Astronomia em línguas de sinais
www.revistas.unc.edu.ar/index.php/revistaEF
REVISTA DE ENSEÑANZA DE LA FÍSICA, Vol. 33, no. 2 (2021) 188
I. INTRODUCTION
The main objective of this work is to make the concepts of sciences in Brazilian sign language (Libras) as clear as
possible to improve communication and understanding of this theme by deaf students. In this case we will make a
clipping focusing on Astronomy considering the importance that everyone needs to have access to this important
information that is part of our daily life in an appropriate way, in addition to stimulating the interest of the Deaf
community in the sciences.
For this communication to be indeed efficient it is necessary to remember that in order to perform a good trans-
lation as well as it is extremely important that the Sign Language Translator Interpreter (SLTI) has a good knowledge
of both Libras and the Language to which it will be translated, it is also extremely necessary that for the creation of
scientific neologisms (sign-terms), this work must be done in partnership with a professional who has a good
knowledge of both the Sign Language to be worked on and the area of knowledge to be represented. The partnership
between deaf community and bilingual professionals points out to be the best way to offer new sign-terms, so that
there is equity of respect for the two areas of knowledge and in addition to preserving the coherence between both
of them.
These neologisms in sign languages should be perceived as an important representation, which should remain to
enable an adequate communication of scientific concepts and not only as mere facilitators of communication. The
daily need in the classroom, for example, leads the TISL, together with the deaf students, to create signs to quickly
fulfil this need, however this practice, many times, leads to the creation of signs based on erroneous conceptions due
to the lack of specific training, or specialization, of these same TISL and deaf students. This type of error can also occur
when a non-Libras user professional conducts researches in the area and creates proposals for sign-terms, without
the knowledge of the language it is not possible to evaluate the possible misconceptions that may arise from it. There
are a lot of researches on scientific neologisms in sign languages, but due to the lack of specialization of both inter-
preters and professionals in the areas worked, there are many signs-terms based on misconceptions as well as some
with visual references meaning the opposite to what it was desired to be represent (Ferreira, Santos and Neves, 2019).
In sign languages neologisms arise with specific grammatical bases, and may be arbitrary or iconic. A resource of
sign languages, and extremely iconic, are the Highly Iconic Expressions (HIE) (Luchi, 2015), also called transfers, as they
transfer to visual communication characteristics of what is supposed to communicate.
A. Highly Iconic Expressions.
According to Campello (2007) there are five types of HIE:
1) Shape and Size Transfer (SST) - Visual representation generally related to the shape and size of what one wants
to represent.
2) Spatial Transfer (ST) - Representation linked to the arrangement, in space, of what is referred. It refers not only
to what one wishes to represent, but also to his relationship with other elements around him.
3) Location Transfer (LT) - Representation of location in space, also of the movement of what one wishes to repre-
sent, relating intensity and gravitational attraction. At times ST and LT relate or become the same, depending on what
one wants to communicate.
4) Movement Transfer (MT) - Representation of the movement linked to meaning, either by the way of using an
object or the movement of a living being, unrelated to location, but to the details of the movement.
5) Incorporation Transfer (IT) - Representation of the relationship of the signifier being incorporated by those who
communicate, representing the object itself, and even emotions when representing living beings.
A sixth transfer is reported by Ramos (2017):
6) Vibrational Transfer (VT) - Representation of events associated with vibrations/sounds. VT is associated with
facial and body expressions. The VT can be associated with short vibrations, Punctual Vibration Transfer (PVT), or with
longer vibrations, Continuous Vibration Transfer (CVT). (Ramos, 2017)
These specific features of sign languages are the basis for many signs, where the concept to be represented has a
strong visual appeal, showing that contrary to what can be imagined the sign languages are in no way inferior to oral
languages. And so, either through an arbitrary sign, without using visual elements that give back to the meaning of
what one wishes to represent, or an iconic sign, using transfers to create a signifier, it is possible to express oneself
fully in the sign languages.