Indirect object markers in Georgian Sign Language

Abstract

This paper presents one of the first studies on Georgian Sign Language (gesl), a sign language that has not previously been taken into consideration in typological research on sign languages. We focus on three types of indirect object markers, that is, auxiliary-like elements that introduce an additional argument. We discuss four markers in total. Interestingly, three of these markers do not only introduce an argument but also come with additional semantics, namely respect, disrespect, and causation. It will further be shown that the presence of an indirect object marker frees the word order in the sentence.