Current issues in sign language linguistics Day 3

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Current issues in sign language
linguisticsDay 3

• LOT Summer School 2006
• Universiteit van Amsterdam
• Josep Quer (ICREA UB)

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Agreement

• A process whereby a grammatical element X
  matches a grammatical element Y in property Z
  within some grammatical configuration (Barlow
  Ferguson 1988 1)

3
SL Verb Typology

• SL verbs seem to fall into three morphosyntactic
  classes (Padden 1988/1983)
• Plain verbs no agreement
• Spatial verbs agreement with locative arguments
• Agreeing verbs agreement with subject and object

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SL Verb Typology

• Plain verbs

think (BSL)
like (BSL)
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SL Verb Typology

• Spatial verbs

BSL
ASL
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SL Verb Typology

• Spatial verbs CUT, PUT-BANDAGE-ON

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SL Verb Typology

• Spatial verbs STAY, MOVE-TO

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SL Verb Typology

• Spatial verbs BE-AT

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SL Verb Typology

• Agreeing verbs they show agreement with subject
  and object loci by means of the movement path and
  the facing (orientation of palm and/or
  fingertips)
• Subtype of agreeing verbs backwards agreeing
  verbs (TAKE, STEAL...) vs. regular agreeing verbs
  (GIVE, HELP...)

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SL Verb Typology

• Agreeing verbs (path) GIVE

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SL Verb Typology

• Agreeing verbs (facing) TAKE-CARE-OF

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SL Verb Typology

• Backwards agreeing verbs

BSL
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SL Verb Typology

• Backwards verbs UNDERSTAND

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SL Verb Agreement

• Agreeing verbs display agreement with the
  referential loci associated with their arguments.
• Subject agreement is optional, object agreement
  is obligatory.

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SL Nonmanual Agreement

• For ASL, another type of syntactic agreement has
  been described
• nonmanual agreement with subject and object
  agreement features, irrespective of the
  morphological verb type (Neidle et al. 2000,
  Bahan 1996).

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SL Nonmanual Agreement

• Head tilt subject agreement
• Eye gaze object agreement

Neidle et al. (2000)
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SL Nonmanual Agreement
ftp//csr.bu.edu/asl/sequences/compressed/master/c
h5-523_273_small_0.mov
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SL Nonmanual Agreement
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SL Nonmanual Agreement

• Sandler Lillo-Martin (2006)
• Neutral form of subject agreement body lean, but
  not always. Untestable.
• Timing of eyegaze and headtilt
• Other semantic or pragmatic functions of eyegaze
  and headtilt.

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SL Nonmanual Agreement

• Thompson, Emmorey Kluender (2006) question the
  characterization of eye gaze as a grammatical
  marker of agreement on an experimental basis.
• Eg with agreeing Vs towards object with plain Vs
  rarely towards object.
• Eg with spatial Vs towards locative argument
• Plain verbs with null objects not marked by
  eyegaze.

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Referential Indices

• In sign languages, referential indices are
  expressed directly
• Realization of referential indices by
  R(eferential) loci (pointing or gazing)
• In agreement verbs, location specifications of
  R-loci are copied into location slots (2)
• Each referent is paired with a unique location in
  space

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Alliterative Agreement

• Common alliterative agreement (e.g. Swahili)
• wa-tu wa-zuri wa-wili wa-le
  wa-meangukaCl2-person Cl2-good Cl2-two
  Cl2-that Cl2-fell.down
• Those two good persons fell down.
• Literal alliterative agreement part of the
  controller is copied onto the target (e.g.
  Bainouk)
• katama-no in-ka vs. dapon-no
  in-dariver-DEF this-CV grass-DEF
  this-CVthis river this grass

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Rathmann Mathur (2002)

• No need to provide a phonological specification
  for a locus syntax operates with indices, but
  its not until they reach the articulatory-percept
  ual interface that they have to be matched
  against some conceptual structure that represents
  spatial relations among the loci.
• Mediated by a gestural space as medium
  component/module that makes the conceptualization
  of referents visible.

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Verb Agreement

• Meir (1998, 2002) verb class is determined by
  thematic structure.
• Path movement is from source to goal
  (thematically determined) while facing of the
  hands is towards the object (syntactically
  determined).
• DIR morpheme in agreeing and spatial verbs
  denotes a path a referent traverses.
• Some candidate agreement verbs may not show
  agreement overtly for phonological reasons
  (orientation or location segments underlyingly
  specified)

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Auxiliaries
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Properties of SL Auxiliaries

• Express agreement morphology (subject/object)
• Do not realize tense or mood categories
• May realize aspect morphology in some languages
• Mainly cooccur with plain verbs

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Cross-linguistic Variation Form

• Pfau Steinbach (2005) identify three basic
  types of auxiliary crosslinguitically in SLs,
  based on their origin
• Concatenated pronouns
• PERSON
• Verb (GIVE, MEET, GO-TO)

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Type 1
TSL
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Type 2
DGS
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Type 3
TSL
NGT
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Auxiliaries more variation

• LSB AUX-IX
• Never co-occurs with an inflected agreeing verb
• Restricted syntactic position
• Cannot inflect for aspect
• Pure agreement auxiliary
• LSC AUX-IX
• Can co-occur with an inflected agreeing verb
• Freer syntactic distribution
• Can inflect for aspect
• Closer to a light verb

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LSB Auxiliary
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Aixiliary with backward verbs
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Null arguments
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Acquisition of agreement

• Action gestures Agreement verbs in neutral
  forms
• 2-3 years Countericonic forms GIVE-2 instead of
  GIVE-1
• 30-36 start of correct inflection wrt present
  referents. Overgeneralizations.

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Acquisition of agreement
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Acquisition of agreement

• Agreement with non-present referents second half
  of 4th year.
• Stacking of loci still in year 5.
• In place year 6.
• Reason Limitations of spatial memory?
  Inflections already learned at year 3.

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Agreement and negation in LSB

• Manual negation can intervene between subject and
  agreeing verb, but not between subject and plain
  verb
• IX JOHNa NO aGIVEb BOOK
• IX JOHNa NO DESIRE CAR
• IX JOHNa DESIRE CAR NO