Saying “shit, eat, drool, wee, vomit, burp, ooze snot, etc” sounds crude and there is a reasonable chance that I would forget something. There are so many gross fluid related things that humans do, especially when they have minimal control of themselves. I think the euphemism is fairly common.
They’re like chimps for a while—the hands work better than the mouths. I babysat a kid who could sign “more”, “drink”, “cereal”, and “banana” before she could say anything useful. Also, the signs are designed to be easy, while the most useful English words were not (otherwise “ba” and “um” would mean something useful, because those are usually the first sounds we manage.)
Sweet. As soon as they invent babies that don’t have any bodily functions I’m going to parent one and it’ll be sign language from the start.
Language is a bodily function.
Saying “shit, eat, drool, wee, vomit, burp, ooze snot, etc” sounds crude and there is a reasonable chance that I would forget something. There are so many gross fluid related things that humans do, especially when they have minimal control of themselves. I think the euphemism is fairly common.
Babies don’t seem to be able to learn to sign all that sooner than they learn to talk.
They’re like chimps for a while—the hands work better than the mouths. I babysat a kid who could sign “more”, “drink”, “cereal”, and “banana” before she could say anything useful. Also, the signs are designed to be easy, while the most useful English words were not (otherwise “ba” and “um” would mean something useful, because those are usually the first sounds we manage.)