ASL Science: Language Evolution

Ted Supalla has established himself as a leading authority in sign language research and linguistics at Georgetown University, where he serves as Professor of Neurology, Linguistics, and Psychology. Born deaf into a deaf family, he completed his academic journey with a Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of California, San Diego in 1982. As director of the Sign Language Research Lab at Georgetown's Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, he conducts groundbreaking research on sign language development, structure, and evolution. His significant contributions include co-authoring with Elissa Newport the first work on movement changes in American Sign Language verb-to-noun derivation, and producing seminal research on classifier constructions and verbs of motion. In 2015, he published Sign Language Archaeology: Understanding the Historical Roots of American Sign Language with Patricia Clark, advancing our understanding of ASL's historical development. His research consistently demonstrates that sign languages parallel spoken languages in complexity and grammatical development. He has served as a consultant to the World Federation of the Deaf and continues to expand the field through the Historical Sign Language Database, a public resource tool hosted at Georgetown. Married to Elissa L. Newport, also a professor in Georgetown's Department of Neurology, Supalla maintains an active research agenda focusing on sign language variation and historical change.