Topics in the Grammar of French Sign Language (LSF)

    LSF exhibits both internally and externally headed relative clauses [Syntax- Section 3.4.1] and can use manual relative pronouns to mark the relative clause. LSF has two different relative pronouns: one for human referents (person-cl: the classifier for person in LSF) and one for any kind of referents (pi: a demonstrative with the morphology of a pointing pronoun). In the examples below, both are accompanied by the set same set of non-manual markers, glossed as ‘rel’: upper body oriented towards the locus of the head-noun + eyebrows raised + lips tensed + chin pointed upwards or downwards.

                                                        rel

       a. ix₁ prefer little girl person-cl pet dog

       'I prefer the little girl, who pets the dog.'

 

 

 

 

                                 rel

       b. ix₁ prefer vet pi cure dog

       'I prefer the vet who cures the dog.'

 

 

 

                                 rel

       c. ix₁ prefer dog pi man pet

       'I prefer the dog which the man pets.

 

 

                             rel

       d. ix₁ prefer pi napkin lighter cover

       'I prefer the napkin which covers the lighter.'               (Hauser, 2019)