Publications

Abstract

This chapter describes neurolinguistic aspects of morphology, morphological theory, and especially morphological processing. It briefly mentions the main processing models in the literature and how they deal with morphological issues, i.e. full-listing models (all morphologically related words are listed separately in the lexicon and are processed individually), full-parsing or decompositional models (morphologically related words are not listed in the lexicon but are decomposed into their constituent morphemes, each of which is listed in the lexicon), and hybrid, so-called dual route, models (regular morphologically related words are decomposed, irregular words are listed). The chapter also summarizes some important findings from the literature that bear on neurolinguistic aspects of morphological processing, from both language comprehension and language production, taking into consideration neuropsychological patient studies as well as studies employing neuroimaging methods.

Abstract

This research investigated developmental changes in children’s representations of large-scale environments as reflected in spontaneous gestures and speech produced during route descriptions Four-, five-, and six-year-olds (N = 122) described the route from their nursery school to their own homes. Analysis of the children’s gestures showed that some 5- and 6-year-olds produced gestures that represented survey mapping, and they were categorized as a survey group. Children who did not produce such gestures were categorized as a route group. A comparison of the two groups revealed no significant differences in speech indices, with the exception that the survey group showed significantly fewer right/left terms. As for gesture, the survey group produced more gestures than the route group. These results imply that an initial form of survey-map representation is acquired beginning at late preschool age.

Abstract

Based on the conversation analysts’ insights into the various forms of third person reference in English, this paper first presents the inventory of forms Kilivila, the Austronesian language of the Trobriand Islanders of Papua New Guinea, offers its speakers for making such references. To illustrate such references to third persons in talk-in-interaction in Kilivila, a case study on gossiping is presented in the second part of the paper. This case study shows that ambiguous anaphoric references to two first mentioned third persons turn out to not only exceed and even violate the frame of a clearly defined situational-intentional variety of Kilivila that is constituted by the genre “gossip”, but also that these references are extremely dangerous for speakers in the Trobriand Islanders’ society. I illustrate how this culturally dangerous situation escalates and how other participants of the group of gossiping men try to “repair” this violation of the frame of a culturally defined and metalinguistically labelled “way of speaking”. The paper ends with some general remarks on how the understanding of forms of person reference in a language is dependent on the culture specific context in which they are produced.

Abstract

One of the central aims of the "Cognitive Anthropology Research Group" (since 1998 the "Department of Language and Cognition of the MPI for Psycholinguistics") is to research the relationship between language, culture and cognition and the conceptualization of space in various languages and cultures. Ever since its foundation in 1991 the group has been developing methods to elicit cross-culturally and cross-linguistically comparable data for this research project. After a brief summary of the central considerations that served as guidelines for the developing of these elicitation devices, this paper first presents a broad selection of the "space games" developed and used for data elicitation in the groups' various fieldsites so far. The paper then discusses the advantages and shortcomings of these data elicitation devices. Finally, it is argued that methodologists developing such devices find themselves in a position somewhere between Scylla and Charybdis - at least, if they take the requirement seriously that the elicited data should be comparable not only cross-culturally but also cross-linguistically.

Abstract

Arbeitet man als muttersprachlicher Sprecher des Deutschen mit Corpora gesprochener oder geschriebener deutscher Sprache, dann reflektiert man in aller Regel nur selten über die Vielzahl von kulturspezifischen Informationen, die in solchen Texten kodifiziert sind – vor allem, wenn es sich bei diesen Daten um Texte aus der Gegenwart handelt. In den meisten Fällen hat man nämlich keinerlei Probleme mit dem in den Daten präsupponierten und als allgemein bekannt erachteten Hintergrundswissen. Betrachtet man dagegen Daten in Corpora, die andere – vor allem nicht-indoeuropäische – Sprachen dokumentieren, dann wird einem schnell bewußt, wieviel an kulturspezifischem Wissen nötig ist, um diese Daten adäquat zu verstehen. In meinem Vortrag illustriere ich diese Beobachtung an einem Beispiel aus meinem Corpus des Kilivila, der austronesischen Sprache der Trobriand-Insulaner von Papua-Neuguinea. Anhand eines kurzen Auschnitts einer insgesamt etwa 26 Minuten dauernden Dokumentation, worüber und wie sechs Trobriander miteinander tratschen und klatschen, zeige ich, was ein Hörer oder Leser eines solchen kurzen Daten-Ausschnitts wissen muß, um nicht nur dem Gespräch überhaupt folgen zu können, sondern auch um zu verstehen, was dabei abläuft und wieso ein auf den ersten Blick absolut alltägliches Gespräch plötzlich für einen Trobriander ungeheuer an Brisanz und Bedeutung gewinnt. Vor dem Hintergrund dieses Beispiels weise ich dann zum Schluß meines Beitrags darauf hin, wie unbedingt nötig und erforderlich es ist, in allen Corpora bei der Erschließung und Kommentierung von Datenmaterialien durch sogenannte Metadaten solche kulturspezifischen Informationen explizit zu machen.

