Table Of ContentOn Relativization and Clefting
Sign Languages
and Deaf Communities 5
Editors
Annika Herrmann
Markus Steinbach
Ulrike Zeshan
Editorial board
Carlo Geraci
Rachel McKee
Victoria Nyst
Marianne Rossi Stumpf
Felix Sze
Sandra Wood
De Gruyter Mouton · Ishara Press
On Relativization and Clefting
An Analysis of Italian Sign Language
By
Chiara Branchini
De Gruyter Mouton · Ishara Press
ISBN 978-1-5015-1037-3
e-ISBN (PDF) 978-1-5015-0000-8
e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-1-5015-0004-6
ISSN 2192-516X
e-ISSN 2192-5178
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A Marcello e Paola
Acknowledgements
My deepest gratitude goes to Caterina Donati. She has introduced me to the
study of linguistics and to sign language research. Her sharp insights and
curiosity have guided me well after my doctoral studies.
During the long gestational period this book underwent, I benefited from
the comments of many people. For my Bostonian studies, I am grateful to
Michela Ippolito, Robert Lee, Carol Neidle, and Michael Schlang at Boston
University for valuable discussion and to Danny Fox and David Pesetsky
for their lessons at MIT. My gratitude also goes to Alessandra Brezzi, Anna
Cardinaletti, Carlo Cecchetto, Caterina Donati, Mara Frascarelli, Carlo
Geraci, Roland Pfau, Elena Pizzuto, Paolo Rossini, Ur Shlonsky, Ilona
Spector, Virginia Volterra and Sandro Zucchi for their observations and
comments. Much appreciation also goes to Karine Arnéodo who provided
the Japanese data and to the students of Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia for
their questions which always challenged and stimulated a deeper under-
standing of the linguistic phenomena.
Many thanks to all my informants for their patience and enthusiasm, as
without them this work would have never existed: Gabriele Caia, Corrado
D’Aversa, Remo and Romolo Leonori, Mauro Mottinelli, Peter Pozzoli,
Fiorella Yacommidakis, Pantelis Yacommidakis.
I also wish to thank the National Deaf Institutes (ENS) of Ancona, Pesaro
and Rome and the SILIS group of Rome for their kind hospitality and collab-
oration in collecting the LIS data. I particularly thank the LIS interpreter
Marzia Branchini and the president of the National Deaf Institute of Ancona,
Adalberto Nisi, who has also been my first LIS teacher.
Finally, I dearly thank Carlo Geraci who has supported me during my
first attempts to become familiar with the technological equipment crucial in
carrying out sign language research.
Contents
Acknowledgements ................................................................................................v
List of figures .......................................................................................................xiii
Notational conventions .......................................................................................xiv
Sign language acronyms ...................................................................................xvii
General Introduction .............................................................................................1
Part I: Introducing Italian Sign Language (LIS)
1 Italian Sign Language and the Italian Deaf community ...............................9
1.1 Historical background .............................................................................9
1.2 The Italian Deaf community today ......................................................10
1.3 Linguistic research on LIS ......................................................................12
2 A syntactic outline of Italian Sign Language (LIS) ......................................15
Introduction ....................................................................................................15
2.1 Modality-specific characteristics ...........................................................15
2.1.1 The internal structure of signs ...................................................15
2.1.2 The linguistic use of space and movement ...............................17
2.1.2.1 Verb agreement .............................................................19
2.1.2.2 Space and referentiality ................................................21
2.1.3 The non-manual component ....................................................22
2.2 Representing LIS syntactic structure ....................................................29
2.2.1 The CP layer .................................................................................30
2.2.1.1 Interrogative pronouns ................................................32
2.2.1.2 Relative pronouns .........................................................36
2.2.1.3 Representing the CP layer ...........................................37
