While some selected aspects of Russian Sign Language (RSL) have recently been researched, many topics in the grammar of RSL remain un(der)studied and nothing is known about fingerspelling or mouthing in RSL. This project aims at providing the first detailed corpus-based description of these two phenomena in RSL and showing how they bear on current debates regarding their linguistic status in sign languages. Due to particular aspects of the visual-gestural modality, fingerspelling and mouthing are specific cases of language contact that do not have a direct equivalent in spoken languages. Inasmuch as fingerspelling and mouthing constitute cross-modal language contact phenomena, this study will provide further insights into the interaction of three different modalities (sign, speech and writing) and the grammatical system(s) underlying this interaction.

The project gains insight into how the spoken and written Russian, in the form of mouthing and fingerspelling, combines with and affects RSL. The processes of nativization of fingerspelled words of the Russian manual alphabet into the sign language lexicon will be tested according to the cross-linguistic nativization model. By investigating the co-occurrence and variation of mouthings on the basis of a set of frequently occurring signs in RSL, the project will shed light on the linguistic status of mouthings.

The occurrences of fingerspelling and mouthing will be investigated as they are produced by and between native RSL signers in the recently created large RSL Corpus (2012-2015, Novosibirsk State Technical University, Russia) containing more than 100,000 signs in 230 video clips presented by 59 native RSL signers. The findings add significantly to the documentation of RSL, contribute to the debate on the linguistic status of mouthing and fingerspelling in sign language grammar, and discuss how these two phenomena suit the existing phonological and morphological models in the sign language and bimodal bilingualism research.

• Bauer, Anastasia. 2019. When words meet signs: A corpus-based study on variation of mouthing in Russian Sign Language. In: Anastasia Bauer & Bunčić, Daniel (Hrsg.). Linguistische Beiträge zur Slavistik: XXIV. JungslavistInnen-Treffen in Köln, 17.-19. September 2015, 9-35. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang.
• Bauer, Anastasia. 2018. Артикуляция в русском жестовом языке. In: Kempgen, Sebastian / Monika Wingender / Ludger Udolph (Hrsg.): Deutsche Beiträge zum 16. Internationalen Slavistenkongress, Belgrad 2018. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2018 (= Die Welt der Slaven. Sammelbände – Sborniki 63), 36-46.
• Bauer, Anastasia. 2019. Seeing stress: temporal reduction in Russian sign language mouthings. Poster presentation at TISLR 13, Hamburg.
• Bauer, Anastasia. 2019. Comparing “palm-up” gestures and palm-up (PU) signs. Gesture Sign Workshop, Prag, 16-17 May.
• Bauer, Anastasia. 2019. Mouthings as prominence markers. Presentation at Sign Nonmanuals, Graz, 3-4 May.
• Bauer, Anastasia & Roman Poryadin. 2019. The interplay of written and sign language. The first corpus-based analysis of fingerspelling and its functions in Russian Sign Language (RSL). Poster presentation at the LingCologne 2019: Multimodality, University of Cologne, 6-7 June.
• Bauer, Anastasia & Kristina Kiehn. 2019. Are stressed syllables visually more prominent? Experimental study on the role of stressed syllables in the visual recognition of German and Russian words. Poster presentation at the LingCologne 2019: Multimodality, University of Cologne, 6-7 June.
• Bauer, Anastasia. 2019. Non-manual components with palm-up in Russian Sign Language. Poster presentation at the 93rd LSA Annual Meeting. New York, NY. January 3–7.
• Bauer, Anastasia 2018. Language contact between Russian and Russian sign language. XVI Slavistenkongress Belgrad, 20.-27. August.
• Bauer, Anastasia, Burkova, Svetlana & Vadim Kimmelman. 2018. Non-manual markers in Russian Sign Language: three case studies. Poster presentation at the SIGN 9 Conference, Warsaw, Polen.