The Role of Fingerspelling in Saudi Arabian Deaf Culture

ABSTRACT

The role of fingerspelling as to its unique features, its use, and its function in the culture and education of the Saudi Deaf population has not been examined. Specifically, this study focuses on assessing historical and existing attitudes and beliefs of Saudi Deaf people regarding the importance of fingerspelling and situations in which they use it. While currently, a disparity exists between the attitudes and beliefs of younger, somewhat more progressive Deaf people and those of their more traditional elders, and the obvious necessity of the acceptance and use of the fingerspelling in Saudi Arabian Deaf daily life and education.

KEYWORDS:

• Deaf literacy
• fingerspelling
• orthography Saudi Arabian Sign Language SASL

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank Deanship of Scientific Research at Majmaah University for this work under Project Number No. R-1441-163.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. It seems important to emphasise here that older Deaf people do not typically use fingerspelling, and they do not favour dealing with its use by others. The fingerspelling alphabet in Figure 1 was not passed until the mid-1990s by the League of Arab States and adopted by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in its Deaf educational system, so older Deaf persons have refused to use it because they are proud, and it is difficult for them to learn. They prefer instead to either write with a finger in the air or on the palm of the hand. However, younger Deaf are more likely to use fingerspelling as part of their sign language (Abdel-Fattah, 2005; Hanafi & Saadoun, 2005).

2. Of the fingers.

3. Loan signs are also called “lexicalised fingerspelling [, which] is when fingerspelling has morphed into an articulatory bundle that has characteristics more similar to a single sign than a string of letters. (Vicars, n.d.)

4. Certain small groups of Saudi Deaf individuals use ‘code’ signs, of which only the small group knows their meaning, because they want to obscure what they are saying from other Deaf people.