On the linguistic status of ‘agreement’ in sign languages
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Diane Lillo-Martin
and
Richard P. Meier
Abstract
In signed languages, the arguments of verbs can be marked by a system of verbal modification that has been termed “agreement” (more neutrally, “directionality”). Fundamental issues regarding directionality remain unresolved and the phenomenon has characteristics that call into question its analysis as agreement. We conclude that directionality marks person in American Sign Language, and the ways person marking interacts with syntactic phenomena are largely analogous to morpho-syntactic properties of familiar agreement systems. Overall, signed languages provide a crucial test for how gestural and linguistic mechanisms can jointly contribute to the satisfaction of fundamental aspects of linguistic structure.
© 2011 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- On the linguistic status of ‘agreement’ in sign languages
- Sign language verb agreement and the ontology of morphosyntactic categories
- Very atypical agreement indeed
- Agreement disagreements
- Prospects and challenges for a clitic analysis of (A)SL agreement
- When agreeing to disagree is not enough: Further arguments for the linguistic status of sign language agreement
- A featural approach to verb agreement in signed languages
- What do agreement auxiliaries reveal about the grammar of sign language agreement?
- Iconic Agreement
- Response to Commentaries: Gesture, Language, and Directionality
Articles in the same Issue
- On the linguistic status of ‘agreement’ in sign languages
- Sign language verb agreement and the ontology of morphosyntactic categories
- Very atypical agreement indeed
- Agreement disagreements
- Prospects and challenges for a clitic analysis of (A)SL agreement
- When agreeing to disagree is not enough: Further arguments for the linguistic status of sign language agreement
- A featural approach to verb agreement in signed languages
- What do agreement auxiliaries reveal about the grammar of sign language agreement?
- Iconic Agreement
- Response to Commentaries: Gesture, Language, and Directionality
