The
chereme (from , "hand"), is a term for the basic unit of
signedA sign language is a language which, instead of acoustically conveyed sound patterns, uses visually transmitted sign patterns to convey meaning—simultaneously combining hand shapes, orientation and movement of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions to fluidly express a speaker's...
communication. It is functionally equivalent to the
phonemeIn a language or dialect, a phoneme is the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances....
s of oral languages, and has been replaced by that term in the academic literature.
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The
chereme (from , "hand"), is a term for the basic unit of
signedA sign language is a language which, instead of acoustically conveyed sound patterns, uses visually transmitted sign patterns to convey meaning—simultaneously combining hand shapes, orientation and movement of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions to fluidly express a speaker's...
communication. It is functionally equivalent to the
phonemeIn a language or dialect, a phoneme is the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances....
s of oral languages, and has been replaced by that term in the academic literature.
The term was coined in 1960 by
William StokoeWilliam C. Stokoe, Jr. was a scholar who researched American Sign Language extensively while he worked at Gallaudet University...
at
Gallaudet UniversityGallaudet University is a federally chartered, quasi-governmental university for the education of the deaf and hard-of-hearing, located in Washington, D.C...
as part of an attempt to demonstrate that sign languages are true and full languages, but that position is now universally accepted and there is no longer felt a need to demonstrate it through terminology.