A Grammar of German Sign Language (DGS)

Both transitive and ditransitive predicates can show person agreement. The ditransitive verb give below exhibits subject agreement with the agent maria and also agrees with its indirect object and recipient, peter. Note that the theme argument cake is not marked on the verb via agreement, but that the hand configuration of the predicate can be modified to represent differently shaped themes. Since it therefore encodes information about the theme, the hand configuration (sometimes referred to as handling classifier [Morphology 5.1.3]) can be considered a form of agreement as well.

 

          maria_3a peter_3b cake _3agive_3b

         ‘Maria gave Peter a cake as a gift.’

 

 

 

In contrast, the theme argument of a transitive verb can be marked via agreement morphology.

 

         ix₁ p-e-t-e-r ix_{3 1}visit₃

         ‘I visited Peter.

 

 

 

Some predicates are obligatorily signed on or near the body (they are body-anchored) and can therefore not show agreement with any of their arguments directly. DGS has an auxiliary form labeled pam (person agreement marker) [Lexicon 3.3.4] that can encode the animate subject and object of such plain verbs [Lexicon 3.2.1] and thereby clarify who does what to whom.

 

          mother ix_3a neighbor new ix_3b like _3apam_3b  

         ‘(My) mother likes the new neighbor.’                      

 

 

 

Spatial verbs [Lexicon 3.2.3] are the second group of predicates that index their arguments through either their path movement (motion verbs) or their location (locative verbs). In motion verbs, the initial location corresponds to the source of movement and the final location to the goal.

 

         g-e-o-r-g  stuttgart ix_3a frankfurt ix_{3b CL:} a_drive_b

         ‘Georg drove from Stuttgart to Frankfurt.’                

 

 

 

Locative verbs agree with their location argument; lie in the following example is signed in the location where table has previously been set up.

 

         table₃ book lie-cl(w):lie_on_a

         ‘The book is lying on the table.’