A typological view of possessive constructions in Sign Language of the Netherlands Cornelia Loos University of Texas at Austin 1. Introduction 1 All cultures, independent of the value they assign to material belongings, have linguistic means for expressing the relationship between a possessed item (concrete ones such as cars as well as abstract ones, like honour) and its possessor. Typological studies of the range of possessive constructions and their characteristics abound for spoken languages (cf. Nichols 1988; Heine 1997; Stassen 2005), yet to date, only one typological study on expressions of possession in sign language exists (Zeshan & Perniss 2008). Looking at language in its different manifestations, both spoken and signed, is vital to uncovering "the full range of possibilities of the structure of human language" (Perniss & Zeshan 2008: 1). At the same time, including sign languages in typological studies of possession allows linguists to discern possible influences of the oral-aural or the visuo-manual modality on possessive constructions. The present paper seeks to expand the range of studies on possession in sign languages presented in Zeshan & Perniss (2008) by taking a preliminary look at the expression of possession in Sign Language of the Netherlands (NGT) and comparing it to possessive constructions in other sign languages. The comparison focuses both on strategies employed to express possessive notions as well as on whether an (in)alienability distinction is realised in any of the sign languages under analysis and if so, where the cut-off point between alienably and inalienably possessed items lies. NGT is the primary means of communication for approximately 30,000 sign language users in the Netherlands. It is genetically related to French and Flemish Sign Language, as the first instructors of the deaf in the Netherlands were trained at the deaf school in Paris, and Belgian teachers of the deaf in turn studied under Dutch instructors several decades later. Dialects of NGT developed around the five major schools for the deaf in Haren, Amsterdam, Voorburg/Zoetermeer, Rotterdam and St. Michielsgestel. Despite ongoing attempts at standardising NGT since the late 1990s, some of the dialects are still in use today. The term possession is saliently associated with notions of ownership and control. In prototypical cases of possession, the possessor is assumed to have the power to dispose of the possessed item, henceforth the possessum, as s/he wishes, as well as to terminate the possessive relationship (see, for example, Taylor 1989a and 1989b, cited in Heine 1997). In his seminal work on the topic, Heine (1997) characterises possession as a "vague" or "fuzzy" concept (1997: 1). At the center of this concept, we find prototypical possession, which is characterised by a specific human being serving as possessor to a specific inanimate and concrete possessum. According to Taylor (1989a and 1989b, cited in Heine 1997), the prototypical possessive relationship is time-stable and involves the 1 I would like to take the opportunity to thank my deaf consultants, without whom this study would not have been possible. I am deeply grateful to the two participants in the elicitation tasks employed here, as well as to Richard Cokart, Shane Gilchrist, and Peter Hagel, who patiently answered all my questions on NGT. 29 Texas Linguistics Forum Proceedings from the 13th meeting of the Texas Linguistics Society June 23-24, 2012 © Loos 2013