Background. Many of the world’s spoken and sign languages mark the difference between the two major lexical categories noun and verb (Abner et al., 2019). In the case of German Sign Language (DGS), different morphophonological properties for nouns and verbs have previously been described (e.g., Happ, 2005) but it remains unclear to what extent these strategies for overtly marking word categories apply systematically or maybe even generalise across the distinction of single noun-verb pairs. Here, we investigate morphophonological markings distinguishing nouns and verbs in DGS in two consecutive experiments: Experiment 1 employs an elicitation paradigm in which signers watched videos depicting scenes specifically designed to elicit either the nominal or the verbal use of a potentially multifunctional DGS sign for concrete objects or actions in the participants’ responses. Experiment 2 uses a sentence reproduction task (Pendzich et al. 2022) designed to elicit either the nominal or verbal use of concrete as well as abstract DGS signs within a given syntactic context. At the time of writing, data analysis for Experiment 1 and data collection for Experiment 2 are still ongoing, which is why we only present preliminary findings from the former here.
Experiment 1. Deaf signers (N = 9, mean age = 40.8) watched videos (N = 91) depicting scenes specifically designed to elicit either the nominal or the verbal use of a potentially multifunctional DGS sign. Uses of the target signs were annotated in ELAN and classified as either nominal or verbal by a coda, whereas unclear cases were evaluated by a deaf member of the research team who is a native signer of DGS. In total, we collected 747 signed sequences which will be evaluated against the following criteria: (1) mouthing vs. mouth gesture, (2) head and body movement, (3) duration of produced signs, (4) reduplication and usage of sign space, (5) interaction of lexical signs with Constructed Action (CA), and (6) sequential supplement for nominal signs in the form of size-and-shape specifiers (SASS). Because data analysis is still ongoing, we here present first results limited to four representative noun-verbs pairs (PLAY, SLEEP, ICE-CREAM, and HAIRDRY) and the evaluation of criteria (1) and (5) which suggests that the DGS noun-verb pairs investigated here indeed do exhibit a largely systematic morphophonologial marking of nominal and verbal uses with regard to mouth gesture and mouthing (Figure 1). Whereas mouthings co-occur with both nominal and verbal uses of a sign, mouth gestures are primarily produced as part of verbs. The iconic potential of a sign’s phonological form seems to impact the frequency in which mouth gestures are produced alongside verbs and mouthings alongside nouns (cf. ICE-CREAM and HAIRDRY). Iconic verbal signs such as HAIRDRY can be context-dependently supplemented by CA involving a gestural demonstration of the action described by the verbal sign (Figure 2). Significantly, elements of CA seem to primarily occur simultaneously as modifications and/or supplements to a verb’s phonological form, while phonologically and semantically underspecified nouns tend to be complemented by sequentially occurring SASS.
Experiment 2. We will employ a sentence reproduction task (Pendzich et al. 2022) specifically designed to elicit either the nominal or verbal use of concrete as well as abstract DGS signs within a given syntactic context by deaf signers participating in the experiment. In addition to video recordings and manual annotation we will also collect data about non-manual elements during sentence reproduction using the so-called TrueDepth camera of an iPhone. We will combine this automated capturing of non-manual components with the analysis of facial expressions using the Facial Action Coding System (FACS) by Ekman et al. 2002 (one project member is a certified FACS coder), which will enable us to adequately quantify non-manual components accompanying nouns and verbs.
Discussion. The preliminary analysis of data from Experiment 1 presented here supports the notion that DGS exhibits some systematic morphophonological marking of nominal and verbal uses of a sign. Signs with low iconic potential (e.g., PLAY) seem to be accompanied by mouthings regardless of whether the signs is used in a verbal or nominal context. In contrast, for signs with higher iconic potential, mouthings and mouth gestures seem to more clearly differentiate between nominal and verbal uses, whereas the latter shows a fuzzy boundary towards CA. Our data suggest that the iconic potential of a sign’s phonological form and the respective context mediate whether a strictly conventionalised lexical strategy or a combination with CA may be used. Singers can flexibly combine lexical as well as manual and non-manual gestural strategies for making part of speech distinctions by exploiting the iconic potential of (verb) signs’ phonological form by gestural demonstrations. In combination, Experiment 1 and Experiment 2 will allow us to characterise the manual and non-manual morphophonological components marking nouns and verbs in DGS.