Language as Description, Indication, and Depiction.
Lindsay Ferrara,Gabrielle Hodge +1 more
TLDR
It is argued that a theory of language must be able to account for all three methods of signaling as they manifest within and across composite utterances and can be viewed as intentionally communicative action involving the specific range of semiotic resources available in situated human interactions.Abstract:
Signers and speakers coordinate a broad range of intentionally expressive actions within the spatiotemporal context of their face-to-face interactions (Parmentier, 1994; Clark, 1996; Johnston, 1996; Kendon, 2004). Varied semiotic repertoires combine in different ways, the details of which are rooted in the interactions occurring in a specific time and place (Goodwin, 2000; Kusters, Spotti, Swanwick & Tapio, 2017). However, intense focus in linguistics on conventionalized symbolic form/meaning pairings (especially those which are arbitrary) has obscured the importance of other semiotics in face-to-face communication. A consequence is that the communicative practices resulting from diverse ways of being (e.g. deaf, hearing) are not easily united into a global theoretical framework. Here we promote a theory of language that accounts for how diverse humans coordinate their semiotic repertoires in face-to-face communication, bringing together evidence from anthropology, semiotics, gesture studies and linguistics. Our aim is to facilitate direct comparison of different communicative ecologies. We build on Clark’s (1996) theory of language use as ‘actioned’ via three methods of signaling: describing, indicating, and depicting. Each method is fundamentally different to the other, and they can be used alone or in combination with others during the joint creation of multimodal ‘composite utterances’ (Enfield, 2009). We argue that a theory of language must be able to account for all three methods of signaling as they manifest within and across composite utterances. From this perspective, language—and not only language use—can be viewed as intentionally communicative action involving the specific range of semiotic resources available in situated human interactions.read more
Citations
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Constructing a language: A usage-based theory of language acquisition
TL;DR: In “Constructing a Language,” Tomasello presents a contrasting theory of how the child acquires language: It is not a universal grammar that allows for language development, but two sets of cognitive skills resulting from biological/phylogenetic adaptations are fundamental to the ontogenetic origins of language.
KARL BUHLER: THEORY OF LANGUAGE: The representational function of language
TL;DR: With this translation, Buhler's ideas on many problems that are still controversial and others only recently rediscovered, are now accessible to the English-speaking world.
Rethinking Context Language As An Interactive Phenomenon
TL;DR: Thank you very much for reading rethinking context language as an interactive phenomenon, where people have look hundreds of times for their chosen novels, but end up in malicious downloads.
References
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Book
Language and Symbolic Power
Pierre Bourdieu,John B. Thompson +1 more
TL;DR: In this article, the economy of language exchange and its relation to political power is discussed. But the authors focus on the production and reproduction of Legitimate language and do not address its application in the theory of political power.
The Tree of Knowledge. The Biological Roots of Human Understanding. Boston (Shambhala) 1992.
H. R. Maturana,F. J. Varela +1 more
Book
Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance
TL;DR: In this article, Gesture units, gesture phrases and speech are classified into three categories: visible action as gesture, visible action with speech and visible action without speech, and gesture without speech with speech.