ELP ID
27457
ELP Language
Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language
Speaker Number
100-999
Ethnic Population
~3,500
Public Comment
"Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL) has arisen in the last 70 years in an isolated endogamous community with a high incidence of nonsyndromic, genetically recessive, profound pre-lingual neurosensory deafness... Within the past three generations, ≈150 individuals with congenital deafness have been born into the community... the deaf members of the community and a significant fraction of its hearing members communicate by means of a sign language. Siblings and children of deaf individuals and other members of a household (which may include a large extended family) often become fluent signers."
Source
The emergence of grammar: Systematic structure in a new language
Preferred
On
Speaker Number Text
>150
Speaker Number Range
100-999