The interactive organization of every day “talk” of native Kenyan sign language (KSL) users: The case of cohesion

People who are deaf in Kenya operate within a distinct Kenyan deaf culture that uses Kenya Sign Language (KSL) to interact. The focus of this paper is every day “talk” or any signing activities that they engage in during their interaction in everyday contacts. The paper pivots on discourse that is not planned. According to Brazil [1] unplanned discourse is instinctive and happens gradually in time. Therefore, unplanned discourse is spontaneous and impulsive and is heavily reliant on immediate context to make known people’s thoughts and relies less on structure to express meaning, Brazil [2].  An analysis of “Talk” that occurs naturally is conversational analysis. Consistent with Richards et al [3], conversation analysis involves examination of naturally occurring conversations to establish the linguistic attributes of “talk” and how it is used in ordinary life. This is the concern of this paper. It also examines how casual talk achieves cohesion as we investigate the linguistic characteristics of every day “talk” in the context of people who are deaf and users of KSL.