Choice of referring expressions in Catalan Sign Language (LSC):

pronouns and classifiers

Gemma Barberà

Universitat Pompeu Fabra

gemma.barbera@upf.edu

Sign Language Colloquium – October 22, 2009

Radboud University Nijmegen 1

LSC (Catalan Sign Language)

2

Barcelona

Discourse

- Entity known by the addressee- Salient - Active- Present in the physical context - Already mentioned, but far away in the discourse- …

- The cat (definite NP)- A cat (indefinite NP)- It (pronoun)- That animal that I told you (long def. description)- Felix (proper name)- Null pronoun-…

3

Antecedent vs Anaphor

• First mention: establishment of the entity in the linguistic context Antecedent

• Subsequent mentions: referring back to a previous antecedent Anaphor

Pronouns and Classifiers4

Entity Classifiers (CLe)

• Elements in which the hand configuration indicates a particular semantic class, and the movement or the location of the hand indicates the motion or the location of the entity

• Represent the entity directly

• Some examples:

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3rd person pronouns (3-PRO)

• 2nd and 3rd person distinction in LSC (Berenz, Alibasic & Wilbur)

• 1st and 2nd person pronouns : indicate principal speech roles

3rd person pronouns: refer to the thing that we are talking about

(Lyons, Bhatt)

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CLe & 3-PRO

• Both elements can be used anaphorically

• Help to make the discourse more cohesive and not so repetitive

• Use of space

• Linked to a NP

• Topic shift potential

CL: verbs of motion and location

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Discourse & file cards• Discourse model:

– mental representation of the entities involved in the current discourse and the attributes and links between them(Heim, Kamp)

• Metaphor of files and file cards: - each file card represents a discourse entity

- attributes and links are connected to each

correspondent card

- as the discourse progresses new file cards

are created and the already existing ones are updated(Heim)

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Referential status

• The referential status of the entities plays a crucial role in the discourse process and in the updating task

– Indefinite NP creation of a new file card

– Definite NP already existing card has to be updated

– Pronoun potential of updating salient / active files cards

3-PRO and CLe9

English and LSC examples

(1) Pat told me a weird story today.

She saw a man with a broccoli stalk.

Well, the guy starts munching on it,

and then he’s arrested right away.

(2) (3)

CLe 3-PRO 10

Accessibility Hierarchy

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Factors:

- Saliency

- Competition

- Distance

- Unity

(Ariel 1990)

Factors (Ariel 1990)

• Saliency: the most prominent referent determined by

grammatical function, order of mention

• Distance: distance between the antecedent and the

anaphor recently mentioned entities are more accessible than remotely mentioned ones

• Competition: number of competitors that can have the

role of antecedent

• Unity: the greater degree of cohesion, the greater the

accessibility of the anaphor

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Saliency

• SLs organize the information following a topic-comment sequence

• Topics occur in first position and are prosodically marked

• Manual sign is co-articulated with brow raised

• Constituent is usually followed by an intonational break (change in the facial expression and sometimes eyeblink)

• CLe and 3-PRO linked to a topic (same or previous utterances)

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Distance in utterances I

• Sign language segmentation

– Topic as a marker of discourse unit

– Verb

– Semantic interpretation

– Major prosodic boundaries

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Distance in utterances II

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CLe

3-PRO

Distance:CLe – 3-PRO difference

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• CLe present clusters of information that 3-PRO do not present

• CLe:• Referent

• Locative spatial information

• Relation with a ground

Accessibility in Space

HIGH ACCESSIBLE SPACE

- Current location > previously location > usual location

- Locative positions (spatial relation)

- Contrastive locations

- Abstract locations

LOW ACCESSIBLE SPACE 17

Abstract locations

• Areas in the space associated with a referent

• Grammatical purposes

• Represented by 3-PRO

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Contrastive locations

• Use of the opposite sides of the signing space (right-left) to denote contrast

• Denote opposition or comparison

• Represented by CLe and 3-PRO (but also torso and dominance reversal)