Abstract

This handbook chapter summarizes some of the problems of nominal classification in language, presents and illustrates the various systems or techniques of nominal classification, and points out why nominal classification is one of the most interesting topics in Cognitive Linguistics.

Abstract

The Trobriand Islanders of Papua New Guinea differentiate and label in their language Kilivila genres and varieties or registers which are constituted by these genres. The documentation and analysis of these varieties and genres reveals how important it is to understand these metalinguistic differentiations. The cultural and verbal competence which is necessary to adequately interact with the Trobriander Islanders is based on the understanding of the indigenous text typology and the Trobriand Islanders' culture specific ways of speaking.

Abstract

This volume deals with the children’s socialization on the Trobriands. After a survey of ethnographic studies on childhood, the book zooms in on indigenous ideas of conception and birth-giving, the children’s early development, their integration into playgroups, their games and their education within their `own little community’ until they reach the age of seven years. During this time children enjoy much autonomy and independence. Attempts of parental education are confined to a minimum. However, parents use subtle means to raise their children. Educational ideologies are manifest in narratives and in speeches addressed to children. They provide guidelines for their integration into the Trobrianders’ “balanced society” which is characterized by cooperation and competition. It does not allow individual accumulation of wealth – surplus property gained has to be redistributed – but it values the fame acquired by individuals in competitive rituals. Fame is not regarded as threatening the balance of their society.

Abstract

Bronislaw Malinowski – based on his experience during his field research on the Trobriand Islands – pointed out that language is first and foremost a tool for creating social bonds. It is a mode of behavior and the meaning of an utterance is constituted by its pragmatic function. Malinowski’s ideas finally led to the formation of the subdiscipline “anthropological linguistics”. This paper presents three observations of the Trobrianders’ attitude to their language Kilivila and their language use in social interactions. They illustrate that whoever wants to successfully research the role of language, culture and cognition in social interaction must be on ‘common ground’ with the researched community.

Abstract

The Trobriand Islanders' eschatological belief system explains what happens when someone dies. Bronislaw Malinowski described essentials of this eschatology in his articles "Baloma: the Spirits of the Dead in the Trobriand Islands" and "Myth in Primitive Psychology" There he also presented the Trobrianders' belief that a "baloma" can be reborn; he claimed that Trobrianders are unaware of the father's role as genitor. This volume presents a critical review of Malinowski's ethnography of Trobriand eschatology - finally settling the "virgin birth" controversy. It also documents the ritualized and highly poetic "wosi milamala" - the harvest festival songs. They are sung in an archaic variety of Kilivila called "biga baloma" - the baloma language. Malinowski briefly refers to these songs but does not mention that they codify many aspects of Trobriand eschatology. The songs are still sung at specific occasions; however, they are now moribund. With these songs Trobriand eschatology will vanish. The e-book is made available under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Abstract

As I have already pointed out elsewhere (Senft 2008; 2010; 2014), the Gricean conversational maxims of Quality – “Try to make your contribution one that is true” – and Manner “Be perspicuous”, specifically “Avoid obscurity of expression” and “Avoid ambiguity” (Grice 1967; 1975; 1978) – are not observed by the Trobriand Islanders of Papua New Guinea, neither in forms of their ritualized communication nor in forms and ways of everyday conversation and other ordinary verbal interactions. The speakers of the Austronesian language Kilivila metalinguistically differentiate eight specific non-diatopical registers which I have called “situational-intentional” varieties. One of these varieties is called “biga sopa”. This label can be glossed as “joking or lying speech, indirect speech, speech which is not vouched for”. The biga sopa constitutes the default register of Trobriand discourse and conversation. This contribution to the workshop on philosophy and pragmatics presents the Trobriand Islanders’ indigenous typology of non-diatopical registers, especially elaborating on the concept of sopa, describing its features, discussing its functions and illustrating its use within Trobriand society. It will be shown that the Gricean maxims of quality and manner are irrelevant for and thus not observed by the speakers of Kilivila. On the basis of the presented findings the Gricean maxims and especially Grice’s claim that his theory of conversational implicature is “universal in application” is critically discussed from a general anthropological-linguistic point of view.

