Argument Structure in Peruvian Sign Language

This chapter offers an analysis of Peruvian Sign Language argument structure. It argues, following insights from research on other sign languages, that there is a correlation between the type of certain classifiers and the type of predicates predicted by the Unaccusative Hypothesis. In addition, it shows how the operation Agree values the specific features of each classifier, accounting for their handshape. Furthermore, it provides evidence in favor of the assumption that externalization of sign language syntactic structures follows a layering system, where various pieces of grammatical information can be externalized simultaneously, expressing predicates and arguments in a single sign.