Pronominal reference in signed and spoken language: Are grammatical categories modality-dependent?

doi:10.1017/CBO9780511486777.017

13 - Pronominal reference in signed and spoken language: Are grammatical categories modality-dependent?

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 September 2009

Edited by

Kearsy Cormier and

Susan Lioyd McBurney: Affiliation:
Linguistics graduate student University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Richard P. Meier: Affiliation:
University of Texas, Austin
Kearsy Cormier: Affiliation:
University of Texas, Austin
David Quinto-Pozos: Affiliation:
University of Texas, Austin

Book contents

Get access

Summary

Introduction

Language in the visual–gestural modality presents a unique opportunity to explore fundamental structures of human language. One of the larger, more complex questions that arises when examining signed languages is the following: how, and to what degree, does the modality of a language affect the structure of that language? In this context, the term “modality” refers to the physical systems underlying the expression of a language; spoken languages are expressed in the aural-oral modality, while signed languages are expressed in the visual–gestural modality.

One apparent difference between signed languages and spoken languages relates to the linguistic expression of reference. Because they are expressed in the visual–gestural modality, signed languages are uniquely equipped to convey spatial–relational and referential relationships in a more overt manner than is possible in spoken languages. Given this apparent difference, it is not unreasonable to ask whether systems of pronominal reference in signed languages are structured according to the same principles as those governing pronominal reference in spoken languages.

Following this line of inquiry, this typological study explores the grammatical distinctions that are encoded in pronominal reference systems across spoken and signed languages. Using data from a variety of languages representing both modalities, two main questions are addressed. First, are the categories encoded within pronoun systems (e.g. person, number, gender, etc.) the same across languages in the two modalities? Second, within these categories, is the range of distinctions marked governed by similar principles?

Information

Type: Chapter
Information: Modality and Structure in Signed and Spoken Languages , pp. 329 - 369

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511486777.017 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2002

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Ahlgren, Inger. 1990. Deictic pronouns in Swedish and Swedish Sign Language. In Theoretical issues in sign language research, Vol. I: Linguistics, ed. S. Fischer and P. Siple, 167–174. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press

Anderson, Stephen R. and Edward L. Keenan. 1985. Deixis. In Language typology and syntactic description, Vol. III: Grammatical categories and the lexicon, ed. Timothy Shopen, 259–308. New York: Cambridge University Press

Aronoff, Mark, Irit Meir, and Wendy Sandler. 2000. Universal and particular aspects of sign language morphology. University of Maryland Working Papers in Linguistics, 10:1–33

Baker, Charlotte and Dennis Cokely. 1980. American Sign Language: A teacher's resource text on grammar and culture. Silver Spring, MD: T. J. Publishers

Bellugi, Ursula and Edward Klima. 1982. From gesture to sign: Deixis in a visual–gestural language. In Speech, place, and action, ed. Robert J. Jarvella and Wolfgang Klein, 279–313. Chichester: John Wiley

Benton, R. A. 1971. Pangasinan reference grammar. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press

Benveniste, Emile. 1971. Problems in general linguistics. Coral Gables, FL: University of Miami Press

Boas, Franz. 1947. Kwakiutl grammar. In Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, Volume 37 (3). New York: AMS Press

Chinchor, Nancy. 1979. Numeral incorporation in American Sign Language. Doctoral dissertation, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island

Corina, David and Wendy, Sandler. 1993. On the nature of phonological structure in sign language. Phonology 10:165–207CrossRef Google Scholar

Cormier, Kearsy. 1998. How does modality contribute to linguistic diversity? Manuscript, University of Texas, Austin, Texas

Diessel, Holger. 1999. Demonstratives: Form, function, and grammaticalization. Typological Studies in Language, 42. Amsterdam: John Benjamins

Engberg-Pedersen, Elisabeth. 1986. The use of space with verbs in Danish Sign Language. In Signs of life: Proceedings of the 2nd European Congress of Sign Language Research. ed. Bernard Tervoort, 32–51. Amsterdam: Institute of General Linguistics of the University of Amsterdam

Engberg-Pedersen, Elisabeth. 1993. Space in Danish Sign Language: The semantics and morphosyntax of the use of space in a visual language. Hamburg: Signum