Abstract

Kilivila is one of the languages of the world that lacks dedicated reciprocal forms. After a short introduction the paper briefly shows how reciprocity is either not expressed at all, is only implicated in an utterance, or expressed periphrastically.

Abstract

This book presents a detailed formal machinery for the conversion of the Semantic Analyses (SAs) of sentences into surface structures of English, French, German, Dutch, and to some extent Turkish. The SAs are propositional structures consisting of a predicate and one, two or three argument terms, some of which can themselves be propositional structures. The surface structures are specified up to, but not including, the morphology. The book is thus an implementation of the programme formulated first by Albert Sechehaye (1870-1946) and then, independently, by James McCawley (1938-1999) in the school of Generative Semantics. It is the first, and so far the only formally precise and empirically motivated machinery in existence converting meaning representations into sentences of natural languages.

Abstract

Reproduced with permission of Blackwell Publishing from: Seuren, P. A. M. (1998) Western linguistics, 25: pp. 426-428, 430-441. Oxford Blackwell Publishers

Abstract

The concept of 'event' has been posited as an ontological primitive in natural language semantics, yet relatively little research has explored patterns of event encoding. Our study explored how adults and children describe placement events (e.g., putting a book on a table) in a range of different languages (Finnish, English, German, Russian, Hindi, Tzeltal Maya, Spanish, and Turkish). Results show that the eight languages grammatically encode placement events in two main ways (Talmy, 1985, 1991), but further investigation reveals fine-grained crosslinguistic variation within each of the two groups. Children are sensitive to these finer-grained characteristics of the input language at an early age, but only when such features are perceptually salient. Our study demonstrates that a unitary notion of 'event' does not suffice to characterize complex but systematic patterns of event encoding crosslinguistically, and that children are sensitive to multiple influences, including the distributional properties of the target language in constructing these patterns in their own speech.

Abstract

Incremental sentence generation imposes special constraints on the representation of the grammar and the design of the formulator (the module which is responsible for constructing the syntactic and morphological structure). In the model of natural speech production presented here, a formalism called Segment Grammar is used for the representation of linguistic knowledge. We give a definition of this formalism and present a formulator design which relies on it. Next, we present an object- oriented implementation of Segment Grammar. Finally, we compare Segment Grammar with other formalisms.

Abstract

Traditional psycholinguistic studies take place in controlled experimental labs and typically involve testing undergraduate psychology or linguistics students. Investigating psycholinguistics in this manner calls into question the external validity of findings, that is, the extent to which research findings generalize across languages and cultures, as well as ecologically valid settings. Here we consider three ways in which psycholinguistics can be taken out of the lab. First, researchers can conduct cross-cultural fieldwork in diverse languages and cultures. Second, they can conduct online experiments or experiments in institutionalized public spaces (e.g., museums) to obtain large, diverse participant samples. And, third, researchers can perform studies in more ecologically valid settings, to increase the real-world generalizability of findings. By moving away from the traditional lab setting, psycholinguists can enrich their understanding of language use in all its rich and diverse contexts.

Abstract

This book examines parent-physician conversations in detail, showing how parents put pressure on doctors in largely covert ways, for instance in specific communication practices for explaining why they have brought their child to the doctor or answering a history-taking question. This book also shows how physicians yield to this seemingly subtle pressure evidencing that apparently small differences in wording have important consequences for diagnosis and treatment recommendations. Following parents use of these interactional practices, physicians are more likely to make concessions, alter their diagnosis or alter their treatment recommendation. This book also shows how small changes in the way physicians present their findings and recommendations can decrease parent pressure for antibiotics. This book carefully documents the important and observable link between micro social interaction and macro public health domains.

