The word number in sign language

Created By: Signing Savvy

Member Tools (tutorial)

You can type any number in the search box to see the sign for the number.

A great place to start learning the ASL numbers is with this word list.

Hand Position / Palm Orientation

Hand positioning when signing numbers can be confusing! We’ve noted palm orientation guidelines for each set of numbers in the lists below. For some numbers, your palm orientation will either face toward or away from your body as you are signing numbers depending on why you are signing them. For example, if you are signing a quantity, the palm of your hand should face away from your body while you are signing the number(s). If you are just signing a number, then the position of your hand varies depending on the number you are signing.

ASL Number Learning Tools

As a Signing Savvy Member, you can use the «Practice with Flash Cards» and «Create Quiz and Test Yourself» tools with this word list to practice and test yourself on the ASL numbers. Just click on the buttons above to get started. This is a great place to start if you are just beginning to learn ASL numbers.

Once you know the individual numbers and how to count in ASL, you are ready to start making larger numbers and series of numbers. We have the Savvy Numbers Quiz and Savvy Numbers Flash Cards tools to help you practice your receptive numbers skills.

Check out the tools to help learn numbers:

Printable Posters

Here is a printable poster that corresponds with this wordlist:

Number Vocabulary

Linguistics

Numeral incorporation is a morphological process, in which a number is incorporated into a handshape, a classifier, or a pronoun of a sign.

Let’s look at an example of two+day and two-day. Notice the difference between these two glosses? The former has a plus symbol which means two ASL signs and the latter has a minus symbol which means one sign (despite two English words for the sake of glossing).

The sign two+day has two separate signs (two morphemes): TWO and DAY.

Numeral incorporation occurs when one incorporates a number into the sign DAY. It becomes one sign, but it has two meaningful parts (morphemes). The numeral part is a «bound morpheme.»

Numeral incorporation with noun

The ASL word hour is a regular noun as shown above.

The sign HOUR can be incorporated into a number from one through nine. Beyond ten, one has to sign two separate signs NUMBER and HOUR.

As a basic rule, numeral incorporation can only work up to 9 numbers. Beyond number 10, use the regular separate signs such as 12+MONTH.

Numeral incorporation can work with the following ASL signs from one through nine (from one through five in a few categories): MINUTE, HOUR, DAY, WEEK, MONTH, O’CLOCK, and so on.

Numeral incorporation with classifier

[L] the upright 1-handshape classifier may represent a standing person, pen, stick or another. By changing this handshape to «2» or «V», this classifier then can represent two persons (standing), two sticks (horizontal orientation), and so on.

Numeral incorporation with pronoun

The images above illustrate ASL pronouns you and I/me respectively, which can be interpreted as you and me/I. They can be incorporated with a manual number as shown below.

Instead of signing you me/I, the signer can incorporate the manual number two into the handshape to create a V- or 2-handshape. It means the same as «you and me/I», «both of us», or «the two of us».

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

«No.» redirects here. For other uses, see No.

The numero sign or numero symbol, №, (also represented as Nº, No, No. or no.),^[1][2] is a typographic abbreviation of the word number(s) indicating ordinal numeration, especially in names and titles. For example, using the numero sign, the written long-form of the address «Number 22 Acacia Avenue» is shortened to «№ 22 Acacia Ave», yet both forms are spoken long.

Typographically, the numero sign combines as a single ligature the uppercase Latin letter ⟨N⟩ with a usually superscript lowercase letter ⟨o⟩, sometimes underlined, resembling the masculine ordinal indicator ⟨º⟩. The ligature has a code point in Unicode as a precomposed character, U+2116 № NUMERO SIGN.^[3]

The Oxford English Dictionary derives the numero sign from Latin numero, the ablative form of numerus («number», with the ablative denotations of «by the number, with the number»). In Romance languages, the numero sign is understood as an abbreviation of the word for «number», e.g. Italian numero, French numéro, and Portuguese and Spanish número.^[4]

This article describes other typographical abbreviations for «number» in different languages, in addition to the numero sign proper.

