A Grammar of Italian Sign Language (LIS)

The distribution of cardinals in LIS is influenced by information structure (PRAGMATICS 4.2). In that respect, it is important to distinguish two distinct cases: i) first-mentioned referents, namely entities that are introduced for the first time into the discourse and constitute new-discourse information and ii) already-mentioned referents, namely entities that have already been mentioned in the discourse and constitute old-discourse information. The noun phrases associated with first-mentioned referents receive an indefinite interpretation, whereas the noun phrases associated with already-mentioned referents receive a definite interpretation.

         For LIS, it has been observed that when a cardinal is included in an indefinite nominal expression, it can appear either before or after the noun. When it occurs in a definite nominal expression, it must appear after the noun.

         Therefore, if a signer is introducing new referents in the discourse, the cardinal can appear either before or after the noun. In the example below, the first-mentioned referents are two children: both prenominal cardinal (a) and postnominal cardinal (b) are acceptable in this context.

         a.               two                  child

         ‘Two children’ (indefinite reading) (recreated from Mantovan, 2017: 173-174)

         b.           child                       two

         ‘Two children’ (indefinite reading) (recreated from Mantovan, 2017: 173-174)

On the contrary, if a signer is talking about already-mentioned referents, the cardinal is obligatorily postnominal. Below we can see that when the two children are mentioned again in the discourse, they receive a definite reading, which is conveyed through the articulation of the cardinal two after the noun child.

         child                                   two                                 CL(flat closed 5): ‘be_at’

         ‘The two children’ (definite reading) (recreated from Mantovan, 2017: 173-174)

As the example above shows, the sequence noun + cardinal conveying a definite reading is compatible with the presence of a whole-entity classifier, which defines the position in space of the already-mentioned referents.

         Another difference between the two semantic interpretations is represented by non-manuals. As we can see in the examples above, cardinals associated with an indefinite reading are usually articulated with backward-tilted head and raised eyebrows, whereas those associated with a definite reading are usually articulated with squint eyes, lowered eyebrows, and chin bent downward.