Extrapolating from spoken to signed prosody via laboratory phonology

Laboratory phonology tests the predictions of phonological analyses through experimental investigations of phonetic behavior. This paper describes how a laboratory phonologist might investigate three issues in the analysis of the prosody of signed languages: the internal structure, if any, of the signed syllable, the realization of lexical and phrasal prominence, and the marking of edges. The paper proposes to investigate the internal structure of the syllable by adapting a variety of psycholinguistic techniques that have been extensively used to study the phonetic packaging of phonological material in spoken languages. Phonological and phonetic arguments are presented in support of the hypothesis that signed languages will increase movement kinematics to convey phrasal and perhaps lexical prominence, and an experiment is sketched that would test this hypothesis. Finally, the paper suggests that the experimental study of the edges of sign articulations might allow a clearer choice between competing phonetic and phonological accounts of external sandhi in language in general.