Lamb Sign Language: Difference between revisions

Latest revision as of 20:09, May 24, 2023

A system of hand signs that the lambs developed to non-verbally communicate with each other.

Particulars[edit]

It can be used from within the pocket<ref>Why did it feel like Walter was the one concerned with this lie about his father standing up? Not about himself, not about reconciling who his dad was, or the betrayal…

He was lying about something.

Gordon opened his mouth to speak, I moved my hand, where it was right by my pocket, a small spreading of my fingers, and the motion was enough to catch Gordon’s eye.

“Tell me, Wally, do you really think what you’ve given us is good enough?”

“It’s true!” Walter said, suddenly alarmed.

People rarely sounded more like they were lying than when they protested like that. - Excerpt from Cat out of the Bag 2.3</ref>, against a surface, or freehand where anyone can see.

It is non-intuitive with particular signs for concepts and best used with an understanding for the interlocutors mental process. It started with a base of six signs and spiraled out from there.<ref>The hand signals used by the Lambs. They had started off simple, covering a variety of bases, and in Jamie’s mind, every last one had had a color, a general shape, and a lot of the vocabulary, spacings and timings of events were similar within a color or key gesture. - Excerpt from Interlude 15.x</ref>

It is essentially made up on the spot and heavily reliant on the interlocutors being aware of each others thought processes.<ref>“You sat down and worked this out? A special language, for all of you?”

“No,” I said. “It evolved naturally. We bullshit it half the time and trust the others to figure out what we mean.”

“Okay,” he said. “You think they hear us?” - Excerpt from Lamb to the Slaughter 6.7 </ref>

Short hand[edit]

Mind - three fingers together <ref>Wonder was inspiration, which fell into the mind gesture. Mind was three fingers together. Mind became different things depending on context, the rigidity of fingers changed. Three fingers up tall, all touching, was hard thinking, maths, Academy science, logic, cold analysis. Bring the fingers down and it became soft, abstract thinking, which often became one of two different things if the thumb was in front or behind the three fingers. Interpersonal thinking for the former, inspired or artistic thinking for the latter.

Of the most basic signs, each one flowed into the other. Each one assigned a color, it allowed colors to blur or mix, for categorizations to find shades of color alongside the general shape of the signs, for easy identification. - Excerpt from Interlude 15.x</ref>

hard thinking, maths, Academy science, logic, cold analysis - three fingers up tall, all touching
soft, abstract thinking - fingers down
- thumb in front the three fingers - interpersonal thinking
- thumb behind the three fingers - inspired or artistic thinking

People[edit]

Appellations for various people are based on a combination of signs.

Mary - cutting metal dancer
Sylvester - small poison man
The Duke - crown gold
Tender Mercies - gentle sugar gentle kill
Infante - crown tall

Trivia[edit]

Was partially based on ASL.<ref>Lamb Gestures (Wildbow, Reddit.com, 2017-04-29)</ref>

References[edit]

