Name Changes and Name Co-existence in Deaf Signing Communities in Germany

ANS 2025, February 22, 2025

Name Changes and Name Co-existence in Deaf Signing Communities in Germany" by Maria Kopf (Universität Hamburg, Germany)

Changing one’s personal name is, typologically speaking, a rather common phenomenon (Nübling 2021). Germany though, has very strict laws about naming and name changes (Schmidt-Jüngst 2020). Within deaf signing communities, this strict name continuity does not seem to be reflected. Signers use personal signs to refer to one another, called name signs. The customs for giving name signs show cultural norms and shared history within deaf communities (McKee 2016). Signers report different occasions where new personal name signs arise, replacing old name signs or coexisting with them (Mindess 1990, Day & Sutton-Spence 2010, Van Mulders 2005). For example, the German former chancellor Merkel is known by several co-existing name signs (see examples in video). However, an extensive investigation of naming customs in respect of name changes and co-existence is still missing.

Based on data from the task ‘Sign names’ in the DGS corpus (Nishio et al. 2010) – a comprehensive collection of German Sign Language (DGS) – this study investigates (i) the act of naming, (ii) name changes and (iii) co-existence of names for personal name signs of deaf signers in Germany. Preliminary results indicate that name changes appear mostly when signers enter a new social group, e. g. at school, work, clubs or in regional deaf communities and families. Name givers seem to be the peer group as a collective, persons in authority, friends or relatives. While most name changes go along with the former name disappearing, there are cases where several names co-exist in different settings.

Biography:

Maria Kopf is a PhD candidate in the field of sign language research at the Universität Hamburg and member of the DGS-Korpus project team. She works on sign language data and comparability and methods for corpus building. Her interests lay in onomastic studies, the interplay of gender and language and sign languages in general.