Null arguments in Russian Sign Language

Autor/a: KIMMELMAN, Vadim
Año: 2018
Editorial: Formal and Experimental Advances in Sign language Theory, Vol. 1 (2018) pp. 27-38
Tipo de código: ISSN
Soporte: Digital

Temas

Lingüística » Lingüística de otras Lenguas de Signos

Detalles

Many spoken and signed languages use null arguments, that is, omission of subjects and sometimes objects (also known as pro-drop).  Different languages have different conditions on when an argument can be left out.  Pro-drop has been connected to both presence of rich agreement and absence of agreement altogether. There are various theories that account for the possibility of pro-drop in some or all languages. Some of these theories initially developed for spoken languages have been successfully applied to signed languages (Lillo-Martin 1986). In this paper I discuss some novel facts about pro-drop in Russian Sign Language (RSL) and suggest that pro-drop in sign languages might in fact be influenced by modality-specific factors.