Abstract

Each time we take a turn in conversation we indicate what we know and what we think others know. However, knowledge is neither static nor absolute. It is shaped by those we interact with and governed by social norms - we monitor one another for whether we are fulfilling our rights and responsibilities with respect to knowledge, and for who has relatively more rights to assert knowledge over some state of affairs. This book brings together an international team of leading linguists, sociologists and anthropologists working across a range of European and Asian languages to document some of the ways in which speakers manage the moral domain of knowledge in conversation. The volume demonstrates that if we are to understand how speakers manage issues of agreement, affiliation and alignment - something clearly at the heart of human sociality - we must understand the social norms surrounding epistemic access, primacy and responsibilities

Abstract

This work presents a salvage grammar of the Biri language of Eastern Central Queensland, a Pama-Nyungan language belonging to the large Maric subgroup. As the language is no longer used, the grammatical description is based on old written sources and on recordings made by linguists in the 1960s and 1970s. Biri is in many ways typical of the Pama-Nyungan languages of Southern Queensland. It has split case marking systems, marking nouns according to an ergative/absolutive system and pronouns according to a nominative/accusative system. Unusually for its area, Biri also has bound pronouns on its verb, cross-referencing the person, number and case of core participants. As far as it is possible, the grammatical discussion is ‘theory neutral’. The first four chapters deal with the phonology, morphology, and syntax of the language. The last two chapters contain a substantial discussion of Biri’s place in the Pama-Nyungan family. In chapter 6 the numerous dialects of the Biri language are discussed. In chapter 7 the close linguistic relationship between Biri and the surrounding languages is examined.

Abstract

What grammatical elements of a substrate language find their way into a creole? Grammatical features of the Oceanic substrate languages have been shown to be crucial in the development of Solomon Islands Pijin and of Melanesian Pidgin as a whole (Keesing 1988), so one might expect constructions which are very stable in the Oceanic family of languages to show up as substrate influence in the creole. This paper investigates three constructions in Oceanic languages which have been stable over thousands of years and persist throughout a majority of the Oceanic languages spoken in the Solomon Islands. The paper asks whether these are the sorts of constructions which could be expected to be reflected in Solomon Islands Pijin and shows that none of these persistent constructions appears in Solomon Islands Pijin at all. The absence of these constructions in Solomon Islands Pijin could be due to simplification: Creole genesis involves simplification of the substrate grammars. However, while simplification could be the explanation, it is not necessarily the case that all complex structures become simplified. For instance Solomon Islands Pijin pronoun paradigms are more complex than those in English, but the complexity is similar to that of the substrate languages. Thus it is not the case that all areas of a creole language are necessarily simplified. One must therefore look further than just simplification for an explanation of the presence or absence of stable grammatical features deriving from the substrate in creole languages. An account based on constraints in specific domains (Siegel 1999) is a better predictor of the behaviour of substrate constructions in Solomon Islands Pijin.

Abstract

This chapter describes the challenges that modern digital language archives are faced with. One essential aspect of such an archive is to have a rich metadata catalog such that the archived resources can be easily discovered. The challenge of the archive is to obtain these rich metadata descriptions from the depositors without creating too much overhead for them. The rapid changes in storage technology, file formats and encoding standards make it difficult to build a long-lasting repository, therefore archives need to be set up in such a way that a straightforward and automated migration process to newer technology is possible whenever certain technology becomes obsolete. Other problems arise from the fact that there are many different groups of users of the archive, each of them with their own specific expectations and demands. Often conflicts exist between the requirements for different purposes of the archive, e.g. between long-term preservation of the data versus direct access to the resources via the web. The task of the archive is to come up with a technical solution that works well for most usage scenarios.

Abstract

Natural human interaction involves the fast-paced exchange of speaker turns. Crucially, if a next speaker waited with planning their turn until the current speaker was finished, language production models would predict much longer turn transition times than what we observe. Next speakers must therefore prepare their turn in parallel to listening. Visual signals likely play a role in this process, for example by helping the next speaker to process the ongoing utterance and thus prepare an appropriately-timed response.

To understand how visual signals contribute to the timing of turn-taking, and to move beyond the mostly qualitative studies of gesture in conversation, we examined unconstrained, computer-mediated conversations between 20 pairs of participants while systematically manipulating speaker visibility. Using motion tracking and manual gesture annotation, we assessed 1) how visibility affected the timing of turn transitions, and 2) whether use of co-speech gestures and 3) the communicative kinematic features of these gestures were associated with changes in turn transition timing.

We found that 1) decreased visibility was associated with less tightly timed turn transitions, and 2) the presence of gestures was associated with more tightly timed turn transitions across visibility conditions. Finally, 3) structural and salient kinematics contributed to gesture’s facilitatory effect on turn transition times.

