Phonological patterns in a dependency model: Allophonic relations grounded in phonetic and iconic motivation

Demey, Eline; Kooij, Els van der

doi:10.1016/j.lingua.2007.12.003

Cited by 19 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…the head location normally expresses meanings of psychological states, signs on the torso express physical states, etc. -see Demey & van der Kooij 2008). If location carries more transparent meaning in signs and these meanings overlap with the gestural repertoire employed by the adults, this may represent a further site for transfer from gestures to signs in adults with mature world knowledge.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comparing child and adult development of a visual phonological system

Ortega¹,

Morgan²

2010

LIA

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Research has documented systematic articulation differences in young children’s first signs compared with the adult input. Explanations range from the implementation of phonological processes, cognitive limitations and motor immaturity. One way of disentangling these possible explanations is to investigate signing articulation in adults who do not know any sign language but have mature cognitive and motor development. Some preliminary observations are provided on signing accuracy in a group of adults using a sign repetition methodology. Adults make the most errors with marked handshapes and produce movement and location errors akin to those reported for child signers. Secondly, there are both positive and negative influences of sign iconicity on sign repetition in adults. Possible reasons are discussed for these iconicity effects based on gesture

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comparing child and adult development of a visual phonological system

Ortega¹,

Morgan²

2010

LIA

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“…The present study connects to several of the themes of this special issue: specifically, in the way that meaning in natural languages and its phonological vessels (in this case, manual gestures) interact. In particular, iconicity has been proposed as a likely, or even inevitable resource that can be tapped in the processing of sign languages (Vigliocco et al, 2005 ), in the acquisition of structure in sign languages (Ormel et al, 2009 ; Thompson et al, 2009 ), in the emergence of linguistic structure in new languages (Meir et al, 2007 ), in the very organization of sign language grammars (Cuxac, 1999 ; Demey and van der Kooij, 2008 ; Meir, 2010 ), and as a general property of both signed and spoken languages (Perniss et al, 2010 ). In the realm of experimental semiotics, Fay et al ( 2013 , 2014 ) argue that gesture is likely to bootstrap human communication systems in the absence of linguistic input precisely because it affords greater iconicity than the auditory modality.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

From iconic handshapes to grammatical contrasts: longitudinal evidence from a child homesigner

Coppola

Brentari

2014

Front. Psychol.

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Many sign languages display crosslinguistic consistencies in the use of two iconic aspects of handshape, handshape type and finger group complexity. Handshape type is used systematically in form-meaning pairings (morphology): Handling handshapes (Handling-HSs), representing how objects are handled, tend to be used to express events with an agent (“hand-as-hand” iconicity), and Object handshapes (Object-HSs), representing an object's size/shape, are used more often to express events without an agent (“hand-as-object” iconicity). Second, in the distribution of meaningless properties of form (morphophonology), Object-HSs display higher finger group complexity than Handling-HSs. Some adult homesigners, who have not acquired a signed or spoken language and instead use a self-generated gesture system, exhibit these two properties as well. This study illuminates the development over time of both phenomena for one child homesigner, “Julio,” age 7;4 (years; months) to 12;8. We elicited descriptions of events with and without agents to determine whether morphophonology and morphosyntax can develop without linguistic input during childhood, and whether these structures develop together or independently. Within the time period studied: (1) Julio used handshape type differently in his responses to vignettes with and without an agent; however, he did not exhibit the same pattern that was found previously in signers, adult homesigners, or gesturers: while he was highly likely to use a Handling-HS for events with an agent (82%), he was less likely to use an Object-HS for non-agentive events (49%); i.e., his productions were heavily biased toward Handling-HSs; (2) Julio exhibited higher finger group complexity in Object- than in Handling-HSs, as in the sign language and adult homesigner groups previously studied; and (3) these two dimensions of language developed independently, with phonological structure showing a sign language-like pattern at an earlier age than morphosyntactic structure. We conclude that iconicity alone is not sufficient to explain the development of linguistic structure in homesign systems. Linguistic input is not required for some aspects of phonological structure to emerge in childhood, and while linguistic input is not required for morphology either, it takes time to emerge in homesign.

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“…Linguistic research has also shed light on the iconicity characterizing signs. It was realized that phonology constrains how iconicity could be represented in a sign, and that arbitrariness could also limit iconicity Demey & van der Kooij, 2008;Dingemanse, Blasi, Lupyan, Christiansen, & Monaghan, 2015;Emmorey, 2014;Meir, 2010;Taub, 2001).…”

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confidence: 99%