1.1.3. Lack of deixis
The use of signing space plays a crucial role in representing the referential status of discourse referents. Determiners and the lack of them have an impact in the interpretation of the co-occurring noun. LSC generally does not make use of determiners in generic noun phrases. Since the expression of pointing signs attributes some referential properties to the noun phrase, generic statements do not co-occur with an index sign, and hence the noun phrase is not localised in space.
In LSC, bare nouns may assume a generic interpretation if they are not localised in space. As shown in the minimal pair below, when the noun phrase is localised in signing space, by means of a pointing or also by directly localising the noun in the signing space, it is understood as referential (i.e., as referring a specific dog, (a)), rather than generic (b).
a) doga obedient++.
‘That dog is obedient.’
(recreated from Barberà & Quer, 2015)
b) dog obedient++.
‘Dogs are obedient.’
(recreated from Barberà & Quer, 2015)
This does not imply that bare nouns in sign language only have a generic reading, but rather that this is one possible reading which contrasts with a full noun phrase (pointing and noun), which always has a referential reading. In fact, bare nouns may also have a definite reading in LSC when have been already introduced and are repeated along a discourse.