Coexpressivity, Gesture, and Language Emergence: Modality, Composition, and Creation

Dear Colleagues,

The notion that human communication, including virtually all signed and spoken languages, routinely involves multiple simultaneous channels or modalities, some vocal and some not, is an ancient idea. Nonetheless, it has only recently received serious systematic attention from scholars of language and social interaction. Scientific advances in the study of what we will refer to as “coexpressivity,” which often involve research by native and non-native researchers alike on endangered or little studied indigenous and community languages, pay careful attention to what Enfield (2009) called “composite utterances”, in which speech (or sign), gesture, bodily configuration, gaze, and/or touch coalesce to constitute and enable communicative action. Existing literature variously addresses such issues: in addition to Enfield’s (2009) foundational study on Lao or Goodwin’s recent (2017) monograph on cooperative action, there are numerous publications on what Kendon (2004) called “speakers’ gestures”, studies on emerging “community” or “natural” sign languages (Kegl et al. 1999, Polich 2005, Zeshan & de Vos 2012., Meir et al. 2010,, Green 2017, Hou 2018, Horton 2021, Edwards & Brentari 2021, Le Guen et al., 2021, Sandler et al., 2022, Le Guen 2022, Haviland 2015, 2022), as well as work on the translanguaging practices of deaf, deaf–blind, and hearing individuals who employ a fluid repertoire of signed and spoken languages, gesture, and other semiotic modalities such as touch, drawing, and the incorporation of objects from the physical surround into their utterances. We invite articles from scholars whose research and field experience address co-expressive aspects of linguistic interaction, especially those grounded in naturally occurring communicative action.

References

Edwards, T., and D. Brentari. 2021. The grammatical incorporation of demonstratives in an emerging tactile language. Frontiers in Communication: Language Sciences. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2020.579992.

Enfield, N. (2009). The Anatomy of Meaning: Speech, Gesture, and Composite Utterances (Language Culture and Cognition). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511576737.

Goodwin, C. (2017). Co-Operative Action (Learning in Doing: Social, Cognitive and Computational Perspectives). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781139016735.

Green, E. M. (2017). Performing Gesture: The Pragmatic Functions of Pantomimic and Lexical Repertoires in a Natural Sign Narrative. Gesture 16, no. 2: 328–362.

Haviland, J. B. (2015). Where do nouns come from? Edited by John B. Haviland. Benjamins Current Topics #70. John Benjamins Publishing Co.: Amsterdam/Philadelphia. DOI:10.1075/bct.70, ISBN 9789027242587.

Haviland, J. B. (2022). How and When to Sign “Hey!” Socialization into Grammar in Z, a 1st Generation Family Sign Language from Mexico. Languages, 7(2), 80. MDPI AG. Doi:10.3390/languages7020080.

Horton, L., (2022) “Lexical overlap in young sign languages from Guatemala”, Glossa: a journal of general linguistics 7(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.16995/glossa.5829.

Hou, L. (2018). Patterned iconicity in San Juan Quiahije Chatino Sign Language. Sign Language Studies, 18(4): 570–611. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/sls.2018.0017.

Kegl, J., Senghas, A., and Coppola, M. (1999). Creation through contact: Sign language emergence and sign language change in Nicaragua. In M. DeGraff (Ed.), Language creation and language change, 179–238. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Kendon, Adam. 2004. Gesture, Visible Action as Utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Le Guen, O., Safar, J. & Coppola, M. (2021). Emerging Sign Languages of the Americas. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501504884.

Le Guen, O. (2022). Early Emergence of Agreement in Yucatec Maya Sign Language. Languages, 7(3), 233. MDPI AG. Doi:10.3390/languages7030233.

Meir, I., Sandler, W., Padden C., & Aronoff, M. (2010) Emerging Sign Languages. In Marc Marschark, and Patricia Elizabeth Spencer (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Deaf Studies, Language, and Education, Vol. 2, Oxford Library of Psychology doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780195390032.013.0018, accessed 24 Feb. 2023.

Polich, L. (2005). The Emergence of the Deaf Community in Nicaragua: With Sign Language You Can.

Sandler, W., Padden, C., & Aronoff, M. (2022). Emerging Sign Languages. Languages, 7(4), 284. MDPI AG. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/languages7040284.

Zeshan, U. & de Vos, C. (2012). Sign Languages in Village Communities: Anthropological and Linguistic Insights. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781614511496.

Prof. Dr. John Haviland
Dr. Olivier Le Guen
Guest Editors

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• coexpressivity
• gesture
• sign language
• emerging languages
• composite utterance
• multimodality