Abstract

This paper addresses the relation between sign language and literacy development in bilingually educated deaf children. These children are acquiring LSQ (Quebec Sign Language) as a first language and written French as a second language. In the spirit of the "Interdependence Theory" of Cummins (1991), we try to determine whether there is a relation between the mastery of L1 and of L2 despite the modality difference between these languages. In order to examine the relation between the use of space in LSQ and reading comprehension in French, two tests were developed. The use of space in LSQ was measured by an imitation task. Given that in LSQ, as in other sign languages, the use of space is involved in all forms of co-indexation (pronominal reference, verb agreement, etc.) and is the means by which the language establishes relations between different lexical elements, mastery of the use of space was hypothesized as an appropriate indicator of global competence in LSQ. Two aspects of the use of space were looked at, namely, locus assignment and reference. To evaluate reading comprehension, a multi-level reading test was designed to verify specifically the ability to locate and infer information in a text. Statistical analyses (Spearman correlations) show that mastery of LSQ is related to reading comprehension. More specifically, the mastery of locus assignment and reference in LSQ seems consistently related to the ability to make inferences when reading French. However, the mastery of locus assignment in LSQ does not consistently correlate with the ability to locate information in a written text and the mastery of reference in LSQ does not appear to correlate with this ability either.