What is contact signing?

Contact signing: a quick definition

Contact signing is a way of signing that develops where a sign language and a spoken or written language meet. In the United States, it usually means a blend of American Sign Language (ASL) and English. Signers use mostly ASL signs but often arrange them closer to English word order, and they frequently mouth English words while signing. You may also see it called contact sign language, or by an older name, Pidgin Signed English (PSE).

Contact signing is not a webcam audio or microphone term. It describes a language variety, not a hardware part, a sound property or a software feature. It comes up in video-call settings because many deaf, hard-of-hearing and hearing signers communicate over webcams, and the term is often used to describe how someone signs.

What contact signing typically looks like

Contact signing is not a single fixed system with official rules. It varies from person to person and from conversation to conversation. Some people's signing sits closer to ASL, and some sits closer to English. Common features include the following.

• Vocabulary drawn mainly from ASL signs.
• Sentence order that often follows English rather than ASL grammar.
• Mouthing of English words alongside the signs.
• Some ASL grammatical features, such as facial expression and the use of signing space, often in reduced or simplified form.
• Few or no signs for English word endings and small grammatical words that strict English-based sign systems would spell out.

Who uses it and why

Contact signing often appears when deaf and hearing people sign together, especially when the hearing person learned ASL as a second language. Deaf signers also use it in situations where English is prominent, such as some school, work or professional settings. A signer may shift toward or away from contact signing depending on who they are talking to. That ability to adjust is one reason linguists treat it as a natural result of language contact rather than as "broken" ASL or poor English.

Why the name "Pidgin Signed English" fell out of favor

In linguistics, a pidgin is a simplified language that arises between groups who share no common language. Contact signing does not fit that definition well. The people who use it typically already know ASL, English or both, and its features vary with each signer's skills and the situation. For those reasons, researchers and many people in the Deaf community prefer the term contact signing.

How contact signing differs from ASL and English-based sign systems

Contact signing sits between two kinds of signing that are easy to confuse with it.

Type | What it is | Grammar | How it arises

American Sign Language (ASL) | A complete natural language with its own grammar | Independent of English; relies heavily on space, movement and facial grammar | Developed naturally within Deaf communities

Contact signing | A blend of ASL and English features | Mixed, often closer to English word order, and varies by signer | Emerges naturally where ASL and English users interact

Manually coded English systems | Sign systems designed to represent English on the hands | Follow English grammar closely, including endings and function words | Deliberately created, often for educational use

What it means for webcam and video-call communication

Because contact signing is visual, a webcam's microphone does not capture it. Microphone settings, input selection and noise controls do not change how well signing comes across. The camera image carries the message. A few general points follow from that.

• Keep the hands and upper body in frame, since signs use the space in front of the body.
• Keep the face clearly visible and well lit. Mouthing and facial expression carry meaning in contact signing.
• Remember that live captions and speech-to-text features work from audio, so they do not transcribe signing.
• If an interpreter is voicing for a signer, the microphone captures the interpreter's spoken voice, not the signing itself. Audio setup then matters for that voiced interpretation.

How well signing comes through on a particular call depends on factors such as camera quality, lighting, connection and the conferencing application. No evidence was supplied about specific cameras, applications or settings. This entry therefore does not recommend particular products or configurations for signing on video.