Manolis Fragkiadakis: Machine learning for sign language corpora
Date: 23 and 28 january 2019
Time: 12:00 – 13:00 / 14:15 – 15:00
Location: Leiden University, Johan Huizinga / P.N. van Eyckhof 2
Languages: English
Translation 28 january: International Sign, English
Over the last years various corpus projects documenting sign languages have started all over the world. Between 2007 and 2014, four large video corpora of West African sign languages have been compiled at Leiden University. These corpora contain over 120 hours of videos along with their annotations. During the annotation process the researcher has to determine the precise time a sign occurs and properly gloss it. As a result, the annotation process is extremely labor intensive, but a condition for a reliable quantitative analysis of the sign language corpora.
The aim of this project is to develop a tool that automatically annotates the signs and their phonological features in a video. The first part towards automatic annotation is to recognize the exact time-frame a sign occurs. To remove the redundant information from the raw video a pose estimation framework (namely OpenPose) has been used. The extracted hand locations have been used to train and test four different classifiers. The result of this process is a tool that uses XGBoost to accurately predict the span of a sign and automatically create the annotation.
Sara Goico: The social lives of deaf youth in Iquitos, Peru
Date: 31 january 2019
Time: 15:30 – 16:30
Location: Leiden University, P.N. van Eyckhof 2/005
Languages: American Sign Language, International Sign
Anique Schüller: title to be announced
Date: 1 february 2019
Time: 14:00 – 15:00
Location: Leiden University, P.N. van Eyckhof 2/005
Languages: International Sign
Victoria Nyst: Hands Shaping Language: the depiction of size and shape in sign languages and gesture as a window on language emergence*
Date: 1 february 2019
Time: 15:30 – 15:50*
Location: Leiden University, Vossius Zaal (2nd floor in University Library)
Languages: English
Translation: International Sign, English
*As part of the LUCL symposium, all lectures will be interpreted. The symposium takes place from 15:00 – 17:15.
For more information, click here
Joni Oyserman: Teaching Sign Languages: building and rebuilding a structured, goal-oriented lesson using the leverage of Sign Language production, understanding and interaction
Date: 5 february 2019
Time: 14:00 – 15:00
Location: Leiden University, Lipsius 236
Languages: International Sign
When teaching a sign language to adult second language learners, it requires for a teacher another subject knowledge compared to interpreters sign language. In core, a teacher sign language should know their subject knowledge 1) linguistic range 2) grammatical accuracy 3) phonological control 4) vocabulary control and 5) sign fluency to build up a successful structured goal-oriented lesson. The lesson should meet the communicative learning needs of second language learners optimal to improve their language competences, proficiency and learning cycle. The goal-oriented approach I use is based on the Common European Framework Reference for Sign Languages (ATERK, 2013), blended with sign language grammar.