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What sign languages show

Neurobiological bases of visual phonology
  • Evie Malaia and Ronnie B. Wilbur
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Towards a Biolinguistic Understanding of Grammar
This chapter is in the book Towards a Biolinguistic Understanding of Grammar

Abstract

The chapter presents analysis of the motion properties of the environment that humans use to parse natural scenes, and the kinematics of articulator (hand) motion in American and Croatian Sign Languages, asking whether the kinematic distinctions between linguistic categories in sign languages are important to phonological and syntactic systems in sign languages. Based on motion capture and neuroimaging data from native signers and sign-naïve non-signers, we propose that sign languages grammaticalize perceptual features already available from the human visual system for the phonology-syntax interface.

Abstract

The chapter presents analysis of the motion properties of the environment that humans use to parse natural scenes, and the kinematics of articulator (hand) motion in American and Croatian Sign Languages, asking whether the kinematic distinctions between linguistic categories in sign languages are important to phonological and syntactic systems in sign languages. Based on motion capture and neuroimaging data from native signers and sign-naïve non-signers, we propose that sign languages grammaticalize perceptual features already available from the human visual system for the phonology-syntax interface.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Interfaces in a biolinguistic perspective 1
  4. Part I. Syntax, semantics
  5. Single cycle syntax and a constraint on quantifier lowering 13
  6. A constraint on remnant movement 31
  7. Language and conceptual reanalysis 57
  8. Part II. Features and interfaces
  9. Decomposing force 89
  10. Function without content 117
  11. The association of sound with meaning 141
  12. Part III. Phonology, syntax
  13. Towards a bottom-up approach to phonological typology 169
  14. The emergence of phonological forms 193
  15. Part IV. Language development
  16. Non-native acquisition and language design 217
  17. Interface ingredients of dialect design 239
  18. Part V. Experimental studies
  19. What sign languages show 265
  20. Indeterminacy and coercion effects 277
  21. Computation with doubling constituents 303
  22. Concealed reference-set computation 339
  23. Index 363
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.194.12mal

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Interfaces in a biolinguistic perspective 1
  4. Part I. Syntax, semantics
  5. Single cycle syntax and a constraint on quantifier lowering 13
  6. A constraint on remnant movement 31
  7. Language and conceptual reanalysis 57
  8. Part II. Features and interfaces
  9. Decomposing force 89
  10. Function without content 117
  11. The association of sound with meaning 141
  12. Part III. Phonology, syntax
  13. Towards a bottom-up approach to phonological typology 169
  14. The emergence of phonological forms 193
  15. Part IV. Language development
  16. Non-native acquisition and language design 217
  17. Interface ingredients of dialect design 239
  18. Part V. Experimental studies
  19. What sign languages show 265
  20. Indeterminacy and coercion effects 277
  21. Computation with doubling constituents 303
  22. Concealed reference-set computation 339
  23. Index 363
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