A Crosslinguistic Study of Sign Language Classifiers

在国家科学基金会的支持下，Diane Brentari博士将对来自三个不同家庭的九种手语的分类系统进行为期三年的语言学研究。这种系统存在于所有已知的手语中，但只存在于一些口语中。量词指的是名词论元的某些属性，但可以用各种语法单位来表达。例如，它们可能出现在名词短语中（例如，英语中“a grain of sand”中的“grain”）或表示运动或位置的动词短语（例如，美国手语中的“3-handshape + go_by”;翻译：“一辆自行车正在经过”）。在手语中，它们通常被表达为手形。本研究将探讨九种手语是否使用相似的手形来表达相似的含义，以及每个系统与包含发达分类系统的所有语言（包括口语和手语）的集合相比如何。相对年轻的以色列手语包括比较成熟的分类系统。Brentari博士和每个语言社区的语言学家将收集数据。启发任务针对特定的语义区分，如静态/主动，代理/非代理，和telic/tagic。研究人员将分析每种手语如何在其分类系统中使用总手形的组成部分来表达这些区别。手语音系学的韵律模型将提供一个理论框架来组织和分析数据。首先，这个项目将有助于我们的手语知识，提供跨语言的信息，一个基本结构，还没有很好地理解。其次，这个项目将增加我们的形态学知识和它的表达方式，因为手语的形态主要是由同时组织的语音单位，而不是由顺序组织的单位。最后，本研究将有助于我们理解自然语言中的量词类型的范围。 除了其科学价值外，该项目还将招募母语为聋人的本科生来帮助分析数据，从而为这些学生提供一个从事母语第一手科学研究的机会。

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Diane Brentari will conduct three years of linguistic research on the classifier systems of nine sign languages from three different families. Such systems exist in all known sign languages, but in only some spoken languages. Classifiers refer to certain properties of noun arguments but may be expressed in a variety of grammatical units. For example, they may appear in noun phrases (e.g., "grain" in "a grain of sand" in English) or verb phrases expressing motion or location (e.g., "3-handshape + go_by" in American Sign Language; translation: "A bike is going by"). In sign languages, they are typically expressed as handshapes. This research will ask whether nine sign languages use similar handshapes to express similar meanings and how each system compares to the set of all languages that contain well-developed classifier systems, both spoken and signed. The relatively young Israeli Sign Language is included to compare to more mature classifier systems. Dr. Brentari and a linguist in each language community will collect the data. Elicitation tasks target specific semantic distinctions such as stative/active, agentive/non-agentive, and telic/atelic. Researchers will analyze how each sign language uses the components of the total handshape in its classifier system to express these distinctions. The Prosodic Model of sign language phonology will provide a theoretical framework within which to organize and analyze the data.Three scientific questions motivate this study of sign language classifiers. First, this project will contribute to our knowledge of sign languages by providing cross-linguistic information about a fundamental structure that is not yet well understood. Second, this project will add to our knowledge of morphology and the way that it is expressed, since morphology in sign languages is expressed predominantly by simultaneously organized phonological units rather than by sequentially organized units. Finally, this research will contribute to our understanding of the range of classifier typology in natural languages. In addition to its scientific merit, this project will recruit native-signing Deaf undergraduate students to help analyze data, and so provide an opportunity for these students to engage in first-hand scientific research on their native languages.