Farnell, Brenda. 1995. Do you see what I mean? Plains Indian sign talk and the embodiment of action. Austin: University of Texas Press

Fauconnier. Giles. 1985. Mental spaces: Aspects of meaning construction in natural language. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press

Fauconnier, Giles. 1997. Mappings in thought and language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Fischer, Susan D. 1996. The role of agreement and auxiliaries in sign language. Lingua 98:103–119CrossRef Google Scholar

Fischer, Susan D. and Yutaka Osugi. 2000. Thumbs up vs. giving the finger: Indexical classifiers in NS and ASL. Paper presented at the Seventh International Conference on Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research, Amsterdam, July

Forchheimer, Paul. 1953. The category of person in language. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter

Friedman, Lynne A. 1975. On the semantics of space, time, and person reference in the American Sign Language. Language 51:940–961CrossRef Google Scholar

Friedman, Victor A. 1994. Ga in Lak and the three “there”s: Deixis and markedness in Daghestan. NSL 7: Linguistic studies in the non Slavic languages of the Commonwealth of Independent States and the Baltic Republics, ed. Howard I. Aronson. 79–93. Chicago, IL: Chicago Linguistic Society

Hale, K. L. 1966. Kinship reflections in syntax, Word 22:318–324CrossRef Google Scholar

Ingram, David. 1978. Typology and universals of personal pronouns. In Universals of human language, Vol. 3: Word structure, ed. Joseph H. Greenberg, 213–247. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press

Johnston, Trevor. 1991. Spatial syntax and spatial semantics in the inflection of signs for the marking of person and location in Auslan. International Journal of Sign Linguistics 2:29–62Google Scholar

Johnston, Trevor. 1998. Signs of Australia: A new dictionary of Auslan. North Rocks, NSW: North Rocks Press

Klima, Edward and Ursula Bellugi. 1979. The signs of language. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press

Lane, Harlan. 1984. When the mind hears: A history of the Deaf. New York: Random House

Last, Marco. In preparation. Expressions of numerosity: A cognitive approach to crosslinguistic variation in grammatical number marking and numeral systems. Doctoral dissertation, University of Amsterdam

Laycock, Donald C. 1965. The Ndu language family. Canberra: Australian National University

Liddell, Scott. 1994. Tokens and surrogates. In Perspectives on Sign Language Structure: Papers from the 5thInternational Symposium on Sign Language Research, Vol. I, ed. I. Ahlgren, B. Bergman, and M. Brennan, 105–119. Durham, England: The International Sign Linguistics Association

Liddell, Scott. 1995. Real, surrogate, and token space: Grammatical consequences in ASL. In Sign, gesture, and space, ed. Karen Emmorey and Judy Reilly, 19–41. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum

Liddell, Scott. 1996. Numeral incorporating roots and nonincorporating prefixes in American Sign Language. Sign Language Studies 92:201–225CrossRef Google Scholar

Liddell, Scott. 2000a. Indicating verbs and pronouns: Pointing away from agreement. In The signs of language revisited: An anthology to honor Ursula Bellugi and Edward Klima. ed. Harlan Lane and Karen Emmorey, 303–320. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum

Liddell, Scott. 2000b. Blended spaces and deixis in sign language discourse. In Language and gesture: Window into thought and action, ed. David McNeill, 331–357. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Liddell, Scott and Robert, Johnson. 1989. American Sign Language: The phonological base. Sign Language Studies 64:195–277CrossRef Google Scholar

Lillo-Martin, Diane. 1986. Parameter setting: Evidence from use, acquisition, and breakdown in American Sign Language. Doctoral dissertation, University of California, San Diego, CA

Lillo-Martin, Diane. 1995. The point of view predicate in American Sign Language. In Language, gesture, and space, ed. Karen Emmorey and Judy Reilly, 155–170. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum

Lillo-Martin, Diane and Edward S. Klima. 1990. Pointing out differences: ASL pronouns in syntactic theory. In Theoretical issues in sign language research. Vol. I: Linguistics, ed. S. Fischer and P. Siple, 191–210. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press

Meier, Richard P. 1990. Person deixis in American Sign Language. In Theoretical issues in sign language research. Vol. I: Linguistics. ed. S. Fischer and P. Siple, 175–190. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press

