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Gesture and the Nature of Language

By: David F. Armstrong, William C. Stokoe, Sherman E. Wilcox

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Paperback | 15 May 1995

At a Glance

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272 Pages

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21.59 x 13.97 x 1.55

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This book proposes a radical alternative to dominant views of the evolution of language, in particular the origins of syntax. The authors draw on evidence from areas such as primatology, anthropology, and linguistics to present a groundbreaking account of the notion that language emerged through visible bodily action. Written in a clear and accessible style, Gesture and the Nature of Language will be indispensable reading for all those interested in the origins of language.

Industry Reviews

'The authors display a broad and deep scholarship, often provocative and stimulating, but never tendentious, and happily free of the polemic tone that mars much linguistic argument.' Michael Studdert-Kennedy 'This book links studies of sign language and gesture with recent ideas about human evolution in a highly interesting way. It presents the important idea of 'semantic phonology' and suggests how syntax may have arisen from the inherent structure of practical actions.' Adam Kendon

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You Can Find This Book In

Non-Fiction Psychology Language & Linguistics Linguistics Sign Languages Grammar, Syntax & Morphology Sociolinguistics

Acknowledgments	p. x
Introduction: language from the body	p. 1
The universe of gesture	p. 5
Signed and spoken languages	p. 5
Speech as gesture	p. 8
Signing as gesture	p. 11
Semantic phonology	p. 12
Language as gesture	p. 16
An evolutionary perspective on language	p. 17
Grasping syntax	p. 21
The nature of gesture	p. 27
Comparing sign and speech	p. 28
What is gesture?	p. 38
Speech as gesture	p. 42
The two faces of gesture	p. 46
Perceptual categorization	p. 48
The role of motor actions in perception	p. 50
Global mappings, preconcepts, and presyntax	p. 53
Event cognition and language	p. 54
Visible gestures: seeing language	p. 57
Are signed and spoken languages differently organized?	p. 64
Language from a different part of the body	p. 64
Describing signed language	p. 69
Seeking organizational similarity at the sublexical level	p. 71
Looking at differences	p. 80
Summary	p. 88
Is language modular?	p. 92
Modular versus associationist theories of language	p. 92
Modularity and cerebral localization	p. 94
Plasticity and associationism	p. 95
Linguistic modality and modularity	p. 97
"Spatial" syntax and the left brain	p. 100
Simultaneity and sequentiality: modules and isomorphs	p. 102
Coarticulation in speech and sign	p. 106
Modularism versus associationism	p. 115
Do we have a genetically programmed drive to acquire language?	p. 121
Universal grammar	p. 122
Are there genetically determined milestones in language development?	p. 123
What must be mastered? Structure and plasticity	p. 126
The critical period for acquisition and species specificity	p. 127
A grammar gene?	p. 132
Past tense and semimodularity	p. 133
Distributed neuronal circuits and neural Darwinism	p. 139
The nature of a gestural acquisition theory	p. 140
Language from the body politic	p. 143
Language from a special part of the universe	p. 143
Movement, brain, society, language	p. 149
The origin of syntax: gesture as name and relation	p. 161
The system of language	p. 161
The second subsystem	p. 166
Language from the whole brain	p. 167
Sign languages and manual gestures	p. 174
Gestural syntax	p. 176
The tree in the seed	p. 178
The opening of the seed	p. 182
Language coevolving with culture	p. 186
Elaborating the pattern	p. 187
Gesture and iconicity	p. 191
Signaling syntax	p. 194
Language from the body: an evolutionary perspective	p. 198
The hominid adaptive complex	p. 199
Darwinian theory: gradualism, incrementalism, and punctuation	p. 203
Evolution of cerebral asymmetry	p. 209
The hominid life style	p. 214
The ancestral stock	p. 215
Hominid social behavior	p. 217
Origin and evolution of language	p. 223
Language and longevity as evolutionary problems	p. 230
Language from the body: final metaphors	p. 234
References	p. 237
Author index	p. 255
Subject index	p. 259
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.

Gesture and the Nature of Language

At a Glance

Paperback

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

You Can Find This Book In

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