It is widely assumed that there is a natural, prelinguistic conceptual domain of time whose linguistic organization is universally structured via metaphoric mapping from the lexicon and grammar of space and motion. We challenge this assumption on the basis of our research on the Amondawa (Tupi Kawahib) language and culture of Amazonia. Using both observational data and structured field linguistic tasks, we show that linguistic space-time mapping at the constructional level is not a feature of the Amondawa language, and is not employed by Amondawa speakers (when speaking Amondawa). Amondawa does not recruit its extensive inventory of terms and constructions for spatial motion and location to express temporal relations. Amondawa also lacks a numerically based calendric system. To account for these data, and in opposition to a Universal Space-Time Mapping Hypothesis, we propose a Mediated Mapping Hypothesis, which accords causal importance to the numerical and artefact-based construction of time-based (as opposed to event-based) time interval systems.

This article reports a field study of event-based time concepts, their linguistic expression and their use in time reckoning practices in three indigenous cultures and languages of Brazil: Huni Kuĩ (Pano, North-West Amazonia), Awetý and Kamaiurá (Tupi Guaraní; Xingu National Park). The results are based on ethnographic observation, interview, conversation and structured language elicitation tasks. The three languages all have rich inventories of lexical and phrasal expressions for event-based time intervals, based on environmental and celestial indices and social norms. Event-based time intervals in the domains of life stages, times of day and night, and seasons are documented. None of the cultures employ metric (calendar and clock) time units, but hybrid calendars representing blends of the 12 months yearly cycle and the indigenous seasonal indices are produced as art works. The number system in each culture and language is documented, and the use of numbers in time reckoning practices, together with notational cognitive artifacts, is described. Metonymic spatial indices for time intervals and temporal landmarks are common, but metaphoric space-time mapping is almost entirely absent. In two languages, event terms can be used in conjunction with some motion verbs (Moving Time), but these usages do not signify motion on a timeline; they are more related to appearance and disappearance. Moving Ego expressions cannot be used in any of the languages. “Past” and “future” are not lexicalized concepts, but these notions can be metaphorically conceptualized in terms of embodied perception and cognition. They are not thought of as “in front of” or “behind” the experiencer. There is no evidence in any of the three languages of a conceptual timeline. The similarities between time concepts in the three languages, and their similarity with the previously studied Amondawa language, suggests the possibility of a cultural areal complex extending over a large part of South America.

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Linguistic theory has been preoccupied since midway through the twentieth century with the search for universals of language. However, more recently there has been increasing attention across the different disciplines that contribute to research in language to variation and difference. This goes together with a more recent focus on culture and language, approached through interdisciplinary research methods, including field research. In this article the authors report the results of a survey they conducted with the assistance of indigenous teachers about the counting term (number) systems of their native Amazonian languages. All the teachers were indigenous people from different communities living in the State of Rondônia, Brazil. This survey of twenty-three languages, belonging to seven different language families, confirms the observation that small counting term systems are a general feature of indigenous Amazonian languages. This article identifies two general features of counting term systems in the languages of Rondônia: a restricted number (less than five) of lexicalisations of number, and the productive combinatorial use of these terms to refer to larger quantities. It suggests that this is evidence of a way of thinking about and practicing counting that is shared across a cultural area. However, this generalization goes together with a high degree of of diversity in the specific patterns of lexicalisation and combination.

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