Can anyone confirm this last (supremely fascinating) quote at the end of the article?
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In sign languages such as BSL, you’d use your hand gestures, facial expressions, etc. to express things like that the walk was on a dirt road; it was nice out; and you enjoyed the walk, with it all expressed simultaneously. This non-sequential nature of sign languages allows for faster and more detailed communication, but has the drawback of being ridiculously hard to put into print, though attempts have been made.
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Confirmed. Adding such sensory detail to narrative descriptions is pretty easy to do in American Sign Language (I can't speak for BSL or others, though French Sign Language is pretty close to ASL, from what I understand).
I'm no longer good enough with ASL that I can do all that simultaneously (I'm a native speaker as a result of 8 years at a school for the deaf, but use spoken/written English all but one or two days out of the year).
The failure of print to convey the richness of language is not unique to sign - we're just used to the limitations.
Consider the difficulty people have with expressing rich communication via email compared with vocal conversation, and again compared to face-to-face communication.
It is fascinating that additional factual details can be conveyed in sign, but it is inaccurate to believe that print can encapsulate the richness of direct personal communication.
" In sign languages such as BSL, you’d use your hand gestures, facial expressions, etc. to express things like that the walk was on a dirt road; it was nice out; and you enjoyed the walk, with it all expressed simultaneously. This non-sequential nature of sign languages allows for faster and more detailed communication, but has the drawback of being ridiculously hard to put into print, though attempts have been made. "