In addition to proposing the major phonological building blocks of signs, handshape, location, and movement, Stokoe (1960) also observed the occurrence of phonological variation, that is, different realizations of the same phonological aspect of a sign, without changing its meaning. Xavier and Barbosa (2017) cite as analogous cases in Libras the signs CANCEL, SILENCE, and ALSO. As can be seen in Figure 4, they can be produced with the hand configured in 1 (B) or in B (]), distinctive in other contexts, but allophonic in those signs.

Studies on phonological variation in ASL have reported that signs can vary in terms of thumb (Battison et al., 1975) or pinkie (Hoopes, 1998), extension, location (Woodward et al., 1976), and number of hands (Woodward & DeSantis, 1977). Xavier and Barbosa (2014) have found the same types of phonological variation in Libras, but can also, as shown in Figure 5, involve other phonological aspects such as movement, palm orientation, and non-manuals.

As an illustration of variation in location, we reproduced in Figure 6a the two productions of UNDERSTAND. As Xavier and Barbosa (2014) explain, this sign can be articulated with the hand in contact with the ipsilateral temple or cheek. The variation in movement, orientation, nonmanuals, and number of hands is illustrated, respectively, by the signs FAT, LETTER-A, UNITED-STATES, and ACCEPT. According to Xavier and Barbosa (2014), FAT (Figure 6b) can be produced with a repetitive wrist rotating movement or with a zigzag movement; LETTER-A (Figure 6c), with the palm facing forward or sideward; UNITED-STATES (Figure 6d), with or without puffed cheek; and ACCEPT (Figure 6e), with one or two hands.

One of the results of the work by Xavier and Barbosa (2014) contradicted the authors’ initial view regarding phonological variation. Contrary to their expectations, the same signs can vary in more than one phonological aspect individually or simultaneously. This is shown in Graph 1 below. Although most signs in their dataset varied in only one phonological aspect, they found a considerable number of signs that exhibited variation in two of them and some that exhibited variation in three, four, and even five phonological aspects.

According to Xavier and Barbosa (2017), the sign TALL is one of those that present variation in four parameters: the active hand and the passive hand can vary in their configuration: the first can appear in 1 (B), with the index extended or in a hook, while the second can appear in 1 (B) or B (]). The movement can be produced upwards in a circle or just circular. Nonmanuals may or not include a look to the side and upwards. Finally, TALL can be realized with one or two hands (Figure 7).

Despite all this variation, in a follow-up study, Xavier and Barbosa (2017) demonstrated that there are stable aspects in all productions of the sign TALL that guarantee the perception of all these productions as different “pronunciations” of the same sign, and not as different signs. The authors came to this conclusion by placing the different realizations of TALL side by side. As can be seen in Figure 8, there are, in fact, many variable aspects.

However, there are aspects that remain constant. These are marked in blue and concern the index finger of the dominant hand (dh) (although this may appear extended or hooked), the downward orientation of the nondominant hand (ndh) (although this may not appear in some productions), the initial location on the chest and the circular movement of the dominant hand (dh) and the participation of this hand in all productions (note that there is no production in which only the nondominant hand appears).

Morphologically, signs can be simple or compound. That is, they can be formed by a single sign or by more than one, respectively. In the following subsection, examples of signs of each type will be presented.

Simplex signs are formed by a single sign, therefore by a single significant unit or morpheme. An example of a simplex sign is the ASL sign BABY (Figure 9).

This is illustrated by the representation in Figure 10, in which the curly brackets { } indicate the boundaries of the morphemic unit.

Compound signs, on the other hand, are signs formed by at least two morphemes. Meir (2012) apud Xavier and Ferreira (2021a) proposes a typology of compounds for signed languages (Figure 11). According to the authors, these can be sequential, when the morphemes are produced one after the other, or simultaneous, when they are produced at the same time, generally one on each hand.

As an example of a sequential compound, Meir (2012) apud Xavier and Ferreira (2021a) cites the ASL sign BRUISE, formed by two signs, BLUE and PLACE, produced in sequence (Figure 12).

This morphological structure is more evident in the representation in Figure 13, in which the curly brackets { } represent both the morphemes that make up the compound and their sequentiality through their linear arrangement and the arrow (→).

Regarding simultaneous compounds, Meir (2012) apud Xavier and Ferreira (2021a) proposes four subtypes: (1) formed by free signs, that is, by signs that can occur alone, (2) formed by classifiers, that is, by hand configurations that represent entities or their handling (Brito, 1995/2010), (3) formed by the incorporation of numerals and (4) formed by initialization, that is, the incorporation of manual letters. Regarding this last subtype, as explained by Xavier and Ferreira (2021a), it consists of replacing the hand configuration used in a given sign with another configuration that refers, in the manual alphabet, to the initial letter of a written word of an oral language. Meir (2012) apud Xavier and Ferreira (2021a) cites as an example of initialization in ASL the signs FAMILY, ASSOCIATION, TEAM, and DEPARTMENT, derived from the sign GROUP (Figure 14).

