Another type of List Buoys in Japanese Sign Language: Emergence from gestureThis paper reports a previously unnoticed type of List Buoys ([4]) in Japanese SignLanguage (JSL) and discusses its consequence for the theory of grammaticalization of gestures.
Signers frequently produce signs with the weak hand held in a stationary position as thestrong hand continues producing signs. Since Liddell [4], those that are used to list or
enumerate sets of entities are known as List Buoys (LBs). It has been reported that several signlanguages have LBs and that their LBs share similar properties as those described by [4] (seee.g. [3], [5]). JSL has such LBs (see Figs. 1-2), but in addition to this “standard” type of LBs(henceforth, S-LBs), JSL signers also use an LB as illustrated in Figs. 3-4, in which the fingersof the weak hand are oriented inward and folded one by one and thus not extended horizontallyas in the case of an S-LB. I refer to this type of LB as inward LBs (I-LBs). I-LBs differ fromS-LBs in several respects: (i) Unlike S-LBs, I-LBs are not allowed to use when the associatedentities are ordered (1); (ii) When the listed items are topicalized, the use of I-LBs makes asentence unacceptable (2); (iii) LBs do not occur in an explicative type of discourse (3).
One possible explanation of the restricted distribution of I-LBs is that an I-LB is a gesturethat co-occurs with signing and is thus not yet a “full-fledged” linguistic item. This seems tobe a plausible analysis, considering that I-LBs are typically used to keep track of counted items.
Moreover, JSL signers and speakers of spoken Japanese use a counting gesture that involves
folding the fingers similarly to an I-LB. However, I show that an I-LB is not a gesture but agrammaticalized element, based on the experiments conducted with native informants ofJapanese and JSL. In the experiments, the participants were given a number of semanticcontexts such as (1) and (3) and were told to list sets of entities under these contexts. The resultsof the experiments reveal crucial differences between I-LBs in JSL and gestures used byspeakers of the two languages: (i) When JSL signers use I-LBs, they consistently insert pointing(PT) with their dominant hand (Fig. 5) to contact the tip of their weak hand before/after
describing the associated entity, but this is not the case with gestures; (ii) Gestures may be used
only partially in the speech, but such incomplete usage is never observed with I-LBs; (iii) While
co-speech gestures of Japanese are used to make associations with both ordered and unorderedentities, the use of I-LBs is limited to the contexts that involve unordered listing.
In light of these observations, I propose that the I-LB in JSL is a linguistic item that has
undergone grammaticalization from a counting gesture (CG). Specifically, I claim that an ILB in JSL is a coordinator head & emerged from the process in (4a-c), which carries the twobasic functions of counting (cf. [1]): to keep track of (un)counted items and to tag each itemwith the number word. At the first stage, CGx with the weak hand, a precursor of &x, isassociated with a nominal object as in (4a) (the subscript X shows the number word associatedwith the object). Next, PT with the dominant hand is introduced and plays a crucial role to “tag”
the nominal root in (4a) with its associated CGx by lexicalizing it and incorporating it in ahierarchical structure (4b). Finally, the two movements performed by the two hands – PT andnumber tracking – become fully grammaticalized as an independent lexical sign, &x, as shownin (4c). This proposal captures the properties of I-LBs described above. Having evolved froma CG, I-LBs bear the primary function of counting. In this task, the number of entities that are
yet to be counted is generally not provided as given information. This explains why I-LBs are
not compatible with contexts in which a speaker already knows how many items there are in
the list, such as ordered listing (1), topicalization (2), and an explanatory speech (3).
This analysis is consistent with data that concern PT observed in early child language
acquisition (cf. [2], [6]). Takei & Torigoe [6] (T&T) show that deaf infants acquiring JSL who
are in the stage between one- and two-sentence periods exhibit PT before or after a lexical sign
as illustrated in (5). Interestingly, this pattern is analogous to the PT used in I-LBs, as shownin (6). There is another similarity: the PT used by infants at this stage is not referential but
simply tagged to the nominal that follows or precedes the PT, and likewise, the PT of I-LBs
associated with a nominal is not referential. T&T, based on their findings, argue that PT as in(5) helps infants make a transition from one- to two-word speech as in (7). The present analysis
can be used to explain this insight: PT, once introduced in an infant’s vocabulary, functions asa categorizer of a root and incorporates it into a two-word sentence structure like (8).

Data

Fig.1 S-LB1 Fig. 2 S-LB5
Fig. 3 I-LB1 Fig. 4 I-LB5Fig. 5 I-LB5(1) Context: List three alcohol drinks that you like best in order.
a.
TOP
LIKE WHAT S-LB1 [WINE] S-LB2 [SAKE] S-LB3 [BEER].
b. *TOP
LIKE WHAT I-LB1 [WINE] I-LB2 [SAKE] I-LB3 [BEER].
‘What I like is wine, sake, and beer, in this order.’TOP(2) a. S-LB1 [WINE] S-LB2 [SAKE] S-LB3 [BEER] (THREE) YESTERDAY HE DRINK.
TOP*?

b. I-LB1 [WINE] I -LB2 [SAKE] I-LB3 [BEER] (THREE) YESTERDAY HE DRINK.
‘Wine, sake, and beer, all three, he drank yesterday.’(3) Context: You are a server in a restaurant. Introduce today’s special dessert to a customer.
TOP

TODAY DESSERT …
a. S-LB1[CAKE] S-LB2[ICE CREAM] S-LB3[PUDDING] THREE.
b. *I-LB1 [CAKE] I-LB2 [ICE CREAM] I-LB3 [PUDDING] THREE.
‘For today, we have cake, ice cream, and pudding, these three.’(4) a. Counting gesture (CG) b.
c.
&1
CG1-√apple …
nCG1
CG2-√orange …
NP
number tracking√applen (weak hand)
APPLE
pointing(dominant hand)(5) a. PT + sign
b. sign + PT
PT CATCAT PT‘cat’(cf. [6]: 57)

&1
I-LB

TOP

(6) a. LIKE WHATI-LB1 [WINE]

I-LB2 [SAKE]

I-LB3 [BEER]

THREE.

TOP

b. LIKE WHAT [WINE] I-LB1 [SAKE] I-LB2 [BEER] I-LB3 THREE.
‘What I like is wine, sake, and beer.’(7) a. PT EAT.
‘eat an apple’ (18 months)([6]: 59)b. APPLE EAT.
‘eat an apple’ (after 18 months)(cf. [6]: 59)(8) Structure of (7a) and (7b) [eat [n √apple n] EAT]
References[1] Alibali, M.W. & DiRusso, A. 1999. The function of gesture in learning to count: Morethan keeping track. Cognitive Development 14(1). 37–56.
[2] Goldin-Meadow, S. & Butcher, C. 2003. Pointing toward two-word speech in young
children. In Pointing: Where language, culture, and cognition meet. 85–107. Erlbaum.
[3] Hendriks, B. 2007. Simultaneous use of the two hands in Jordanian Sign Language. In
Simultaneity in signed language: Form and function, 237−255. John Benjamins.
[4] Liddell, S. 2003. Grammar, gesture, and meaning in American Sign Language. CUP.
[5] Liddell, S. & Vogt-Svendsen, M. & Bergman, B. 2007. A crosslinguistic comparison ofbuoys: Evidence from American, Norwegian, and Swedish Sign Language. In
Simultaneity in signed language: Form and function,187−215. John Benjamins.
[6] Takei, W. & Torigoe, T. 2001. The role of pointing gestures in the acquisition of Japanese
Sign Language. Japanese Journal of Special Education 38(6). 51–63.