Abstract This case study provides a first exploratory study on the early Flemish Sign Language acquisition of a deaf infant from the perspective of Halliday’s Systemic Functional Theory. It highlights some remarkable aspects of sign language acquisition with respect to interpersonal interaction between the child and its mother. The free play interactions of the Deaf mother and her moderately deaf daughter were recorded when the child was 6, 9, 12, 18 and 24 months old. These interactions were annotated in ELAN and transcribed in view of the analysis adapting Systemic Functional Linguistics. The analysis indicates that the early sign language development of the child chronologically correlates with Halliday’s descriptions of the universal functions of language. The infant’s first lexical signs appeared at 12 months. The child produced one-sign utterances (12 months and older), one-sign utterances along with a pointing sign (18 months and older) and two-sign utterances (24 months). The mother integrated attentional strategies to redirect the child’s attention. She also adopted techniques that are appropriate for child-directed signing, i.e. questions, recasts and expansions.

中文翻译：

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佛兰德手语发展

摘要 本案例研究首次从韩礼德系统功能理论的角度对聋儿早期佛兰芒手语习得进行了探索性研究。它强调了手语习得的一些显着方面，涉及儿童与其母亲之间的人际互动。在孩子 6、9、12、18 和 24 个月大时，记录了聋哑母亲和她的中度聋女儿的自由玩耍互动。鉴于适应系统功能语言学的分析，这些相互作用在 ELAN 中进行了注释和转录。分析表明，儿童的早期手语发展与韩礼德对语言普遍功能的描述按时间顺序相关。婴儿的第一个词汇标志出现在 12 个月大时。孩子会发出单手语（12 个月及以上）、单手语和指点（18 个月及以上）和双手语（24 个月）。母亲整合注意力策略来重新引导孩子的注意力。她还采用了适合儿童导向的手语的技巧，即提问、重铸和扩展。