Miller, G. A. 1956. The magical number seven, plus or minus two: Some limits on our capacity for processing information. Psychological Review 63:81–97CrossRef Google Scholar PubMed

Mühlhäusler, Peter and Rom Harré. 1990. Pronouns and people: The linguistic construction of social and personal identity. Oxford: Basil Blackwell

Nagaraja, K. S. 1985. Khasi: A descriptive analysis. Pune, India: Deccan College

Neidle, Carol, Judy Kegl, Dawn MacLaughlin, Benjamin Bahan, and Robert G. Lee. 2000. The syntax of American Sign Language: Functional categories and hierarchical structure. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press

Padden, Carol. 1988. Interaction of morphology and syntax in American Sign Language. New York: Garland

Pederson, Eric and Jan Nuyts. 1997. On the relationship between language and conceptualization. In Language and conceptualization, ed. Jan Nuyts and Eric Pederson, 1–12. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Pinker, Steven and Paul, Bloom. 1990. Natural language and natural selection. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 13:707–784CrossRef Google Scholar

Pizzuto, Elena. 1986. The verb system of Italian Sign Language (LIS). In Signs of life: Proceedings of the Second European Congress of Sign Language Research, ed. Bernard Tervoort, 17–31. Amsterdam: Institute of General Linguistics of the University of Amsterdam

Pizzuto, Elena, Enza Giurana, and Giuseppe Gambino. 1990. Manual and nonmanual morphology in Italian Sign Language: Grammatical constraints and discourse processes. In Sign language research: Theoretical issues, ed. Ceil Lucas, 83–102. Washington DC: Gallaudet University Press

Rabel, L. 1961. Khasi: A language of Assam. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press

Ray, Sidney Herbert. 1926. A comparative study of the Melanesian Island languages. London: Cambridge University Press

Reed, Judy and David L. Payne. 1986. Asheninca (Campa) pronominals. In Pronominal systems, ed. Ursula Wiesmann, 323–331. Tübingen: Narr

Siple, Patricia. 1982. Signed language and linguistic theory. In Exceptional language and linguistics, ed. Loraine K. Obler and Lise Menn, 313–338. New York: Academic Press

Smith, Wayne. 1990. Evidence for auxiliaries in Taiwan Sign Language. In Theoretical issues in sign language research, Vol. I: Linguistics, ed. Susan Fischer and Patricia Siple, 211–228. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press

Supalla, Samuel J. 1991. Manually Coded English: The modality question in sign language development. In Theoretical issues in sign language research, Vol. II: Psychology, ed. Patricia Siple and Susan Fischer, 85–110. Chicago: University of Chicago Press

Supalla, Ted. 1982. Structure and acquisition of verbs of motion and location in American Sign Language. Doctoral dissertation, University of California, San Diego, CA

Supalla, Ted. 1986. The classifier system in American Sign Language. In Noun classes and categorization, ed. Colette Craig, 181–214. Amsterdam: John Benjamins

Supalla, Ted and Yutaka Osugi. Unpublished. Gender handshapes in JSL (Japanese Sign Language). Course lecture notes, University of Rochester

Vasishta, Madan M., James, C Woodward, and Kirk, L Wilson. 1978. Sign language in India: Regional variation within the deaf population. Indian Journal of Applied Linguistics 4:66–74Google Scholar

Weber, David J. 1986. Huallaga Quechua pronouns. In Pronominal systems, ed. Ursula Wiesmann, 333–349. Tübingen: Narr

Winston, Elizabeth A. 1995. Spatial mapping in comparative discourse frames. In Language, gesture, and space, ed. Karen Emmorey and Judy Reilly, 87–114. Hillsdale NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum

Woodward, James C. 1978a. Historical basis of American Sign Language. In Understanding language through sign language research, ed. P. Siple, 333–348. New York: Academic Press

Woodward, James C. 1978b. All in the family: Kinship lexicalization across sign languages. Sign Language Studies 19:121–138CrossRef Google Scholar

Zeshan, Ulrike. 1998. Functions of the index in IPSL. Manuscript, University of Cologne, Germany

Zeshan, Ulrike. 1999. Indo-Pakistani Sign Language. Manuscript, Canberra, Australian National University, Research Centre for Linguistic Typology

Accessibility standard: Unknown

Accessibility compliance for the PDF of this book is currently unknown and may be updated in the future.