"great" American Sign Language (ASL)

American Sign Language: "great"

The right sign for "great" depends on your meaning. Generally "great" is done as "wonderful." Hold both five handshapes out in front of you at about the height of your head (higher if you are more enthusiastic). Push both hands forward twice. The sign starts with the hands back and ends with the hands out.
WONDERFUL / "Great!"

The sign for "great" as is in "large" is done as a modified form of the sign "big."

LARGE / great / big / huge

See: WONDERFUL

See: BIG

Note:
In a message dated 10/13/2002 7:50:42 PM Central Daylight Time, a student writes:
"Can you please let me know how to produce the symbol for the word top; meaning "on top of the world." Thanks for your assistance."
- Mary Whelan
-------------------------
Mary,
"On top of the world," meaning what?
If I'm feeling "on top of the world" I'd sign, "I feel great."
"Great" is expressed by using the sign "WONDERFUL."
- Dr. Bill

Note:
AWESOME:
A student asked me how to sign "God is great!" Or "God is awesome!"
"Great" or "awesome" would use the sign "WONDERFUL" For an example see: "God is awesome!"
(Adjust your facial expressions to match the circumstances. In the video I'm thinking in terms of signing during a reverent Sunday service. But if you are at an exciting "revival" meeting then you would certainly want to show corresponding emotion.)

Question:

In the comment section of the YouTube video titled American Sign Language (ASL) Lesson 03 (narrative / story)
at https://youtu.be/496uGsJ_5F4 @randyweber6576 on 2024/12/20 asked:

"Dr. Vicars, how do you sign a Great-Great-Great Grandfather or Great-Great-Great Grandmother as in generations ago?"

Reply:
There are different ways.
One of the ways uses a sign that looks like a one-handed version of "next" but it does an arc movement backwards toward (and aimed a little above) the dominant shoulder. That sign generally means "one generation previous" -- but can mean one segment of time previously. You do the arc movement once for each "great" and then sign grandfather.

(I do not expect you to be able to visualize that sign just from a text description -- but rather it is a note to myself to record that next time I'm in front of my video camera in my studio.)

The other main way is to do the sign "large" but use the movement of "big" (that doesn't twist the forearms) and do it in a series of steps becoming wider with each step. Each step corresponds with one "great" in the phrase great, great, great grandfather.

There is another way but it is somewhat complex and "hard" for some people to sign and that is to combine one of the previous methods and simultaneously count 1, 2, 3 (incrementing for each great) on the non-dominant hand.

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