Linguistic data were collected using a hand-held Canon Legria HV40 Mini-DV Video Camera, and a mini tripod that was no taller than 30cm when fully extended. As well as being easier to carry, the small size of the equipment helped to limit as far as possible any intimidating effects that it may have had on informants. All cassette tapes were immediately labelled clearly after filming, and stored securely both in the field and at the university. A catalogue was created to log the content of each tape, including the location of filming, the names of participants and the length of the clip.
In most cases, participants were asked to talk among themselves about anything they wanted. Sometimes, especially when visiting an informant’s house, one of the research consultants took
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on a prompting role, to keep the conversation going. The initial request made of informants to sign in front of a video camera was a novel one, and generated a range of responses: some informants became engaged in animated conversation more or less immediately, while a few formally introduced themselves to the camera, and one triad had prepared a scripted conversation. The effects of being formally observed on the nature of the data collected – referred to as the Observer’s Paradox (Labov, 1971) – are well-known, and have been noted by many linguists (Preston, 1996; Cukor-Avila, 2000; Tagliamonte, 2006, 2012; Gordon, 2013). In addition, the situation was judged by some SL users to be formal, which led to data with more hyper-correction and features from the grammar of Indonesian.
In a bid to try and reduce the effects of the Observer’s Paradox, a range of techniques were used. After placing the participants and starting the filming, I showed no interest in watching the informants, and engaged any other people in the area in a separate conversation some way away, to prevent them from ‘watching’ those being filmed. Informants were encouraged to chat freely, since early attempts to prescribe a particular topic evoked additional expectations that made informants stilted and unsure of what they had to say. Thirdly, triads and tetrads were used in addition to dyads, in accordance with advice from Dikyuva (2011), who collected data from TİD signers:
group activities involving three or more participants were found to be far more effective in realising natural data that includes a fuller range of non-manual expressions, as these situations were more typical of situations in which Deaf people frequently interact, and drew attention away from the presence of the camera (Dikyuva, 2011:54).
Finally, as explained above, not all filmed texts produced by the convenience sample were selected for transcription, and this meant that examples of more ‘natural’ discourse could be selected.
As explained in section 1.2.1, the language that signers use may be strongly influenced by the grammar of a spoken language – in this case Indonesian – but this is a continuum feature, and it is not possible to measure how far a text diverges from sign language grammar. In order to determine whether a text should be included in the data analysis, I looked at the mouthings that a signer uses in that text. Mouthing is exhibited by all signers to some extent, but if a text includes a signer who is speaking or mouthing entire sentences in Indonesian and ‘adding’ signs to this – so that, without the manual component, the utterance would still be grammatical in Indonesian – the text was excluded.
Further to this, in order to identify texts that comprise data that are more natural, and hence most suitable for transcription, I created a list of features that appear to typify ‘natural’ and ‘unnatural’ discourse, based on observation of the data. Many of these features are indications of how at ease or how nervous the informants are, which has a strong influence on the naturalness of the language that they produce (Trask, 2007:83). Features of ‘unnatural’ discourse include informants signing
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more slowly than they do off camera; informants signing at the camera; and regular, obvious examples of self-correction. In addition, instances where informants ask each other questions to which they already know the answers tend to occur in sections of text that are stilted. Texts that exhibit these features were not deemed suitable for analysis.
Conversely, there are plenty of indications that discourse is more ‘natural’ and hence suitable for analysis. These include natural turn-taking strategies and discourse features such as interruptions, requests for clarification, use of interjections, and so on. Informants who do not show an awareness of the passing of time tended to be more involved in the conversation, and hence use more natural language. Inevitably, after a period of time, some informants became tired or bored, but the most natural conversations went on for over 15 minutes, and some of the more animated conversations exceeded 30 minutes. In contrast, more ‘unnatural’ conversations could last for just three minutes, after which typically one informant would announce that the exercise had ended. Another indication that discourse is more ‘natural’ is the occurrence of animated behaviour, where informants engage in heated debates – and even throw a cushion at their interlocutor in mock umbrage. The use of humour is another valuable indicator that participants are at ease and using language naturally.
It was not always possible to know in advance whether the members of a dyad, triad or tetrad were great friends who would engage in playful conversation, relatively unknown to each other, or somewhere in between. I take the view that all eventualities are of value, but in future it would be useful to have a more accurate idea of the relationship between informants who are filmed together, simply to control for this more, and perhaps include it as a factor in sociolinguistic variation if appropriate. There is also a mix of informants of different sexes and ages. Generally, informants came forward as same-sex groups, although a few texts feature informants of mixed sex, such as M-F and F-F-M.