Paper-Conference | Marc Schulder

Corpus à la carte – Improving Access to the Public DGS Corpus

Abstract

This article presents the fourth release of the Public DGS Corpus, a large corpus of German Sign Language (DGS). Since its first release in 2018, the Public DGS Corpus has provided its content through multiple portals to meet the needs of different user groups. Having started with a community portal and a research portal for general data access, the ANNIS portal for dynamic web-based exploration of the corpus was added in 2022. With this latest release, a fourth portal is added to allow sign language linguists to access the public corpus directly through the annotation software iLex. Furthermore, search capabilities and interconnectedness between the portals are strongly improved, allowing users to move between portals to combine their strengths. Additional improvements to the corpus include additional recordings, new pose information models, improved HamNoSys, enhanced type information and web interface revisions.

Reiner Konrad, Thomas Hanke, Amy Isard, Marc Schulder, Lutz König, Julian Bleicken, Oliver Böse

Signs and Synonymity: Continuing Development of the Multilingual Sign Language Wordnet

Abstract

The Multilingual Sign Language Wordnet is the first publicly available wordnet resource for sign languages. It is a growing multilingual resource providing data for eight sign languages to date. During the initial phase of its creation, the focus lay on producing the infrastructure to support various languages and to produce initial sets of content for them. This article represents the start of the second phase, in which the focus is moved to establishing overlapping coverage across the different sign languages. Building on the data produced so far, a new feature to assist annotation is introduced which leverages established partial synonymy between signs (inter- and cross-lingually) to discover likely additional synonymies. Other improvements to the annotation interface and workflow build directly on the experiences from the first phase. Working with the updated annotation interface, new data is produced for Polish Sign Language, Greek Sign Language and Swedish Sign Language.

Marc Schulder, Sam Bigeard, Maria Kopf, Thomas Hanke, Anna Kuder, Joanna Wójcicka, Johanna Mesch, Thomas Björkstrand, Anna Vacalopoulou, Kyriaki Vasilaki, Theodoros Goulas, Athanasia-Lida Dimou, Stavroula-Evita Fotinea, Eleni Efthimiou

Not just 'any' sign! Searching for negative polarity items in German Sign Language (DGS)

Abstract

Negative Polarity Items (NPIs) are expressions such as “any” that cannot occur in positive assertions with simple past (“Mary bought any books”), but become acceptable under the scope of negation (“Mary didn’t buy any books”). While NPIs have been claimed to occur in virtually every language, evidence for their use in signed languages is still very limited. Our study seeks to identify potential NPI candidates in German Sign Language (DGS) by performing a collocation analysis of negation signs in the DGS Corpus dataset.

Cornelia Loos, Marc Schulder

EASIER Notation – A Proposal for a Gloss-based Scripting Language for Sign Language Generation Based on Lexical Data

This article is ©2023 IEEE. I recommend using the accepted version of the paper, which is open access. For the closed access published version follow the URL in the citation below, but note that most hyperlinks have been broken in that version. The accepted version does not have this problem.

Abstract

We introduce EASIER Notation, a gloss-based scripting language to describe sign language content to be signed by an avatar and describe the functionality a lexical database for a sign language needs to provide in order to fully support the notation approach. In addition, we present the prototype of a text editor supporting EASIER Notation for human post-editing of machine translation output as well as pre-scribing signed utterances from scratch.

Thomas Hanke, Lutz König, Reiner Konrad, Maria Kopf, Marc Schulder, Rosalee Wolfe

The Sign Language Interchange Format: Harmonising Sign Language Datasets for Computational Processing

This article is ©2023 IEEE. I recommend using the accepted version of the paper, which is open access. For the closed access published version follow the URL in the citation below, but note that most hyperlinks have been broken in that version. The accepted version does not have this problem.

Abstract

We introduce the Sign Language Interchange Format, a new format for representing annotations and lexical inventories of sign language datasets. The format is designed as an intermediate step in data preparation for language technologies, unifying the annotation conventions of different corpora for further use. Complex gloss notations and implicit relations between tiers are made explicit through a hierarchy of machine-readable container structures. Sample implementations for converting to and from the new format are provided.

Marc Schulder, Sam Bigeard, Thomas Hanke, Maria Kopf

Deutsche Gebärdensprache zugänglich und nutzbar machen: Das Öffentliche DGS-Korpus und das Digitale Wörterbuch der Deutschen Gebärdensprache

This article is only available in German.

