques of processing oral ntences and discours prented in written