Usages[edit]

The numero sign as a single glyph, despite its widespread usage internationally, is not a standard keyboard symbol in virtually any European language^{[citation needed]}. Its substitution by the two separate letters ⟨N⟩ and ⟨o⟩ is common. A capital or lower-case «n» may be used, followed by «o.», superscript «o», ordinal indicator, or the degree sign; this will be understood in most languages.

Bulgarian[edit]

In Bulgarian the numero sign is often used and it is present in three widely used keyboard layouts accessible with Shift-0 in BDS and prBDS and with Shift-3 on the Phonetic layout.

English[edit]

In English, the non-ligature form No. is typical and is often used to abbreviate the word «number».^[2] In North America, the number sign, #, is more prevalent. The ligature form does not appear on British or American QWERTY keyboards.

French[edit]

The numero symbol is not in common use in France and does not appear on a standard AZERTY keyboard. Instead, the French Imprimerie nationale recommends the use of the form «n^o» (an «n» followed by a superscript lowercase «o»). The plural form «n^os» can also be used.^[5] In practice, the «o» is often replaced by the degree symbol (°), which is visually similar to the superscript «o» and is easily accessible on an AZERTY keyboard.

Indonesian and Malaysian[edit]

«Nomor» in Indonesian and «nombor» in Malaysian; therefore «No.» is commonly used as an abbreviation with standard spelling and full stop.

Italian[edit]

The sign is usually replaced with the abbreviations «n.» or «nº», the latter using a masculine ordinal indicator, rather than a superscript «O».^[6]

Philippines[edit]

Because of more than three centuries of Spanish colonisation, the word número is found in almost all Philippine languages. «No.» is its common notation in local languages as well as English.

Portuguese[edit]

In Portugal the notation «n.º» is often used, as in Spain.^[7] In Brazil, where Portuguese is the official language, «nº» is often used on official documents.^[8]

Russian[edit]

Although the letter ⟨N⟩ is not in the Cyrillic alphabet, the numero sign № is typeset in Russian publishing, and is available on Russian computer and typewriter keyboards.

• 

  1912 typewriter with Russian layout.
  № sign can be seen on the 8 key.

• 

  Russian typewriter, circa 1985.
  № sign can be seen on the 1 key.

The numero sign is very widely used in Russia and other post-Soviet states in many official and casual contexts. Examples include usage for law and other official documents numbering, names of institutions (hospitals, kindergartens, schools, libraries, organization departments and so on), numbering of periodical publications (such as newspapers and magazines), numbering of public transport routes, etc.

«№ п/п» (номер по порядку, «sequential number») is universally used as a table header to denote a column containing the table row number.

The № sign is sometimes used in Russian medical prescriptions (which according to the law must be written in Latin language^[9]) as an abbreviation for the Latin word numero to indicate the number of prescribed dosages (for example, tablets or capsules), and on the price tags in drugstores and pharmacy websites to indicate number of unit doses in drug packages, although the standard abbreviation for use in prescriptions is the Latin N.

Spanish[edit]

The numero sign is not typically used in Iberian Spanish, and it is not present on standard keyboard layouts. According to the Real Academia Española^[10] and the Fundéu BBVA,^[11] the word número (number) is abbreviated per the Spanish typographic convention of letras voladas («flying letters»). The first letter(s) of the word to be abbreviated are followed by a period; then, the final letter(s) of the word are written as lowercase superscripts. This gives the abbreviations n.^o (singular) and n.^os (plural). The abbreviation «no.» is not used, because it might be mistaken for the Spanish word no (no, not). Furthermore, nro. and núm. are also acceptable abbreviations for número. The numero sign either as a one-character symbol (№) or composed of the letter N plus the superscript «o» character (sometimes underlined or substituted by ordinal indicator º) is common in Latin America, where the interpolated period is sometimes not used in abbreviations.

Nr.[edit]

In some languages, Nr., nr., nr or NR is used instead, reflecting the abbreviation of the language’s word for «number». German Nummer is represented this way, and this language capitalises all nouns and abbreviations of nouns. Lithuanian uses it as well, and it is usually capitalised in bureaucratic contexts, especially with the meaning «reference number» (such as sutarties Nr., «contract No.») but in other contexts it follows the usual sentence capitalisation (such as tel. nr., abbreviation for telefono numeris, «telephone number»). It is most commonly lowercase in other languages, such as Dutch, Danish, Norwegian, Polish, Romanian, Estonian and Swedish. Some languages, such as Polish, omit the dot in abbreviations, if the last letter of the original word is present in the abbreviation.

