A Grammar of Italian Sign Language (LIS)

As in other sign languages, topics in LIS might be non-manually marked. Although the presence of prosodic markers is not mandatory, it is possible to identify some recurrent tendencies among topic types. In this section, a description of these uses is provided.

         Aboutness topics in LIS are mostly marked by raised eyebrows and squint eyes. We usually find one of these two markers. Raised eyebrows (re) are shown below.

 

 

 

                                      re

         dom:     boss ix_a CL(V): ‘walk_to_b’ CL(V): ‘fall_at_b’-------------------------------------------------------

         n-dom:                                                CL(V): ‘fall_at_b’ dog come CL(curved open V): ‘jump_on_b’++

         ‘The boss was walking when he fell on the ground, then the dog came and jumped on him several times.’

 

The example below shows the combination of aboutness topic and squint eyes (sq).

 

 

 

                               sq

         man ix(dem) ix_{1 3}tell₁ everything

         ‘That man has told me everything.’     

 

However, in rarer cases, it is possible to find both of them accompanying the same topic expression, as in the example below.

 

 

 

                            re

                             sq                                                                                              wh

         dome milan CL(spread curved open 5): ‘be_at’ direction which direction o-v-e-s-t

         ‘The front of the dome of Milan is directed toward the West.’                       

 

In LIS, squint eyes seem to play a role in the retrievability of the information conveyed by the topic. It is possible to suppose that a signer uses this marker when the interlocutor is supposed to already know the topic entity. Moreover, in LIS, there is a statistically significant correlation between the marker squint eyes and aboutness topics (PRAGMATICS 4.2) which are realised as nominal expressions. Therefore, contrarily to pronouns which are easily retrievable topics, it is possible that the marker squint eyes accompanies topics which are not easily retrievable.

         Conversely, aboutness topics (PRAGMATICS 4.2), which are realised as pronominal forms, are more likely to be marked by another specific non-manual marker: head tilt back. This is displayed in the example below.

         Finally, aboutness topics which are realised as nominal expressions are also likely to be divided from the remaining part of the sentence by two non-manual markers: eye blink (eb) and head nod (hn). These markers can occur after the realisation of the aboutness topic item separately or together, the latter case is displayed below.

 

 

 

                     hn

                      sq eb                                 

         dog ix_3a    child++ seven SASS(flat open 4): ‘little’++ beautiful 

         ‘The dog had seven cute little cubs.’     

 

Similarly to aboutness topics, scene-setting topics (PRAGMATICS 4.2), of both time and location, might be accompanied by raised eyebrows and squint eyes. We can find one of these markers over the topic expression or they can be both present in a layering fashion, as in the example below, where these two non-manual markers accompany the scene setting topic of location (tree).

 

 

 

                                                      re

                                                                 sq

         tree_a SASS(5): ‘shape_round’_a  bird fly CL(curved open V): ‘fly_on_top_of_a’

         ‘A bird flew to the top of a tree.’

                                                                                               

Sometimes, when scene setting topics of time and scene-setting topics of location occur together in the same sentence, the non-manual markers might have scope over the entire topic expressions. An example of this is displayed below, where the raised eyebrow spread over both the scene-setting topic of time (yesterday) and location (restaurant inside).

 

 

 

                                                                 hn

                                                             re eb       re     

         yesterday restaurant inside    fish_a gianni eat done pizza_b not_yet

         ‘Yesterday, at the restaurant, as for the fish, Gianni ate it, while pizza he didn’t.’

 

Moreover, similarly to aboutness topics, also scene-setting topics can be divided by a prosodic pause which is signalled by an eye blink and a head nod, as illustrated in the example above.

With regards to the realisation of contrastive topics (PRAGMATICS 4.2), they also show the presence of raised eyebrows and squinted eyes. Body leans to the left and to the right are mainly used as a specific signal of contrast, as displayed in the example below.

 

 

 

         Context: What do Gianni and Maria think about the cat?

                      hn                     hn                                  

                      eb                      eb                            eb

                    re             bl-right             bl-left                                                     

         cat ix_a gianni_b hate_a  ix_c maria_c love_a  

         ‘As for the cat, Gianni hates him, while Maria loves him.’