Question

So far, you have learned how to sign quite a few words in ASL and some of those signs are actually what we call “cognates” to words in English; they are words whose signs are easily understandable because their signs are almost as if you were playing the game charades and acting out the word. In ASL linguistics, we call these “iconic” signs because there is a visual reason behind the formation of the sign (I, YOUR, HELLO). There are also “arbitrary” signs in which there is no obvious reason behind the formation of the sign (MOTHER, LIKE, COLOR). Based on the visual, sort the following signs into the three appropriate categories. (3 points)
Cognates Iconic Arbitrary
GRAY



PAY-ATTENTION



YES



ENGLISH



TIRED



MAYBE

Answer 1

Cognates
- PAY-ATTENTION — the sign visually “acts out” looking/attending (charades-like)
- TIRED — the sign depicts the posture/feeling of being tired
- MAYBE — the shrugging/uncertain motion directly represents “maybe”

Iconic
- YES — the fist “nods” like a head nod, so there’s a clear visual/gestural reason
- GRAY — the handshape/motion visually represents the concept (e.g., gray hair/appearance)

Arbitrary
- ENGLISH — the sign form has no obvious visual relation to the spoken word “English” (it’s lexical/arbitrary)