How a story is told in Italian and in LIS

The study derives from a FIRB research project which was designed to implement a e-learning environment for Italian deaf learners both teens and adults. Our task was to investigate which aspects of LIS and Italian are comparable and which are idiosyncratic. The aim was to assess to what extent salient and distinctive features of LIS can interfere and hinder the process of learning Italian by deaf learners. We focused on narrative texts in Italian and LIS and more specifically on deictic and anaphoric features which allow for the textual cohesion of these texts. We asked six subjects to watch a story and then tell it to other people. This story was simple and short and it required the narrators to resort to a variety of communicative strategies. The study showed how deixis/anaphora overall appeared and how it was linked to a gesture in LIS and in Italian verbal narrations.