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-A system of hand signs that the lambs developed to non-verbally communicate with each other.
+A system of hand signs that the lambs developed to non-verbally communicate with each other.<!--Need to copy from actual sign language guide.
+https://www.reddit.com/r/Parahumans/comments/6875hc/twig_hand_gestures/dgwb13p/
+Loosely inspired by (ASL) sign language, but I say that when I only know about 100 signs, and caveats/changes have to be made to accommodate the fact that the twig signs often need to be covert. Things get complicated because it's not really rooted in a base language that one can reference.
+So the basic structure is that it stems from six base signs, which formed the initial set of instructions and cues. Aggress, go, handle, watch/wary, think, stay. Most can be reversed and there's a cue to indicate if it's reversed or if it's just the given hand position, typically involving the pinky. Though I call them reversals, they counter original meaning, rather than being their opposite. A reversed 'go' sign means something very different from the 'stay' sign. There are a few tertiary/secondary ones beyond the six, like emotion.
+So first, middle, and ring fingers together is 'think' (base concept is the tower of learning). If you've got your hand at your pocket and you stick three fingers out over the edge of the pocket, and you turn your attention to someone as a teammate glances at your hand and then meets your eyes, they know you're conveying 'he thinks'. If your pinky is inside the pocket, it's not a reversal, but if it's out and bent back (preserving the three finger tower) it likely is. Hand position factors in and a heavier rest of the hand on the pocket might imply heavier or more substantive thinking while a lighter hand or more animated movement of the fingers might imply something lighter or flightier. It becomes the difference between 'he knows/remembers' and 'he's thinking about something'.
+From there, other signs stemmed as variations on the originals, and signs sit between each of the six. There's different signs between alert/watch and the three finger 'tower' of 'think', for example. There's also different signs between think and 'stay', the latter of which already breaks down into sub-signs involving holding a position and protecting/guarding.
+So it got it start almost exclusively as verbing, because the subject was often implied or could actually be pointed to. Adjectives or nuance could be largely informed by variant signs, as described above, or combinations of signs, though some would later be added, often with the core verb roots.
+Sign combinations, for the record, often include transitions, where a sign transforms as it's made, or bridges, where a sign moves (ie. three fingers together in 'think', sweeping to one side) and then becomes another.
+Signs later formed to indicate very basic nouns -person, place, thing- and were summarily played with (counters in this case indicating the less common/assumed. They spend most of the time in the city so reversed place is often wilderness or garden or the like).
+Touching back on adjectives because they make a good example of the more vague signs and how ideas are communicated, 'Old' has a degree of permanence, so it falls closer to 'stay' in hand shape (fingers curled in, hand flat), which also has that permanence, and it has its own subset of words/ideas/impressions in abstract that would share a hand shape with it. With the roots being what they are, you can just throw a sign in there as an adjective and end up with an exchange:
+[Making gesture very like the 'stay' sign, fingers curled in, hands flat. Unusually, however, the fingers are separated], followed by [that person], indicating the person they're talking to.
+Onlooking teammate glances at it. No idea what it means, except that it's vaguely reminiscent of the [watch & stay] sign, and it's sort of reminiscent of the heart sign. They look at the source and make a sign of their own:
+[Emotion/Heart sign], followed by a half circle drawn by the pinky, which is [Question]
+The person who made the initial gesture knows it's asking about the unfamiliar adjective (because said adjective was just made up), and can confirm. Yes, this is an emotional state/quality of the person's personality. Any subsequent gestures help lead the other person to the right conclusion. The person they're indicating is being protective of something.
+Given that it's abstract and nothing wholly evolved, it's subjective, it's loose, and it relies a lot on knowing how the other person you're gesturing to thinks. The text gets a little fuzzy about it, I know, and I can back to cases where they teach Catcher a sign and it's a modified alert/trap sign, and Sy muses on the think sign, but it's a flatter, broader one, usually used to refer to the Academy, and I can't remember if he's actually referring to academy skill/learning as he makes the sign.
+I'd like to think it can be hand waved (ha) with an emphasis on them very much knowing how each other think and there being nuance that can't be covered in mere words.
+https://twigserial.wordpress.com/2015/11/19/tooth-and-nail-7-12/
+https://twigserial.wordpress.com/2016/07/26/dyed-in-the-wool-12-8/
+https://twigserial.wordpress.com/2016/12/24/lamb-arc-15/
+-->
 ==Particulars==
-Is non intuitive with particular signs for concepts and best used with an understanding for the interlocutors mental process.
+It can be used from within the pocket<ref>Why did it feel like Walter was the one concerned with this lie about his father standing up?  Not about himself, not about reconciling who his dad was, or the betrayal…<br><br>He was lying about something.<br><br>Gordon opened his mouth to speak, I moved my hand, where it was right by my pocket, a small spreading of my fingers, and the motion was enough to catch Gordon’s eye.<br><br>“Tell me, Wally, do you really think what you’ve given us is good enough?”<br><br>“It’s true!” Walter said, suddenly alarmed.<br><br>People rarely sounded more like they were lying than when they protested like that. - [https://twigserial.wordpress.com/2015/04/21 Excerpt] from [[Cat out of the Bag 2.3]]</ref>, against a surface, or freehand where anyone can see.
+It is non-intuitive with particular signs for concepts and best used with an understanding for the interlocutors mental process. It started with a base of six signs and spiraled out from there.<ref>The hand signals used by the Lambs.  They had started off simple, covering a variety of bases, and in Jamie’s mind, every last one had had a color, a general shape, and a lot of the vocabulary, spacings and timings of events were similar within a color or key gesture. - [https://twigserial.wordpress.com/2016/12/24 Excerpt] from [[Interlude 15.x]]</ref>
+It is essentially made up on the spot and heavily reliant on the interlocutors being aware of each others thought processes.<ref>“You sat down and worked this out?  A special language, for all of you?”<br><br>“No,” I said.  “It evolved naturally.  We bullshit it half the time and trust the others to figure out what we mean.”<br><br>“Okay,” he said.  “You think they hear us?” - [https://twigserial.wordpress.com/2015/09/26 Excerpt] from [[Lamb to the Slaughter 6.7]]
+</ref>
 ==Short hand==
+Mind - ''three fingers together ''<ref>Wonder was inspiration, which fell into the mind gesture.  Mind was three fingers together.  Mind became different things depending on context, the rigidity of fingers changed.  Three fingers up tall, all touching, was hard thinking, maths, Academy science, logic, cold analysis.  Bring the fingers down and it became soft, abstract thinking, which often became one of two different things if the thumb was in front or behind the three fingers.  Interpersonal thinking for the former, inspired or artistic thinking for the latter.<br><br>Of the most basic signs, each one flowed into the other.  Each one assigned a color, it allowed colors to blur or mix, for categorizations to find shades of color alongside the general shape of the signs, for easy identification. - [https://twigserial.wordpress.com/2016/12/24/ Excerpt] from [[Interlude 15.x]]</ref>
+*hard thinking, maths, Academy science, logic, cold analysis - ''three fingers up tall, all touching''
+*soft, abstract thinking - ''fingers down''
+**thumb in front the three fingers - ''interpersonal thinking''
+**thumb behind the three fingers - ''inspired or artistic thinking''
+===People===
 Appellations for various people are based on a combination of signs.
 [[Mary]] - ''cutting metal dancer''<br>
 [[Sylvester]] - ''small poison man''<br>
-The Duke - ''crown gold''<br>
+[[The Duke]] - ''crown gold''<br>
 Tender Mercies -  ''gentle sugar gentle kill''<br>
-The Infante - ''crown tall''<br>
+[[Infante]] - ''crown tall''
+==Trivia==
+*Was partially based on [[Wikipedia:American Sign Language|ASL]].<ref>[https://redd.it/6875hc Lamb Gestures] ([https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Wildbow Wildbow], Reddit.com, 2017-04-29)</ref>
+{{Reflist}}
 [[Category:Essentia]]