Contact-Induced Grammaticalization in Turkish Sign Language: From Mouthings to Grammatical Markers
LANGUAGE & SPEECH++, cilt.69, sa.4, ss.1-28, 2026 (SCI-Expanded, SSCI, Scopus)
- Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
- Cilt numarası: 69 Sayı: 4
- Basım Tarihi: 2026
- Doi Numarası: 10.1177/00238309261496903
- Dergi Adı: LANGUAGE & SPEECH++
- Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: EBSCO Communication Source, Academic Search Ultimate (EBSCO), Art, Design & Architecture Collection (ProQuest), Social Science Premium Collection (ProQuest), Art, Design & Architecture Collection (ProQuest), Arts Premium Collection (ProQuest), Biomedical Reference Collection: Corporate Edition (EBSCO), Communication Source (EBSCO), Education Collection (ProQuest), Education Source Ultimate (EBSCO), Health Research Premium Collection (ProQuest), Scopus, Linguistics Collection (ProQuest), Sociology Source Ultimate (EBSCO), Agricultural & Environmental Science Database, Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-EXPANDED), Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), IBZ Online, Periodicals Index Online, CINAHL, Communication Abstracts, Educational research abstracts (ERA), EMBASE, EBSCO Education Source, Linguistic Bibliography, MEDLINE, MLA - Modern Language Association Database, Psycinfo, MLA International Bibliography
- Sayfa Sayıları: ss.1-28
- Ankara Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet
Özet
This study investigates the contact-induced grammaticalization of the Turkish existential mouthing /var/ (“there is”) in Turkish Sign Language, proposing a novel Cross-Modal Contact Route for grammaticalization. Based on 1,024 attested existential/possessive constructions identified within a corpus of 101,908 tokens from 58 signers, we analyze the distribution of variants along a unidirectional reduction cline (/var/ > /va/ > biting lips, bl). Generalized estimating equations and multinomial logistic regression analyses reveal a robust apparent time effect: while older signers retain the full spoken mouthing, younger signers predominantly use the biting lips—a visual remnant of the initial labiodental fricative [v]—indicating a change from below. Significantly, the structural autonomy of the emergent gesture is supported by 118 tokens—produced exclusively by signers aged 45 or younger (16–45)—where the bl marker attaches to non-existential hosts (e.g., group, pocket) and pronominal signs, functioning as an independent clitic for existence and possession. These findings problematize the rigid theoretical distinction between mouthings and mouth gestures, demonstrating that spoken lexical items can be scavenged, eroded, and nativized into the visual grammar of a sign language, effectively expanding current models of grammaticalization.