Typing the symbol[edit]

On typewriters and computers that do not support this symbol, it is acceptable and commonplace to replace it with the trigraph «No.» (letter «N», letter «o», and a period (full stop)).

On typewriters and computers that support the degree symbol a digraph «N°» may be used. If the masculine ordinal indicator is available, the better digraph «Nº» may be used. These result in a passable approximation of the numero sign, but a consistent notation must be used in digital data which must be searchable.

On Russian computer keyboard layout, the № character is available and often located on the 3 key.

In macOS, the character can be typed using «U.S. Extended» and «Irish Extended» keyboard layouts by typing ⇧ Shift+⌥ Option+;. As of macOS 10.13, this combination does not yield the numero symbol when «U.S.» or «U.S. International» is chosen. It will only yield the numero symbol when «ABC – Extended» is chosen as the input keyboard.

In X11 (and related, like Linux) systems with a compose key, the character can be typed using Compose, ⇧ Shift+N, O. Alternatively standard XIM style can be used: Ctrl+⇧ Shift+u then 2116↵ Enter.

In Microsoft Windows and HTML in general, the numero sign can be entered by the Unicode input methods № or №.

Technical considerations[edit]

U+2116 NUMERO SIGN is provided both for Cyrillic use, where it looks like [semi-cursive «N» followed by raised, underlined small «o»], and for compatibility with Asian standards, where it looks like [angular «N» followed by raised, underlined small «o», followed by a period]. … Instead of using a special symbol, French practice is to use an «N» or an «n», according to context, followed by a superscript small letter «o» (N^o or n^o; plural N^os or n^os). Legacy data encoded in ISO/IEC 8859-1 (Latin-1) or other 8-bit character sets may also have represented the numero sign by a sequence of «N» followed by the degree sign (U+00B0 degree sign). Implementations working with legacy data should be aware of such alternative representations for the numero sign when converting data.

— The Unicode Standard.^[12]

See also[edit]

• Superior letter

References[edit]

External links[edit]

• Unicode Letterlike Symbols code chart

A. Alphabet and Fingerspelling:

Learning the alphabet and fingerspelling is a crucial part of mastering sign language. Each letter of the alphabet has a corresponding hand shape, which can be used to spell out words and proper names. Practice is key to becoming proficient in fingerspelling, as it requires a lot of hand-eye coordination and dexterity.

B. Numbers and Counting:

Numbers are an essential part of everyday communication, and counting in sign language has its own unique set of signs to represent them. In addition to the basic numbers, there are also signs for ordinal numbers (first, second, third, etc.) and fractions (half, quarter, etc.). Counting is also done differently in sign language, with the use of repetition and specific hand shapes to indicate quantities.

C. Greetings and Introductions:

Greetings and introductions are a fundamental part of social interactions, and sign language has its own set of signs to express them. Common greetings include “hello,” “goodbye,” and “nice to meet you,” while introductions can be done by fingerspelling names or using specific signs for family relationships (mother, father, sister, etc.).

D. Yes and No:

In sign language, there are several ways to express agreement or disagreement. The most common signs for “yes” and “no” involve nodding or shaking the head, but there are also signs for “correct” and “incorrect.” Facial expressions and body language can also convey meaning in sign language, so it’s important to pay attention to context.

E. Thank You and Please:

Expressing gratitude and politeness is an important aspect of communication in any language, and sign language is no exception. Signs for “thank you” and “please” can be done using specific hand shapes and movements, and they are often accompanied by facial expressions to convey sincerity and emotion. Mastering these signs can help build strong, positive relationships with deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals.

F. Basic phrases for Beginners

If you’re interested in learning some basic sign language phrases, check out our recent blog post on “20+ Basic Sign Language Phrases for Beginners.” Whether you’re looking to communicate with someone who is deaf or hard of hearing, or simply interested in expanding your communication skills, this post provides a great starting point for learning American Sign Language (ASL).