The present paper offers a first systematic approach to the expression of impersonal human reference in French
Sign Language (LSF). It extends and deepens a prior study carried out by the authors on the basis of a large scale discourse
corpus. The description proposed here is based primarily on data elicited through a specialised questionnaire on impersonal human
reference (Barberà & Cabredo Hofherr, this volume), initially developed for spoken
languages and adapted for sign languages. The strategies revealed are compared with those discussed in our prior study. We begin
with a brief review of the literature on impersonal human reference in spoken and sign languages, and a presentation of our
theoretical framework for the analysis of LSF. We then elaborate on our methodology and the issues raised by the elicitation
protocol adopted, from initial stages of its preparation to the representation of our data. We finally present and discuss the
main strategies we highlighted for the expression of impersonal reference in LSF.
2012The meaning of space in Catalan Sign Language (LSC). Reference, specificity and structure in signed discourse. Barcelona: Universitat Pompeu Fabra PhD dissertation.
Barberà, Gemma & Patricia Cabredo Hofherr
2016Une stratégie de mise en arrière-plan de l’agent en Langue de Signes Catalane – passif ou
impersonnel?L’information grammaticale 1491. 55–60.
Barberà, Gemma & Patricia Cabredo Hofherr
eds. This volume R-impersonal strategies in sign languages: Introduction & questionnaire
Barberà, Gemma & Patricia Cabredo Hofherr
2017Agent-backgrounding in Catalan Sign Language (LSC) – passives, middles or impersonals?Language 931. 767–798.
Barberà, Gemma & Josep Quer
2013Impersonal reference in Catalan Sign Language (LSC). In Laurence Meurant, Aurélie Sinte, Mieke Van Herreweghe & Myriam Vermeerbergen (eds.), Sign language research, uses and practices: Crossing views on theoretical and applied sign language linguistics, 237–258. Berlin & Nijmegen: de Gruyter Mouton & Ishara Press.
Brentari, Diane & Carol A. Padden
2001Native and foreign vocabulary in American Sign Language: A lexicon with multiple origins. In Diane Brentari (ed.), Foreign vocabulary: A cross-linguistic investigation of word formation, 87–119. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Cabredo Hofherr, Patricia
2003Arbitrary readings of third person pronominals. In Matthias Weisgerber (ed.), Proceedings of the Conference SuB7 – Sinn und Bedeutung, Vol. 1141, 81–94. Konstanz: Konstanz University, FB Linguistik.
Cabredo Hofherr, Patricia
2006‘Arbitrary’ pro and the theory of pro-drop. In Peter Ackema, Patrick Brandt, Maaike Schoorlemmer & Fred Weerman (eds.), Agreement and arguments, 230–258. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
2015How do you/we/they get impersonal in Spanish Sign Language (LSE)? A first look. Paper presented at the
Workshop on sign languages and R-impersonal pronouns
. 6 February 2018, Paris.
Creissels, Denis
2015R-impersonals in Atlantic and Mande languages. Paper presented at the
Workshop on R-impersonal pronouns
. 4 February 2015, Paris.
Creissels, Denis
To appear. Impersonal pronouns and coreference: the case of French on. Unpublished ms. [URL]
Creissels, Denis, Sokhna Bao-Diop, Alain-Christian Bassène, Mame-Thierno Bassène, Alexander Cobbinah, et al.
2015L’impersonnalité dans les langues de la région sénégambienne. Africana Linguistica 211. 29–86.
Cuxac, Christian
1996Fonctions et structures de l’iconicité des langues des signes. Paris: University Paris V doctoral dissertation.
Cuxac, Christian
2000La langue des signes française. Les voies de l’iconicité. Faits de langue vol. 15–161. Paris: Ophrys.
Cuxac, Christian & Elena Antinoro Pizzuto
2010Emergence, norme et variation dans les langues des signes: vers une redéfinition notionnelle. Langage et Société 1311. 37–53.
2002Corpus LS-Colin sur plusieurs genres discursifs. Programme Cognitique 2000, Langage et Cognition, Université Paris 8, IRIT, LIMSI-CNRS, Université Paris Sorbonne. [URL]
Cuxac, Christian & Marie-Anne Sallandre
2007Iconicity and arbitrariness in French Sign Language: Highly iconic structures, degenerated iconicity and
diagrammatic iconicity. In Elena Pizzuto, Paola Pietrandrea & Raffaele Simone (eds.), Verbal and signed languages: Comparing structures, constructs and methodologies, 13–33. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Emmorey, Karen
(ed.)2003Perspectives on classifier constructions in sign languages. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Fonseca-Greber, Bonnie & Linda R. Waugh
2003On the radical difference between the subject personal pronouns in written and spoken European
French. In Pepi Leistyna & Charles F. Meyer (eds.), Corpus analysis: Language structure and language use, 225–240. Amsterdam & New York: Rodopi.