Our findings suggest that speaker visibility--and especially the presence and kinematic form of gestures--during conversation contributes to the temporal coordination of conversational turns in computer-mediated settings. Furthermore, our study demonstrates that it is possible to use naturalistic conversation and still obtain controlled results.

Abstract

Every language manifests casual speech processes, and hence every second language too. This study examined how listeners deal with second-language casual speech processes, as a function of the processes in their native language. We compared a match case, where a second-language process t/-reduction) is also operative in native speech, with a mismatch case, where a second-language process (/r/-insertion) is absent from native speech. In each case native and non-native listeners judged stimuli in which a given phoneme (in sentence context) varied along a continuum from absent to present. Second-language listeners in general mimicked native performance in the match case, but deviated significantly from native performance in the mismatch case. Together these results make it clear that the mapping from first to second language is as important in the interpretation of casual speech processes as in other dimensions of speech perception. Unfamiliar casual speech processes are difficult to adapt to in a second language. Casual speech processes that are already familiar from native speech, however, are easy to adapt to; indeed, our results even suggest that it is possible for subtle difference in their occurrence patterns across the two languages to be detected,and to be accommodated to in second-language listening

Abstract

The artificial grammar learning (AGL) paradigm enables systematic investigation of the acquisition of linguistically relevant structures. It is a paradigm of interest for language processing research, interfacing with theoretical linguistics, and for comparative research on language acquisition and evolution. This chapter presents a key for understanding major variants of the paradigm. An unbiased summary of neuroimaging findings of AGL is presented, using meta-analytic methods, pointing to the crucial involvement of the bilateral frontal operculum and regions in the right lateral hemisphere. Against a background of robust posterior temporal cortex involvement in processing complex syntax, the evidence for involvement of the posterior temporal cortex in AGL is reviewed. Infant AGL studies testing for neural substrates are reviewed, covering the acquisition of adjacent and non-adjacent dependencies as well as algebraic rules. The language acquisition data suggest that comparisons of learnability of complex grammars performed with adults may now also be possible with children.

Abstract

Prevoicing is the presence of vocal fold vibration during the closure of initial voiced plosives (negative VOT). The presence or absence of prevoicing is generally used to describe the voicing distinction in Dutch initial plosives. However, a phonetic study showed that prevoicing is frequently absent in Dutch. This article discusses the role of prevoicing in the production and perception of Dutch plosives. Furthermore, two cross-modal priming experiments are presented that examined the effect of prevoicing variation on word recognition. Both experiments showed no difference between primes with 12, 6 or 0 periods of prevoicing, even though a third experiment indicated that listeners could discriminate these words. These results are discussed in light of another priming experiment that did show an effect of the absence of prevoicing, but only when primes had a voiceless word competitor. Phonetic detail appears to influence lexical access only when it helps to distinguish between lexical candidates.

Abstract

In terms of its linguistic and cultural make-up, the continent of South America provides linguists and anthropologists with a complex puzzle of language diversity. The continent teems with small language families and isolates, and even languages spoken in adjacent areas can be typologically vastly different from each other. This volume intends to provide a taste of the linguistic diversity found in South America within the area of clause subordination. The potential variety in the strategies that languages can use to encode subordinate events is enormous, yet there are clearly dominant patterns to be discerned: switch reference marking, clause chaining, nominalization, and verb serialization. The book also contributes to the continuing debate on the nature of syntactic complexity, as evidenced in subordination.

Abstract

Yurakaré (unclassified, central Bolivia) has five subordination strategies (on the basis of a morphosyntactic definition). In this paper I argue that the use of these different strategies is conditioned by the degree of conceptual synthesis of the two events, relating to temporal integration and participant integration. The most integrated events are characterized by shared time reference; morphosyntactically they are serial verb constructions, with syntactically fused predicates. The other constructions are characterized by less grammatical integration, which correlates either with a low degree of temporal integration of the dependent predicate and the main predicate, or with participant discontinuity.

Abstract

Onderzoek naar taal en communicatie heeft zich in het verleden veel te veel gericht op taal als systeem om berichten te coderen, een soort TCP/IP (netwerkprotocol voor communicatie tussen computers). Dat moet maar eens veranderen, stelt prof. dr. Jos van Berkum, hoogleraar Discourse, Cognitie en Communicatie, in zijn oratie die hij op 30 september zal houden aan de Universiteit Utrecht. Hij pleit voor meer onderzoek naar de sterke verwevenheid van taal en gevoel.

