Quotation in sign languages

A visible context shift

Annika Herrmann | University of Göttingen

Markus Steinbach | University of Göttingen

Assuming that quoting utterances and thoughts is a universal property of natural languages, sign languages are also expected to have various linguistic means to mark quotation. Like spoken languages, sign languages have regular forms of indirect reported speech. However, sign languages mostly draw on a specific grammatical means for quotation called role shift. Role shift is a particularly interesting form of reported speech that combines properties of both direct and indirect speech. Based on a pilot corpus study, we discuss the formal and functional properties of role shift in German Sign Language (DGS). We argue that role shift can be analyzed as a nonmanual agreement operator that overtly agrees with the signer and the addressee of the reported utterance and triggers a context shift from the actual context to the context of the reported utterance.

Published online: 01 May 2012
https://doi.org/10.1075/celcr.15.12her

Cited by

Cited by 15 other publications

Anne Baker, Beppie van den Bogaerde, Roland Pfau & Trude Schermer

2016. In The Linguistics of Sign Languages,

Bressem, Jana, Silva H. Ladewig & Cornelia Müller

2018. In Linguistic Foundations of Narration in Spoken and Sign Languages [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 247], ► pp. 223 ff.

Cormier, Kearsy, Sandra Smith & Zed Sevcikova-Sehyr

2015. Rethinking constructed action. Sign Language & Linguistics 18:2 ► pp. 167 ff.

Davidson, Kathryn

2015. Quotation, demonstration, and iconicity. Linguistics and Philosophy 38:6 ► pp. 477 ff.

Frederiksen, Anne Therese & Rachel I. Mayberry

2019. Reference tracking in early stages of different modality L2 acquisition: Limited over-explicitness in novice ASL signers’ referring expressions. Second Language Research 35:2 ► pp. 253 ff.

Haiman, John

2020. In Meaning, Life and Culture: In conversation with Anna Wierzbicka, ► pp. 291 ff.

Herrmann, Annika & Nina-Kristin Pendzich

2018. In Linguistic Foundations of Narration in Spoken and Sign Languages [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 247], ► pp. 275 ff.

Hübl, Annika, Emar Maier & Markus Steinbach

2019. To shift or not to shift. Sign Language & Linguistics 22:2 ► pp. 171 ff.

Hübl, Annika & Markus Steinbach

2018. In Linguistic Foundations of Narration in Spoken and Sign Languages [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 247], ► pp. 1 ff.

Jantunen, Tommi, Danny De Weerdt, Birgitta Burger & Anna Puupponen

2020. The more you move, the more action you construct. Gesture 19:1 ► pp. 72 ff.

Köder, Franziska

2018. In Linguistic Foundations of Narration in Spoken and Sign Languages [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 247], ► pp. 207 ff.

KÖDER, FRANZISKA & EMAR MAIER

2016. Children mix direct and indirect speech: evidence from pronoun comprehension. Journal of Child Language 43:4 ► pp. 843 ff.

Sandler, Wendy

2018. The Body as Evidence for the Nature of Language. Frontiers in Psychology 9

Steinbach, Markus & Edgar Onea

2016. A DRT Analysis of Discourse Referents and Anaphora Resolution in Sign Language. Journal of Semantics 33:3 ► pp. 409 ff.

Zeman, Sonja

2018. In Linguistic Foundations of Narration in Spoken and Sign Languages [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 247], ► pp. 173 ff.

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 12 november 2021. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.