Example with 3-PRO

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Locative positions

• Spatial relations of the entities

• Clusters of information: figure, ground

• Represented by Cle

• Distinction between:

abstract location locative

aMOVEb CLe.person-walking20

Current location

• Current location > Previously location > Usual location

• Demonstratives (manual pointing and eyegaze)

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Distance & Space

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Accessibility in Space:CLe and 3-PRO

HIGH ACCESSIBLE SPACE

- Current location > previously location > usual location

Demonstrative (IX3)

- Locative positions (spatial relation)

CLe

- Contrastive locations Manual pointing pervasive

CLe and 3-PRO and eyegaze optional / slight

- Abstract locations

3-PRO

LOW ACCESSIBLE SPACE 23

Eyegaze

• Eyegaze keeps the referent active

• Coordinate the interlocutors’ shared focus of attention

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Accessibility & Eyegaze

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HIGH ACCESSIBLE SPACE

Eyegaze

- Current location +

- Locative positions

- Contrastive locations

- Abstract locations -

LOW ACCESSIBLE SPACE

Further work

• Accessibility factor: Competition

– Role shift as an important strategy to assign prominence

– Manual simultaneity

– Use of intensifier (MATEIX – ‘self’)

• Eyegaze:

– Distinction between CLe and 3-PRO in contrastive locations

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Thanks for your attention!

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Some referencesAlibašid Ciciliani, Tamara & Ronnie B. Wilbur. 2006. Pronominal system in Croatian Sign

Language. Sign Language & Linguistics 9: 95-132

Ariel, Mira. 1990. Accessing Noun-Phrase Antecedents. London: Routledge.

Berenz, Norine. 1996. Person and deixis in Brazilian Sign Language, Ph.D. dissertation, University of Calfornia, Berkeley

Berenz, Norine. 2002. Insights into person deixis. Sign Language & Linguistics 5: 203-227

Bhat, DNS. 2005. Pronouns. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Glück, Susanne & Roland Pfau (1998), On classifiying classification as a class of inflection inGerman Sign Language. In: Cambier-Langeveld, T., A. Lipták & M. Redford(eds.), Proceedings of ConSOLE 6. Leiden: SOLE, 59-74

Grosz, B. et al. 1995. "Centering: A Framework for Modeling the Local Coherence of Discourse." Computational Linguistics 2(21), pp. 203-225

Gundel, Jeanette, Nancy Hedberg and Ron Zacharski. 1993. Cognitive Status and the Form of Referring Expressions in Discourse. Language 69: 274-307

Heim, Irene. 1988. The Semantics of Definite and Indefinite Noun Phrases. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Kamp, H. 1981 A theory of truth and semantic representation, en J. A. G. Groenendijk, T. M. V. Janssen, y M. B. J. Stokhhof (eds.), Formal Methods in the Study of Language, pp. 227-322, Amsterdam: Mathematical Centre.

Kegl, J. 1986. Clitics in American Sign Language. En: H.Borer (ed). Syntax and Semantics19: The Syntax of the Pronominal Clitics. Nueva York: Academic Press, pp 285-309

Perniss, P. 2007. Space and Iconicity in German Sign Language (DGS). MPI Series in Psycholinguistics 45, Radboud University Nijmegen

Prince, Ellen (1981) Toward a taxonomy of given-new information. In Cole, P., ed. Radical Pragmatics. NY: Academic Press. Pp. 223-56

Prince, Ellen F. 1992. The ZPG letter: Subjects, definiteness, and information-status. En William C. Mann y Sandra A. Thompson, Discourse description , 295-325. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins

Vallduví, E. 1992, The Informational Component, Garland

Winston, E. 1995. Spatial Mapping in Comparative Discourse Frames. A Language, gesture and space, eds. K. Emmorey i J. Reilly, 87-114. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates

Zwitserlood, I. & I. van Gijn. 2006. Agreement Phenomena in Sign Language of the Netherlands. In: Ackema, P., P. Brandt, M. Schoorlemmer & F. Weermann (Eds.), Arguments and Agreement, pp. 195-229. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Zwitserlood, I. 2003. Classifying Hand Configuration in Nederlandse Gebarentaal. Doctoral dissertation, University of Utrecht. Published by LOT, Utrecht, The Netherlands