Abstract

Mutations of the human FOXP2 gene have been shown to cause severe difficulties in learning to make coordinated sequences of articulatory gestures that underlie speech (developmental verbal dyspraxia or DVD). Affected individuals are impaired in multiple aspects of expressive and receptive linguistic processing and ­display abnormal grey matter volume and functional activation patterns in cortical and subcortical brain regions. The protein encoded by FOXP2 belongs to a divergent subgroup of forkhead-box transcription factors, with a distinctive DNA-binding domain and motifs that mediate hetero- and homodimerization. This chapter describes the successful use of FOXP2 as a unique molecular window into neurogenetic pathways that are important for speech and language development, adopting several complementary strategies. These include direct functional investigations of FOXP2 splice variants and the effects of etiological mutations. FOXP2’s role as a transcription factor also enabled the development of functional genomic routes for dissecting neurogenetic mechanisms that may be relevant for speech and language. By identifying downstream target genes regulated by FOXP2, it was possible to identify common regulatory themes in modulating synaptic plasticity, neurodevelopment, and axon guidance. These targets represent novel entrypoints into in vivo pathways that may be disturbed in speech and language disorders. The identification of FOXP2 target genes has also led to the discovery of a shared neurogenetic pathway between clinically distinct language disorders; the rare Mendelian form of DVD and a complex and more common form of language ­disorder known as Specific Language Impairment.

Abstract

A central question in the study of the mental lexicon is how morphologically complex words are processed. We consider this question from the viewpoint of statistical models of morphology. As an indicator of the mental processing cost in the brain, we use reaction times to words in a visual lexical decision task on Finnish nouns. Statistical correlation between a model and reaction times is employed as a goodness measure of the model. In particular, we study Morfessor, an unsupervised method for learning concatenative morphology. The results for a set of inflected and monomorphemic Finnish nouns reveal that the probabilities given by Morfessor, especially the Categories-MAP version, show considerably higher correlations to the reaction times than simple word statistics such as frequency, morphological family size, or length. These correlations are also higher than when any individual test subject is viewed as a model.

Abstract

This paper describes how reciprocity is expressed in the Papuan (i.e. non-Austronesian­) language Savosavo, spoken in the Solomon Islands. The main strategy is to use the reciprocal nominal mapamapa, which can occur in different NP positions and always triggers default third person singular masculine agreement, regardless of the number and gender of the referents. After a description of this as well as another strategy that is occasionally used (the ‘joint activity construction’), the paper will provide a detailed analysis of data elicited with set of video stimuli and show that the main strategy is used to describe even clearly asymmetric situations, as long as more than one person acts on more than one person in a joint activity.

Abstract

Common ground is an essential prerequisite for coordination in social interaction, including language use. When referring back to a referent in discourse, this referent is ‘given information’ and therefore in the interactants’ common ground. When a referent is being referred to for the first time, a speaker introduces ‘new information’. The analyses reported here are on gestures that accompany such references when they include definite and indefinite grammatical determiners. The main finding from these analyses is that referents referred to by definite and indefinite articles were equally often accompanied by gesture, but speakers tended to accompany definite references with gestures focusing on action information and indefinite references with gestures focusing on entity information. The findings suggest that speakers use speech and gesture together to design utterances appropriate for speakers with whom they share common ground.

Abstract

Pointing gestures are recognised to be a primary manifestation of human social cognition and communicative capacity. The goal of this task is to collect empirical descriptions of pointing practices in different cultural settings.

Abstract

Indo-Pakistani Sign Language (IPSL) is the sign language used by deaf communities in a large region across India and Pakistan. This visual-gestural language has a dedicated construction for specifically expressing reciprocal relationships, which can be applied to agreement verbs and to auxiliaries. The reciprocal construction relies on a change in the movement pattern of the signs it applies to. In addition, IPSL has a number of other strategies which can have a reciprocal interpretation, and the IPSL lexicon includes a good number of inherently reciprocal signs. All reciprocal expressions can be modified in complex ways that rely on the grammatical use of the sign space. Considering grammaticalisation and lexicalisation processes linking some of these constructions is also important for a better understanding of reciprocity in IPSL.