ASL: "super"


There are a variety of ways to sign "super" -- depending on your intended meaning.

If you mean "super" as in "superhero" -- then draw an "S" shape on your chest using an "S" (or "fist") handshape and then fingerspell "hero."

If you mean "super" as in "wonderful" then use the sign WONDERFUL.

 



Notes:

See: SUPERMAN

See: SUPERHERO

 

An ASL hero wrote to ask:

QUESTION:
I noticed an online vlogger [at ________ ] did an "S" handshape diagonally across the torso when signing about "superhero" similar to the group of signs that includes things like QUEEN, KING, PRINCE, LORD etc.  Is it common to use the sign that way for "super"?

RESPONSE:
 

Dear _______,
I took a look at the video.  The signer in the sample video is "NOT" signing "super" diagonally across the torso similar to the group of signs that includes things like QUEEN, KING, PRINCE, LORD etc.

Nope.

A "royal sash movement" across the torso is not what is happening.  The signer was making an "S" movement across the chest. The signer was just doing it so fast and loose (or in other words "in such a native-like way) that it could be misinterpreted by a beginner as an "S"-initialized ROYAL.

Whenever you see someone online signing "something" -- think of it as "one vote" for that method. Life-long signers who engage in frequent signed interactions with varied communication partners (hmmm...such as Deaf people or active, long-experienced itinerant interpreters) tend to "vote" in ways that are more reflective of the pulse of the overall Deaf community. (Thus the vote of a socially active, native Deaf adult tends to be worth many times the vote of someone who has "not" had a lifetime of experience or the vote of a Deaf hermit.)

Sometimes when I see a vlogger sign something "non-standard" I think to myself, "Okay that just happened." (Even though it might not have actually happened -- I might have misinterpreted.)

Then I put it in perspective with the several hundred other times I've seen that concept signed (figure, for a sign like SUPERMAN maybe 10 times a year for several decades equals a minimum of 300 times.) Thus if I've seen Superman signed with an S on the chest 300 times and then someone signs "Superman" by initializing "ROYAL" with an "S" and then adding MAN -- I will, in my mind, have a voting ratio of 300:1 -- and choose to continue signing SUPERMAN as an "S" on the chest.