The representation in Figure 15 indicates the morphological structure of initialized signs, very similar to that of signs that undergo numeral incorporation, except for the fact that in the sign FAMILY both hands simultaneously produce parts of the signs that form it. Precisely, in such a sign the palm orientation (PO), location (LOC), movement (MOV) and number of hands (NH) come from the sign GROUP and the handshape (HS) comes from the sign LETTER-F.

According to Klima and Bellugi (1979), lexical iconicity is a striking feature of signed languages. The authors attribute this to the mimetic origin of signs. To illustrate, they cite the sign VIDEOCASSETTE-RECORDER from ASL (Figure 16).

Klima and Bellugi (1979) say that they witnessed this sign being first made by a deaf colleague in their laboratory, at a time when there was no conventionalized sign in ASL to express this concept. In the form observed by the authors, the movement of both index fingers was clockwise, thus imitating the movement of the reels. Later, the fingers began to rotate in the opposite way: the finger of the nondominant hand in a clockwise direction and the finger of the dominant hand in a counterclockwise direction. Based on this, they argue that, despite their mimetic origin, signs must conform to the phonological rules of the language.

Thus, according to Klima and Bellugi (1979), iconic signs are those in which a relationship between the shape of the sign and visual aspects of what the sign refers to can be observed. As an illustration of this, see Figure 17, where the ASL sign for tree is depicted. As Figure 17a suggests, in ASL TREE the dominant hand represents the treetop while the arm, the trunk. The nondominant arm, in turn, represents the ground.

Adam (2012) explains that lexical borrowings occur when speakers or signers of a language use words or signs from another language to express a concept for which their language does not yet have an established form. Because sign languages are of a different modality than spoken languages, that is, they are produced and perceived differently, the manual alphabet is one of the main resources that these languages have to incorporate elements of the majority’s spoken language. Below is the manual alphabet used in Libras (Figure 18).

According to Quadros and Karnopp (2004), among the most frequent cases of fingerspelling use in Libras are those in which reference is made to proper names, and technical terms, as illustrated in Figure 19.

In their study of Libras signs formed from the manual alphabet, Xavier and Batista-Souza (2023) observe that, among these, there are those that originate precisely from fingerspelling. As the authors report, in the data collected from the dictionary by Capovilla and Raphael (2001), fingerspelled signs formed by two manual letters are more frequent. Despite this, there are cases in which more manual letters may be present (Graph 2).

To illustrate each of these identified types, Xavier and Batista-Souza (2023) cite the examples in Figure 20. They show the sign B-O (boletim de ocorrência) ‘police report’ formed by two manual letters, B and O (Figure 20a), the sign C-L-T (Consolidação das leis trabalhistas) ‘labor legislation’, formed by three manual letters (Figure 20b) and, finally, the sign V-O-V-O ‘grandparent’ (Figure 20c), made up of four manual letters.

Xavier and Batista-Souza (2023) also report that, in addition to signs formed from fingerspelling, there are other morphological patterns (Graph 3). The most frequent in their dataset refers to those formed by the combination of a manual letter with other phonological parameters of Libras, such as FRANCE (Figure 21c). The second most frequent cases are the initialized ones, such as DICTIONARY (Figure 21b), simultaneously formed by the sign BOOK and the manual letter D. Fingerspelling, already mentioned, is the third most frequent morphological pattern (cf. A-L-H-O ‘garlic’, Figure 21a). The fourth most frequent pattern is illustrated by Xavier and Batista-Souza (2023) with the sign J-A-Ú ‘city name’ (Figure 21d). This sign is referred by the authors as a mixed sign, because it consists of the fingerspelling of the Portuguese city name and a semicircular movement in contact with the body, which potentially refers to some aspects of its meaning.

In addition to contact with the majority’s spoken language, signed languages may be in contact with other signed languages and, as a result, incorporate elements from them. Machado and Quadros (2020) document signs from French Sign Language (LSF) and ASL that were incorporated into Libras more recently. As can be seen in Figure 22, these are technological (VIRTUAL-LEARNING-ENVIRONMENT) and scientific (PHONOLOGY, LANGUAGE, and LINGUISTICS) terms for which Libras did not have conventionalized signs.

Black color

The images in Figure 28 show the occurrence of variation in the hand configuration in the sign BLACK (charcoal). Some participants produced this sign with the hand configured in s (Figure 28a), others in D (G) (Figure 28b), in n (Figure 28c), in i (Figure 28d) and in P (d) (Figure 28e).

Three variants of the movement were also identified. The first involves a straight movement with repetition (Figure 29a), the second one consists of a semicircular movement (Figure 29b) and the third one, a straight movement without repetition (Figure 29c). These results and those related to the variation in the handshape are summarized in Graph 4.

The sign BLACK (curly hair) also presented phonological variation, but only in relation to its location. This sign was observed being produced on the upper lateral part of the head by some participants (Figure 30a) and on the lower lateral part of the forehead by others (Figure 30b). We present this result in Graph 5.

