What's the point? Examining indices in American Sign Language nominals

Authors

  • Daniel Neault University of Southern Maine

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.3765/plsa.v8i1.5505

Keywords:

ASL, syntax, index/indices, nominals

Abstract

In American Sign Language, nominal phrases contain various pointing signs, referred to as 'indices', which establish specific referential loci in the signing space. These indices can occur pre- and/or post-nominally or can function as an independent pronoun. Traditionally, these indices have been treated as separate lexical items, but I argue that they are instead realizations of the same functional category, namely idx. Here, I extend part of an analysis of Washo nominal phrases (Hanink 2021) to nominals in ASL.

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Published

2023-04-27

How to Cite

Neault, Daniel. 2023. “What’s the Point? Examining Indices in American Sign Language Nominals”. Proceedings of the Linguistic Society of America 8 (1): 5505. https://doi.org/10.3765/plsa.v8i1.5505.