Time. Chapter 7
Shenk, C., & Cokely, D. (1991). Time. In American Sign Language: A Teacher's Resource Text on Grammar and Culture. Washington, D.C.: Clerc Books, Gallaudet University Press.
The expression of Time in ASL can be broken down into past, present, and future. This covers days, weeks, months, years, hours, minutes, time of day, and the list goes on. The body itself represents a physical timeline, in which the past is behind the body, or leaning back, the present is the body in its natural position, and the future is in front of the body.
While it is possible to express something very far in the future or the past, it can also be expressed that something is to happen quite soon, or happened quite recently. In the act of bringing the chin and the shoulder inwards towards each other, it displays the notion of “soon,” or “recent.” In this, opinion can be expressed. For example, two weeks ago can be expressed as an average time ago, or as if two weeks was very recent. Today can be said as just today or it can be expressed as today already! One year could be expressed as a long way away, or it could also be expressed as very soon to come. Moving on to the times of day, ASL expresses morning, afternoon, and night. With this, the language is able to express any time within these categories, for example, earlier or later in the morning, afternoon or night, and so on. Beyond expressing the times of day, ASL also expresses both regularity and duration of an activity for dates and time. For example, every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year, every other month, all day, all night, every Wednesday, or every three weeks. ASL also expresses uncertainty of time, but with a general time frame given with a facial expression to show uncertainty. Examples of this are "I think Saturday... I'm not sure," or "around mid morning, early afternoon." Tense is expressed in ASL by defining an exact date/time, and if none is provided, it is assumed to be in the present tense.
In learning about time, I found it very helpful that the timeline is physically expressed with the body. There are expressions like “leave the past behind you,” and “there are good things ahead,” which makes it very easy to convey that in ASL for me.
While it is possible to express something very far in the future or the past, it can also be expressed that something is to happen quite soon, or happened quite recently. In the act of bringing the chin and the shoulder inwards towards each other, it displays the notion of “soon,” or “recent.” In this, opinion can be expressed. For example, two weeks ago can be expressed as an average time ago, or as if two weeks was very recent. Today can be said as just today or it can be expressed as today already! One year could be expressed as a long way away, or it could also be expressed as very soon to come. Moving on to the times of day, ASL expresses morning, afternoon, and night. With this, the language is able to express any time within these categories, for example, earlier or later in the morning, afternoon or night, and so on. Beyond expressing the times of day, ASL also expresses both regularity and duration of an activity for dates and time. For example, every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year, every other month, all day, all night, every Wednesday, or every three weeks. ASL also expresses uncertainty of time, but with a general time frame given with a facial expression to show uncertainty. Examples of this are "I think Saturday... I'm not sure," or "around mid morning, early afternoon." Tense is expressed in ASL by defining an exact date/time, and if none is provided, it is assumed to be in the present tense.
In learning about time, I found it very helpful that the timeline is physically expressed with the body. There are expressions like “leave the past behind you,” and “there are good things ahead,” which makes it very easy to convey that in ASL for me.