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Once signed languages are recognized as natural human languages, a world of exploration opens up. Signed languages provide a powerful tool for investigating the nature of human language and language processing, the relation between cognition and language, and the neural organization of language. The ...

Once signed languages are recognized as natural human languages, a world of exploration opens up. Signed languages provide a powerful tool for investigating the nature of human language and language processing, the relation between cognition and language, and the neural organization of language. The value of sign languages lies in their modality. Specifically, for perception, signed languages depend upon high-level vision and motion processing systems, and for production, they require the integration of motor systems involving the hands and face. These facts raise many questions: What impact does this different biological base have for grammatical systems? For online language processing? For the acquisition of language? How does it affect nonlinguistic cognitive structures and processing? Are the same neural systems involved? These are some of the questions that this book aims at addressing. The answers provide insight into what constrains grammatical form, language processing, linguistic working memory, and hemispheric specialization for language. The study of signed languages allows researchers to address questions about the nature of linguistic and cognitive systems that otherwise could not be easily addressed.

Each section focuses on a particular issue and papers that discuss general questions, as well as comment on specific issues are presented at the end of each section. Contents: Preface. Part I: The Syntax and Morphology of Classifiers in Sign Languages. A. Schembri, Rethinking "Classifiers" in Signed ...

Each section focuses on a particular issue and papers that discuss general questions, as well as comment on specific issues are presented at the end of each section. Contents: Preface. Part I: The Syntax and Morphology of Classifiers in Sign Languages. A. Schembri, Rethinking "Classifiers" in Signed Languages. B. Bergman, L. Wallin, Noun and Verbal Classifiers in Swedish Sign Language M. Arnoff, I. Meir, C. Padden, W. Sandler, Classifier Complexes and Morphology in Two Sign Languages. A. Aikhenvald, Commentary: Classifiers in Spoken and in Signed Languages: How to Know More. C. Grinevald, Classifier Systems in the Context of a Typology of Nominal Classification. Part II: Cross-Linguistic Variation in Classifier Constructions and Spatial Language. U. Zeshan, "Classificatory" Constructions in Indo-Pakistani Sign Language: Grammaticalization and Lexicalization Processes. G. Tang, Verbs of Motion and Location in Hong Kong Sign Language: Conflation and Lexicalization. L. Talmy, Commentary: The Representation of Spatial Structure in Spoken and Signed Language. Part III: Classifier Constructions and Gesture. S. Liddell, Sources of Meaning in ASL Classifier Predicates. K. Emmorey, M. Herzig, Categorical Versus Gradient Properties of Classifier Constructions in ASL. T. Supalla, Commentary: Revisiting Visual Analogy in ASL Classifier Predicates. S. Duncan, Gesture in Language: Issues for Sign Language Research. Part IV: The Acquisition of Classifier Constructions. D.I. Slobin, N. Hoiting, M. Kuntze, R. Lindert, A. Weinberg, J. Pyers, M. Anthony, Y. Biederman, H. Thumann, A Cognitive/Functional Development of Reference Switching Encoded Through Body Classifiers in British Sign Language. E.Engberg-Pedersen, How Composite Is a Fall: Adults' and Children's Descriptions of Different Types of Falls in Danish Sign Language.

In the sign languages of the deaf some signs can meaningfully point toward things or can be meaningfully placed in the space ahead of the signer. Such spatial uses of signs are an obligatory part of fluent grammatical signing. There is no parallel for this in vocally produced languages. This book ...

In the sign languages of the deaf some signs can meaningfully point toward things or can be meaningfully placed in the space ahead of the signer. Such spatial uses of signs are an obligatory part of fluent grammatical signing. There is no parallel for this in vocally produced languages. This book focuses on American Sign Language to examine the grammatical and conceptual purposes served by these directional signs and demonstrates a remarkable integration of grammar and gesture in the service of constructing meaning.

What is the role of meaning in linguistic theory? Generative linguists have severely limited its influence while cognitivist and functionalist linguists believe that meaning pervades and motivates all levels of linguistic structure. This dispute can now be resolved conclusively by evidence from ...

What is the role of meaning in linguistic theory? Generative linguists have severely limited its influence while cognitivist and functionalist linguists believe that meaning pervades and motivates all levels of linguistic structure. This dispute can now be resolved conclusively by evidence from signed language. Language from the Body rebuts the generativist linguistic theories that separate form and meaning and asserts that iconicity can only be described in a cognitivist framework where meaning can influence form.