Abstract

Das DGS-Korpus-Projekt erstellt ein Referenzkorpus der Deutschen Gebärdensprache (DGS) und macht mit dem Öffentlichen DGS-Korpus und dem korpusbasierten Wörterbuch der DGS diese Sprache in ihrer Vielfalt öffentlich zugänglich. Um den verschiedenen Nutzungsaspekten gerecht zu werden, stehen die Daten des Öffentlichen Korpus in drei verschiedenen Portalen zur Verfügung. Inhalte des Wörterbuchs werden bereits als Vorabeinträge veröffentlicht. Der Artikel gibt einen Überblick über die Inhalte und Funktionen der drei Portale sowie des Wörterbuchs, die untereinander verlinkt sind.

Reiner Konrad, Julian Bleicken, Calvin Khan, Amy Isard, Gabriele Langer, Anke Müller, Marc Schulder

Facilitating the Spread of New Sign Language Technologies across Europe

Abstract

For developing sign language technologies like automatic translation, huge amounts of training data are required. Even the larger corpora available for some sign languages are tiny compared to the amounts of data used for corresponding spoken language technologies. The overarching goal of the European project EASIER is to develop a framework for bidirectional automatic translation between sign and spoken languages and between sign languages. One part of this multi-dimensional project is that it will pool available language resources from European sign languages into a larger dataset to address the data scarcity problem. This approach promises to open the floor for lower-resourced sign languages in Europe. This article focusses on efforts in the EASIER project to allow for new languages to make use of such technologies in the future. What are the characteristics of sign language resources needed to train recognition, translation, and synthesis algorithms, and how can other countries including those without any sign resources follow along with these developments? The efforts undertaken in EASIER include creating workflow documents and organizing training sessions in online workshops. They reflect the current state of the art, and will likely need to be updated in the coming decade.

Hope E. Morgan, Onno Crasborn, Maria Kopf, Marc Schulder, Thomas Hanke

Introducing Sign Languages to a Multilingual Wordnet: Bootstrapping Corpora and Lexical Resources of Greek Sign Language and German Sign Language

Abstract

Wordnets have been a popular lexical resource type for many years. Their sense-based representation of lexical items and numerous relation structures have been used for a variety of computational and linguistic applications. The inclusion of different wordnets into multilingual wordnet networks has further extended their use into the realm of cross-lingual research. Wordnets have been released for many spoken languages. Research has also been carried out into the creation of wordnets for several sign languages, but none have yet resulted in publicly available datasets. This article presents our own efforts towards an inclusion of sign languages in a multilingual wordnet, starting with Greek Sign Language (GSL) and German Sign Language (DGS). Based on differences in available language resources between GSL and DGS, we trial two workflows with different coverage priorities. We also explore how synergies between both workflows can be leveraged and how future work on additional sign languages could profit from building on existing sign language wordnet data. The results of our work are made publicly available.

Sam Bigeard, Marc Schulder, Maria Kopf, Thomas Hanke, Kyriaki Vasilaki, Anna Vacalopoulou, Theodore Goulas, Athanasia-Lida Dimou, Stavroula-Evita Fotinea, Eleni Efthimiou

The Sign Language Dataset Compendium: Creating an Overview of Digital Linguistic Resources

Abstract

One of the challenges that sign language researchers face is the identification of suitable language datasets, particularly for cross-lingual studies. There is no single source of information on what sign language corpora and lexical resources exist or how they compare. Instead, they have to be found through extensive literature review or word-of-mouth. The amount of information available on individual datasets can also vary widely and may be distributed across different publications, data repositories and (potentially defunct) project websites. This article introduces the Sign Language Dataset Compendium, an extensive overview of linguistic resources for sign languages. It covers existing corpora and lexical resources, as well as commonly used data collection tasks. Special attention is paid to covering resources for many different languages from around the globe. All information is provided in a standardised format to make entries comparable, but kept flexible enough to allow for differences in content. The compendium is intended as a growing resource that will be updated regularly.

Maria Kopf, Marc Schulder, Thomas Hanke

How to be FAIR when you CARE: The DGS Corpus as a Case Study of Open Science Resources for Minority Languages

Article and video presentation on how the DGS Corpus implement ethical open data practices.

Marc Schulder, Thomas Hanke

How to be FAIR when you CARE: The DGS Corpus as a Case Study of Open Science Resources for Minority Languages