2012) and deaf-particular topics ( Fisher et al. Sign languages are no exception with regard to general topics ( Mirus et al.
Likewise, language (sub)communities deem different topics taboo (such as social class, Macaulay 2002). Additionally, language communities draw on culture-particular topics for taboo terms ( Andersson and Trudgill 1990). Topics that yield taboo terms include bodily effluents, disease and death, religion, and sex. Taboo terms have much in common cross-linguistically. Lastly, we propose that iconicity as a cognitive structuring principle of linguistic expressions constrains the possible semantic extensions of iconic taboo terms. Further, lexical blending and non-manual enhancement play a role in the creation of dysphemisms in DGS. We further show that embodiment creates modality-enhanced ‘vicarious embarrassment’ in the viewer that results in the respective signs being judged obscene or offensive. This allows for creating dysphemisms and euphemisms via phonological changes to a sign. Semantically similar taboo signs based on the same metonymic anchor but differing in their degree of iconicity also differ in offensiveness. In conjunction with cross-linguistically common metonymic word-formation strategies, the degree of visual explicitness of a sign increases its potential to offend. We find that German Sign Language uses a variety of linguistic means to introduce and enhance offense, many of which rely on iconic properties of the taboo sign. Using the Think Aloud Protocol, we elicited offensive or crass signs and dysphemisms from nine signers. We analyze the linguistic mechanisms that introduce offense, focusing on the combined effects of cognitive metonymy and iconicity. The present paper offers the first investigation of taboo terms in sign languages from a cognitive linguistic perspective. Taboo terms offer a playground for linguistic creativity in language after language, and sign languages form no exception.
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