A Grammar of Italian Sign Language (LIS)

Agreement verbs are also called directional or indicating verbs. Differently from plain verbs, agreement verbs can be spatially modified to mark their arguments (see MORPHOLOGY 3.1.1 for details). They are usually verbs that express (abstract or concrete) transfer, and their phonological form can involve path movement (PHONOLOGY 1.3.1). This class of verbs includes: i) verbs with two points of articulation in the neutral space connected by path movement, like help (a); ii) verbs with one point of articulation in the neutral space, like break (b); and iii) verbs in which the beginning of the path movement is on the body of the signer and the end of the path movement is in a location associated with an argument of the verb, like say (c). 

 

 

 

 

            a.         gianni_a maria_b ahelp_b

            ‘Gianni helps Maria.’

 

 

 

            b.         ix₁ dish_a break_a

            ‘I broke a dish.’

 

 

 

            c.         ix₁ address poss₁ say₂

            ‘I told you my address.’

 

It is instructive to look at the distinction between two transitive verbs that are almost synonymous: like and love. like is a plain verb, so it does not have a path movement, rather, it is produced on the body of the signer, as can be seen in the following example.

 

 

 

            sara pizza like

            ‘Sara likes pizza.’

 

On the other hand, love is an agreement verb: it is initially articulated on the body of the signer, like the verb like, but then it moves towards the location associated with the object, pizza.

 

 

 

            sara pizza_a love_a

            ‘Sara loves pizza.’

 

Agreement verbs may also show agreement with the object (direct or indirect) through orientation of the palm and direction of the path movement. Some of these are teach, show, ask, tell, take_care.

 

 

 

            father_a son_b ix_3a atake_care_b

            ‘The father takes care of his son.’

 

Agreement verbs can select one, two, or three arguments. Agreement verbs selecting one argument behave as intransitive verbs. The verbs break (in its intransitive use) and grow_up belong to this category.

 

            young ix(def) grow_up

            ‘The boy grew up.’

 

Agreement verbs selecting two arguments behave as transitive verbs. help and love in the sentences reported above are examples of transitive verbs.

            Agreement verbs selecting three arguments behave as ditransitive verbs (SYNTAX 2.1.1.1). Ditransitive verbs involve a notion of (possibly abstract) transfer. They can have: i) two points of articulation in the neutral space expressing agreement with the subject (mario) and the recipient/goal  indirect object (sara), like give (a); ii) a path movement which starts from the body of the signer and ends in the location associated with the recipient/goal indirect object (student), like say or explain (b) (but see MORPHOLOGY 3.1 for a different starting point of the verb explain when the subject is different from a first person); iii) one point of articulation in the neutral space encoding agreement with the indirect object through both the direction of the path movement and orientation of the palm, like teach (c); iv) they can be articulated on the non-dominant hand and express agreement with the indirect object through direction of the movement, like tell (d). 

 

 

 

            a.         mario_a ix_a envelope ix_3a sara_{b 3a}give_3b

           ‘Mario gives an envelope to Sara.’

           

 

 

            b.         teacher math ix_b student_b explain_3b

            ‘The teacher explains math to the student.’

 

 

 

            c.         sister_a poss₁ son_b ateach_b

            ‘My sister teaches her son.’

 

 

 

 

            d.         mother_a son_b ix_3a fairy_tale tell_b

            ‘The mother tells her son a fairy tale.’

 

A peculiar type of ditransitive construction is the one displaying a classifier predicate with two points of articulation in the neutral space connected by path movement. In such constructions, the two points express agreement with the subject argument, encoding the agent/source, and the indirect object, encoding the goal/recipient argument, whereas the hand configuration encodes the theme direct object. In so doing, they show overt manual agreement with the three arguments (SYNTAX 2.1.2.4). This is illustrated below.

 

 

 

 

           l-u-c-a_a g-i-a-n-n-i_b drinking_glass _aCL(unspread curved open 5):‘give_glass’_b

            ‘Luca gives a glass to Gianni.’

 

Agreement verbs including path movement and two points of articulation usually move from the locus associated with the subject to the locus associated with the object. However, in a subclass of transitive agreement verbs called backward verbs the reversed order is observed: in this case, the verb moves from the locus associated with the object towards the locus associated with the subject. Verbs like copy, receive, invite, exploit, take and choose belong to this class.

 

 

 

            a.         copy

 

 

 

 

           b.         receive

 

 

 

            c.         invite

 

 

 

            d.         exploit

 

 

 

            e.         take

 

 

 

            f.          choose

 

For further information about agreement verbs, see (MORPHOLOGY 3.1).