This volume provides a unique cross-disciplinary perspective on the external ecological and internal psycholinguistic factors that determine sign bilingualism, its development and maintenance at the individual and societal levels. Multiple aspects concerning the dynamics of contact situations involving a signed and a spoken or a written language are covered in detail, i.e. the development of the languages in bilingual deaf children, cross-modal contact phenomena in the productions of child and adult signers, sign bilingual education concepts and practices in diverse social contexts, deaf educational discourse, sign language planning and interpretation. This state-of-the-art collection is enhanced by a final chapter providing a critical appraisal of the major issues emerging from the individual studies in the light of current assumptions in the broader field of contact linguistics. Given the interdependence of research, policy and practice, the insights gathered in the studies presented are not only of scientific interest, but also bear important implications concerning the perception, understanding and promotion of bilingualism in deaf individuals whose language acquisition and use have been ignored for a long time at the socio-political and scientific levels.

Table of contents:

Contributors

Foreword

Carol A. Padden

Acknowledgements

- Code-mixing in signs and words in input to and output from children

Anne Baker and Beppie van den Bogaerde

- Does the knowledge of a natural sign language facilitate Deaf children's learning to read and write? Insights from French Sign Language and written French data

Nathalie Niederberger

- Bilingualism and deafness: Correlations between deaf students' ability to use space in Quebec Sign Language and their reading comprehension in French

Colette Dubuisson, Anne-Marie Parisot and Astrid Vercaingne-Ménard

- Why variation matters: On language contact in the development of L2 written German

Carolina Plaza-Pust

- Deaf and hearing children: Reading together in preschool

Barbara Ardito, Maria Cristina Caselli, Angela Vecchietti and Virginia Volterra

- Can signed language be planned? Implications for interpretation in Spain

Victòria Gras

- Language use and awareness of deaf and hearing children in a bilingual setting

Verena Krausneker

- Sign bilingualism in Spanish deaf education

Esperanza Morales-López

- Ideologic signs in Deaf education discourse

María Ignacia Massone

- Sign language and oral/written language in Deaf education in China

Jun Hui Yang

- Sign bilingualism: Language development, interaction, and maintenance in sign language contact situations

Carolina Plaza-Pust and Esperanza Morales-López