Garcia, Brigitte
2016Scripturisation, grammatisation et modélisation linguistique à la lumière du cas des langues des signes. Dossiers
d’HEL, SHESL, Écriture(s) et représentations du langage et des langues 91. 238–253.
Garcia, Brigitte, Marie-Thérèse L’Huillier & Coralie Vincent
2016Corpus Creagest, dialogues en LSF d’adultes sourds. Projet ANR. [URL]
Garcia, Brigitte & Marie-Anne Sallandre
2014Reference resolution in French Sign Language (LSF). In Patricia Cabredo Hofherr & Anne Zribi-Hertz (eds.), Crosslinguistic studies on noun phrase structure and reference, 316–364. Leiden: Brill.
Gast, Volkert, & Johan van der Auwera
2013Towards a distributional typology of human impersonal pronouns, based on data from European
languages. In Dik Bakker & Martin Haspelmath (eds.), Languages across boundaries. Studies in memory of Anna Siewierska, 31–56. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.
Giacalone Ramat, Anna & Andrea Sansò
2007The spread and decline of indefinite man-constructions in European languages. An areal perspective. In Paolo Ramat & Elisa Roma (eds.), Europe and the Mediterranean as linguistic areas. Convergences from a historical and typological perspective, 95–131. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Haspelmath, Martin
1997Indefinite pronouns. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Johnston, Trevor
2012Lexical frequency in sign languages. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 17(2). 163–193.
This volume. Agent-backgrounding in Turkish Sign Language.
Kimmelman, Vadim
2015R-impersonals in Sign Language of the Netherlands (NGT). Paper presented at the
Workshop on sign languages and R-impersonal pronouns
. 6 February 2015, Paris.
Kimmelman, Vadim
This volume. Impersonal reference in Russian Sign Language.
Liddell, Scott K.
2003Grammar, gesture, and meaning in American Sign Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
2016Impersonal reference to human agents in French Sign Language (LSF). Poster presented at the
Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research Conference
12. 6 January 2016, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia.
1997Réflexions sur le statut du mouvement en LSF – aspects lexicaux et syntaxiques. LIDIL 151. 11–30.
Sallandre, Marie-Anne
2003Les unités du discours en Langue des Signes Française. Tentative de catégorisation dans le cadre d’une grammaire de
l’iconicité. Paris: Université Paris 8 PhD dissertation.
Sallandre, Marie-Anne, Brigitte Garcia
2013Epistemological issues in the semiological model for the annotation of sign language. In Laurence Meurant, Aurélie Sinte, Mieke Van Herreweghe and Myriam Vermeerbergen (eds.), Sign Language research, uses and practices. Crossing views on theoretical and applied sign language linguistics, 159–177. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter.
Sallandre, Marie-Anne, Alessio Di Renzo & Robert Gavrilescu
2016Various types of personal transfers (constructed actions) in seven sign languages. Poster presented at the
Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research Conference 12. 4 January 2016, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia.
2011Third person plurals in the languages of Europe: Typological and methodological issues. Linguistics 43(2). 575–610.
Cited by
Cited by 4 other publications
Breed, Adri, Jo-Ann Chan & Daniël van Olmen
2021. Developing and validating a visual questionnaire for the study of impersonalisation strategies: A design thinking approach. Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 39:2 ► pp. 152 ff.
Garcia, Brigitte & Marie-Anne Sallandre
2020. Contribution of the Semiological Approach to Deixis–Anaphora in Sign Language: The Key Role of Eye-Gaze. Frontiers in Psychology 11
Jaber, Angélique, Caterina Donati & Carlo Geraci
2022. On the properties of null subjects in sign languages: the case of French Sign Language (LSF). The Linguistic Review 39:4 ► pp. 655 ff.
Keleş, Onur, Furkan Atmaca & Kadir Gökgöz
2023. Reference tracking strategies of deaf adult signers in Turkish Sign Language. Journal of Pragmatics 213 ► pp. 12 ff.
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 14 april 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
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