Pink color

Phonological variation was observed in the production of the sign for the color pink, both in the hand configuration and in the movement. The sign was produced with the B (]) hand configuration (Figure 31a), unrelated to Portuguese, and with the R (X) hand configuration, which refers to the initial letter of the corresponding Portuguese word rosa ‘pink’ (Figure 31b).

Each of these configurations presented variations, such as the B hand configuration with thumb extended (x) (Figure 32a), the semi-flexed B-hand (:) (Figure 32b), the hand configuration in the shape of the number “3” (_) (Figure 32c) and the 5-hand configuration, with semi-flexed fingers ()) (Figure 32d).

Regarding the movement, three variants were identified: clockwise circular movement (Figure 33a-b), counterclockwise circular movement, which can be interpreted as metathesis (Figure 33c), and repeated wrist rotating movement (Figure 33d-e). These results are presented in Graph 6.

Black color

Regarding the color black, Figure 34 shows the variability and stability in the different productions of the sign that refers to curly hair. Stability is found in the hand configuration, palm orientation, movement, number of hands, and contact. On the other hand, variation is identified in the place of articulation and nonmanuals. Figure 35 shows the sign that makes reference to curly hair. In this case, it is possible to observe greater variability in almost all phonological aspects, with the exception of the place of articulation, number of hands, and contact.

Pink color

Figure 36 presents the signs for the color pink that makes reference to cheek color. It can be seen that these sign presents greater stability in the palm orientation, location, number of hands, and contact. However, there is variation in the configuration of the dominant hand, in its movement and in nonmanuals.

Simplex signs formed without the influence from Portuguese were found for both colors, BLACK (Figure 37a) and PINK (Figure 37b-d).

Compounding is predominant in the data analyzed. The initialized sign for the color black (Figure 38a) is a derivation of the sign formed without influence from Portuguese that refers to the act of “rubbing charcoal on the back of the hand”. In Figure 38b, the sign for the color pink also originates from a sign that is not influenced by Portuguese, the one referring to the cheek color. This sign results from the replace of the original hand configuration with the handshape of the manual letter R.

In Figure 39, the representation illustrates the simultaneous compounding of the initialized sign BLACK (charcoal). As can be seen, while the dominant hand produces the sign for the manual letter P, the non-dominant hand performs part of the sign CHARCOAL.

Regarding the color pink (Figure 40), the simultaneous compounding of the initialized sign is represented. In yellow we represent the elements in the compound that come from the native sign PINK, the one the makes reference to the cheek color, and in blue we represent the phonological aspect, the handshape, that comes from the sign LETTER-R.

Black color

Two lexical variants were identified for the color black, formed without any influence from Portuguese. The first sign appears to refer to curly hair (Figure 41a). The second sign, on the other hand, according to a deaf signer from the state of São Paulo in a video shared on social media, refers to rubbing charcoal on the back of the hand, a practice carried out to assess the quality of the charcoal (Figure 41b). In both cases, the reference to the color black is therefore made indirectly.

The map of Brazil in Figure 42 indicates each lexical variant formed without the influence of Portuguese that designate the color black. Notably, a curious pattern emerges in relation to the signs that refer to curly hair and rubbing charcoal on the back of the hand. The first one seems to be used in most states in the South and Southeast regions of Brazil, while the second one predominates in most states in the North and Northeast regions.

Pink color

For the color pink, we identified two lexical variants formed without influence from Portuguese. One refers indirectly to the cheek color (Figure 43a), and the other is an extension of the sign FLOWER/ROSE, so as to make reference to its color (Figure 43b). The sign referring to the cheek color appeared in the productions of deaf people from the South and Southeast regions, while the sign derived from FLOWER/ROSE was found only in Minas Gerais (Figure 44).

Black color

We found a sign formed by initialization. This sign is associated with the sign that makes reference to “rubbing charcoal on the back of one’s hand” (Figure 45). On the map in Figure 46, we show that this was attested in the states of Pará, Pernambuco, Rio de Janeiro, and Rio Grande do Norte.

Pink color

In our dataset only one sign for the color pink is formed with the influence from Portuguese, precisely through initialization. The lexical variant shown in Figure 47 results from the replacement of the original handshape of the sign that makes reference to the color of the cheek with the handshape of the sign LETTER-R. This sign is found in all states considered plus the Federal District (Figure 48).

The work Iconographia dos Signaes dos Surdos-Mudos ‘Iconography of the Signs of the Deaf-Mute’, published in 1875 by Flausino José da Gama, a former deaf student of the National Institute of Education for the Deaf (INES) provides insights into the signed language used at that time. According to Sofiato (2011), the work is recognized as a literal translation into Portuguese of a work by Péllissier published in France in 1856. Thus, the sign for the color black (Figure 49), one of the lexical variants still used in Libras, might have originated in LSF and later incorporated by Brazilian deaf people into Libras.