Language Contact between Israeli Sign Language and Kufr Qassem Sign Language

We investigate the contact situation between Israeli Sign Language (ISL) and Kufr Qassem Sign Language (KQSL) in a bilingual deaf community in Israel. We examine one outcome of language contact, known as reiteration—when two semantically equivalent lexical items from two different languages are produced sequentially. Until now, reiteration has been accepted as a clear example of code-switching. Yet, when we find multiple examples of reiteration present in monolingual signers of KQSL, we ask the following question: Is this a case of code-switching? KQSL monolingual signers produce the signs girlISL girlKQSL not as an example of reiteration but rather as a compound with the meaning of "wife." We conclude that, in this case, the sign girlISL is borrowed from ISL into a preexisting compound present in KQSL. Using examples from monolingual and bilingual data, we unravel the mystery of the "wife" and the stages of language change it has undergone.