1.4.2. Asymmetrical signs
In asymmetrical signs, the dominant hand is phonologically more complex than the non-dominant hand, specifically, the non-dominant hand is the major place of articulation with no movement feature, whereas the dominant hand has movement and its handshape is equally complex or more complex than the handshape of the non-dominant hand.
The asymmetrical signs are classified into two groups based on whether the two hands have identical handshapes. In one group, the handshapes are the same and they are generally among the handshapes listed below:
Handshape Example sign
knıfe
parsley
urgent
weddıng
assıstant
rock
bottle
be_lost
matches
taılor
However, exceptions exist such as the P-handshape in tuesday as shown below:
tuesday
Asymmetrical signs that have different handshapes is another class of signs where the handshape of the non-dominant hand can only be one of the most frequent and least complex handshapes. These non-dominant hand handshapes are listed below with example lexical items.
Handshape Example Sign
assıgnatıon
chıcken
oppressıon
flag
Exceptions to this pattern almost always appear in iconically motivated signs. Such an exception is tunnel with respect to the handshape of the non-dominant hand, since ?-handshape is not among the frequent handshapes listed above.
tunnel
Another exception is cınema with respect to the non-dominant hand location. The dominant hand is not close to the non-dominant hand, yet the non-dominant hand iconically represents the shape of a bigger object than the hand, namely an old-style camera. Similarly in watermelon, the non-dominant hand represents only a fragment of the watermelon’s contours. The examples are presented below.
cınema
watermelon