A Grammar of Italian Sign Language (LIS)

In LIS, the same verbal root may appear in a transitive or intransitive event. This alternation is found both in lexical and classifier predicates.

         In lexical predicates, the same verbal root can be found in transitive constructions selecting an agentive subject and an object with the thematic role of theme (a), and in intransitive unaccusative predicates selecting a subject with the thematic role of theme (b), as illustrated in the following examples.

 

         a.            child computer break

         ‘The child breaks the computer.’

 

         b.            computer break                 

         ‘The computer breaks down.’  

 

In LIS classifier predicates, the transitive/intransitive and unergative/unaccusative alternations are encoded through a different hand configuration. More specifically, handle classifiers (MORPHOLOGY 5.1.3) are used in transitive predicates encoding an agentive subject and a theme object, as in (a) below, while entity classifiers (MORPHOLOGY 5.1.1) are used with intransitive unaccusative predicates encoding a theme subject, as in (b). The examples below illustrate the transitive /intransitive unaccusative alternation.

 

 

 

         a.         m-a-r-i-a book CL(flat open 5): ‘take_book’

         ‘Maria took the (standing) book.’

 

 

 

         b.         book CL(unspread 5): ‘book_fall_down’

         ‘The (standing) book fell down.’

 

Furthermore, bodypart classifiers (MORPHOLOGY 5.1.2) are used in intransitive unergative predicates encoding an agentive subject, as in (a) below, while entity classifiers are used in intransitive unaccusative predicates encoding a theme subject, as in (b). The unergative /unaccusative alternation is illustrated in the examples below.

 

 

 

         a.            woman CL(closed 5): ‘bow’

         ‘The woman bows.’

 

 

 

         b.            woman CL(V): ‘fall_down’

         ‘The woman falls down.’